Circle of Three — (2001-2002) Publisher:
With this ribbon I do bind
My heart to yours and yours to mine.
Love, I call you, come to me,
As is my will, so mote it be.
Kate cast the love spell with results unforseen. She cannot stop it by herself, but the book of spells tells her of two strangers who can help her—if only she can find them.
             
               
 Merry Meet: "Warm Sun, Cool Rains..."
Being the second book in the fifteen-book series The Circle of Three, this further introduces to us the concept of Wicca and the three teenage girls that decide to explore it. Kate, Cooper and Annie are three very different girls that met over a spell that went awry, and as a consequence discovered a subculture of Wiccan practices at work in their town of Beecher Falls. Like the previous book So Mote It Be, the story is predominantly told through the point-of-view of Kate, a popular girl who is trying to juggle her ditzy friends with her newfound interest in Wicca and her friendships with Annie and Cooper.
In Merry Meet we are introduced to two major reoccurring characters, Sasha (a young runaway who also becomes interested in Wicca) and Tyler (a male-Wicca that catches Kate's eye) and the trouble that both cause in Kate's life as she constantly tries to keep her Wiccan interests hidden from her friends, especially the bossy Sherrie and her boyfriend Scott. Though it ends on a cliff-hanger, it is reasonably fast paced and draws upon certain storylines that were introduced in the first book (with plenty of room for the sequels).
Together Kate, Annie and Cooper commit to a dedication ceremony that requires them to study Wicca for a year and a day — the stories that follow are each centered around a particular girl and her experiences. Isobel Bird does an adequate job of presenting three independent girls and a (mostly realistic) view of Wicca. Unlike the type of witchcraft you would find in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Charmed, there is a firm grounding in reality, i.e. no levitating, flashes of light or fighting demons. However, Isobel Bird does sometimes slip too far in the opposite direction, as often her stories are rather dull and anti-climatic; furthermore, I have heard complaints that the Wiccan religion isn't taken seriously enough in these books, portrayed as the sort of trendy, flavour-of-the-month gimmick. I could kind of see their point when there are lines like this: "Ritual begins at five, with potluck after." —R.F.
What the Cards Said: "You Will Be Tested As You Go Deeper Into the Woods..."
What the Cards Said is the fourth book in the Circle of Three series, a fifteen-volume set that chronicles the learning experiences of three adolescent girls — Kate, Annie and Cooper, in their year and a day of study in the religion of Wicca.
In this book Annie has discovered her skills in tarot reading, and after she's been talked into playing "Miss Fortune" at the school fair, others pick up on her uncanny habit to accurately predict things. Soon she's the talk of the school, with a range of popular girls requesting information on everything from careers to boys to future events. Flattered by the attention, Annie eagerly agrees to show off her gift.
Well, you don't need Annie's precognitive abilities to know what happens next — some people are freaked out by her premonitions, and when others discover that the future doesn't bring them exactly what they want, they end up blaming Annie for their misfortune. The moral of the story: don't abuse your gifts. But I could've told you that before you read this book.
That ultimately is the main problem with Isobel Bird's books — they're just so darn predictable. Just reading the blurbs on the back covers will give away the whole story. Furthermore, some details of this story just don't work well, and are devoid of any meaningful suspense or climax. For instance, at one stage Annie tries to "test" the powers of the cards, and ends up telling Sasha a fib concerning her reading. This results in Sasha running away, and the inevitable "lesson-learnt" speech from her Wicca teachers. But then what happens? Annie solves the problem by doing another Tarot card reading, that not only tells the reader what they already know, but doesn't help find Sasha in any way. A few minutes later the phone rings, informing them that Sasha's been found and is on her way home. So much for dramatic tension.
Of course, one might argue that Bird is simply adhering to a realistic course of events, but really, if any practicing Wicca thinks that meeting the goddess Hecate in the flesh, or experiencing Tarot card readings that are that accurate comes under the term "realistic," then they're kidding themselves.
But Bird's books are not all bad, as she has a clear, concise (if rather dull) narrative voice, which can clearly describe what the tarot is all about and brings to life a rather enjoyable coven ritual in which the witches-in-training are sent into the woods in order to meet folks dressed as the characters of the tarot.
The three girls are likeable and Bird's most worthy attribute is the way she is gradually letting them grow and learn, but they are also rather unimaginative stereotypes: Annie is the brainy one, Cooper is the rebel and Kate is the popular one who is now suffering for her involvement in witchcraft. They are also surrounded by rather tired stereotypes for friends and associates — the streetwise runaway, the sensitive boyfriend, the catty bitch, and all of their Wiccan teachers are virtual clones of each other.
Ultimately, these books are what I classify as "holiday reads" — they are short, cheap, forgetful buys that you can read whilst travelling, but not be too upset about if they're misplaced. —R.F.
Through the Veil: "The Veil Has Been Rent. Will You Pass Through?"
Through the Veil is the ninth book in the Circle of Three series, which chronicles three teenagers' journey through a year-and-a-day of discovering and exploring Wicca. If you haven't yet come across these books, I suggest you stop reading now and head back to book number one So Mote It Be, as the books are very closely tied together and it's near impossible to read them out of chronological order (which is annoying, but there you go).
The three girls are Kate, Cooper and Annie (the ex-popularity queen, the rebel and the nerd are their individual personalities in a nutshell) and in Through the Veil they are fast approaching Halloween — Samhain in the Wicca calendar. Samhain marks the thinning of the veils between the living and the dead, which is especially relevant for Annie considering her parents passed away when she was young.
This title deals mainly with Annie — she is approaching her sixteenth birthday, and has asked her aunt if she can take a visit to San Francisco for her present. She lived there with her parents before they were killed in a house fire that she accidently started. Now she's been having disturbing nightmares about them and seeks out a way to communicate with them. As such, a few Wiccan rituals are thrown in — a meeting with a physic, a circle taken place at Annie's old home, and the coven's Samhain celebration itself which involves some symbollic "role-playing" along the same lines as the events that took place in What the Cards Said and In the Dreaming. Not that that's a bad thing — these gatherings are pretty much the only reason I keep reading these books.
Meanwhile Kate and Cooper are dealing with their own (less critical) problems. Kate's parents are vehemently against her involvement in witchcraft and react by sending her |
