Review: The Seven Year Witch, Jodi Redford

The Seven Year Witch, Jodi Redford

That Old Black Magic, book 2

Released: March 23, 2011

eBook, received from author

The Blurb from samhainpublishing.com

After this much foreplay, something’s bound to combust.

That Old Black Magic, Book 2

As head mistress of Beaumont coven house, Clarissa Miles has perfected two things: keeping her sister witches from accidently turning innocent bystanders into toads, and resisting the sexy overtures of her familiar, werewolf Logan Scott.

But her resolve is vanishing—fast. Seven years ago she sold her soul to save her father, and that contract is coming due. The allure of spending her last days indulging in some dirty, naked loving is too tempting to resist.

Logan has patiently ridden out the past seven years, content to do Clarissa’s bidding and ignoring his consuming need to mark her as his. Now that the ban on witch/familiar fraternizing has been lifted, he’s off the leash and ready to launch a full-on sensual assault on her defenses. They’re destined mates, and he’ll do whatever it takes to convince her.

It’s delightfully easy to get her in bed. Get at her heart? Not so much. Especially when a deadly predator stakes its claim on her…and Logan faces a battle not only to win her heart, but save her soul. 

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Product Warnings

This book contains a villain with more personalities than Sybil, a witch in search of redemption and a dirty-talking werewolf hell-bent on claiming his mate in every wicked, sexy way possible. Spontaneous howling may occur. 

My Review

This series has me convinced that Jodi Redford has some serious talent. It’s not just that she crafts the steamiest romantic scenes—many, hot, romantic interactions—she manages to create intriguing characters with life-kinks that she drags us into from her opening lines.

Griffin Trudeau didn’t know it, but he was about to have his bones jumped.

Opening of That Voodoo You Do

This book had me at “bones jumped” in line one. That’s talent right there. I did a double take. With the next book:

Nothing sucked more than having your soul on a seven-year layaway plan. No, scratch that. Having the layaway plan on the brink of expiration? That really blew the big one.

Opening lines That Seven Year Witch

Here I get a sense of the character just from these lines and an idea that she’s in one hell of a predicament. Redford rocks at character voice. We’re always in third person, but we bounce back and forth in awareness. Sometimes we’re leaning towards Clarissa’s POV, others it’s Logan’s. This can be jarring, bouncing around, but each character’s voice is so distinct it flowed seamlessly for me. Logan doesn’t stand around eying a woman’s shoes, for example. Unless he’s flirting with sexuality lines, that’s not likely to match up to his personality—especially this man’s personality. All gruff and sexy. And struggling. Ah, the inner struggle. Love it.

I love a good damaged hero and/or heroine. I felt like both Clarissa and Logan were damaged in their own way. It made them real to me. We get to join them on this crazy journey of Redford’s imagination—which is seriously twisted by the way—and along the way we get our fair share of toe curling smexy scenes.

I admit it. I like a bad boy, and Logan totally fits the bill. There’s something about the hard core, ladies man who really wants just one lady…it pulls me in every time.

In all, I really loved this book. The dialogue, the characters, plot twits, narration…all well crafted by an extremely talented writer. It’s one of those ah-mazing first time reads, but there certain parts of the novel that I feel, much like Lord of the Rings (movie), I’ll be skipping over parts when I read it in the future. (If you must know, I skip the parts with crazy little mutated guy Smeddle—creeps me out).

World building is consistent with book 1, and we even get cameos from Griffin and Jemma—I like that they weren’t totally cut out. There were times, though, that I would like to have spent more time with Clarissa in certain scenes, to get a feel for what she was feeling. I felt a little distanced when things heated up—out of the bedroom (mind out of the gutter people).

The book reads extremely well, although I did get hung up in the middle thinking: “Oh, well it should be about the end, right?” What I didn’t account for was the premise for the book—lien on a soul (reminder—I don’t read book blurbs, hence the confusion). It almost felt like two books joined together at that point, where book A dealt with Logan and Clarissa breaking down the 7-year barrier and climbing into bed—and anywhere else that seemed fitting—and book B dealt with their inner struggles and Clarissa’s date with Seven. It’s not that it doesn’t work, it does actually. The way Redford works the inner and outer struggles for both characters allows time to focus on some good old fashioned fun. And the perpetually horny Logan delivers. Again. And again.

If you haven’t picked up That Voodoo You Do, That Old Black Magic Book 1, you should check it out. Like now. Maximum Witch, That Old Black Magic Book 3 comes out at the tail of September! I’ll be posting a review of that as well, so be on the lookout, on the off chance you still need convincing.

Favorite Quotes:

“Would ya do the rest of us a favor and give ole broomstick-up-her-butt over there a tumble now and then?”

…and disbelief that she was about to engage in sex with someone who kept an available stash of condoms on their coffee table. For goddess’s sake, where else did he hoard them? The cookie jar in the kitchen?

Kegan grimaced in the direction of Logan’s fly. “For crying out loud, does that thing have a damn off switch?”

The remainder of her words falling victim to his mouth, he tugged her against him, his hands burrowing in her hair.

“Hello. Mom unit standing right here. I don’t need to picture your guy’s kinky tiger sex while my precious is reciting her vows.”