I read Stolen Songbird , a.k.a book one of the Malediction Trilogy and I was interested enough to read the second book. But the things that I liked about book one where nowhere to be found in book two. For those who haven’t yet read Stolen Songbird there may be spoilers.

What I liked: The first installment left off at a cliffhanger and the second novel immediately jumped into action. Cecile embarks on a quest to find Anushka, break her curse, and save Tristan. In this novel the love story played a secondary role, which allowed me to get to know the characters better individually.

The Bad: It turns out getting to know the characters better individually was less than satisfying. For one, Cecile and Tristan are consumed by thoughts of their romance but still embark on completely separate quests. They were both working towards different goals and even though the parallel quests were not confusing to understand, they were taxing. For example, Tristan continues to work to free the Half Bloods (it sounds like a bad Harry Potter reference but it really just means individuals who are part troll and part human) and Cecile tries to unite with Tristan by finding Anushka. Unfortunately, the independent narratives bring out the worst in both of the characters. Without the romance driving their relationships, thoughts, and actions the narrator's are sadly predictable and lackluster. Secondly, there were several key details that the author didn’t address well that left me very confused. The first example is Cecile’s bond mark.

Spoiler

Cecile never conceals her mark, but yet in the final chapter Anushka is shocked by the existence of a bond between Cecile and Tristan. You would think that a witch who has lived 500 hundred years with the sole goal of cursing trolls, would notice a detail that pointed to a flaw in her future plan. Like seriously, Anushka saw Cecile almost every day and only when she realized Cecile was bonded to Tristan did she notice the mark.

The second big thing I found unbelievable and confusing was the explanation for Anushka’s curse.

Spoiler

In the first novel, we are told Anushka cursed the Trolls for a good reason: to make sure they would be trapped in Trollus and could never hurt humans. This is a seemingly morale action-- to trap the race that would harm your own-- but at the conclusion to the is novel we are told the backstory of the curse. Basically, Anushka loved King Alexis. King Alexis loved her but was bonded to powerful Queen Lamia. Lamia is jealous of Anushka and Anushka’s bastard daughter. To punish her, Lamia kills Anushka’s daughter. Anushka seeks revenge and so she curses all the trolls. But in order to extend the life of the curse, Anushka would have to live forever. And get this, the only way she could continue cursing the people who murdered her first daughter, was to murder her following daughters and granddaughters. It doesn’t make sense to me. Not one bit. I mean if the murder of my first daughter bothered me enough to curse an entire race, wouldn’t I want to treasure my other daughters? Overall, Anushka could have been a very dynamic character by having good intentions as her motivator. Instead we got a black and white villain who had a very ironic method of revenge.

“She killed him for his weakness, but she cursed the trolls as revenge against Lamia. What the Queen wanted more than anything was to see her children rule the world, and all Anushka wanted was to take that dream from her.”

The third thing I am still puzzling about is, what happened to Cecile’s grandmother.

Spoiler

Yes the book says that she was killed by Anushka but it doesn’t add up. Why would Anushka take both the grandmother and Genevieve in such a short period, especially when there was only one solstice in the time period? It would have made a lot more since if Anushka was parading as the grandmother and her next victim would be Genevieve.

The fourth thing I found odd was the fact that

Spoiler

Cecile has magic on both sides. On her father’s side, her grandma is a witch and on her mother’s side she has Anushka. Isn’t magic rare? Wouldn’t it be odd to have two magical matriarchs? I understand what the author was trying to do; she was trying to mislead us into believing that Cecile’s mother’s side had no magic. Well it didn’t work. I could assume that Cecile was related to Anushka from book one because of the resemblance and other hints.

Finally at the conclusion to the novel

Spoiler

dragons suddenly attack. WHERE DID THEY COME FROM? Up until this point there had only been the slight mention of the POSSIBILITY of dragons existing, but no actual evidence. Even in the troll city there were no dragons to be found. But once the curse is broken dragons suddenly appear? Ugghh this book is dragging me through the mud.

Everything else: Coming into this book, I was still wondering what the trilogy title meant. There has been no mention of ‘malediction,’ so I looked it up. Apparently malediction means a magical word or phrase uttered with the intention of bringing about evil or destruction; a curse. Basically the series is called the ‘Curse Trilogy’ in fancier lingo. I do appreciate how all of the titles have a theme. Stolen Songbird, Hidden Huntress, Warrior Witch The author did warns us in the first book that she loved alliteration. What it comes down to when rating a book, is is entertainment value. It can have no meaning, no themes, no symbols but as long as I enjoy it I will rate it well. I am giving this novel two stars because I was bored by the predictability of the plot. I enjoyed the first book but this one left me cold. I don’t think I will read the third book unless someone gives me it on a 12 hour flight to Japan.