Review: The Witch Hunter by Max Seeck

What started off as an unusual but straight-forward case for Detective Jessica Niemi soon spirals into a literal witch hunt. When famous fantasy author Roger Koponen’s wife is killed in the couple’s home in what seems to be a parody of a murder from his own books, Jessica’s team are at a loss. But then when more bodies start appearing, each matching a grisly scene from Koponen’s books, Jessica can’t help but notice an eerie connection between the murders, and her own life.

As Jessica hunts a twisted serial killer, she can’t help but wonder if these murders have something to do with her, and her own tragic past. Either way, then the team needs to catch the killer before Jessica herself becomes the next victim, and also while not revealing any of her carefully guarded secrets.

The Witch Hunter is a truly bewitching read, if you’ll pardon the pun. As you flit across the pages, you can’t help but wonder if Max Seeck hasn’t applied some magic of his own. From a carefully crafted plot and loveable characters, to prose that is beautifully crafted and doused with an intriguing macabre undertone, this book offers someone for everyone. The Witch Hunter is the perfect marriage of whodunit and horror, with just enough of the occult to get your heart racing.

The only problem with this book is that is ends too soon, and on a cliffhanger of sorts. While I’m already eagerly anticipating the next installment in what promises to be an amazing series, I can’t help but feel a little cheated that I didn’t get to spend more time with the characters. All that’s left to do now is try ignore my need for closure, and stalk Max’s social media for hints about a sequel, because the world needs to see way more of Jessica Niemi.

The Witch Hunter by Max Seeck is published by Welbeck Fiction Limited, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers

Review: David Mogo: Godhunter by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

David Mogo is not like the other residents of Lagos. He is a demigod. However, since The Falling, when a divine war led to a number of godlings to fall to earth, he has become something else. Together with his adoptive father, an aged magician, David is an extremely effective Godhunter. His unique connection to the divine beings through his mother’s blood allows David to help the residents of Lagos evict the fallen gods, for a price.

Despite this, David and Pap Udi barely manage to get by. Soon, David finds himself in financial straits, and in desperate need of a few good jobs. So when he’s offered the task of kidnapping a set of twin gods by the powerful wizard, Ajala, David can’t help but be skeptical. Despite his foreboding, he accepts the job, only to be proven right. Ajala has bigger plans than kidnap, and unless David stops the wizard, the whole city will fall to ruin. Faced with an impending war, David finds himself turning to his mother, and ancient powers beyond his understanding, in the hopes of victory.

David Mogo: Godhunter is the definition of adventure. From the first page, the reader is immersed in a colorful world where the divide between the heavens and earth is awry, and it’s glorious. Not only is it refreshing to see an African country represented in a chillingly realistic post-apocalyptic light, but to have the continent as the centre of the action also allows for a glance into a new kind of myth, with an African twist. Okungbowa’s world is rich and vibrant, and so beautifully captured that one can almost smell the port of Lagos. And amid this whirlwind of beauty is a top-notch fantasy with a thoroughly likeable protagonist.

This book is not only entertaining and beautifully written, but it ticks all the boxes. It’s a fresh perspective on an old theme, and presents a much-needed change to the first-world countries we generally see in this genre. All that’s left is to find out if there will be a sequel, because I hope we haven’t seen the last of David Mogo.

David Mogo: Godhunter by Suyi Davies Okungbowa is published by Abaddon Books, a Rebellion Books company, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers.  

Review: The End of the Ocean by Maja Lunde

After a lifetime and career spent protecting nature from humanity’s selfishness, Signe realizes that she’ll never come to terms with a changing world in which each generation robs its children of their natural surroundings. But she can try to make a difference. With that in mind, she decides to undertake a final act of protest. Despite being nearly 80 years old, she sets out on a perilous solo journey across the ocean, to interrupt the destruction of a glacier near her childhood home. But as she contemplates the dwindling ice, she can’t escape her memories of the immense love she lost, the family that rejected her, and the childhood she so desperately wanted to escape. Now, armed with her boat and her determination, she seeks to make a change.

Two decades later, and humanity’s biggest fears have been realised: the environment has been destroyed. As a drought spreads across the globe, David and his family have no choice but to flee their home in search of salvation and water. Yet in the panicked moments of their departure, David loses his wife and son, and all that remains of his former life is his young daughter, Lou. As conditions worsen and the prospect of doom creeps ever nearer, the pair discover an abandoned boat, and with it, hope.

Despite not quite hitting the 400-page mark, The End of the Ocean is an expansive novel that hides a universe between its covers. Between a heartfelt call for humanity to ease its selfish destruction of the environment and the blossoming of hope and love in two families, Maja Lunde has presented a terrific escape. Not only is this book well-written, but it is engaging, poetic, and poignant. In fact, it’s hard to consider the earth’s future as it is represented in this book as ‘dystopian’. The dried-up husk of an earth that Lunde warns of is already a growing reality, making The End of the Ocean less a work of heart-racing fiction and more of a dooming prediction. To prevent our doom, we must change, and this book is another in a long and vital line of literature that begs us to do just that.

The End of the Ocean by Maja Lunde is published by Scribner, a Simon and Schuster company, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers.

Review: The Sin Eater by Megan Campisi

May Owens always considered herself a goodly girl, and yet she is in prison. Orphaned, starving, and without options, the young woman’s hunger forced her hand. And while her fellow cellmates are sentenced to various grisly punishments, her crime of stealing a loaf of bread receives an entirely unexpected punishment, and the price is a heavy burden indeed.

For her crime, May is sentenced to be a Sin Eater; a woman cast out by the society that branded her to take upon her body the sins of the dying. For each sin named, there is an accompanying food that must be eaten before the dying can return top the Maker. Yet the reward for the Sin Eater’s task is thankless – they may not be touched, spoken tom, or looked out – they are the incarnation of sin, and they are feared and hated throughout the land.

Despite the awful punishment, and the loss, confusion and anguish which follow it, May tries her best to adjust to her new life under the silent and hostile gaze of the town. However, when the new Sin Eater accidentally uncovers a royal scandal that could change the very nature of her life, she must decide the best path to take; break her vow and speak up, or maintain her silence and her duty while people die.

There’s something darkly seductive about The Sin Eater. Between lines of dancing prose dwells a story that’s as shocking as it is intriguing, in which the world as we know it has been tweaked and shaped into a dazzling story about life’s unseen horrors. Campisi presents a belief system that it skewed, and a royal bloodline plagued by dissent, jealousy and murky secrets. Here, history is unreliable, witchcraft is blossoming, and religion is a many-faceted monster that causes as much good as it does pain. And yet the system remains unchallenged, fostering a sense of discomfort which builds throughout the narrative, culminating in well-earned pity for the protagonist, as well as a roaring anger at the multiple injustices of the world – both fictional and not.

The Sin Eater by Megan Campisi is published by Mantle, an imprint of Pan MacMillan.

Review: A Girl Made of Air by Nydia Hetherington

Mouse had an unusual upbringing. Born to a circus performer, her early years were a blur of big tops, circus animals, and parents who just weren’t all that interested in their daughter. Then one day, a flame-haired girl called Serendipity Wilson comes to the circus, and everything changes. Serendipity takes an interest in Mouse, teaching her to read and write, and eventually, to walk a tightrope.

Over the years, the two women become as close as sisters, and through Serendipity’s tutelage, Mouse becomes a great funambulist, and the star of the show. And just as she thinks that life is starting to look up, Mouse loses Serendipity first to a lover, and eventually to a baby. As their relationship becomes more strained, Serendipity seems to be fading away, becoming a shadow of her former self. To rectify this, Mouse comes up with a brilliant idea, only to have it backfire for her to lose Serendipity forever.

Determined to start fresh, Mouse travels to America, where she seeks a new life and fame. Here, she finds appreciation for her craft, and an audience for her tragic past.

A Girl Made of Air is not your average carnival adventure. Instead of circus freaks and romance, we have dark intrigue and a tragic past.  The narrative is steeped in loss and heartache, and does an excellent job of playing with the reader’s emotions. As Mouse searches for her own story, and seeks to right her wrongs, she strings us along an unusual life filled with wonder, loss, redemption, and finally, peace. If you’re looking for history and myth along with your magic, look no further.

A Girl Made of Air by Nydia Hetherington is published by Quercus, A Hachette company, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers.