Search - White Witch, Black Curse (The Hollows, Bk 7)

White Witch, Black Curse (The Hollows, Bk 7)
Larger
White Witch, Black Curse (The Hollows, Bk 7)
Author: Kim Harrison

Book Information
Publisher: Eos
Book Type: Hardcover
Members Wishing: 430
Rating:

ISBN-13: 9780061138010 - ISBN-10: 0061138010
Publication Date: 2/24/2009
Pages: 512

Book Description:
Some wounds take time to heal... and some scars never fade. Rachel Morgan, kick-ass witch and bounty hunter, has taken her fair share of hits, and has broken lines she swore she would never cross. But when her lover was murdered, it left a deeper wound than Rachel ever imagined, and now she won't rest until his death is solve... and avenged. Whatever the cost. Yet the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and when a new predator moves to the apex of the Inderlander food chain, Rachel's past comes back to haunt her. Literally.

Members who requested this book also requested:


Genres:

Top Member Book Reviews

Debbie D. (spoiledrottenbrat) wrote on 3/3/2009...

5 member(s) found this review helpful.

Excellent! This book is her best one yet! Darker, funnier, and with a few answers we have all been waiting for. Rachel has been struggling for a long time with who and what she is and in this book, she finally starts to figure things out. It is a fun and interesting story with ghosts, demons, and more!! A must read for Hollows fans!

Judy C. (Judy-Ree) - Homosassa Spg, FL wrote on 3/1/2009...

5 member(s) found this review helpful.

I just finished reading this book, and I firmly believe that this is Ms. Harrison's best book yet. There were 2 stories that were part of anthologies that were set in The Hollows world, but showed past events in Rachel and Ivy's lives. Both of these stories were incorporated into the present day storyline. I don't think that they are necessary to enjoy this book, but if you have read them, it gives you some additional insight into the story.

This story picks up where we left Rachel, Ivy and Jenks in the the last book. Kisten is dead and Rachel and Ivy are still trying to find the killer and come to grips with everything that has happened. Rachel's brother Robbie joins us for the first time since the anthology story. David, Ceri and Kinsey are mentioned but don't make an appearance in this book. Otherwise, all are old favorites are back and accounted for.

As the title suggests, the main theme of this book is about Rachel and how she is trying to stay a white witch even though she is doing black magic and carries the demon smut. Rachel really comes to terms with how and where her life is headed and makes some hard decisions about her future in this book. I really believe that this book is a turning point for Rachel and Ivy. If you have laughed and cried through the other books in the series, like I have, you will truly enjoy this book as well.

Karissa E. (ophelia99) wrote on 6/16/2009...

2 member(s) found this review helpful.

This is the 7th book in the Hollows series by Kim Harrison. In a series that has consistently blown me away with its great writing quality and fast pace this book was a huge disappointment. I really feel like Kim Harrison was forced to write this book and forced to wrap up the whole Kisten mystery and didn't want to; this book just drags. Quick side note: I listened to this on audio book and the audio book quality was great.

In this book Rachel is trying to remember what happened on the night when Kisten was murdered. Ford is along to try and help her jog her memories. Ivy is still trying to solve the Kisten murder in her own way. Then they get called on a case that ends up involving a mother Banshee who may be killing to feed her child. Oh and Pierce (you know the guy in the short story done in the anthology "Holidays from Hell") pops into Rachel's life. Also like usual Rachel is having trouble with Al (her demon teacher) and is trying to keep things with Marshall on a "strictly friends" basis.

As you can tell from the above things were kind of jumbled together; Rachel didn't seem to know what she was doing most of the book. There are so many things that bothered me about this book. First and foremost is Rachel's whining. I mean you probably could have cut 50 pages out if you had eliminated some of the whining; I felt like counting the number of times Rachel said "But, I'm a White witch!" with an honest to god foot-stomping whine...the number of times this was said had to be in the double digits at least; were they trying to drive home the book title? Rachel acted pathetic throughout the book and constantly said she would change things while she constantly made the same horrible decisions over and over again. It just wasn't interesting to read about that.

Next issue is the Kisten thing. All this build up over multiple books over who Kisten's killer was...it was very anti-climatic. The conclusion to the Kisten murder was weird too (I won't give anything away) but it was very rushed and very unsatisfying and really felt forced; like someone told Harrison she had to wrap up this plot point so she grudgingly did it. My only positive reaction to this part of the story is that we finally can (hopefully) stop hearing "Who was Kisten's killer?".

Then there is the appearance of Pierce, a minor character in a short story in an anthology half of the readers of this series probably haven't read. Pierce takes a major part in this story and I thought it was odd that he suddenly plays such a big role in Rachel's life. His inclusion felt forced and unnatural. The Banshee character Mia was also unsatisfying; there was so much "we have her, we lost her, we have her, we lost her" that I just got bored with the whole story. Rachel's whole moral struggle with bringing in Mia was odd, it was like Rachel completely lost her sense of right and wrong and wandered around confused for most of the Mia investigations.

Of course, to bring even more pain into the mix Harrison had to (again) bring up Ivy and Rachel's blood balance. I had really, really hoped we were done hearing about this. In fact it seemed pretty tied up in the last book and I was disappointed to see it rear its ugly head again. Bringing this up, yet again, added to my boredom and made me roll my eyes...I mean come on let the characters move on and get on with the story. Same with Marshall, what was up with his relationship with Rachel, is it there just to take up page space?

There were a couple good pieces to the story. Pierce is actually an interesting character and I am eager to see more of him. Eddings and Glenn were great characters and added more to the story than any of the other characters. Al stole the scenes he was in too. Also Bis was awesome and I hope the gargoyle is in the story more in the future. Rynn Cormel is an intriguing master vamp and I am also eager to find out what his future actions are. In fact all of these characters were way more interesting than Rachel and Ivy; maybe Rachel's character is just getting tired. All I know is something has to change or I will be getting rid of all the books in this series and dropping it.

All in all a disappointment. This was a long, long book that felt forced and chased itself in circles a lot. There were a couple bright spots, but overall I just wanted the book to be over.

Christine H. (solarawynn) wrote on 3/1/2009...

2 member(s) found this review helpful.

This book felt alot darker than the others.Overall. I did have a few times I laughed out loud. I felt sad when I was finished.

Dana (daedelys) wrote on 7/6/2009...

1 member(s) found this review helpful.

While still good, this book was just not AS good as the rest of the series has been. I just got done reading the series back-to-back during the past week, so perhaps it's because a lot was still fresh in my head that this one came out lacking. There were times when it just dragged on and I wanted to smack Rachel for acting like a whiny twit. I even noticed certain jokes (like the Jedi Mind Trick) being stolen from other author's books that I've read, so that was something of an annoyance. It also felt like some of the familiar characters were thrown into the plot just so they could make a cameo, even though they really didn't do anything important, but instead having to read about it added to the length of the book.

Rachel and Ivy's relationship continues to be the same old "I love you but I can't sleep with you but I want to share blood with you without sleeping with you" thing. So don't expect any surprises there. Jenk's continues to worry about his wife and is his usual self, so there are some laughs with his comments.

Rachel's brother showing up in this story didn't really add to anything other than the over-inflated mama-drama she believes she has with her mother and to let us know there was some definite sibling rivalry going on.

Big Al was his usual self and it gets irritating how Rachel keeps expecting him to be something other than a manipulator. This TSTL attitude she has about the obvious gets redundant because her character doesn't seem to learn any life-lessons, even though people around her try to give advice which falls upon deaf ears.

The search for Kisten's killer finally ends and I was really disappointed in the closure on that one. It felt like Harrison just had nothing on it, so that's what she gave. Nothing. The abrupt end to her relationship with Marshall was equally lame.

Pierce's character is interesting, although every time he wanted to explain something to Rachel, she "didn't want to hear it" and so we're left with knowing what he wanted to tell her because she couldn't stop and listen for 5 minutes. I really hate when so many books/movies have that little hook.

The whole banshee thing was interesting, although it's definitely the first time I've read a book where a banshee's not a screamer. (Hence their name.)

Overall, the book was good, but did drag a little. I really hope that the next one in the series will pick up and be more like the earlier ones. But, this one was, in my opinion, the worst I've read out of the series because it felt like it was filled with just a lot of page-filling to get a book out.

Karina F. (FineLQQKn) - Boynton Beach, FL wrote on 3/24/2009...

1 member(s) found this review helpful.

Great series. Love the pixie.


Please Rate these Book Reviews

Andrew/Darcey J. (Andrew-Darcey) wrote on 4/17/2009...


This was the best book in the series so far. Loved it!


Book Wiki
Series
The Hollows  7 of 8
Original Publication Date (YYYY-MM-DD)
People/Characters
Rachel Morgan (Primary Character)
Real Places
Fictional Places
Important Events
Awards and Honors