Review: “Star Cursed” (The Cahill Witch Chronicles #2) by Jessica Spotswood

Before I start….

Disclaimer #1: This post will be 100% fangirling.  I LOVED THIS BOOK.

Disclaimer #2: This post will contain spoilers for Born Wicked (The Cahill Witch Chronicles #1).  You can read my review of the first book here.  

Disclaimer #3: I stayed up until 1:30 AM finishing this book, and even later thinking about it  because it was so good.  I also had to be up before 8:00 this morning for work.  Any typos, ramblings, or erratic behavior in general can be attributed to this.

How do I even start?  I loved this book from start to finish.  I love this book to the moon and back.  I love this book enough to marry it.  Sorry, Chad.

Let’s start with the synopsis from its Goodreads page:

With the Brotherhood persecuting witches like never before, a divided Sisterhood desperately needs Cate to come into her Prophesied powers. And after Cate’s friend Sachi is arrested for using magic, a war-thirsty Sister offers to help her find answers—if Cate is willing to endanger everyone she loves.

Cate doesn’t want to be a weapon, and she doesn’t want to involve her friends and Finn in the Sisterhood’s schemes. But when Maura and Tess join the Sisterhood, Maura makes it clear that she’ll do whatever it takes to lead the witches to victory. Even if it means sacrifices. Even if it means overthrowing Cate. Even if it means all-out war.

In the highly anticipated sequel to Born Wicked, the Cahill Witch Chronicles continue Cate, Maura and Tess’s quest to find love, protect family, and explore their magic against all odds in an alternate history of New England.

This book aligns completely with my theory that the second books in series most often have the capabilities of being the best.  The first book has the burden of establishing the setting, characters, plot, conflict, etc.  The second book gets to assume all of the first and really take the story to level 2.  In Star Cursed‘s case, it’s Level Infinity (oh yeah. I went there).

I love every single thing about Spotswood’s writing.  Anyone who wants to write books should be required to take a class from her on character development; the world of literature and publishing would greatly benefit from it.  I don’t know how she did it, but she gave a perfect amount of screen time (er, page time?) to dozens of the sisters at the convent, the teachers, Finn, Paul, and everyone else.  She created, out of the thin air of her imagination, so many talented and multi-faceted witches with whom Cate becomes friends (or in certain cases, enemies) yet each one has her own personality and gifts that completely set her apart from the others.  On top of that, I felt like I was in the convent, the courtyard, or the Harwood Asylum with the way she mastered that delicate balance of describing the setting enough to give the reader a clear picture without overloading on minuscule details.  I honestly don’t comprehend how she did this but it was one of my favorite parts of the book.

My other favorite aspect of the book was the inter-personal relationships between Cate and her sisters.  I don’t know if Jessica Spotswood herself has any siblings but she was 100% accurate in her writing of sibling communication.  I was constantly smiling to myself at how what started out as a simple discussion between the sisters, particularly Cate and Maura, would so quickly escalate into personal stabs and words poisoned with raw emotion.  Maybe some readers rolled their eyes at this but I can tell you that I’ve personally experienced this countless times; there’s no one in the world, perhaps even more so than a spouse/significant other, that knows how to push your button like a sibling.  It’s their specialty!  I would swear that Spotswood had somehow snuck into my house and recorded the arguments that seem to spring out of no where between my husband and his siblings.  On the other side of the coin, there is no love quite like the love between sisters and that is something I can also personally attest to and say that Spotswood captures it perfectly.

And now for the romance.  I think the terms “feels” and “swoon” and the like are overused in the blogging and reviewing world but if there was ever a time to use them it would be now.  I don’t know that I’ve ever rooted for a romance like I do for Cate and Finn.  He’s just so perfect for her.  He loves her for who she is, he’s willing to do anything for her but not in that scary, overbearing, this-is-not-healthy way.  Also, I got the romance in perfect doses.  This is an adventurous book with twists and turns with romance in it, not the other way around, and that’s how I like it.  I seriously cannot praise Jessica Spotswood’s expert ability to juggle all of these different elements enough.

Second to lastly, the message of this book is something I think everyone can get behind.  Light spoiler here, but in the beginning of the book the Brotherhood makes an announcement that they’re prohibiting girls from going to school, learning to read, and are forcing the burning of all books in general lest girls get any crazy ideas about independence.  This is an issue about which I could write a completely separate post, but the fight for education for women is something that is still very much alive today and so reading this as eerily similar current events occur around the world was especially powerful for me.  Like I said in my review of Born Wicked, I wish I daughters with whom I could share this book.  The girl-power-yeah feels I got reading the first one?  Those increase 100-fold in Star Cursed!

Now, onto the ending.  Without giving away the particulars I will tell you that it wrecked me.  Don’t believe me?  Look at these completely psycho texts I sent to my best friend and blogging partner Justine last night/early this morning when I finished it:

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(for context, she’s breastfeeding her baby daughter Harvey so that’s where the boob comment came from )

This ending literally ruined me.  I stayed up all night thinking about it.  It’s going to take me days, maybe weeks, to get over it.  I honestly don’t think I’ve had a book affect me this way in…. I can’t even remember how long.  I don’t know how else to communicate this, I just wish I could convince everyone I know to read this series.  I wish I had enough money to buy everyone this book if they would promise me they’d read it.  Whatever you want me to say to make you read this book, just tell me in the comments, and I’ll do it.  That’s quite a hefty promise but it’s worth it!

You can buy Star Cursed on Amazon here and on Barnes & Noble here.

Oh, and Jessica Spotswood, if you read this and you read those texts up above, I wouldn’t really steal your manuscript for Sister’s Fate (the third book to be released in August 2014).  I mean, I couldn’t.  I’d want to, but I can’t.  Wait, this isn’t coming out right.  Look, I just can’t be held responsible for my actions after what you did to me with that ending.  I’m not saying you would deserve it, but no good deed (your stellar writing being the good deed in this case) goes unpunished

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