Book Review: The Witch of Luna Hill by Neel Kay (The Witch of Luna Hill #1)

Synopsis:

A year ago, Aia was found dead in a lake. Fortunately, her rescuer managed to resuscitate her. But how she ended up in the water in the first place, she doesn’t remember. Actually, she doesn’t remember one single thing about her old life from before she died.

Now she lives her monotone life by the edge of the Great Forest in which she works hard day in and day out. Up there in Northland beyond the mountains, the war against supernatural beings, humans with strange abilities and all who side with them isn’t quite as visible as in the rest of Bragimark.

But when she meets Merian Storm, a privileged student trying to escape her dysfunctional family and the memory of the man she loved, Aia is jerked out of her comfort zone and thrown into a journey across the haunted mountains in search of her past.

When entering Merian’s war-torn home in the south, Aia’s role in the war becomes significant and so does her presence in the lives of the Storm family and vice versa – especially Merian’s rogue brother.

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About the Author:

Introvert, creative, awkward.

Neel Kay lives with her husband and two kids in rural surroundings in the south of Denmark, not far from the German border. She’s a trained milliner, studied English at university, and now works a day job as a web editor. But she’s been writing always.

Love coffee, scarves and sea views. Oh, and butt-kicking heroines who know how to swing a sword and aren’t afraid to get a little dirty.

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My Review:

The Witch of Luna Hill was a bit of a cocktail of romance and fantasy and had very believable elements of both woven together with a nice plot. It had a strong female protagonist, which is rare in upper YA fiction.

From a writer’s perspective, although strong, Merian could be very annoying at times, none more so than in the opening chapter – a very dangerous thing for an author to do, as a less open minded reader might cut the story then and there. She was confusing and rather bitchy, and it took me a while to start to feel for her and her situation. I found the dialogue a little jumpy and characters slipped in and out of the plot with little information attached to them. Perhaps parts had been edited out that really should have remained?

The front cover is a bit drab, and could do with some colour in it to make it really pop on the virtual book shelf – I keep saying this, but YA fiction is incredibly competitive and quite frankly everyone does judge a book on its cover (whether it’s PC to admit it or not)

Overall I’d give the Witch from Luna Hill 3 out of 5 stars, a solid teen read.