Review: Half Bad - Sally Green

He's half White Witch, half Black Witch.

His mother was a healer, his father is a killer.
He's been kept in a cage since he was fourteen.
But if White Witches are good and Black Witches are evil,
what happens if you are both?

 With exactly this problem Nathan Bryn, the protagonist of the Half Bad Trilogy, has to deal with.

His mother, a White Witch, once fell in love with the most feared Black Witch of all - Marcus. But as Blacks are reckoned as evil, the Council of the White Witches, of course, prohibited this love and Nathan´s mom got married with someone else and had three children with him. Since Nathan´s Mom still was in love with Marcus, they came together once again and had a child - Nathan, half Black, half White. As Nathan is a Half Code, the other children bully him for his mixture of blood - especially the O´Brien bothers, after they discovered that their sister, Annalise, meets up with him.

On top, he regularly has to go to the Council to test whether he is assessed as Black or White Witch. At some point the Council decides that his Grandmother, at whom he lives, isn´t a good teacher/Guardian for him anymore. That way he ends up kept in a cage by Celia, his new teacher.

For almost two years he lives at Celia´s and she teaches him how to fight, trains him... He still has to do the Assessments but it´s still not clear if he´s rather Black or White.

One day Hunters, something like the police of the White Witches, show up at Celia´s and take Nathan with them. Trapped at the Council, Nathan gets at least three tattoos on his little finger and three more over his whole body (if someone cuts off Nathan´s finger, he can make a witch bottle out of it and torture him in this way). Somehow Nathan manages to escape and now he is heading to Mercury to make her perform his Giving ceremony.

The Giving is something every witch runs through as they turn 17. Then a ancestor - usually your mother or father - gives you three gifts and let you drink their blood. This way witches receive their Gifts, their special magical ability.

As Nathan´s mother is dead and he doesn´t know his dad so far, he now has to find Mercury, who has samples of blood from Nathans ancestors. But Mercury doesn´t trust everybody and so Nathan has to be judged as trustworthy first. The one who says Nathan is ready to meet Mercury is Gabriel, with whom he stays in Geneva until Nathan is ready.

Nathan and Gabriel become friends and they do a lot of hiking together when they finally are at Mercury´s cabin.

A few days before his birthday, Nathan, Gabriel and Rose - someone like Mercury´s servant - have to go to Geneva again and steal the Fairborn - a old knife, that once was Marcus´s but is now stolen by the Clave.

here are some difficulties with the ´re-stealing´ - Rose gets shot, Nathan commits his first murder... - and Nathan and Gabriel get separated.

So now Nathan has to walk back to Mercury´s by himself. He arrives just in time for his Giving,

but the valley is full of Hunters then. Mercury and the Hunters fight and now it´s almost too late for Nathan´s Giving, but suddenly Marcus shows up, slowing the time.

He performs Nathan´s Giving and gives him three gifts. Then Marcus disappears again, and a short time after that, Mercury and the Hunters are gone, too.

After all this, Nathan heading to a meeting point with Gabriel, and there he waits for him to come back.

The most interesting thing about Half Bad is, that some chapters are written in the 2nd-person point of view. This makes you feel like Nathan, just like you´re really in his situation.

The book is also written very thrilling, dramatic, humorous... Sally Green is really an amazing author and Half Bad is absolutely recommendable!

This novel is rated 4 out of 5 stars.