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A review by anovelstart
White Cat by Holly Black
4.0
I found this book quite unusual, unique. I am quite fond of supernatural mystery books so I thought I'd give this one a go after Amazon recommended it to me for something ridiculous like 80p.
Anybody in this world who can work magic is called a worker (short for curse worker). It's set in a world just like our own, except there's magic and it's banned. Magic is dealt through touch so everybody has to wear gloves. If you remove a glove, people pale and think they're under attack. I thought this was quite a unique concept, something so innocent as a hand that can be used as a weapon. Furthermore, Cassel's mother had a trick of cutting a small hole in the tip of her glove so she could use her magic on the person who shook her hand (finger to wrist connection). It's very well thought out by the author on how these people, so suppressed, have adapted to cope.
I like Cassel as a character, it's 17 years old and always on the outside of the circle of friends. He's always wanted to be a worker because he came from a family who are all workers. Workers keep their knowledge amongst themselves so he's frequently left out of family meetings. He's always been an outsider. I think quite a lot of people can relate to a person like this at some point in their lives.
I nearly gave this book five stars, except sometimes the mystery part of the plot was quite obvious. Most of it wasn't (which is good) so I still gave it four stars.
I really liked the mystery part of this book because it was quite unusual. How do you unravel a mystery when your memories of the event have been taken away? The book was quite short (320 pages) so I finished it in a day and a half, but it was well worth the read. The world Black creates is totally unique to any supernatural mystery series I've read before and due to the authors 3D characters and life-like world I couldn't wait to read the rest of the series (I'm hoping it's a long one!).
If you like supernatural mysteries you should definitely give this book a try. It even has the Mafia! They're curse workers and are pretty bad-ass.
Enjoy!
If you would like to read more of my reviews please visit my blog at: http://a-novel-start.blogspot.co.uk/
Anybody in this world who can work magic is called a worker (short for curse worker). It's set in a world just like our own, except there's magic and it's banned. Magic is dealt through touch so everybody has to wear gloves. If you remove a glove, people pale and think they're under attack. I thought this was quite a unique concept, something so innocent as a hand that can be used as a weapon. Furthermore, Cassel's mother had a trick of cutting a small hole in the tip of her glove so she could use her magic on the person who shook her hand (finger to wrist connection). It's very well thought out by the author on how these people, so suppressed, have adapted to cope.
I like Cassel as a character, it's 17 years old and always on the outside of the circle of friends. He's always wanted to be a worker because he came from a family who are all workers. Workers keep their knowledge amongst themselves so he's frequently left out of family meetings. He's always been an outsider. I think quite a lot of people can relate to a person like this at some point in their lives.
I nearly gave this book five stars, except sometimes the mystery part of the plot was quite obvious. Most of it wasn't (which is good) so I still gave it four stars.
I really liked the mystery part of this book because it was quite unusual. How do you unravel a mystery when your memories of the event have been taken away? The book was quite short (320 pages) so I finished it in a day and a half, but it was well worth the read. The world Black creates is totally unique to any supernatural mystery series I've read before and due to the authors 3D characters and life-like world I couldn't wait to read the rest of the series (I'm hoping it's a long one!).
If you like supernatural mysteries you should definitely give this book a try. It even has the Mafia! They're curse workers and are pretty bad-ass.
Enjoy!
If you would like to read more of my reviews please visit my blog at: http://a-novel-start.blogspot.co.uk/