"Truthwitch" by Susan Dennard

Susan Dennard's Truthwitch is the first book in a new YA fantasy series, and has been out for a few months now. In fact, the second book is scheduled to come out in January 2017. I believe the series will have 5 or 6 books total. I have seen very positive reviews of this novel so decided to give it a go.

This book definitely did not blow me away but there are a few things that I really liked. First of all, the female friendship in this book is amazing. Normally, in YA and adult romances, the main female protagonist gets so wrapped up in her romantic interest that she has no time for friends. Or, if she does have friends, they end up turning against her, betray her or create some other negativity around her. Not so, in Truthwitch. Safiya and Iseult share a very strong friendship bond and continue to care and protect each other and put their friendship above all else no matter what is happening around them.

The second aspect of the book that I really enjoyed was the political intrigue and the magic. I thought it was very interesting and well-done. I do however, agree with some other reviewers, that this book would really benefit from a glossary of terms. For the first 50 to 100 pages, things are really confusing to the reader because the author simply plunges into the world without explaining much about it. There is wisdom in not including long world building narratives that tend to get tedious and feel like info dump, but a nice concise appendix listing the main characters, kingdoms and types of magic would really be helpful. I hope this will be added in future books so things do not get too confusing.

Overall, the book is very well written and thought through. Once I got through the first 100 pages, I started to really enjoy it. 4 out of 5 stars. I will definitely be picking up book 2.