A review by stormlightreader
Her Majesty's Royal Coven by Juno Dawson

4.0

"The oldest covens had always been in the north and Scotland because - simply put - the north is more magical"

I am genuinely so surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. I was gripped the whole way through and I found most of the POVs enjoyable but when I finished, I was a bit unsure whether I'd enjoyed it (until I tried four other witchy books and DNFed them all). 

It had a lot going for it. It was atmospheric and set in the UK, which I loved! The book had a very similar feel to Charmed (the original TV show) and Dawson even mentioned Charmed, which made younger me very happy. I loved the witches leading normal lives aspect and the natural explanation for the powers was excellent. 

The first 40% felt like build up and that was a huge positive for me, especially since it's laying the groundwork for a trilogy. The only thing that stopped this being an immediate favourite was Leonie's POV, which always took me a few pages to get into, because those chapters brought up discussions that felt shoehorned into every situation Leonie was currently in. On the other hand, my favourite POV was Niamh. Hands down. There were some great side characters like Valentina and there was some awesome scenes showcasing the witchcraft!

 "Simply being in the company of other witches was restorative of itself. There was a reason they came together in covens" 

The ending left me wondering whether I felt compelled to continue on to book 2, mainly due to the cliff-hanger ending with Ciara.