The Winter Witch

So here's the thing about Goodreads Giveaways. I don't enter all of them - I have this ridiculous mindset that if I enter to win ALL THE BOOKS by some twist of fate I'll only win the ones I don't really want to read. So I did legitimately want to read this book. I've been (really) meaning to read Paula Brackston's The Witch's Daughter for years and I keep getting distracted. So when I saw The Winter Witch I was excited because hey, distract myself with a book I've literally been meaning to read for years with a new one by the same author.

This book hits a lot of boxes for me - Historical Fiction, specifically Celtic History, Fantasy, Magic, Witches and more importantly, latent Witches. A part of life that anyone from that culture gets. It's also a YA book, and recently I'm loving them - part work related, part they're just plain good. I love the 500 Kingdom's books, and it wasn't until after I read them I found out they were a) YA books and b) put out by Harlequins' teen branch. I've touched on this before. Still baffled. Either way, so YA books. I like them.

So here's the good - I read a lot of Historical Fiction, I got my undergrad degree in it so I have a general at least latent knowledge of history and I like it. The book was spot on for where a historical fiction book should be - it was written in a way that didn't make it seem like Brackston was throwing in historical facts just because, the details were woven in beautifully and as a HF book, it was very well done.  Morgana was a lovely character, with depth and excellent character development. Cai was also well done and gave a fascinating prospective.  The writing itself was also generally solid, and it was a very readable book.

The less good is that I actually didn't love the book. The characters other than Morgana and Cai were slightly on dimensional and it felt like some of the details were a bit thrown together. I delayed writing this review because I wasn't entirely sure why the book didn't grip me and I think it's because (this kills me to say because I hate trilogies) but I kind of wonder if this should have been book one of a trilogy.  Brackckston is clearly a fantastic writer, with creative lovely ideas and fantasic plots.  I think if there had been a bit more character development for the other characters, and a little more time given to the ending it would have been an amazing read.

*** I was sent this book by the publisher - all opinions are my own.