I enjoyed The Bone Witch. It’s a YA Fantasy with heavy focus on world-building and character development. Usually, when I read YA Fantasy with a lot of world-building, they tend to focus more on plot and characters don’t tend to shine as much, although there are those which manage to balance characters, plot, and world-building well. In The Bone Witch, there are times when some might find it a little “plot-less” because most of it focuses on Tea getting to the point where she was in the present-day. For me, I did enjoy that part because while there is a plot (i.e. Tea’s training and becoming an asha), the focus on her character development is clearly vital as a setup for what’s going to happen in the next books.

There are two timelines that weave together in this book. In the first one, Tea is in exile, telling her story to a bard also in exile. This is how we first met Tea and sets the tone and stage for what’s going to happen next. In the second, Tea is a young apprentice who discovers she is a Dark Asha who is capable of necromancy and controlling and killing daeva, monsters who plague their world. In the second one, we see how Tea is trained and how she’s becoming molded into the person she was in the present-day timeline. There’s obviously the mystery as well as to how she got to that point and this doesn’t get fully resolved in this book. There are still more things to figure out in the next one.

As I said, this book really focuses on setting up what the world looks like and how the characters develop. With regard to character development, I really enjoyed it and I found Tea to be a very strong character. She has her own ideals, goals, and vision. She’s quite strong and that does give her a lot of confidence but at the same time, she also defers to the advice of those who know better when she thinks it’s more advantageous to do so. I also liked the depiction of her relationship with Fox, her brother. It’s one of the most wholesome and heartwarming depictions of sibling relationships in YA I’ve read and I hope we can get more of that. Less sibling rivalries and more siblings who love and protect each other please. There isn’t much of a romance in this book (although there is setup for it) aside from an infatuation and her mentor’s warnings about giving her heart.

The world building is also quite strong and draws from Middle Eastern and Asian influences. For example, the concept of ashas draw a lot from geisha. There are also many cultural concepts depicted and the vivid descriptions make the world come alive. However, it also doesn’t fall prey to the ‘world-builder’s disease’ which can make world-building unwieldy or even cheesy. It’s world-building done right.

The writing is also very good, lyrical and poetic. It’s very lovely and fits the tone of the book. There’s a graceful rhythm to the prose which really suits the graceful asha this story revolves around. It’s descriptive but not over-bearing, lyrical but not heavy-handed.

I highly recommend this book for fans of YA Fantasy. If you enjoy strong protagonists, a focus on characterization, and great world-building, then this book is for you.