Recent Reads: Weather Witch by Shannon Delany- DNF

Weather Witch by Shannon Delany
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Available: Now

 

Source: Netgalley and St. Martin's Griffin
Format: Ebook

My Rating: DNF

Goodreads Synopsis:

In a vastly different and darker Philadelphia of 1844, steam power has been repressed, war threatens from deep, dark waters, and one young lady of high social standing is expecting a surprise at her seventeenth birthday party–but certainly not the one she gets!

Jordan Astraea, who has lived out all of her life in Philadelphia’s most exclusive neighborhood, is preparing to celebrate her birthday with friends, family and all the extravagance they might muster. The young man who is most often her dashing companion, Rowen Burchette, has told her a surprise awaits her and her best friend, Catrina Hollindale, wouldn’t miss this night for all the world!

But storm clouds are gathering and threatening to do far more than dampen her party plans because someone in the Astraea household has committed the greatest of social sins by Harboring a Weather Witch.

Review: Weather Witch is a new series by the author, Shannon Delany. Toted as Young Adult and Steampunk in genre the plot takes place in Philadelphia in 1844 and is about a young girl taken from her family, accused of being a witch and enslaved for the use of her power.

I received this book as an e-copy from the publisher and just recently got around to reading it. I have heard over the interwebs that it was going to be a love it or hate it type of book. The masses are definitely divided. I have seen 5 star raving reviews and 1-2 star loathing ones.

I requested this book based on the premise, it was going to be Steampunk and about witches and it is YA…completely up my alley right? Well… not so much, sadly. I really wanted to like and get deeper into this book but I got to 46% and then decided to call it quits. I don’t DNF much but this was one of them for me.

The whole time I found the book to be mmmeehhh. I enjoyed the scenes about Jordan, the main character, and her situation and the doom becoming of the Astraea household but found the other characters boring and their stories for the time being completely astray from the main one, and there were a lot of them.

The book jumps around to various groups of characters and their events after Jordan’s party is broken up by the worst thing that could possibly happen…someone being deemed a witch! (I say this kind of mockingly, because in the first few chapters Jordon brings up this statement A LOT! I understand that you are alluding to the rest of the book, but really like every paragraph?!)

The classification of steampunk was an interesting one for this book; first, it is set in the US in Philadelphia, which in and of itself is strange for a steampunk setting. Secondly, for the first half of the book there isn’t all that much to give us the steampunk world building; yes, there are airships and yes their electricity is gathered in a rather unusual fashion, but normally when a book is steampunk it is STEAMPUNK.

The one thing that I did enjoy was something that wasn’t even in the plot, but the naming of the family, Astraea. I thought it was intriguing that Jordan and her family is thrown into this conundrum of justice against witches when their name essentially stands for ‘justice.’ Astraea was a Greek goddess, also known as the star-maiden (if I remember right :/) and she embodied justice along with innocence and purity…all things that I think are great if they really allude to more in the story later. I just couldn’t have that be the only reason I kept reading (sad face).

Normally this is where I say something along the lines of “this book would be great for people that enjoy …” but today I am not sure I can do that. I don’t think it will appeal to the diehard Steampunk fans and I am not sure there is enough instant plot happening to appease the normal YA readers. If you think this plot line is something for you, feel free to pick it up, I just thought it was slow moving.


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