This was extremely cute! This seems like an easy hand-sell for the high school set and young college group. I loved the Pacific Northwest setting, it felt very cozy and perfect for fall. Enemies to lovers romances have been very popular for us (Book Lovers, Beach Read, The Hating Game, etc.) and this is a nice stretch for romance readers.

If it’s got magic I can almost guarantee I’ll like. Maybe it was growing up on Harry Potter and Ella Enchanted but my soul craves all.the.magic. And let me tell you, Wild is the Witch did not disappoint.

Iris is a girl with past hurts and a kind of fear of the outside world. She struggles to open up and let her guard down. Something Pike finds furiously irritating and a little bit intriguing.

Pike is a seemingly carefree guy with habit of shirking his responsibilities, driving Iris continually mad. When Pike confesses his hatred of witches, unaware that Iris is one, it causes Iris to make a series of unfortunate decisions.

I loved how the story played out and was so neatly wrapped up in the end. It seemed to have a slower pace which normally bores me but Griffin has a way of making that part of its charm. The story held me captive, the characters were lovable and relatable, and magic was perfection.


Content Warning: explicit language, heavy kissing

Advanced Reader’s Copy provided by NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire in exchange for an honest review.

After really enjoying THE NATURE OF WITCHES, I was excited for another witchy YA from Griffin. I will say that WILD IS THE WITCH took me awhile to get interested in it. I'm glad I stuck with it but at the start I didn't like Iris, Pike, or the whole dynamic. But once they went into the woods looking for the owl I felt like the plot found its groove and I enjoyed the rest of the novel.

The Pacific Northwest vibes are strong and I loved that. I also really liked the different focuses of witchcraft, the magic rules Griffin establishes, and how witches fit into society. The enemies-to-lover tropes are all there and they are great. And as much as I was annoyed about the bad decisions that got Iris into the mess she was in, they did make for a good plot to unfold.

I'll definitely be looking forward to Griffin's next novel and hope it's another witchy nature book!

This book was such a fun and easy quick read! I flew through it. I love the banter and relationship between Iris and Pike! I was invested from start to finish!

I can’t wait to read more from this author!

Thank you to NetGalley and SourceBooks Fire for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

This book was a fun time full of magic! If you like fully accessible fantasy stories about witches, i would choose this one. The author makes very interesting characters.

This is one of, if not the best, books I've read this year. Seriously. I loved it.

Wild Is The Witch had very good world building and magic system. It's been a while since I read a book where the magic system was complete and made perfect sense. It has fantasy, witches, animals, friendship, romance, and good banter.

I loved the Mom's character and her romantic relationship. It was really sweet. The main character has anxiety, as do I, so I could really relate to her.

The last 30 pages or so had me crying the whole time. And the little surprise on the last few pages. I may never recover! I have immediately pre-ordered a copy. I can't recommend this books enough. It really spoke to me. I wouldn't change anything it.

Iris loves her life. She loves her home in the Pacific Northwest, she loves working at the animal refuge with her mom, and she loves being a witch. Almost as much as she hates the refuge’s intern, Pike. And almost as much as Pike hates witches. But when an endangered owl runs off (with one of Iris’ spells) these two will have to work together to save the owl and the town.

If you love cozy atmospheric magical realism and a story that will make you feel like all the main characters are your friends? This should be your next read.

This was my first Rachel Griffin book I read and I really loved it. The banter, the relationship with nature, working to overcome anxiety and trauma, and the overall atmosphere was incredible.

This story is written beautifully and really immerses you in the nature aspect. I love how whimsical it felt and how much was explained about the witches’ abilities to work alongside nature. The witches were crafted so naturally in this story and really fit in with the modern world. It was nice to see witches and humans working alongside each other. The amount of detail that is included was breathtaking. I felt like I was on the journey with Iris and Pike the whole time and the connection Iris has to the earth and animals is beautiful.

Alongside the stunning atmosphere, I really fell in love with the characters. Iris is a young witch who loves who she is and loves what she can do with animals and nature. It’s her whole life and I would honestly be the same way too if I were a witch. She truly cares for her environment and the animals in the wildlife refuge. She sassy and filled with anxiety but has the biggest heart. Pike on the other hand is infuriatingly charming, and I just love their relationship. The banter is top notch and I love their journey they take together. Iris’ mom and her fiancé Sarah were absolutely adorable. I even loved McGuffin (you’ll have to read it to find out who that is 😉)

This book had all the tropes for fans of:
- Loathe to love
- Forced proximity
- One bed/one tent
- Secret identity

It also had great representation of lgbtq rep, anxiety rep, asthma rep, and the handling and repairing of past traumas.

While the writing for this book was rather lovely, I really can’t say I enjoyed this at all.

It has everything to do with this so-called “romance”.

The synopsis calls this “enemies to lovers” but it didn’t feel like that to me. I can’t get behind this trope of if a boy is mean to you, makes fun of you and endlessly teases and makes you feel genuinely scared, it means he likes you. That’s just so messed up.

What’s even more messed up is the main character Iris has let it be known to her mother how uncomfortable the boy makes her. How scared she feels around him at times. The mother just shrugs it off and tells her daughter to “relax”. Just no. HARD no.

The mother then makes the daughter take said boy on a trip into the woods to find a lost owl. You read that right. This girl who has said she doesn’t like this boy and is uncomfortable around him has to trek into the woods with him ALONE. Can we just collectively say NO again.

I truly hate that this is a narrative that is still being pushed. It has big “boys will be boys” energy and it’s beyond unnecessary.

Rachel’s books feel very contemporary and she has a gift of making magic and witches seem so natural that it’s almost unbelievable that they’re not part of our reality. As a person who grew up surrounded by nature and has an irrational love for animals, this book is the epitome of comfort to my soul. Her writing is beautiful and with her words she created a vivid and rich atmosphere that makes for a very immersive reading experience.
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My absolute favorite thing about this book was the connection of the MC with all the different animals. I also enjoyed the banter between Iris and Pike, and loved the evolution of their relationship. It’s just an absolute cozy read that I highly recommend! I’m a mood reader, and the mood not only relates to the genre but also with the time of year I read the books 😅 so if you’re like me I actually recommend you to read it in the autumn, because that’s definitely the vibe I got from the setting 😂
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Wild is the Witch comes out next Tuesday, August 2nd, but I urge you to pre-order the book now, so you can contribute to the pre-order campaign from which part of the funds will go towards the care of Sequoia, a northern spotted owl (swipe to see how beautiful she is!).
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Thank you so much to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire for providing me with an e-ARC of this book.

I was a fan of Griffin's debut The Nature of Witches, and I continue to be impressed by the way she interweaves magic and the natural world together so seamlessly. I tend not to pick up fantasy because I find myself easily overwhelmed by the worldbuilding, so the line these books walk between realism and fantastical elements is really right up my alley. I also appreciated the cozy tone she accomplished and the slow-burn enemies-to-romance in this book. I did wish the backstory had been slightly more developed, but overall I really enjoyed this and am excited to recommend to readers who want wilderness and animal focused stories and real-world fantasy.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC of this title in exchange for an honest review.

Wild is the Witch follows a young witch, Iris, living in today's society, where witches live among humans. They work with them and have a set of rules to keep things running smoothly.

When Iris accidentally places a curse on her annoying coworker, she has to find an owl that's holding the curse.. with her annoying coworker, Pike.

This is pretty classic enemies-to-lovers, and it was cute. However, I wanted more of the witch stuff and less of the romance, That's just my personal style, though. The writing was a little repetitive, but it wasn't awful. The descriptions of the natural world were certainly beautiful! I would recommend this to people who like romance.

(4.5 stars)
An incredible story about fear, grief and fixing our mistakes.
My favourite thing is the author’s writing style. Rachel Griffin writes tales full of wonder focused on Nature and her love for this world that we happen to live in is transported to her books. I highlighted multiple paragraphs of descriptions and inner monologues from Iris admiring the landscape due to the sheer beauty of them. I would call Griffin’s stories, climate hope stories, kindling our love for magical natural spaces that feel so few nowadays and Wild is the Witch isn’t the exception.
I adored Iris and Pike, I have a sweet spot for characters that had to build walls to survive. You go through emotional arcs with them, as more secrets and layers are shed. Pike is a great character and love interest and Iris is not judged for the walls she had to build. Their interactions at front value seem related to tropes from rom coms but they don't fit the mold. One of the things that I was weirded out, after some thought, can be read as a brilliant character study. The moment in the tent when they are kissing and Isis takes Pike’s glasses seems weird at first glance because he can't see without them. But because she is, at that moment, trying to hide her magic so that he could still love her (something that she then concludes isn't possible). Also, Isis’s anxiety and asthma are portrayed responsibly. Both of them lead to changes in decisions and consequences.
This being the author’s second book is possible to see a pattern starting to form in the type of stories she tells. Many decisions made by Isis, her mother and Pike are made due to trauma related to abandonment, in different ways. Her mother celebrates this release and opens herself to things, leading to her relationship with Sarah (love them by the way). Isis is the contrary, closing herself emotionally and physically and Pike hides emotionally. I especially liked how no one, overall not in confrontations, was shamed for their way of dealing. In the end, their way of dealing with life is validated but it is shown not to be necessary. They are allowed to breathe.
In conclusion, I really enjoyed this book and I’m thankful I got a chance to read it. The reason it wasn't 5 stars was an issue in the revision stage. Some parts got slightly repetitive and could have been reduced or cut. Other than that the book was excellent. Also thank u for not killing the owl off completely!

I liked this book, but I didn't have as much connection to it as The Nature of Witches. The plot felt a little predictable. That being said, I think a lot of teens would really connect with this story, and I want to recommend this book for all 7th grade + .

This was a sweet witchy YA book. I thought it was unique that the magic was so nature-focused, and it tied in nicely with the beautiful descriptions of PNW scenery. Iris and Pike were cute together and their “quest” was engaging. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys YA romantic fantasy.

I so wanted to love this book as I absolutely adored Rachel Griffin's first book. This book was just missing something for me compared to her first book.

In this book we follow Iris, whose best friend cursed her boyfriend and she ended up losing her magic. Now Iris has a new home in the PNW and is using her magic on animals as a way to cope with also losing her best friend. She works with an intern named Pike who she she cannot stand. Iris ends up setting a curse on Pike that she never intends to reach him. However, an owl comes between her and the curse as she is setting it and now the curse is in the owl. She has to save the owl in order to prevent Pike from being cursed. What could possibly go wrong?

I did enjoy the PNW setting as that has always intrigued me. I just think I would have preferred the school setting that Rachel Griffin wrote so fantastically in the first book. I do love her writing as it is atmospheric and simple. I also did not enjoy Pike at all. I did not think the character development for him was done in a fantastic way. We get a lot of backstory on Iris that makes us understand her but not Pike as much and for that reason, I didn't 100% buy the relationship between them.

Overall, if you enjoy books about witches, then you will enjoy this book. 3.5 out of 5 stars.

“That’s one of the worst casualties of being hurt by someone who was never supposed to hurt you: you start to question all the beautiful things that led up to the ugliness, start to wonder if some of the moments you thought were perfect were actually painted with a dirty brush”

With vivid imagery and some of my favourite tropes + a plot that I found exciting and different I am more than happy to give this book 5 stars!

Right off the bat, the imagery in this book is incredible. It reminds me of a cool autumn afternoon. This could be in part because it takes place around Washington state and it’s perpetually cloudy, but I like to think its at least partly the writing.

Something I really liked about this book was that while the plot itself is urgent, Rachel does a spectacular job of slowing us down and smelling the pine trees. She created a very vivid sense of isolation and home in the woods and I enjoyed watching Pike and Iris’s relationship grow and shift as they tried to track down Macguffin (the northern spotted owl). While we are reading Iris’s innermost worries and wants, we are also experiencing all of these confusing and clarifying moments that I think a lot of us can relate to. These moments all come back to dealing with a crush on someone you are conflicted about (a darn near universal experience if I’ve ever seen one).

I want to classify this book as a sort of enemies to lovers book but honestly at best I would say it falls closer to “strong dislike to lovers” only because -we the readers- KNOW that Pike doesn’t hate her and he only picks on her because he’s a boy not sure how to express himself sometimes. Iris on the other hand… I wouldn’t say hates him, but she worries what might happen if he finds out she’s a witch (and given the background in the story, I get it) BUT this doesn’t make the shift into friends/ lovers any less satisfying.

There is also the fun “forced proximity” trope which personally I am a huge fan of. Nothing moves along an “enemies to lovers” story quite like forcing the main characters to spend time together! This comes in the form of her mom (and new step mom) agreeing that Iris shouldn’t go out into the wild alone, and insisting Pike go along to assist should she need the help. It is a not so subtle nudge and a wink that had me excited for the coming story.

Needless to say, things go awry and after some damage, they find themselves sharing a tent. It's very cute, very sweet and I am so soft for these two it isn’t even funny.

Things reached their peak and I sobbed uncontrollably for a little while. It was the kind of sobbing where you know it’ll all be ok but it doesn’t change how sad you are in the moment. The very thing she was most frightened of happening sort of happens and after everything, that is the most heart wrenching part. I thought that this part of the book was really well thought out and seemed to stay true to character for both Iris and Pike. The rapid changing of emotions felt very authentic to what I’m sure the characters were kind of experiencing in that moment.

Unrelated, but I adored the sheer number of twilight references the book makes and honestly I was so excited about that because it takes place in a very similar environment (the pacific northwest) and she saw the opportunity and she took it.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for allowing me the opportunity to read an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I will never stop recommending Rachel Griffin's works and I can’t wait for this book to be out officially because I will be picking up a copy!!

3.5 ⭐️
I liked it but was missing something that I loved from the first book. That happens so often I feel like I’m series. Still beautiful writing, just felt like (for me) I needed more

I will say that I LOVED her first one so so much, so start with that first.

Iris Gray is a witch, but she doesn't feel comfortable telling anyone after she is involved in a horrific accident. She finds refuge with her mother on their animal rescue in the Olympic Pennisula, far away from her other home in Nebraska. There is another intern at the refuge named Pike Alder who does nothing but torment Iris (and hate witches). When Iris accidentally sets a terrible curse out into the world, her and Pike have to team up to destroy the curse and save multiple lives in the process.

I think this book was more action-packed than Griffin's previous novel which made it a more enjoyable read. The author does a great job of capturing the atmosphere of nature and the woods. Her attention to environmental concerns and connecting them to nature are what drew me to her books in the first place (oh, and the witches).

This book also does a good job of portraying the anxiety that Iris feels as someone that is constantly having to hide her true self. Her nervous behaviors resonate with anyone that struggles with these feelings, and her interactions with the other characters allow readers to see her coping mechanisms and their effect. I also love the depth of Pike's feelings towards witches and the world in general. I think many readers will be able to see their own feelings and grudges mirrored in his life and his actions, along with his ability to constantly look for the best in situations and find humor in dark places.

I went into this with no expectations, and I found myself pleasantly surprised.

Iris is a young witch working at her mom’s wildlife refuge. Things are going well, except for the witch hating jerk of an intern, Pike.

After one particularly irritating encounter with said jerk, Iris decides to blow off steam by casting and voiding a curse for him.

Things take a turn when a very rude owl swoops down and grabs the curse before Iris can void it, so now there is a bird out in the wilderness that will wipe everyone in the area out if it dies before the curse can be removed. Oh, and if the Witch’s Counsel gets wind of it, Iris’ powers will be stripped.

Naturally Iris plans to trek into the woods to find the winged thief and do damage control. Unfortunately for her, she is forced to bring none other than Pike along for the trip.

This was FANTSTIC. The atmosphere the author created was beautiful and immersive. The characters inspired a “protect these adorable wholesome kids at all costs” vibe.
I don’t think I have ever been so emotionally attached to a bird before.

I don’t really have any negatives, I wanted a bit more at the end, but altogether this was perfect.

I now have a strong urge to go hike in the Pacific Northwest.

Check it out, when it hits shelves, 8/2/22!

A big thanks to the Publisher & NetGalley for gifting me a digital copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.