Name: The Unbound Witch
Series: Unmarked #2
Author: Miranda Lyn
Publisher: Self Published
Format: Hardback (available on KU)
Genres: New Adult, Fantasy, Romance, Paranormal, Magic
Noted Tropes: Enemies To Lovers, Shifters, Witches, Found Family
Steam or Spice: Spice
Rating:
Synopsis: Goodreads
A HEART DRIVEN BY VENGEANCE; A SOUL DEVOURED BY REGRET
After finally ending the Dark King’s perceived reign of terror, a heartbroken Raven must face the grief and guilt of becoming a murderer. Her best friend Kirsi might’ve helped her cope, except she has her own existential crisis learning to be a wraith. They find themselves stranded in the human lands with the Dark King’s cousin, Grey, and a new band of misfits desperately searching for a way back home.
BUT HOME IS HARBORING NOTHING BUT RUINATION
In the wake of the Dark King’s demise, the coven leaders have the perfect opportunity to retrieve the Grimoires in their hunt for supremacy and power. But casting near two at once could unleash catastrophic horrors, and Raven’s life has already been shattered enough. Determined to preserve what’s left of their broken worlds, Raven and Kirsi race against time as they battle the remaining coven leaders to stop the Harrowing. And a shocking revelation from the other side might crash Raven’s world once and for all.
Review:
The Unbound Witch is the second book in the Unmarked duology, and so there will be spoilers for book 1 in the review below.
Before I get into this, I was really pleasently surprised when I started The Unbound Witch and discovered that the first chapter was a recap of book one! This is brilliant, and I wish more series did this! Okay, time for the review. I really enjoyed the story, and the characters, the twists and reveals… they were all up my street!
We have more than just Raven’s POV in The Unbound Witch which I’ve seen has both been enjoyed and hated – but I enjoyed Kir’s POV! I felt like finding out how she was handling the fact that she was dead but stuck on the mortal plane as a wraith was actually well written. I’d expect that I would also be upset and angry about this situation… So I didn’t see her POVs as unnecessary nor whiny! Ultimately these two are literally best friends and no amount of sadness or anger (or even death!) would keep them apart and I love that.
I was not a fan of everyone being stuck in the mortal world as a result of Raven casting the death spell on Bastian – this whole section of the book was almost painful to read. It was so slow and it never felt like much was happening – even when stuff was happening. But we were introduced to a group of secondary characters that I adored – Atlas and Torryn who were shifters that went through training with Grey (Bastian’s cousin) when they were younger. The found family aspect of book two really shined! And was possibly my favourite part of this book!
I couldn’t not write about some of the relationships but this section is filled with spoilers!! You’ve been warned.
Okay so whilst Raven and Kir are like the best, best friends ever… Atlas Torryn and BASTIAN give them a run for their money. Together they all truly become one of the best Found Families I’ve ever read. I loved them.
And of course Raven and Bastian are an amazing couple – he is so fiercely protective over her and she over him that they would both sacrifice themselves for each other whilst wanting the other person to not do the same.
Kir has this ability to make everyone love her, but her relationship with Bash and Atlas was beautiful. Which showed some great character growth for Kir despite the whole, ya know, dying thing.
The reason I couldn’t give this review 5 stars was down to the fact that I found the book to be rather slow and it took me a couple days to just reach the 30% mark of the book. But once I got passed this section I found the pace started picking up. My issue with duologies so far seems to be that the second book seems to be much slower, get good, and then rush to finish and it’s a bit disappointing… Unfortunately The Unbound Witch also fell victim to this.
Ultimately we had some great story points, the relationships were brilliant, and the friendships are something to be jealous of! But in the end it fell flat because a lot of the twists and the ending were rushed. I’m not sad that I read this duology, I think I’m more sad that it was a duology (or at least that The Unbound Witch wasn’t longer to allow for things to be explained out better…).
“There’s nowhere you can run that I will not find you. I will chase you all over this world if I have to.”
Reading With Tyler 
Leave a comment