Book Review: The Witch of Storms by Thea Stilton (Princesses of Fantasy Kingdom #10)

Note: The title of this book has been translated into English by me for the reading comprehension of this blog's viewers as the book itself isn't available in English (yet). The original title reads Principesse del Regno della Fantasia #10: Strega delle Tempeste.

Book ten time! Spoilers ahead.

Nives is ill and is starting to become worse by the day. Nobody can figure out what's ailing her and therefore there is no known cure. Meanwhile, Yara and Samah are trapped in the castle of the Gray Witches and will have to escape. Will they survive? And will Nives be okay?

While most of the book in this series have so far been good, they also suffer from being rather formulaic. This was true for arc one, and for the second "Witch Arc" it has been true so far as well. The books are good, they do have nice world-building, characters and conflicts, but the executions are often so formulaic that it's starting to feel same-y and predictable.

Thankfully, this book turns the formula on its head at least a bit. Not by a lot, but the chapters with Yara and Samah in the witches' castle made for a very nice change of pace. It raised the stakes and gave us some nice interactions between the oldest and youngest sister, really showing the contrast between the two. It was also a very clever way to get us to learn more about the witches without too much exposition, as Yara and Samah discover these things naturally in the castle rather than having it just told to them. And as a nice bonus it also ended up being the solution to Nives' problem as they learned how to make their sister better (by removing the cursed bracelet).

The plotline of the rest of the royal family was admittedly a bit less interesting to me, but it was overall still pretty strong and I like how the Nives plotline was handled. It's been a mystery that was built up decently in the previous book, so to see it resolved nicely here was neat. I also gotta say that the Witch of Storms, Etheria, is my favorite of the witches so far. She has the most fun personality and the coolest design if you ask me.

So yeah, a bit of a step up from the last one, even if not fantastic. 

Rating: 4/5