Life isn’t bad for psychic Jolie Wilkins. True, she doesn’t have a love life to speak of, but she has a cute house in the suburbs of Los Angeles, a cat and a quirky best friend.
Enter Rand Balfour, a sinfully attractive warlock who insists she’s a witch and who just might turn her life upside down. Rand hires her to help him solve a mystery regarding the death of his client who also happens to be a ghost. Jolie not only uncovers the cause of the ghost’s demise but, in the process, she brings him back to life!
Word of Jolie’s incredible ability to bring back the dead spreads like wildfire, putting her at the top of the Underworld’s most wanted list. Consequently, she finds herself at the center of a custody battle between a villainous witch, a dangerous but oh-so-sexy vampire, and her warlock boss, Rand.
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For our first book club read, we went with
Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble by H.P. Mallory. It seemed interesting and it was free on Amazon. Everyone was pretty much in agreement: It was a cute read and we liked it enough that we will (eventually) read the next installment, it's just not on the top of our list. Overall we felt that it could have been more in depth in certain places. We wanted more of a backstory - which may happen later on in the books, but we felt since it was the first book in the series that we should have been introduced properly into this world. Some members felt it was anti-climactic at times.
Discussion points:
The dual between Rand and Bella: I really liked it, thought it was cute. I've never read anything like that before so I thought it was rather ingenious. Another member has read other dual scenes similar to that one before and was more accustomed to them - she liked the scene but wanted that particular scene to be more in depth.
Wingfield Hall: This was something that personally just irked me. The author references Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester's home which she calls Wingfield Hall. Now I've never seen the movie version of Jane Eyre, but I know (and love) the book and the musical, and Mr. Rochester's home is named Thornfield not Wingfield; so it was a rather cringe-worthy moment for me.
Backstory: This is part of the in depth comments that have already been made. We were a bit confused and left with a lot of questions. We wanted to know more about the relationship between Jolie and her mom; I personally was surprised that her mom didn't put up more of a fight when her daughter left the country. We also wanted to know more about Christa's backstory; she had a boyfriend before she left the country, we gathered that she broke up with him but what happened? Did she feel bad about it, did she hurt, did she just not care, was he just a fling? Also, what exactly are some of the rules in the witch community? This is something both the book club members and Jolie would like to know; it would have made Jolie's life a little less complicated if she were privy to that information. One particular thing that I brought up was that Rand could sense Jolie when she's near; in one scene he could sense her from the elevator, yet in another scene she walked into his room and had to say his name for him to even notice she was there. Is there a particular reason why he could sense her before but not during that particular scene? How does his sensing work, exactly?
Jolie: There were times when Jolie got on our nerves. One of the members said that Jolie was supposed to be this independent strong individual, but sometimes she came off rather weak and whiny. I agree, and I remember saying out loud during a particular whiny moment that she should just man up and deal with it. I thought she was a bit self-centered at times and personally I got tired of the way she treated Christa; she either ignored her completely, or just gave her attitude when all Christa was trying to do was make her feel better.
Spelling: There were a couple of spelling mistake, enough that it took us out of the story, and enough that more than one person noticed.
This group rating was very easy to determine. I will say this though, the cover is very cute!
