So despite me reading this book back in August for some unknown and bizarre reason I never wrote my review up for 'Half Bad' by Sally Green on this blog, but managed to make a YouTube video for it? I have no idea what went wrong there but here it is nevertheless...
Sixteen-year-old Nathan lives in a cage: beaten, shackled, trained to kill. In a modern-day England where two warring factions of witches live amongst humans, Nathan is an abomination, the illegitimate son of the world's most terrifying and violent witch, Marcus. Nathan's only hope for survival is to escape his captors, track down Marcus, and receive the three gifts that will bring him into his own magical powers- before its too late. But how can Nathan find his father when there is no one safe to trust, not even family, not even the girl he loves?
I finished this book so so quickly, I'm not even sure I have ever read a book as quick as this one! Its actually turned out to be one of my favourite books I have read so far in 2014 and funnily enough I only bought it because the website Goodreads was bombarding me with adverts about it so I caved and decided to pick it up, clueless as to what it was about originally haha...
Anyway, this book is about good and bad witches. At the beginning of the novel you meet Nathan who is being tormented captor, unknown to us as to why this is happening to begin with.You soon learn that Nathan is a "half code" which simply means he is half bad (black) and half a good (white) witch. Black witches are frowned upon whereas the white witches are seen to be the good guys, and because Nathan is a half code those who surround him are wary because he is half black witch- and dramatically his father Marcus is famous for being the worst of the black witches around.
Nathan goes through a series of events where he meets other witches to find out more as to who his father really is and whether he is who everyone has described him as. Perhaps the view of his father is more exaggerated by the white witches compared to how he actually may be in person.
What I loved about this book is firstly that its set in London, Scotland and Wales- territory I am somewhat familiar with because of living in the UK! Where I read a lot of American novels I can find it hard to picture what its like in a different environment, so I felt quite settled with knowing how this setting may look like.
I'm currently not enjoying Nathan's character- oops! However Sally Green has created some amazing characters in this book, you have these two guys who are the stereotypical London "cockney" figures who I can picture to be crafty and ruthless. Again, a character named Gabriel (although pronounced as Gabrielle) who is definitely my favourite character currently. He's funny, quirky, and becomes close friends with Nathan which to no surprise shipping of these two is already happening!
One flaw I will say is that at points it can be quite hard going where Nathan is meeting a lot of people on his way to meet his father that it did seem a little pointless but regardless of that its an easy read and full of suspense and I am very excited for the follow on to this book 'Half Wild' :)
