By: Josh Roberts
Published On: May 26, 2020

Well, this was quite a fun middle grade read. Full of mystery, history, friendships, bullies, jealousy, rivalries and magic. As an adult I enjoyed it. The younger middle-grade me would have devoured it.

What the description doesn’t do justice to is the fact that this is an ensemble cast. While it is true that Abby Shepherd is the main character, it is also true that her best friend Robby – a nonmagical person – plays a significant role as well. Even then there are several others with large ‘screen time’ such as Amethyst, whose hair color matches her name, Zeus, Becca, and Piper just to name a few. The strength of the book lies with these characters and the different avenues they take to learn the truth about recent events and the town’s history. Doing so helps the plotting of the story continually move forward, but the variety of characters also help provide a realistic town and school setting. After all, this is the age where kids start ‘noticing’ each other.

It all starts on the night certain girls turn 13. That’s when their magical abilities begin to manifest themselves. Some of the magic they experience seems to be person-specific and other types of magic is general to all. While our new magic users are becoming adjusted to this rather huge change two seemingly unrelated individuals mysteriously disappear. There is too much coincidence going on and some of our cast is split on learning spells while others are researching the town’s history.

If there are any issues with the story it would be with how one of our main characters handled a disappearance of someone they knew. While the individual and their parent were upset I felt it was glossed over a bit to help ensure the main story line plot continued to move forward.

Toward the end, we get the hint that perhaps there are more sinister events coming their way, but that will be for a future book.

Rating: 4 stars

Thanks to Netgalley and Owl Hollow Press for the reader copy and opportunity to provide an honest review.

Description:

It’s not easy being a teenage witch. Seventh grader Abby Shepherd is just getting the hang of it when weird stuff starts happening all around her hometown of Willow Cove. Green slime bubbling to life in science class. Giant snakes slithering around the middle school gym. Her best friend suddenly keeping secrets and telling lies.

Things only begin to make sense when a stranger named Miss Winters reveals that Abby isn’t the only young witch in town—and that Willow Cove is home to a secret past that connects them all. Miss Winters, herself a witch, even offers to teach Abby and the others everything she knows about witchcraft.

But as Abby learns more about Miss Winters’ past, she begins to suspect her new mentor is keeping secrets of her own. Can Abby trust her, or does Miss Winters have something wicked planned for the young witches of Willow Cove?