I received a copy from Netgalley.

An interesting quick read with a switched at birth plot with a magical twist. A UK based YA paranormal romance.

Teenager Poppy has always been awkward and never seemed to fit in anywhere. Whenever she gets stressed, angry or upset, strange things just seem to happen. And as a result Poppy keeps getting expelled from school. Even though she has no idea what happened most of the time. Doesn’t help that her dad is a workaholic and almost never home. Her mum had some sort of breakdown and is an institution convinced that Poppy is not her daughter.

Another teen, Ember lives with a coven of witches in caravans who live off the grid and by their own female only society rules. Ember is really pretty, sweet and innocent and made fun of by the other girls. She’s by far the worst witch in the group and seems to have little to no magical talent whatsoever. Her cousin Sorrel is the meanest of the mean girls. Sorrel’s supposedly destined to be the next Queen of the Witches. Sorrel’s mom Raven is the sister of Ember’s mum Charlock.

There’s some sort of prophecy and Raven has interpreted it to her favour. The witches only take normal men as lovers in order to become pregnant, only the girls are allowed to live. They seem to know when its going to be a boy and the mother is given a potion which kills the baby in the womb before it can be born. Raven’s been manipulating Charlock with potions and spells to make sure if she gets pregnant it’s only ever boys that she knows will never be born. Until something changes and Charlock finds herself pregnant with a girl. Raven is furious at this, she wants her daughter to be the next Witch Queen so the two of them to conspire to make Ember as miserable as possible.

Which sucks because not only is it unecessarily cruel, Ember is really nice. Very naive, but good and pure and wants to believe the best in everyone. Ember has a secret little hang out just on the edge of the witch’s property. By chance Poppy finds her way there one afternoon and meets Ember. They become fast friends, a connection sparking between them immediately.

I really enjoyed the friendship between Ember and Poppy. How they connected with each other, Poppy tells Ember about her normal ever day world and even though she’s not supposed to tell, Ember tells Poppy about hers. Poppy’s world suddenly starts to make sense. She becomes obsessed with magic and witches and convinced that that is why the things around her happen as they do.

While all this is happening Poppy meets homeless teen Leo when a couple of nasty men try to mess with her. Leo intervenes and saves her. I can’t say I really liked Leo all that much. Compared to Poppy and Ember he didn’t seem to have much of a personality, he seemed like a generic love interest with a tragic background, and didn’t do much, while Poppy and Ember and the other background characters all seemed to leap off the page and to life. Leo has an instant connection with Poppy and feels like they were destined to meet. It’s eye rolling YA insta-love at it’s best. Sometimes insta-love works, sometimes not and for me, this one was just annoying.

Poppy starts spending more and more time with Leo, and eventually brings him to meet Ember, who of course having never actually met a boy before is fascinated with him. Meanwhile, Sorrel has noticed Ember’s been sneaking off to hang out with Poppy and blabs to her nasty mother. So Raven has Sorrel spy on Ember to find out where she’s going. And Sorrel spots her with Leo. Next thing you know, Sorrel is suddenly consumed with jealousy. She’s falling for Leo as well.

The plot takes a few darker twists as Poppy learns more about magic and some home truths are revealed. Silly love triangles aside, this was actually quite a good read with some interesting takes on magic. I really liked Poppy and Ember as main characters, both were quite unique and full of life. She makes some interesting choices towards the end of the book. Some of the plot twists were kind of obvious right from the start, but either way, it was a well written book and I’m looking forward to seeing where this story is going.

Thank you to Netgalley and Hatchette Children’s Books for the review copy.

3.5 Stars in my Sky!

Witches, a prophecy and a whole lot of drama is exactly what we get in The Hawkweed Prophecy. The narrative has a sweet tone which is reminiscent of an old fairy tale.

The story focuses on two girl Ember and Poppy. Ember is born into a coven of witches with seemingly little power or interest in the usual witchy things, whilst Poppy is a human who doesn't feel like she fits in anywhere. A twist of fate pushes them together and they discover that everything they believed in is wrong.

I loved their friendship. Poppy shows Ember about being a normal human teenager whilst being educated in the magical traditions Ember's family live by. Each is particularly intrigued by the others world.


A potential romance threatens to dismantle their beautiful friendship but far more is at stake than kissing and first flirtations.

The world building is fun and I kinda wanted to go join the witches. I was a little unsure about the targeted age range for this one but I'd probably class it as more middle grade than YA.

I received a copy from the UK publisher (via NetGalley) in exchange for an honest review!

this book was fun and interesting mostly, but at the same time I felt like the story was a bit all over the place at times and lacked a little structure.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing me with this in exchange for an honest review.


The Hawkweed Prophecy, to quite simply put it, was a mess. What started off a strong and intriguing dark fantasy quickly faded away to nothing but a badly written fantasy/romance. This book had the potential to be a great fantasy with great female characters, as it started off so.

Where to begin? First I must talk about the structure and how this novel switches between perspectives suddenly. There's no prior warning. Nothing. One minute you're reading something from one persons point of view; and then someone elses the next! This heavy juxtaposition between the perspectives was dreadful - it was confusing and I often got lost on whose point of view I was in and why. Honestly - the meaning was lost. I read the same scene over and over again from many different point of views. I wouldn't mind if it served a purpose, but it did not, and instead it felt long winded and dragged out.

OH THE LOVE TRIANGLE / INSTA LOVE. Poppy literally meets Leo, and then the next day she's invited him into her house alone. When he leaves, she brings his mug up to her lips and places her mouth where his just was.

I just ? ? ? no.

Oh and Ember. As soon as she meets him she's instantly in love and of course Poppy then thinks it was her destiny to bring these two people together. Sure. Ember has never seen a man before, Leo's the first, so? It's not like she had much to compare him with? Not to mention that Sorrel, in her own twisted way, has an infatuation with him.

And Leo . . . well boy can't make up his mind, can he? One minute he's making out with Ember and then running to Poppy saying how he's desperately in love with her and how she's his true love. . . and then he's making out with Ember again. HE. CAN'T. MAKE. UP. HIS. MIND.

To me it's like the author can't actually decide what she wants. It's just a mess - one minute it's going in a solid and clear direction, and then any development or characterisation that's been made is out of the window. It's like every time the author sat down she changed her mind but didn't want to backspace what she had written. UGH.

Oh and the female characters. Petty? Check. Stupid? Check. Stereotyped? Check. I mean of course we have to have a mean girl. Of course we have to have the whole "special snowflake" thing. And Ember . . . I just. The author promotes her prettiness as what was it . . . being fair haired and pale? Don't hold me exactly to that - the characters were so boring and bland they all began to blend together as one.

WHAT WAS THE PLOT? No, seriously. I'm asking you. It started off strong with a classic-switchero, and of course, THE PROPHECY. But was soon taken over by the mindless "romance" scenes and Poppy and Ember continually moaning about how they don't fit in, while Raven is just being a weirdo and an abuser to her daughter.

Side note: I really loved Ember's and Poppy's friendship to begin with. I think it started off too quickly - but I liked the companionship and comfort they found in each other and the dell. But that soon faded away to nothing but petty jealousies and hate. Sometimes the touch of sisterhood would come back but then the moment was robbed by thoughts of Leo.

Anyways - back to the lack of plot. Yeah. It kept disappearing. I think if this book had focused more on that then it would have been better. I did like how we saw Poppy actually practice, and it wasn't just on a whim of "hey! look how good I am at this thing I've never learnt before!" but still. It wasn't great.

Oh and the PARENTS. I mean they were all shitty. Especially Poppy's father. He blamed Poppy for something, that wasn't her fault, making her feel guilty and worthless all because he didn't want to out himself and his secret. So he used his daughter to get what he wanted and basically punished her for the thing he knew he shouldn't have. Make sense?? I am trying not to spoil too much.

ANYWAYS - much like the plot, I am going off track. But yeah. Moments where the plot was put back in I was like WOO we're getting somewhere only to be robbed of it like two pages later. I'm not happy about this.

The writing was okay, even if the writing structure was not.

OH! ALSO. THIS WITCHCRAFT. It'd be nice to actually understand how the spells work? Like one minute they have to chant and then spells happen? Other times, like in the duel, they just hold out their hands and blast? Then they talk about only some can shape shift BUT THEN WE GET TONS THAT CAN SHAPESHIFT? Other times we have to use ingredients for spells?? HOW DOES THIS ALL WORK? TELL ME. MAKE ME UNDERSTAND. I just don't think the system was properly explained and there was NO excuse for that. While Poppy was inexperienced, and Leo had nothing to do with the witch world, the rest of the narrators did. So there's no reason why this could have been clearer.

Oh. The world-building. For starters, I was confused with what time period we are in. Secondly, and maybe I wasn't reading clear enough, but where is this set? America? Some made up town? WHERE? How come no ones accidentally walked into this hidden forest place that's just outside town that looks like it came from the 1400's? Does magic protect it? WHAAAT? TELL ME.

I am silently screaming in frustration.

Oh and the ending. Throwing out these plot twists of HAHA, but it was obvious?? Like ?? It's not like it was subtly hinted at so if you didn't come out and give that explanation for it it would be a pile of shit?? I'm just surprised the characters didn't figure it out sooner. SO. OBVIOUS.

But yeah. I think that's it. Maybe. That's all my important points - if I were to nitpick further I could possibly run out of characters.


So overall, I liked the idea. It had a strong start and sometimes was strong in plot, but for the most of it it wasn't. Rather it favoured a dodgy love triangle, poor characterisation, and lost sight of the point of the whole novel. I doubt I'll be continuing on with this series, but I am a curious person . . . so I'll probably read the second one. . .

Did not download this in time, sadly, because it seemed like a great book that I would have loved to read.