Review: Bloodwitch

Bloodwitch by Susan Dennard
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The third full-length novel - and fourth book overall - in Susan Dennard's Witchlands brings the quality back up to the level I came to expect for all the books in this series after it began in Truthwitch. That one had been followed by Windwitch with its bloated character sheet, and Sightwitch with its gothic mind-screwery. Here, in Bloodwitch, we've got the bloated character sheet back - but also, I think that this time, Dennard does a better job managing the delicate balancing act of managing all the many POVs she crams into the book. Whereas Windwitch had the disadvantage of subtracting too much focus from my big faves - Safi and Iseult - those two get a lot more equal time in this book. As, of course, does Aeduan - which makes a lot of sense since this is the book named for his particular witchery. Though the plot needle doesn't move quite as forward as I'd hope it would - naturally, since Dennard's expanded the series from four full-length novels to five, and possibly even more? - it's still a breakneck paced, engaging fantasy. With a particularly distressing cliffhanger that I'm pretty sure is going to enrage many of my fellow readers. I guess my friend Becca was right to not trust Dennard with her characters' lives, eh?

View all my reviews