Liza's Reviews > The Coven
The Coven (Sweep, #2)
by Cate Tiernan
by Cate Tiernan
The first 2-3 books in this series are addictive, a fresh "modern-teen" POV in the tired genre of witches/kids with supernatural powers finding themselves (and the wonder of Wicca) among families/communities who "don't get it".
After #3, it goes downhill. There is no psychological development of the main characters (and the secondary characters are quite shallowly described and hard to distinguish throughout the series; even the more promising and believable ones, BFFs Bree & Robbie are essentially dropped from the books by #4) a lot of the narrative suspenseful points are all "tell" and no "show", the conclusions are hurried and tied up nicely--except for a minimum of predictable suspense that the publisher made you have to draw people through the series. Also, each book is so short, (it's like a single chapter of a Harry Potter) that the narrative arc is predictable and hasty, and makes one wonder if these were paid by the book, or that the series was extended way beyond what should have been its natural life span by the publisher, or what.
It's no Harry Potter, that's for sure. Apart from the above flaws, here's no humor (unless you count Morgan's drinking Diet Coke all the time, which gets tired really fast) and no writing good enough to be enjoyed by adults as well (a sure sign of a good children's book).
Also there's way too much touchy-feely Wicca rituals and pseudo Gaelic chanting, which is not well enough written to be convincing and also gets tiresome.
After #3, it goes downhill. There is no psychological development of the main characters (and the secondary characters are quite shallowly described and hard to distinguish throughout the series; even the more promising and believable ones, BFFs Bree & Robbie are essentially dropped from the books by #4) a lot of the narrative suspenseful points are all "tell" and no "show", the conclusions are hurried and tied up nicely--except for a minimum of predictable suspense that the publisher made you have to draw people through the series. Also, each book is so short, (it's like a single chapter of a Harry Potter) that the narrative arc is predictable and hasty, and makes one wonder if these were paid by the book, or that the series was extended way beyond what should have been its natural life span by the publisher, or what.
It's no Harry Potter, that's for sure. Apart from the above flaws, here's no humor (unless you count Morgan's drinking Diet Coke all the time, which gets tired really fast) and no writing good enough to be enjoyed by adults as well (a sure sign of a good children's book).
Also there's way too much touchy-feely Wicca rituals and pseudo Gaelic chanting, which is not well enough written to be convincing and also gets tiresome.
Sign into Goodreads to see if any of your friends have read The Coven.
sign in »
