A review by amaliachimera
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna

emotional hopeful lighthearted relaxing
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

This was pretty cute and heartwarming, but also lacking depth amongst the tweeness! I was expecting more magic in a book with “witch” in the title, and magic mentioned so much in the blurb, so that let me down a little, and I’d say this book is more about relationships and a little bit of trauma rather than magic. The found family aspect of this book is what I liked the most, since I think a lot of neurodivergent people IRL gravitate towards this idea. (And I felt like the magic aspects were a subtle, maybe unintentional, mirror to neurodivergence.)

I liked most of the characters, aside from the trope of “jerk who MC falls in love with despite being a jerk all the time,” which just makes me sigh. Folks, the heart of gold has to be more visible to make this trope work… liking some kids is not enough!

My main gripe was how random and frequent the word “fucking” and “fuck” were in the writing. I don’t mind cussing, really!! Haha. But it just felt so awkwardly interjected into the dialogue and characters’ thoughts, so much so that I began to suspect the author put them all over to take down the twee level a notch. I don’t think it worked, and moreso, it was jarring against the cozy world of this book! Also the most cringe at the line, “that’s not the only thing that’s hard” 🤢 — which at least was not spoken out loud.
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