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Amazon Best of the Month, February 2011: It all begins with a lost manuscript, a reluctant witch, and 1,500-year-old vampire. Dr. Diana Bishop has a really good reason for refusing to do magic: she is a direct descendant of the first woman executed in the Salem Witch Trials, and her parents cautioned her be discreet about her talents before they were murdered, presumably for having "too much power." So it is purely by accident that Diana unlocks an enchanted long-lost manuscript (a book that all manner of supernatural creatures believe to hold the story of all origins and the secret of immortality) at the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and finds herself in a race to prevent an interspecies war. A sparkling debut written by a historian and self-proclaimed oenophile, A Discovery of Witches is heady mix of history and magic, mythology and love (cue the aforementioned vampire!), making for a luxurious, intoxicating, one-sitting read.
Review
'Intelligent and off-the-wall, it will be irresistible to Twilight fans' -- The Sunday Times 'A bubbling cauldron of illicit desire...all the ingredients for an assured saga that blends romance with fantasy' -- Daily Mail 'An inventive addition to the supernatural craze... Historian Harkness's racy paranormal romance has exciting amounts of spells, kisses and battles, and is recounted with enchanting, page-turning panache' -- Marie Claire 'A romp through magical academia' -- Guardian '...a grand romance smartly dressed up in the fashion for the occult...Sauced up with magic as well as being intelligent, the novel will be irresistible to Twilight fans' -- The Sunday Times
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Most helpful customer reviews
20 of 22 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
I couldn't put it down!,
By
This review is from: A Discovery Of Witches (Hardcover)
First things first -- if you're looking for a teenage vampire romance, or a re-hash of Harry Potter, this is not the book for you.A Discovery of Witches is a fresh, intelligent, rich, and detailed re-imagining of our mundane world to include four kinds of people: humans and the so-called "creatures" known as vampires, witches and daemons, where interrelations between the "creature" species is forbidden by an ancient Covenant. But the Covenant's balance of power is only as strong as the creatures' commitment to maintaining that balance. And that balance is threatened by the raw power contained within a reluctant witch, those who desire to possess her power for their own gain, and the love of an ancient vampire. The tale has the intellectual, detective aspects reminiscent of the DaVinci Code. It has the political and strategic aspects of a complex chess game, with creatures poised on the brink of war placing their pieces in complex plans and strategems. And it tells the story of a deep, forbidden love between an ancient vampire and a witch of great power, a love that is tested by those who would stop at nothing to preserve the ancient Covenant and possess the witch's power. The book has the feeling of a classic epic: rich in depth, complexity and detail, all of which are interwoven into a larger tapestry which we can only see a small piece of in this novel (the story just begs for another two books in the series). And all throughout, the author asks the question, "Is what we see in this world all there really is?" I was swept away by the author's imaginative answer. And as soon as I finished the book, I wanted to start reading it all over again. If I could, I'd give A Discovery of Witches 6 stars. It is an engaging, intelligent and satisfying read, far above the pulp fiction being churned out in the genre today. I eagerly and impatiently await the next chapter.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
WAIT FOR THE SEQUEL(S)!!!!!! REALLY, WAIT!!,
By
This review is from: A Discovery Of Witches (Hardcover)
I've just read what reviews are here and I agree with some aspects of all of them. For the most part, I enjoyed the book. I like her style of writing and the story was a decent one ...HOWEVER, I found the main character, Diana, to be too freaking irritating to be likeable. A witch, born to two witches, who has every power known to witch-hood and possibly a few not yet known, refuses to use her powers, boo-hoo, because she's soooo stubborn, just like her daddy was. Her pride in not giving in to her talents to make life easier is just a little much to swallow, not to mention the extreme intelligence that got her through school and university at such a young age and got her a fantastic job just because she's so smart. Reminds me too much of "Bella" from the Twilight series - the breathtaking beauty who can't see her own loveliness, etc. Gag. Why do authors think we'll love these "perfect" women? They just aren't real. This witch, who is supposedly so intelligent to the extreme and so self-reliant, suddenly becomes a clumsy little girl who needs constant attention and protection when she meets the big extremely handsome and breath-taking vampire. Another gag. She does such STUPID things to get herself into trouble. You can see it coming a mile away for pete's sake! Even with the above parts that irked me, I still enjoyed the story, although I wonder why the author rarely mentions the daemons. They're there, just not brought up except as the other of the three kinds of creatures. The one thing I will give you as my strongest word of advice on this book ... buy it but don't read it until the author comes out with the sequel. It's got a terrible, cliff-hanging kind of ending and I wanted to throw it across the room when I realized I was actually at the end and there was no more book left to read (I was reading it on an ebook). If it had been a paper copy of the book, I most assuredly would have thrown it but I didn't want to break my e-reader.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Review by Bibliotropic ([...]),
By
This review is from: A Discovery of Witches (Hardcover)
While reading through A Discovery of Witches, I confess, I couldn't help but compare it to Twilight. That being said, most of those comparisons consisted of, "This is what Twilight should have been." They share some of the same elements, chiefly a romance involving a powerful male vampire, but where Twilight stays firmly entrenched in the land of teenyboppers, this romance is of a more mature variety. If mature intelligent adults want to fantasize about a vampire romance that's not caught up in being dark, edgy, or 'big-city' modern, this is the way to go about it!Unlike the bulk of urban fantasy, the characters here are not hip, on the edge of fashion, incredibly popular, or filled with woes about their latest crush or how their job isn't fun. They're professionals, mostly researchers, and they come across as people who have made peace with themselves. Even the main character, Diana, who in many ways has not actually made peace with herself and her magical heritage, still understands who she is, is comfortable with herself as a person, and is refreshingly more focused on research papers than parties, scholarship more than socializing. She's the kind of character I look at and say to myself, "I want to be just like her," and I can relate to her because she isn't what so many urban fantasy heroines are. She isn't young, pretty, and modern. She's dedicated, fairly quiet, and interested in academia. The research that the author put into this novel shows. Harkness has definitely done her homework when it comes to alchemy, genetics, location, culture, history, and, unsurprisingly, wine. While occasionally imparting all this information borders on breaking the "show, don't tell" rule of writing, honestly, I can't imagine another way that it could have all been presented in a way that makes sense both to the reader and in the way that the characters are explaining. Harkness evidently spent a good amount of time asking all the right questions (for example, if vampires have extra chromosomes, just how do they get them when they came from human stock?) and finding good answers to them that make sense. I learned a good deal while reading this, and moreover, I also experienced that mental shift that comes with asking your own questions and trying to figure out the answers about things you may never have considered before. Harkness weaves a wonderful mystery, dropping hints in all the right places and tying things together very smoothly. She can make things sexy without being graphic, and make academia sound far more exciting than it probably has any rights to be. (At least for those who aren't total bibliophiles, that is!) Her style is wonderful, flowing nicely along and carrying the reader across time and pages to a place where they won't want to leave. This is one author well worth keeping an eye on, and I'm very excited for the next book of the series. This comes highly recommended; do not miss your chance to read this one!
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