A review by lordenglishssbm
Greenwitch by Susan Cooper
3.0
This is my favorite book of the series, helped in part because of how different it feels from the one that comes before and the two that come after. It takes the vision Cooper laid out in Over Sea, Under Stone and refines it, cleaning up the language and adding a dash of paganism that stands as a stark contrast to the overarching plot.
To me, the idea that the dark and the light are just two relatively weak players in a vast world is the most interesting part of Cooper's setting, and this is the only book to explore it. The titular witch is petulant, childish, impulsive, and totally indifferent to the war going on around it. The only thing it responds to is affection, which ties in nicely to the theme of magic going beyond good and evil. It makes the setting feel larger by increasing the amount of philosophical implications underlying it, which is a much more interesting way of building a world than just adding lore.
The children are back, and their little arguments are fun to read. This book also manages to repurpose Will into something interesting: A creature that looks like a human but can't quite disguise the fact that it isn't. I appreciated this because Will never quite feels like a kid in any of the books.
I wish the entire series would have taken some of the concepts introduced in this book and run with them, but at least we got this book. It's a pity that what comes next is worse.
To me, the idea that the dark and the light are just two relatively weak players in a vast world is the most interesting part of Cooper's setting, and this is the only book to explore it. The titular witch is petulant, childish, impulsive, and totally indifferent to the war going on around it. The only thing it responds to is affection, which ties in nicely to the theme of magic going beyond good and evil. It makes the setting feel larger by increasing the amount of philosophical implications underlying it, which is a much more interesting way of building a world than just adding lore.
The children are back, and their little arguments are fun to read. This book also manages to repurpose Will into something interesting: A creature that looks like a human but can't quite disguise the fact that it isn't. I appreciated this because Will never quite feels like a kid in any of the books.
I wish the entire series would have taken some of the concepts introduced in this book and run with them, but at least we got this book. It's a pity that what comes next is worse.