Book Binge

Tracy’s review of Waking the Witch (Otherworld #11) by Kelley Armstrong.

The orphaned daughter of a sorcerer and a half-demon, Savannah is a terrifyingly powerful young witch who has never been able to resist the chance to throw her magical weight around. But at 21 she knows she needs to grow up and prove to her guardians, Paige and Lucas, that she can be a responsible member of their supernatural detective agency. So she jumps at the chance to fly solo, investigating the mysterious deaths of three young women in a nearby factory town as a favor to one of the agency's associates. At first glance, the murders look garden-variety human, but on closer inspection signs point to otherworldly stakes.

Soon Savannah is in over her head. She's run off the road and nearly killed, haunted by a mystery stalker, and freaked out when the brother of one of the dead women is murdered when he tries to investigate the crime. To complicate things, something weird is happening to her powers. Pitted against shamans, demons, a voodoo-inflected cult and garden-variety goons, Savannah has to fight to ensure her first case isn't her last. And she also has to ask for help, perhaps the hardest lesson she's ever had to learn.

The blurb for this story does a very good job of telling the premise for this book. It’s very much a mystery with a lovely coming-of-age twist to it. Savannah wants to prove that she’s able to handle investigations on her own and takes the bull by the horns. But as world wise as she is there are just some things that one can’t be prepared for.

I very much liked reading this book from Savannah’s point of view. She was a cocky 21 year old but we got to see her doubts and sometimes fears and I think it made her so much more real to me as a human, even though she’s part witch, part sorcerer. She had real emotional moments and the way that Armstrong portrayed Savannah’s feelings were very touching.

I’ve only read 2 other books in this Otherworld series – the first two, Bitten and Stolen, but those were very good. This showed me again how Armstrong can suck me into her writing. I must warn you though, without giving anything away, that this has a cliffhanger ending which was quite frustrating, but good! You can bet I will be reading the next book in this series to find out what happens next.

Rating: 4.25 out of 5

This book is available from Dutton. You can buy it here or here in e-format.


The series:



You can read more from Tracy at Tracy’s Place