"This is death magic, complicated and exclusive and implacable, and from the start, I wielded it with ease."

In THE BONE WITCH, our heroine, Tea, lives in world full of witches. Her sisters are traditional witches, specializing in things like Forest and Water. Tea's power is unknown, but it turned out that she is a necromancer - one who can bring back the dead from the living, when she unwittingly wakes her dead brother from his coffin.

I'm very, very impressed with this debut. Rin Chupeco is an author to watch. The writing is beautiful. I found the plot to be allllmost too slow for me, but the writing kept me fully invested. I also loved the magic system. I think Tea is a very interesting character and I'm looking forward to her overall character arc in this series.

This book series has so much potential. I will definitely buy and read the next book in the series just because I really do believe this could be something amazing.

I almost felt like this was a Memoirs of a Geisha fanfic piece. The story mainly focused on the training of the asha and their rites of passage. It kind of dragged for me. There was action no doubt, but the PURPOSE of the story wasn't clear. Even at the end I was left wondering if Tea is the downfall of the kingdom or meant to save the kingdom. The flashback POV made the story as a whole confusing.

I adored this book. I really home there is a sequel soon. The world created was vibrant and I was hooked immediately.

"In the captivating start to a new, darkly lyrical fantasy series for readers of Leigh Bardugo and Sabaa Tahir, Tea can raise the dead, but resurrection comes at a price...

Let me be clear: I never intended to raise my brother from his grave, though he may claim otherwise. If there's anything I've learned from him in the years since, it's that the dead hide truths as well as the living.

When Tea accidentally resurrects her brother from the dead, she learns she is different from the other witches in her family. Her gift for necromancy means that she's a bone witch, a title that makes her feared and ostracized by her community. But Tea finds solace and guidance with an older, wiser bone witch, who takes Tea and her brother to another land for training.

In her new home, Tea puts all her energy into becoming an asha―one who can wield elemental magic. But dark forces are approaching quickly, and in the face of danger, Tea will have to overcome her obstacles...and make a powerful choice.

Memoirs of a Geisha meets The Name of the Wind in this brilliant new fantasy series by Rin Chupeco!"

Name-checking both Leigh Bardugo and Patrick Rothfuss in the description is sure a way to get my attention.

This was a darkly evocative book and drew me in from the very beginning. The entire concept of the series was starkly original, even if the society that the MC was in brought up images of the geisha lifestyle. It was a severe disappointment to come to the end of the book, because I wanted to know immediately what was going to happen next.

I was first interested in reading the book due to the title. I love fantasy stories that include magic. The main plot of The Bone Witch takes place in the past, and occupies the majority of the book.

In it, a dark asha (also known as a Bone Witch) tells of her rise within the ranks of the gilded community of spellbinders who takes her in to be trained. But she is more powerful than any can imagine, and may be the key piece in defeating the evil Faceless and their nearly invincible creatures.

It is interspersed with flashes to the present where the witch is interacting with a bard she has invited to her hideaway while she pieces together the present with the past.

It's an interesting way to tell the story, and at times, a bit confusing, but not too much.

I really enjoyed the story and the characters. The author does a great job of creating this fantasy world, and is very descriptive. I look forward to reading the next installment in the trilogy.

A gorgeous cover for a gorgeous book! Such a great read. Full review will be on my blog soon, so please check back for that. I love books from Sourcebooks!

The beginning of this book was very slow for me. I have a hard time with fantasy books where I can’t connect with the characters immediately when they have unique names. I was glad I pushed through because I ultimately enjoyed it very much. It has certain Harry Potter-esque features due to the training setting. I am looking forward to reading the sequel.

I received a complimentary ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

The Bone Witch is a beautifully written unique fantasy that draws you slowly into this world rather than slamming it in your face with over-the-top action. The pacing allows for more character study, more charm, and more storytelling, as the main narrative of Tea progressing in her studies as a bone witch is interspersed with a future perspective. I loved the juxtaposition and that we as readers don't quite know how to piece it all together, until the very end. An end that leaves you wanting the sequel--which is out now, that I haven't read yet, and will get my hands on soon.

This isn't just a book with a beautiful cover. Rin Chupeco truly has a way with words. I've loved The Girl from the Well and The Suffering, two of her previous books that succeed in being simultaneously terrifying and charming. Somehow that has seeped into The Bone Witch as well. How can it not, with a narrative that revolves around necromancy? But Chupeco always writes the unexpected. Tea's resurrected brother was my favorite character. Others in the story who are outwardly perfect are often the worst in personality. The sly wit that slips into the book is perfect.

Although I definitely read for characters, this world is amazing as well. The world-building is done so well, which is amazing in the fact that it is detailed so quickly without becoming confusing. There weren't many moments where I needed to pause to think about what was happening or being referenced.

I highly recommend this book. It's unique. It's lovely. It will make you laugh and, honestly, leave you a little uncomfortable because of the monsters you'll meet.

The Bone Witch is the dark fantasy love child of Bardugo's Grisha trilogy and Taylor's Daughter of Smoke and Bone. It's a story that is finely painted slow and deliberately with such vivid intricacies that certainly leave an impression.

One of the reasons I wanted to read The Bone Witch was because of how much I enjoyed Rin Chupeco's writing style in The Girl from the Well. She is one of those talented people who can paint with words, creating an atmosphere that seems to take over the senses. The Bone Witch did not disappoint at all. The world Chupeco builds is rich with culture and conflict. The Asha are magic uses, divided into several different types, and are similar to that of the Geisha from our world. They are talented in the arts and serve as social butterflies, entertaining guests and provided income to their Houses. But they are also warriors of the highest caliber are integral to the protection of the country from those who try to attack using deva, horrendous monsters raised from the grave.

Tea is a dark-asha, or a Bone Witch. Bone witches are extremely rare and are unable to use elemental magic that comes naturally to other Asha, instead, they have the ability to raise the deva and to send them back to their graves. They are the key to protecting the realm, but they are also treated as if they are cursed. This book offers two timelines to read through simultaneously. One begins with Tea when she is a child and moves with her during her time learning to become a full fledge Asha, and the other begins when Tea has been isolated at the edges of the world and for some reason (not yet known) she has become an enemy of those she once held close. I personally loved seeing the Before and After at the same time, and had that drive to see what exactly caused Tea to change her loyalties. The entire answer isn't one that is revealed in The Bone Witch, but it's certainly a wonderful driving force to pick up the next book in the series. I found Tea enjoyable. She's ambitious and eager to learn, and as she grows older she obtains a bit of fire in her that allows her to stand on her own during the toughest times. Her relationship with her brother Fox was another beautiful thing in this book. It's rare that fantasy novels have such a strong familial bond actually shown on its pages instead of implied. Fox is amazingly supportive, even when he doesn't agree with Tea's path.

Overall I think The Bone Witch is a winner. It's atmospheric and beautifully written, and as a fan of slow burn fantasy, this one was perfect. It has a gorgeous magic system and even goes as far as putting a bit of focus on the rigidity of gender roles. I have high hopes for The Heart Forger, the second novel, and I really want to see more of the social issues push forward and more conflict.

I tried to read this several times and I just couldn't get past the first few chapters. It's well written and seems like a very original story I just couldn't connect with it.

First off love, love, love the cover. The idea and plot line were awesome. The writing style and the descriptions were lovely. The world building was phenomenal with hints about absolutely creeptastic monsters. The magic system was really cool and I liked the take on witches, especially necromancy as bone magic.

I adored the characters around Tea, Fox is my favorite. I also really grew to like Mykaela and I wanted more time with her. I did like that there were lots of not flat characters and that they shaped Tea.

There were a couple things I didn't like. My biggest problem was the pacing. It is s-l-o-w.. I also think that the pacing could have been helped by less time spent in The Willows. However I did like hearing about Tea's life and training. I didn't love Tea's crush. Ugh. It got so annoying super super fast. There were too many K names among 3 boys around the same age and all related to each other.

This book was a several day read for me. I picked it up and put it down a lot but I liked it a lot. (I liked the audio a lot too!)

The plot is almost nonexistent. Most of the book revolves around Tea being trained to become an asha. As fascinating as the world is, the characters are dull and underdeveloped. I neither like nor dislike any of them. The excellent and original world isn't enough to keep me interested. I'm sure this will definitely appeal to some but will be too slow moving for others.

I've put off reading The Bone Witch despite having owned it for over a year because a friend told me I would hate it. However, after hearing how amazing it is for months, seeing the gorgeous cover for The Heart Forger, and being told by another friend that I absolutely SHOULD read it, I finally gave it a try!

Tea, not pronounced like the beverage, is the Bone Witch and she is special. She has rare, strong powers that she uses as a child with no training to bring her brother back to life. She is taken by an older bone witch to learn how to be an asha. Intertwined with Tea's narration is that of a bard who has come to find older, banished Tea and learn her story. I enjoyed the way the two storylines were told and anticipated them coming together at the end of the book. All of this sounds awesome, and the beginning had me hooked!

Unfortunately, The Bone Witch becomes incredibly boring and tedious after the first few chapters. There are countless descriptions with very little action throughout most of the story. Tea goes to class, Tea has dinner, Tea makes friends, Tea gets new clothes, Tea has a crush, and on and on and on. Buried within all this monotony is a good story, but it takes so long to get to it that I just couldn't force myself to stay interested.

I found the characters themselves to be just as boring. Honestly, I can't remember any of their names besides Tea and her brother, Fox, who was probably the most interesting character in the entire book. I wanted desperately to care about Tea, but she came off as a special snowflake (is there another word for this that we can use now?) who has amazing powers for... reasons... and she is more powerful than anyone around her for other reasons. She also knows how to use them without training, which is, of course, out of the usual. I really wish more had been explained about why Tea was so much more advanced than the other girls around her.

Something I did love about The Bone Witch was the world building. Since 92% of the book was spent on descriptions, I definitely had a good idea of the world and what it looked like. There was some interesting backstory to the magic and the city, and I thought some of the creatures and especially the daevas were really unique. But again, all this comes at the expense of a plot. There is none.

Finally, I despised the ending. In fact, I thought the audiobook hadn't downloaded the last part and double checked, then texted a friend asking if I'd missed something major. The two storylines I mentioned earlier never came together. What I'm guessing is the middle of the story is shown at the beginning of the book, then we work towards that point from Tea's perspective, but the book ends well before the two converge. It left it all feeling very unfinished.

I didn't completely despise this book, but I was left extremely underwhelmed. I prefer to read series and don't mind a cliffhanger at all, but I hated the way this one was written. I don't mind stories that aren't completely plot-driven either, but this one barely had a plot at all and the characters were forgettable. In the hands of another author, I think this is a story I really could have loved. I just don't think Rin Chupeco is the author for me.

So it’s become a thing where if a book I got a review copy of has been out for so long that it goes on sale for cheap, I buy it. Might be a print copy of the book in a bookstore, might be a Kindle book. It’s my apology for being such a failure of a reviewer, especially if the book is by and about marginalized people. The Bone Witch was one such case. The book left me underwhelmed, but I don’t regret buying it or reading it one little bit. I just wanted more from it.

The worldbuilding and plot are the novel’s strongest points by far. Following Tea from the time her powers as a dead-raising bone witch awaken at her brother’s funeral to when she becomes a full-fledged asha, Chupeco’s fantasy world unfolds naturally as Tea herself learns about the surprisingly superficial asha system while a maid and then apprentice in House Valerian, one of many asha collectives in The Willows, a district of the city of Ankyo. More powerful asha will fight, sure, but a surprising amount of an asha’s time is spent as an entertainer at nobles’ parties as an entertainer. Upon becoming an asha, they have to pay their House back all the money that was spent on them.

It sounds like a criticism of the novel, but the shallow superficiality of the system was actually one of the most interesting points of the worldbuilding. It’s such an obvious flaw that there’s simply no way it won’t come back up later. Since an older Tea is in exile and ready to raise some hell, perhaps she came to the same realizations. She’s fourteen when she’s an apprentice and seventeen as an exile, leaving a gap of three years where something drastically changed Tea.

Most of the novel focuses on Tea’s time as a fourteen-year-old asha apprentice, the process of becoming an asha, and the very slowly unfolding mystery of who is causing chaos within the city. Though all of it is interesting as Tea’s world unfolds itself before our eyes, the actual pacing of The Bone Witch is glacial. Most of the novel’s forward momentum comes not from the above-listed events but from interlude-esque sections in which an older, exiled Tea is telling her story to an unnamed bard. She slowly reveals her plans for war to him and (not unsurprisingly) freaks him out.

Though I don’t know the proper name for it, this literary device is so irritating. Another example: when you read the action-packed prologue to a 400-page book only for the novel to meander along uninterestingly until that action finally kicks in around page 390. It’s a teasing attempt to up the pacing of any slow-moving novel and it rarely works. Here, it’s just annoying. It’s clear something happened to change Tea after the end of her apprenticeship, but the novel doesn’t feature that event. We only get mentions of that big something and implications about it.

That massive gap between who she was in the past and who she was now, leaving readers with questions about what in the world happened, is simply too much for me. A guessing game is not what I wanted from this book. Though its sequel The Heart Forger is out now, I don’t have much interest in picking it up since its jacket copy implies it’s picking up and sticking with where the older Tea’s story left off. It’s worth reading for the brilliance of the worldbuilding, but The Bone Witch is ultimately a mixed bag.

This book wasn't my cup of tea. I liked it the idea of the story and the plot seems great. But something about the first few chapters didn't hook me in. Something fell short for me. I have a sort attention span when it comes to books. If I don't like the first six or seven chapters, I find myself uninterested. Sadly, this book was not what I expected.

So the book started off a little slow but it picked up quickly and kept me interested the entire time! I read this book while on vacation and it was a really good story. I didn't realize at first that this book was part of a series but I'm very interested in continuing the series now!

This is a listening recommendation. Last year I read a galley copy of Rin Chupeco’s book called the Bone Witch. I have to admit I seriously struggled to finish reading it and when I finally finished I was nonplussed. As a reader, I was heartbroken because I loved her books The Girl from the Well and The Suffering. That love did make me want to give this new book and its author a second chance, though. Luckily my library has the downloadable audiobook on OverDrive so I listened to it before passing my final judgement. The readers (Emily Woo Zeller and Will Damron) did a spectacular job and wer able to bring this book to life for me in a way that reading could not. So the next time you are disappointed by a favorite author’s new work or any book for that matter, try it in a different format and see what you think. The audiobook saved this book and the author for me and now I’m so excited to see her next installment of the Bone Witch series The Heart Forger set to release in March 2018!

~ Under the Covers


Bone Witch is a story of a young lady’s discovery of her powers in necromancy among other things. It tells her journey of her beginning and her training into becoming part of the royal witch if you will. And most of all, it tells the heroine’s relationship with her brother, her teacher, and how she became her present self.

The story truly has potential and I appreciated the creativity of this world. It has all the makings of witches and warlocks, royal court politics, battling monsters, and a smidge of romance. Tea’s journey has a bit of similarity to The Memoirs of Geisha which earned a bit of respect from me as the heroine handled quite a bit.

If you’ve seen the ratings and reviews, you’ll know that people either love it or hated it. I, on the other hand, am split right in the middle. There were slow spots throughout the story, and there was a bit of an info dump about the heroine’s past. I would’ve like to know more of the heroine’s present, the other kingdoms, and the brewing war. Perhaps more action and suspense. I assume Ms. Chupeco has more for us in the next installment. I’m also intrigued by Fox’s POV and the possibility of his own story excites me. I hope Ms. Chupeco has that in the works already.

Being a bone witch means being ostracized in a group that has enough problems on it's hands. When Tea does something...unusual, she finds out just how unusual she really is...