Book Review: A Witch in Isenshire
A cosy but bold witchy fantasy sequel in the Witch of Emelle series from Azalea Forrest.
By now you all know how much I enjoyed Witch in the Lighthouse, and so I jumped at the chance when author Azalea Forrest put out a call for ARC readers for its sequel, A Witch in Isenshire, a book which I had the privilege of helping to reveal the cover for recently. I’ve really come to enjoy cosy fantasy as a genre, and if you had told me this would be the case a few years ago, I’m not sure I would’ve believed it. There’s something about the slower pace, idyllic settings, and lower stakes mixed with a sense of wonder and whimsy that feels like a nice, warm hug. It’s rather refreshing.
Blurb
A Witch in Isenshire is a bold cup of coffee made with determination, personal growth, and adventure.
Magnolia Hanna never thought she’d forgive Basil Olivander, the witch who inadvertently upended so many lives in Lightview. Yet four months after their battle, Basil’s learning to deal with his heartache and make amends. He’s become Maggie’s roommate, her technomancy teacher, and—just maybe—her friend. Now, they’re packing for a trip to visit Maggie’s family in the hidden hamlet of Emelle.
Maggie and Basil face their grief together, finding closure at her late uncle’s grave and comfort among her friends and family. If it were up to her, she would stay for a fortnight, but their trip is cut short at the behest of Lightview’s mayor, who sends the two witches on an adventure of a lifetime—to the advanced city of Isenshire, the birthplace of the automaton.
To Maggie’s dismay, Isenshire’s witches can only use magic with a permit, and their jobs have been reduced to fortune telling and parlor tricks. Magnolia’s fear of her skills being replaced by tech is reignited tenfold. Are the witches in Isenshire truly happy, or are they complacent to the powers that be? Magnolia’s only wish is to make magic relevant again, but she soon finds that the power of the automaton is too awesome to ignore.
Review
The opening of this book is a truly beautiful exploration of the messy and imprecise process of bereavement, guilt, and friendship. Following immediately on from the ending of Witch in the Lighthouse, we have the witches Basil and Magnolia mending and maintaining the lighthouse. They’re also preparing to go on a trip to Maggie’s hometown to pay their respects to Maggie’s late uncle Tom. The cosy, Ghibliesque vibes of the first book continue on here, and are tinged bittersweet by grief. It’s a thoroughly satisfying and cathartic epilogue to the first book and I loved it. The plot in general was great, as the book moves onto exploring the intersection of magic and technology, and the place of magic in an industrialised world.
The stakes here are somewhat higher than in the first book, as we escalate from the personal to the political. And that’s what makes this both cosy and bold. We see and learn more of the world, the other countries, more of the history of witches and the noble magic families, and see an escalation of the distrust of magic in Isenshire. But the book never loses its slower paced, cosy feel. We’re with Maggie, ever the optimist and somewhat naive, as she refuses to be disillusioned despite the attitudes in the Big City. Basil is a fantastic foil as her companion; his personality is almost totally the polar opposite to Maggie’s, but he’s also earnest and truly wants to make amends.
I very much enjoyed the way that technology interacts with magic here, and how we got to see more of the magic system through the primary antagonist and Basil’s backstory. I will say that I didn’t quite get the right sense of the automatons—all the way up until a certain point, I thought the one Maggie was interacting with was, like, knee-height! That’s the only thing that didn’t quite work for me, but the action scene that followed was great fun. Very thrilling.
Overall, A Witch in Isenshire is a marked step up from the first book, and I’m really looking forward to seeing where this series goes next.
