After the events of the first book, I didn’t think another story here was necessary. This story did surprise me with the direction the author went with but there wasn’t really much payoff to the setup. Let’s discuss.

So this story is a direct sequel to the original story The Witch Haven. Because Frances and Finn opened a portal to the afterlife, the veil between life and death is weakened. Neither can cast consistently and their powers act unpredictably. They haven’t spoken since the events and Frances would like to keep it that way. She goes on a vacation to France with her friends, but with an ulterior motive. She’s found someone she thinks might be able to help her with her magic and she also wants to see her man, Oliver. When they all get to France, they discover another society of witches is using the veil as a way to make themselves immortal. Frances and friends must find a way to fix the veil or her magic will never be the same.

This story is relatively basic on the surface and seemed like an unintended sequel rather than a planned continuation. It feels superfluous and the resolution doesn’t do much for me. Many things are still left unresolved and the relationship dynamics only slightly evolve. Frances has a lot of trauma that she carries after the things she’s done and the weight really gets her down. I’m sympathetic to her struggles, but I got tired of her downer personality. She’s relatable in the worst ways and there’s not enough instances of her looking at the bright side for me to see a light at the end of the story. Her dire mood causes relationship tensions with Oliver and their complications were so sincere that I hoped they’d be able to work it out. Her other friends, Lena and Maxine, are good compliments to Frances’ personality. They take a backseat for much of the story and this decision puts most of the focus on Frances, which as I said before, is a downer. There are a lot of times where the group is hashing out a plan and their back and forth had some of the better moments, but from Frances’ perspective, they were all foggy and meaningless. She focuses so much on the bad that the only positives in the story are when Oliver sweeps her off her feet or Lena and Maxine comfort her. I would’ve liked to see a more confident Frances here, and the decision to keep her as a mousy, unsure protagonist really did a damper on my enjoyment of the story. The veil between life and death isn’t particularly interesting though, so I’m not sure what could’ve actually made me enjoy it.

Minor spoilers here (skip the paragraph if you care) but Finn is in this book and his hopeless love for Frances makes me roll my eyes. Though the issue with the veil is mainly his fault, he’s present too often in the story, doing nothing with the main group and I think it would’ve been more fluid for the group to run into him as a member of the secret witch society in Paris rather than how they meet him. I just can’t bring myself to have any sympathy for him and his redemption arc is completely forced and unrealistic. This guy should not be here. Also, the Pascal character is handled terribly here. I couldn’t believe half of what happened with him. I was questioning “why” way too often when his story played out.

The entire story I was questioning the reason behind this sequel. Frances does not grow in this story and there’s no real closure for any of the characters. I’m not saying there had to be a “happily ever after” but there needed to be a reason for the story. If the point was to say that people can’t change or that trauma has hands, I get that. Otherwise, I see no real message here. It felt like the story had no direction and the characters were aimlessly stumbling upon things while Frances cried about how terrible a person she is. It was not fun to read, nor did I come away with any real substance. It’s an unnecessary sequel and I wish I had only read the first one.