K.S. Marsden

Synopsis

Hunter Astley has always known that he is different: being a witch-hunter that can use magic has sealed his fate.
He must destroy the Shadow Witch once and for all, with the help of some unlikely allies.

We delve even deeper into the world of the Malleus Maleficarum; into myth, rumour and history that refuses to stay in the past.

Review

After losing the war against the witches and all his allies, Hunter decides to search for the Benandanti. Being on the witches’ radar, he spends a lot of time traveling the world to avoid capture, until he manages to reach Italy and finds the Donili temple.

The Benandanti were a branch of the Donili. Since Hunter’s “powers” were similar to theirs, they agree to train him. This implies that Hunter spends more than a year learning with them with his 13-year-old companions who take advantage of teasing him ?.

“If you want my opinion, and I know you won’t like it.” The Abate stated. “Anti-witches and Donili have a lot more in common with witches than normal humans.”

When Hunter is finally ready to return, he encounters a new moderately organized resistance and meets Mel among them. Quite an interesting girl who seems to be as crazy as the hatter from Alice in Wonderland.

Mel danced around the table, making ure her two guests were seated before skipping to the door and yanking it open.
“Hello Dave.” She trilled to the with-hunter on sentry.
“We’re having a tea party. Can you bring the tea?

Now they must find a way to permanently end Sophie, carefully selecting their allies and setting aside all their previous prejudices.

The first thing I have to say is that Adam is 4 years old when Hunter finally meets him officially … I really can’t believe it was so long without looking for him, but well.

This book pleasantly surprised me. When I felt that the story had nothing new to deliver, an enormity of new mysteries appeared. Among them Hunter’s dreams, Mel’s real identity, and characters like Kristen.

Demons, and the prophecies, and greatness. It all seemed far-reaching. But then again, if someone had told him five years ago that the world would fall to ruin, and witch-hunters would use magic, he would have thought it equally unlikely.

Mel is a very cute character who just wants to make friends. But a genuine chill ran down my spine when Hunter finds out who she really is.

After taking a moment to work out who Hunter was, Mel turned and went back to the house with all the appearance of a kicked puppy.

Knowing that this story was about a forbidden love, I expected another type of relationship. Normally I like stories in which forbidden love is achieved at all costs, while in this story love only served to complicate things, however they never really intended to have a relationship. Honeslty this was not bad, it was just different from what I expected.

This book deserves 4/5 stars for me. It is a good story and I find it to be recommendable and entertaining. However, many questions remained without satisfactory explanation, such as the origin of the dreams and the connection between Hunter and Sophie, the powers of Adam, Mel … complete ?. Also, I find it difficult to believe that a character like Lucy was a mere spectator in the story, I hoped that would influence much more.

Honorary mention to a character that I did not mention in my previous reviews and who is probably the best character in this saga. Mrs. Astley ?

[su_spoiler title=”Spoiler of Mel’s identity” icon=”chevron-circle”]“Mother! Mel does not have special needs. She is…” Hunter broke off. What could he tell his mother, that Mel was a demon, a servant of Satan? And worse, that Mel found Mrs Astley scarier than her master?”[/su_spoiler]

Bye bye ?

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Synopsis

The second part of the Witch-Hunter series.

The world has been thrown into darkness by the Shadow Witch’s revolution. The witch-hunters are scattered, but still strong. The race is now on to gather allies and win the war.
New enemies will arise; loyalties will be pushed to the limit. And an important question will be answered: can a witch-hunter that practices magic ever be trusted, or will he be persecuted?
It is said that ‘love conquers all’, but this twisted love must stay secret, locked away with the past.

Review

Sophie fell in love with Hunter and vice versa. But they couldn’t be together and Sophie was determined to kill him. Until she stabbed him and felt the same pain he did.
Apparently the baby creates a strange connection between them, so Sophie is forced to withdraw during her pregnancy, creating a moment of peace before the storm.

Hunter discovers that he has interesting abilities that allow him to travel from one place to another in a “blink” even taking others with him. He also has the ability to form an anti-magic shield, which proves to be a great advantage in a war against witches.

Thanks to Sophie (who accuses him of being a witch), he learns that these “powers” are similar to those of the Benandanti, an ancient anti-witch people who developed skills in their years of fighting witches and ended up being annihilated by the witch hunters themselves for their powers.

From this point, Hunter and James desperately searched for information about them, but there were no major results. It would be necessary to search their place of origin in Italy, but with the war that was being prepared Hunter could not abandon the MMC.

There had been a few hints from his research, but nothing solid. That the Benandanti could walk through dreams, that they could control the elements and manipulate the world around them. But no one mentioned how.

The truth is there is not much more to tell about this book. Yes, some interesting things happened and there is an advance in the story. However, I do not stop feeling that the real progress of the plot could have been made in just a couple of chapters.

I feel like Hunter’s reactions to having a child are too vague. An overreaction such as crying every time he remembers it would not be logical either, however, it is like he forgets his existence most of the time.

Hunter stilled at the mention of his son. Where was he now? At home with his grandmother, while his mother went on her killing spree?

Here the relationship between Sophie and Hunter is destroyed. It is clear that Sophie loves him, but is obsessed with doing her duty. But Hunter doesn’t seem to really love Sophie, at least his behavior doesn’t show it. And honestly it does not show either the desire for revenge that he should feel against her with everything she has done. There are very few moments of weakness when he shows any emotion towards Sophie.

When did this happen? A few years ago, he would hace enjoyed the attention. She was a pretty girl – they could have flirted, possibly slept together, and entertained some short-lived relationship. Hunter blamed Sophie, it had to be her fault. Or was it because he was a father – did that automatically make you mature and responsible?

It’s not a bad book nor did it bore me at any point, but it really disappointed me in terms of the development of the story. I still recommend it, as the entire saga is quite entertaining to read. K.S. Marsden is hilarious.

PS: In this book there is a conversation between Hunter and his team in which they tell him that he was Voldemort and Sophie Dumbledore. Pure gold.

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Synopsis

When a new witch threat rises, only Hunter Astley can stop them…

In the face of dark magic and evil witches, a secret witch-hunting society works tirelessly to keep them at bay. The Malleus Maleficarum Council have strict rules and practises for eradicating magic.
Due to their work, witches have been almost forgotten, relegated to myth; but rumours are starting to emerge of a new power that will throw the world into chaos.

As the only 7th generation witch-hunter, Hunter Astley is the best the MMC has to offer. With the help of his colleagues, it’s a race to track down this new threat and stop them… in any way he can.

Review

She raised a brow. “A witch-hunter named ‘Hunter’? How very original.”

Hunter (George) Astley was a witch-hunter, the best one actually. He was the only seventh generation in history, and that implied he was more powerful than the others. It seems, when you fight witches you start to absorb some of their power, which gave each generation of witch-hunters more abilities than the older one, but given their lifestyle, not lots of them had decendents.

Witches are an entirely different breed of human, at least one parent has to be a witch; you can’t become one by wanting it.

Hunter was on holiday in Venice, forced by his friend and partner James, a first generation witch hunter, for having a little rest from work. He was actually just getting bored when he felt the magic (one of the witch hunters abilities) and found a young lady about to be sacrificed in a ritual for giving witches more power. He saved the girl, kill the men witch and got the other two witches to surrender and accept their magic being bound.

Hunter sighed, even witch-hunting required paperwork in this crazy modern world – but thankfully Hunter could shift all that onto James’ workload. He preferred the more active part of his job than this paperwork. And James did a tediously good and thorough job of it.

The rescued lady’s name was Sophie, a beautiful but excessively cold woman that decided not to get out of this new world she just found and asked to be part of the MMC. It seems this wasn’t so weird, lots of the rescued asked for joining, but most ended up in paperwork in the office. But Sophie wanted to be a hunter, and she didn’t give up until she was accepted as a first generation witch-hunter.

Sophie has an opinion… not so popular among the witch-hunters. She can’t believe that all the witches are evil just because they are witches. Besides, the witch-hunters used their amulets and their acquired abilities that were not that different from magic. However, she decides to stay in the team.

Hunter watched Sophie walk away from him and move up the main staircase, heading straight for her room. He didn’t want her to be alone; he told himself that she shouldn’t be alone after such a day. But a part of him knew better. Oh god, he was in trouble.

Hunter, James and Sophie find out that a Shadow Witch had rose. A very rare breed whose magic powers are unlimited. There’s only register of two Shadow Witches in history, one was murdered by Hunter’s grandfather.

After facing her, it gets clear that witch-hunter are no opponent for her and it depends on Hunter and his seventh generation abilities to defeat her and save humanity.

“Oh, that is bad. Did the Shadow Witch give a bad guy speech?”
“Oh yes, very impressive and clichéd – shame you missed it.”

For now, I’ve liked the story a lot, it’s a totally recommendable book. I’ll keep reading the saga and hope the next ones are as good or even better.

I loved Hunter. Typical lead of a fantasy book that is too good to be real and that can make a thousand mistakes, but as you are in his mind you can’t stop loving him. This is not a complaint, I love this kind of characthers ?.

He could fight, kill if need be, but he couldn’t face sorrow. Not even when one of his best friends needed his comfort.

I really like Sophie too. I hope we will know more about her in the next books, but I will anyway read her prequel. I really want to understand what made her the way she is.

James… I actually liked this character and feel he is important for the story itself, but I can’t stop picturing him as Sherlock Holmes’s Watson ?. Thinking better, Hunter could be this Holmes too.

Something I really liked of this book is how they laugh about clichés.

How very British; having a nice cup of tea whilst conversing about witches.

I love books that make me laugh without losing the emotion of the story.

“Look, just because we’re sharing a bed, doesn’t make this a girly sleepover.”

[su_spoiler title=”Here is a little spoiler, predictable, but read this on your own risk.” icon=”chevron-circle”]Honestly, for me it was too predictable that Sophie was a witch, until she was “possessed” and I started doubting it a little. Anyway, this didn’t diminish my desire to read the book.[/su_spoiler]

PD: I’m really trying to like the cover but no… it still freaks me out ?

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