Unveiling Magic: A Discovery Of Witches Review

Overall rating

7.5 Characters
9.5 Atmosphere
7.5 Writing Style
7.5 Plot
8 Intrigue
7.5 Relationships
8.5 Enjoyment
8
A Discovery of Witches - the first book in the All Souls series by Deborah Harkness.

Deep in the stacks of Oxford’s Bodleian Library, young scholar Diana Bishop unwittingly calls up a bewitched alchemical manuscript in the course of her research.

Descended from an old and distinguished line of witches, Diana wants nothing to do with sorcery; so after a furtive glance and a few notes, she banishes the book to the stacks.

But her discovery sets a fantastical underworld stirring, and a horde of daemons, witches, and vampires soon descends upon the library. Diana has stumbled upon a coveted treasure lost for centuries-and she is the only creature who can break its spell.

~Synopsis from goodreads

This was a book that I’ve long been wanting to read. Similar to the magical alchemical manuscript that is called by Diana, every time I saw this book in the library, I felt compelled to pick it up.

However, I didn’t know much about the book, and these days, I am all about reading up on a book before I pick it up.

So, I looked up goodreads and saw all the 1-star reviews.

Twilight for adults

said one reviewer.

Trainwreck bad

said another.

I still might have attempted this book if it was standalone. But it is the first of the All Souls trilogy, and each book in this series is almost 1000 pages long.

So, I put this book out of my mind, and picked up something else. But I just could not ignore that inner voice asking me to give this book a chance, so one day, that’s exactly what I did.

My Review

And you know what? The book wasn’t that bad. Sure, I understand where the Twilight for Adults comments come from, and sure, Diana and Mathew have to be the most irritating lovers on this planet, but still, I ended up liking this book.

Here’s why:

  • The crux of the story is very intriguing. The whole idea of a magical manuscript that has been hidden for centuries and contains some mystical secret about alchemy, the origins of life, or something else altogether is fascinating.
  • The scholastic atmosphere of most of the book is extremely inviting for someone like me, who has always wanted to be a deep-thinking scholar researching metaphysical topics but who is, unfortunately, scrolling through a Twitter feed at work instead.
  • Also, the characteristics of daemons, witches, and vampires, and their history and legends were brought out very well.

So, yeah, I liked the book’s concept, setting, and world-building very much.

That said, this book has some incredibly low points too.

Yeah, all those incredibly repetitive bits—the yoga sessions, the tea drinking, the wine tasting, the cheesy romance between Mathew and Diana (I totally eye-rolled at all those frequent ma lionne and mon couer utterances by Mathew). I also totally eye-rolled at her frequent naps and her even more frequent knee-buckling episodes where Mathew had to carry her to her room for rest. I swear it feels like Diana slept through almost half the book.

Another low point is that the story was not standalone enough, and I do feel that for the number of hours I invested in the book, I didn’t get anything beyond some world-building and a setup for the next part of the book, which is a little disappointing. I do like the ending, though, and I had high hopes for the other two books in the series, but I see on Goodreads that the reviews for those are even more scathing.

So, I am just not sure what to do. Should I continue, or should I give up? It’s a bit of a dilemma, because I didn’t really hate on this book like so many others did, but I can’t say I loved it thaaat much to spend another two weeks (or more) reading the sequels.

Have you read this series? What do you think about these books?

Join the Conversation

9 Comments

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

  1. Pingback: 1adelaide
  2. says: Dennis the Vizsla

    hello nishita its dennis the vizsla dog oh my dada tried to reed this wun but he hated it!!! he did not eeven finish it!!! he duz like witches and he duz like vampires but i gess he prefers willow and spike to diana and matthew!!! ha ha ok bye

    1. says: Nishita

      @dennisthevizsla:disqus haha, yes, I prefer Spike, Buffy, and the gang too. Nobody in the vampire world has since come close…well, maybe except for Sookie and gang 🙂

  3. says: Verity from Lilolia

    I have also toyed with the idea of this book Nish! The low points you mentioned are enough to make me pass on this one though. Love your ratings score system!

    1. says: Nishita

      @Verity from Lilolia: I actually liked this one in spite of its flaws. But that is probably because Fantasy is one of my favorite genres, and it would have to be a really bad book for me to rate it lower.

      I guess I would recommend it based on your tolerance levels for romantic cheesiness. If you ignore that, the rest of the book is quite nice.

      And oh, thanks for the feedback on the rating system 🙂

  4. says: Harini

    When the books first came out I was interested but the reviews have put me off. Besides I have so many other books I want to read.

    1. says: Nishita

      @HariniKarnamadakala:disqus It’s not a must read book by any means.