Miss Mabel's School for Girls

I received this ebook in exchange for a honest review.

Bianca Monroe is a sixteen year old witch with a family curse that threatens everything she holds dear, to save herself and her family, she goes to Miss Mabel's School for Girls, she must get close to the only person who can reverse the curse, Miss Mabel...

I really enjoyed this one. A very good start for this new series, I'm definitely intrigued as to where it's going. Bianca is a strong MC, the world building is very is good, even if we spend most of our time in one place, can't wait to learn more about it.

Funny thing, just this week I read a review (for another book) where the reviewer made a point about female villains interest always being a man, "Why can a women villain not just be after power?" I think we've found her!
In fact there are 3 male characters in this book altogether.

If you know me at all, you know I love my fantasy filled with romance, I went into this book with the feeling there wouldn't be much of it in there, I was right. However, I still enjoyed this book!

It was refreshing! It's all about the plot. And the plot is very good,there are twists and turns, overall very enjoyable!

And who's to say what new characters are coming our way in the next installment.

Definitely recommend this to fantasy lovers!

Happy Reading!

Bianca Monroe is beginning her school career at Miss Mabel’s School for Girls. As a first year student she is expected to learn everything she can about magic and stay out of the way of the second and third year students. But Bianca has other plans. When the time comes for girls to volunteer for the ultimate training test, Bianca steps up and demands to take the challenge. She can’t wait until she has formal training under her belt. Her grandmother was cursed and as the third generation after the curse, she must break free or die on her 17th birthday. As the lessons get darker and darker Bianca continues to face Miss Mabel’s tasks and test the boundaries of her own inner strength. Will she be able to overcome the hurdles placed before her? What is Miss Mabel’s underlying motives in pushing so hard?

Miss Mabel’s School for Girls is the first book in The Network Series. This magical tale has everything a reader can wish for except a romance. That would be expected in a story that takes place at a school for girls, yet this is the first book and it is likely a romance may be in Bianca’s future. Readers who enjoy a first book that has a clean ending will not be happy with the final chapters. There is no cliff hanger, yet readers are left with a feeling of despair in not having a satisfying conclusion. If you as a reader that doesn’t want to wait, please don’t read this book until the second book is available. This is a great start to a new series and I will definitely be looking for the rest of the series in the future.

Excellent!

This will be the next best thing to Harry Potter!

A definite must read! I loved it from cover to cover and could not put it down!

Cannot wait to buy it for my own library. I will be telling everyone!

I was surprised by this book and storyline. I didn’t quite know where it was going and I read the book in one sitting! The story follows Bianca as she becomes an assistant to the evil Miss Mabel. Bianca’s family has a curse that was placed on the women’s side long time ago and only Miss Mabel can lift it. So Bianca strikes a deal with Miss Mabel but NEVER UNDERESTIMATE HER!

Bianca is a great character though at times naive at times. She definitely grows in the story and becomes more aware of her surroundings. She was snarky at times and made me LOL. (I’m sure my landlord thought something was wrong with me) She shows great strength and I could relate to her really well. She also makes friends with two other girls who complement her well. Leda, quiet and weird and Camille, petty and loyal.

Now…Miss Mabel! What an EVIL character!!! She is so manipulative! I like how we already knew who the evil person is and didn’t have to take the whole story to find out who. It was a nice change from other books and made the story move faster in a sense. I really liked her as a character even though she was evil and all that. She was a good type of evil that made you want to strangle her!

The pacing was a little slow in the beginning and it didn’t move until a little half way through the book but it was still a good book. I recommend this to people who want a change from clique story lines.

I received a free copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Bianca Monroe is a 16-year-old witch. A powerful Inheritance curse has been placed on her mother and grandmother. The witch behind the curse is none other than Miss Mabel of Miss Mabel’s School for Girls. The school is the most prestigious one in the Witches’ Network and every year, it hosts a Student Competition, the prize of which is private lessons with the school’s High Witch. Within the first few hours of arriving to the school, Bianca volunteers for the Competition – the first first-year volunteer in centuries. She needs to get to Miss Mabel and to save her family. But what she doesn’t realise, and what she has been warned about, is that winning the Competition was the easiest part – Miss Mabel is cunning, ruthless and ambitious and has her own agendas, for which Bianca could be the perfect weapon…

“Miss Mabel’s School for Girls” is a fairly short novel – I managed to finish it in an afternoon. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I was pleasantly surprised. For a debut author, the world of The Witch Networks is quite solid – I read a lot of fantasy and paranormal books, and witches, together with vampires, are amongst my least favourite premises. Katie Cross, however, did manage to make it work for me. Perhaps it’s because I love novels set in boarding schools, and I especially like it when there are actual lessons and learning going on – otherwise it’s just a building where teenagers rebel and manage to fool experienced supervisors with the dumbest tricks in the book. The writing is unpretentious and sets the fast pace quite nicely. Even Bianca’s occasional internal monologues fit it really well.

The book is the first instalment in “The Network series”, which explains the brief, albeit, as I said above, quite solid explanations of the world of The Network. One of the things that surprised me was that the witches in the book were more “Harry Potter” than those who practice Wiccan religion. The students at Miss Mabel’s School learn charms, spells, magical arts and other things of the sort – which is what we see at Hogwarts. However, the world of Harry Potter doesn’t have High Priests and Priestesses, whereas in “The Network” they are quite important. I look forward to leanring more about the world in the next installment!

“Miss Mabel” is a quick, fast-paced read that doesn’t try to be anything other than a nice way to spend a summer afternoon. It is a very good book for a summer reading list. My rating is 6.5/10

Miss Mabel's School for Girls was a very decent introduction into a new series. It didn't fascinate with original ideas but it could convince with a well-written plot and some interesting characters. In the second half, it was hard for me to keep up my reading motivation but I got through and don't regret it.

At the beginning of the book, Bianca is so incredibly nervous about becoming a first-year student at a network witching school. But it soon turns out to be unnecessary since she's trained for this event all her life. In the first half of the book, Bianca works on winning an important competition to become the assistan and personal student of Miss Mable, an infamous witch. In the second half of the book, she struggles with her immense workload and gains even more knowledge in the world of witchcraft.

This book didn't exactly blow my mind, but it was still entertaining. The worldbuilding was a little bit sketchy, only mentioning some very marginal historical background that might explain a world full of magical users. Bianca was a nice main character. I loved her single-mindedness and how she tried to be strong for her family and the curse that lies upon them.

I think, there was one thing missing in this book: boys. I mean all the girls don't even talk about them. Somewhere towards the end, Bianca's grandmother mentions some boys and wants her to snuck out and visit the boy's school. But that's about it. Didn't seem exactly authentic for teenage girls no matter how studious or ambitious.

I think the book was a bit too long. At times, I was bored out of my mind because there just wasn't anything happening. Biance read this tome, and tried that potion, and started all over again the next day. I would have wished for a little bit more action and intrigue.

I'm not sure whether I'll read the next book of the series. It would have to be completely different. But I'm pretty sure the author won't go back to this setting and maybe there will be a bunch of new things happening which would be perfect. I also hope that there will be some boys or men included.

I loved this book. I loved how there was more than one plot, how it went on and on and even though it's to be continued, it was pretty involved for a first book.

I loved this novel! Please click the link to see my review on my blog Stacks and Shelves. I have also posted links to this review on my Instagram and Twitter to maximize exposure to book lovers :)

I found this to be a charming book, with an interesting heroine and story. Having the threat of an impending death curse hanging over her head, a young woman is accepted into Miss Mabel's School for Witches, and immediately volunteers for a competition for the favor of the sadistic head, who is the only person who can remove the curse. The story unfolds nicely, although there could definitely have been more detail of the magical education and less politics. It also ended without sufficient resolution; it just ended. I look forward to the next installment.

I was given this book by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.