The Shadow Wand by Laurie Forest is the third book in The Black Witch Chronicles.
Elloren Gardner has been hiding her secret for too long; she is the next black witch and soon everyone will know it. But the question remains, will she triumph or will her powers bring down destruction and ruin to all?
Forced to flee from even her allies, Elloren must turn to someone she promised to hate forever… her fastmate, Commander Lukas Grey. Now Elloren must decide whether she can trust the man she was forced to fast to in order to stay out of hands of the Gardnerian’s leader Marcus Vogel and his demonic shadow wand.
Together, Lukas and Elloren must find a way to control her powers and train to become the warrior the world needs, but can you ever expect to win a battle when even the trees and nature itself believes the worst of you? Regardless, it is time to fight and Elloren must be ready to give up everything so that others may live.
Hmm, this has been a controversial series and for me, this was probably the least controversial of the three so far… and yet, there was something about it that bugged me. I had a really hard time transitioning from the previous book to this one. So much happened in the first two books and we saw a lot from a lot of characters. In this one, we get fewer narrators and not as much happening, plot-wise. Yes, a few big things do happen but it just felt a little stretched out compared to the previous books–almost like this one was intended to be part of the next one but it got too hefty in terms of page-count. We’ll just have to wait until the next one is published to find out.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the book and can’t wait to see where the series is heading next. I do think Elloren’s “change of heart” was a bit fast on the heels of hearing certain information second-hand and I wish there was a more realistic mourning period for certain characters.
Overall, this is a series I am in for the long haul and I will be waiting for the next one. This one gets 3.5-4 stars from me.
That’s all for now!
-M-