Title: Spellbound
Author: Samantha Combs
Publisher : Astraea Press
Available now.
Spellbound is a refreshingly sweet book about good witches
who protect humans from evil witches and demons. It’s a pleasant read full of lovely warm-hearted characters – apart from the requisite evil master mind and his demon minions, of course.
Christophe wants to breed a race of super-witches under his
control and Sarina has the genes he wants. He isn’t going to try to woo her, however, because her family knows he’s evil, so she’s not interested. He’s going to have to fight them for her and now that she’s old enough, the time for the inevitable battle is drawing near. Sarina is only now learning about this and about other family secrets, and the revelations rock her world.
She and her two sisters arrive in a new town and she
promptly falls in love with Logan and him with her. At first her older sister, who is also her surrogate parents (the siblings parents died when they were very young) opposes the match, until she finds out something very interesting about Logan. He has the powerful witching gene too. Christophe is interested in him too, though we’re not quite sure how he planned to fit Logan
into the picture of Christophe fathering a new super witch race.
Logan didn’t even know his mother was a witch – she hid it from him and his sister – now he discovers that his sister is a Twitch (teenage witch) and he has latent warlock talents. These revelations come right after he’s discovered that his new love is a witch. Next thing he’s fighting demons and an evil warlock. It’s all a big shock for him, but he handles it well and is determined to protect Sarina at all costs.
Eleven extra exceptional witches with a variety of talents
come to stay at Sarina’s new home and begin her intensive training. Once they realise that Logan has talent and a part to play in keeping the lovely Sarina from the evil protagonist, they also train Logan, and the day finally arrives when he and the coven have to face Christophe and his demons, not only to stop him from snatching Sarina away, but also to rescue others he’s already taken.
My favourite bit was when the coven practiced their group
powers. The magic was awesome.
There is one surprise in the plot, but other than that, the
story progresses as you expect it to. I think the book could have been better if Logan and Sarina had had more obstacles to overcome before they got together. I felt that everything was resolved a little too easily and I never did work
out why it was Logan who had to save the day in the end, when there were thirteen powerful witches in the room and he had been training about two weeks. I also felt that there was a little too much repetition of the ‘I love you and I’ll do anything to protect you,’ refrain from both Logan and Sarina.
All in all, it’s a lovely book for younger teens. I give it
three and a half stars.
