The Ravens Review

GoodReads:

The sorority girls are real witches.

From New York Times bestselling authors Kass Morgan and Danielle Paige comes a thrilling, dark contemporary fantasy about a prestigious sorority of witches and two girls caught up in its world of sinister magic and betrayals.

At first glance, the sisters of ultra-exclusive Kappa Rho Nu – the Ravens – seem like typical sorority girls. Ambitious, beautiful, and smart, they’re the most powerful girls on Westerly College’s Savannah, Georgia, campus.

But the Ravens aren’t just regular sorority girls. They’re witches.

Scarlett Winter has always known she’s a witch – and she’s determined to be the sorority’s president. But if a painful secret from her past ever comes to light, she could lose absolutely everything…

Vivi Devereaux has no idea she’s a witch. So when she gets a coveted bid to pledge the Ravens, she vows to do whatever it takes to be part of the magical sisterhood. The only thing standing in her way is Scarlett, who doesn’t think Vivi is Ravens material.

But when a dark power rises on campus, the girls will have to put their rivalry aside to save their fellow sisters. Someone has discovered the Ravens’ secret. And that someone will do anything to see these witches burn . . .

My Review

Content/Trigger Warnings: Death, suicide, gore, murder, death of an animal (in detail and for a ritual sacrifice), ritual sacrifices, and cancer.

First off, great academia setting, made me miss my Uni days a little. But then I remember student debt and suddenly I don’t miss it at all. Anyway, the authors did a great job with the setting.

The witches are done in a manner that harkens back to ‘The Craft’ but also had such a great twist, loved the association of their abilities and tarot cards!

There was cattiness which I knew to expect, but it did get to me after a while, some of it seemed so trivial given the urgency of the situations they consistently in.

I will tell you what, I did not like one girl from the beginning and so though I didn’t have all the details hashed out, I did figure out the twist before our MCs did and that’s okay. Sometimes we’re meant to find out things before them in books.

Someone is using wicked magic, and despite the girls being catty in close quarters of a sorority house, they’re not evil. The use of wicked magic is no trivial matter.

I did like the male characters in the book, they aren’t the focus, but there’s still romance, and it’s a nice turn. They’re there, we’re interested, but we’re on a path to danger and doom so there are priorities lol.

Scarlett was also probably my favorite of our two MCs though I did enjoy them both. I just felt she was more fleshed out, that she seemed more ‘real’ to me.

One of the reasons I rounded this novel down to 3 instead of up to 4 like I usually do on half start ratings was the amount of plot holes in the book. Too many things went unexplained or left unsaid for me to just fill in the gaps with context or ignore, especially where Gwen and Dahlia and the events connected to them were concerned.

Another reason was the animal sacrifice ritual. THIS IS NOT A REFLECTION ON THE AUTHORS and me saying it was problematic. I just happen to have owned a rat and so that part was actually very upsetting for me.

The gore and creepiness in general though was not a problem. I generally liked all of that and wanted more of the creepy vibes!

Overall it was good, it kept me entertained, I just wanted more answers to the plot holes.

3.5/5 cups of coffee from me. I do look forward to the sequel The Monarchs. This edition (the Illumicrate edition) was also a really pretty edition to read!