Reviews

Witchmark - Die Spur der Toten by C.L. Polk

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lizruest's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

ameruck's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny mysterious medium-paced

Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

hirvimaki's review against another edition

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2.0

I'm of two minds here. On the one hand, I feel like Polk did an admirable job of world building, even though at times it felt a little like a cheat based on London, but totally not London. And I always like when magic has rules. I like consistency and a solid framework so that magic isn't just a gimmicky plot device (the good: Dresden Files, the bad: Harry Potter). And I really enjoyed the class structure and the depth that brought to the story. It really was the most fascinating part of this book.

And yet...there was a lot of grey in this book. Slavery being a key component to the tale, it felt...unresolved and a bit dodgey. And as to the magic of the world, I really did not understand who knows what (Does everyone (read: non-magic users) know the upper class are magic users?) and the repercussions that the various practitioners suffer (privilege or punishment) didn't seem very well explained - but perhaps I missed it. And finally, the romance. Meh. It did nothing to add to the enjoyment of the tale and in fact was distracting in that it felt shoehorned in.

I vacillated between two and three stars, but in the end I felt there were just too many little pieces that didn't fit and left me disappointed.

maddoxx's review against another edition

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3.0

Very confusing magic system and world building, often lacking sufficient explanations.
A+ for characters though, they alone made this book intriguing enough for me to pull through.

polemos's review against another edition

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mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.5

The main character embodied his privilege, I suppose. Starting from a militant stance that slavery is wrong and must be abolished and transitioning to slavery is wrong but maybe we can just treat our slaves better? Please???

The mystery did not flow well with the reveals, perhaps because we spent so much time with the main character as he re-experienced high society and rationalized atrocities. The denouement felt rushed for the same reason. Also unsatisfying since much of the interesting consequences happened while the main character was sleeping so we just get a brief AAR at the end.

bookph1le's review against another edition

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3.0

I enjoyed this book, but...

The execution was hugely problematic. The narrative got away from the compelling central mystery and wandered too much. This was unfortunate, because I very much wanted the book to fully develop the mystery aspect as that was my favorite part. Sadly, it did not.

Spoiler-y, so read beyond the tag at your own risk.

Spoiler

Also, I was extremely annoyed by how credulous Miles is. I mean, he's very, very stupid when it comes to his sister. Her sudden and inevitable betrayal (hahahaha!) surprised me not one iota, however much it surprised him. Instead, I was scratching my head and wondering why anyone in their right mind would wander back into the belly of the beast after going to great lengths to escape it.

I still want to read the next installment, though. I'm interested to see where the series goes from here.