Witch and Wizard by James Patterson and Charbonnet
Hey, guys! It's great to be here. You can call me Gigi, and this is my first post here and my first honest to goodness book review. So...bear with me, alright?
First of all, before I start the review I must say that Witch and Wizard is the first James Patterson book I've ever read in its entirety. Other than that, I've only looked at snippets of his Max Ride series (which I decided I was not interested in from some of the reviews I've read). I do have friends who like the Max Ride series and recommend his books, so I decided to check this out out after seeing this commercial on TV. When I first saw it I was only half-paying attention to it, but my head shot up when I heard the narrator say:
"Now you can stop waiting for the next Harry Potter."
Um, now I admit I haven't read all of the Harry Potter books (only the first and second) and haven't been into the series for years, but that's kind of a big claim, isn't it? I mean, jeez. After seeing a commercial like that (which was months ago), I was interested, but not enough to make a whole trip to the library just to pick it up. However, I was at the library the other day to pick up my reserved copies of 1984 and Watership Down (which I fully intend to start reading today), and saw Witch and Wizard in the young adult section, so I decided to check it out to see if it was worth anything. I should say I also chose this book because I'm interested in dystopian novels (which is why 1984 is next on my reading list), and the idea of a "New Order" taking over and these kids fighting against the corruption of a new government sounded interesting. Was this truly going to live up to its claim that this was the really next Harry Potter?
Well.... (WARNING: SPOILERS.)
At least the cover is nice, right?
One of the first things that bothered me right of the bat were the chapter lengths. As in, each chapter is only 2 - 4 pages long and there are 102 chapters in this book, excluding the prologue and epilogue. This really got me because these "chapters" don't really feel like chapters. They feel like very short scenes and make the book hard to follow because the narrators are constantly switching off (more on that later). Patterson and Charbonnet could've easily put together many of these chapters together and had twenty or twenty-five chapters with some actual substance in them instead of over one hundred chapters.
Now, if I had to sum up this story in one or two words, I would choose "wasted potential". Why? Because this plot really had the potential to be something good. This book takes place sometime in the future, in an America that's been taken over by a government called the "New Order". According to one of the two main characters (both of whom I've grown to dislike very much), mention at the beginning of the book that the American government was overthrown. There were "elections, the new government, the ravings of my parents about the trouble the country was in, the special broadcasts on TV, the political petitions my classmates were circulating online, the heated debates between the teachers at school". Later, we find that the New Order had been around for years and took careful steps to take over the U.S., such as monitoring polls, elections, and doing demographics research and other things like that. When their plan was finally in motion, they managed to overthrow the whole government in a matter of months. Sounds at least a bit interesting, right? Well, I ended up being very disappointed. None of those things were ever expanded on in this book. We never find out how the "New Order" managed to take over, we are just told that they're already in power and that's it. We never see any of the drama behind the United States of America's takeover by the leader of the New Order, "The One Who is the One" (which has to be the stupidest "intimidating" name for a dictator that I've ever seen). We never see any other countries react to the takeover. We never see any of the citizens reactions to the takeover. Surely there would've been one big protest or two before everyone is brainwashed into loving the New Order? That was where this book really could've shone and it really saddened me that none of my many questions were answered. Instead, we're given these two kids who've suddenly been kidnapped, hauled off to prison, and sentenced to death. All of the details of the New Order's rise to power are just mentioned in passing with no detail.
And speaking of "detail", that's where Witch and Wizard really falls short. Nothing about this book has any depth whatsoever. All of the characters in this book are flat, unlikable, and lack any sort of personality, and that's especially true for the two main characters, Whitford and Wisteria Allgood (also known as Whit and Wisty or “the witch and wizard”). They narrate the whole book, each of them having their own chapters to themselves. This would've been fine and good as I've seen this done before, but these two have to be the most obnoxious little snots I've ever had the displeasure of reading about. Whit is described as ”beautiful”, “tall and blond”, “slender yet well-muscled”, and “perfectly proportioned”. Okay, there's nothing wrong with being good looking, but Charbonett and Patterson apparently felt the need to remind us of how handsome Whit is every few chapters (read: every few pages). Oh yes, “washboard tummy”, the entire school that the characters went to prior to the story thought that he was the “hunk of all hunks”. He's described as the “biggest and fastest quarterback around”, and the only “flaw” we're ever told (as in, not shown) is that he's clumsy and almost flunked biology (which his sister later says is “cool” for some reason), the first of which does not count as a personality flaw. Also, we're never shown that he's clumsy or might not be the smartest guy in the world in any way during the story. I would actually believe that those flaws were true if I'd been shown that they were true, but no. We're just supposed to take the authors' word for it, and after having his perfect body described to me about fifteen times throughout this book, I think it's safe to label this character a “Gary Stu”. His sister, Wisty, is on about the same level of blandness that he is, except thankfully we're spared the details of how beautiful she is on every other page and instead we get a mention that she's “disobedient”, has “over two weeks of detention to be served in school”, but we are never shown that she's any different than Whit in terms of personality and “voice”.
That's another thing. Both Whit and Wisty are sarcastic, unfunny and let me assure you, no modern teenager in the world talks like they do. Both use childish similes to describe things on a regular basis (example from text: “My heart was thumping like an epileptic rabbit's”) and both are very unpleasant and it didn't take me long to get tired of them. Their “voices” are also the same. Even with the name of the character emblazoned under each chapter heading, I still ended up getting the two confused. The other characters aren't even worth mentioning, save for maybe one girl, Celia, who is Whit's girlfriend a big Mary Sue as well. She's first mentioned in the second chapter (but doesn't show up until about fifty chapters later only to leave shortly afterward with very little explanation) and we are told multiple times about how she's beautiful, rich, and looks like a super-model except she's totally not stuck-up at all, you guys! She was kidnapped and killed by the New Order and now exists as a ghost in the Shadowland, another dimension. However, she can travel back and forth between the dimensions and randomly shows up in the middle to break Wisty and Whit out of prison. Then she takes them back to a little group of “Freedom Fighters” that helps children escape the New Order's prisons.
And about the parallel dimension thing, that was about the part where I just kind of lost it. Halfway through the book all of this nonsense about there being different dimensions or “worlds” that the characters can travel to but it's all so disjointed and confusing that I kind of gave up and rushed through the next twenty chapters until I got to the end. And the ending was terrible, but to understand why it's so horrendous, we must go back to the prologue.
In the prologue, the entire Allgood family (the two kids plus their mother and father), is about to be hanged in front of a stadium of cheering citizens. It's narrated by Wisty, who suggests that we go back a bit and find out how we all got here. That's when the first chapter starts. Towards the middle of the book where the freedom fighters and the parallel dimensions show up, Whit and Wisty are shown a “prophecy wall” in the freedom fighter's hideout where prophecies randomly show up. One of the prophecies is that the Allgoods shall be executed. Interesting enough, right? It's explained that the execution prediction was prophecy “number five”, but prophecy “number six” says that Whit and Wisty are the “Rescuers” and will liberate the country and bring peace. Alright, then. Let's skip ahead a little. So what happens? The last thing we see before the epilogue are Whit and Wisty talking to their parents, who have also escaped from prison and are using magic to communicate again. The parents give them the power to use a magic book and wand. The parents disappear, and then this happens:
“And off we went to crush the New Order.
Except things didn't go exactly according to plan.
Just according to the prophecies.”
And then we arrive at the epilogue on the next page. The Allgood family is about to be hanged, just like in the beginning. That's it. There's no explanation about how the kids or the parents were captured by the New Order again unless “Things didn't go according to plan” counts as a valid explanation. It just switches from the kids being free and happy to being captured and about to be executed, which feels like a huge cop-out. I want to know how they got themselves into trouble again. And then it ends right where it began. The gallows are about to do their duty, but Wisty promises that they'll be okay because she's “a scary witch who keeps her promises”. And then the book ends. We don't know whether they save themselves or not, and that was when I was finally able to put the book away and go to bed trembling.
The writing is bland and choppy. The authors take way too many liberties with those horrid sentence fragments. The settings, characters, and story are never expanded on or fleshed out. There is very little detail except for when character's appearances are being described. The reader's questions about how exactly all of this new government stuff happened are never answered. The story could've been good if the writers had just explored exactly how the New Order managed to take over, how they managed to brainwash all of the normal citizens into supporting, just who are the Allgood parents (they only appear in the very beginning and at the very end and have no personalities like the rest of the characters in this book), how the New Order managed to find out that the Allgoods were a magical family, and I really wish they'd just kept all of that unnecessary alternate dimension crap out. The kids are rescued without having to work for it (Celia just shows up and hooray they're okay!), and there's no explanation for how the kids or their parents were captured again in the ending.
My verdict? Stay the hell away from Witch and Wizard. Don't be fooled by any tween girls telling you that it's awesome and you should totally read it. It's an unpleasant, ugly, disjointed book that had what it took to be so much better. However, instead of a compelling tale in which the last of those who still have free will must fight to take back the country that's been snatched from them, we get a confusing mess that tries to replace actual depth and substance with oh-so-witty commentary from these two immature kids. This book feels really rushed, almost like a skeleton of a book. No meat, just bones. It's saddening, really, and even though I'm not much of a fan of Harry Potter I find it ridiculous for anyone to believe that this is the actual next Harry Potter series. These two authors have nothing on Rowling. I don't know anything about Charbonett, but I've heard of Patterson and I have to say that I'm very disappointed and will think twice before trying any of his books again.
Now I'm going to go eat. Maybe some buttered rolls will make me feel better. Yum.