James Patterson is a well-known author of the modern age, readers buying the novel just for his name. My first introduction was my editor’s shelf, crammed with Cross detective stories. She wanted to purge her personal library and I wanted to build my own. Every Patterson and Koontz book she owned went to me, and I’ve been intermingling them into my extensive “to be read” list. The first one I tried was closer to my forteit: Witch & Wizard.
I love a good detective novel now and then, but fantasy is a consistent draw. Witch & Wizard is the start of a 5-book series with magic in a dystopian future. The writing style is jarring and thrilling all at once as it’s VERY different from my personal writing voice. Nevertheless, I turned many pages in order to understand the world and follow the characters through a challenging time of persecution and rebellion.
Wisty, the Naive and Powerful Witch
Most books I review I’m going off memory (between work and personal deadlines, I don’t have enough time to reread). James Patterson took the route of James Dashner though with miniscule chapters and heavy character involvement. However, Patterson’s characters are better.
Enter Wisteria Allgood, known as Wisty. High school student and younger sibling to the class jock, her life is a compilation of every Disney sitcom featuring that one guy you hate. Up until the point soldiers bust into their house and that one guy you hate accuses her of being a witch. We’re given a taste of her sarcastic humor even as the world appears to turn upside-down with threats and creepy bald men demanding obedience. The one thing she didn’t expect is that everything they accused her of was true.
Again, Patterson’s style for this book really prioritizes characters, so you gotta read to understand their many layers. There are highlights though:
- she cares about her older brother Whit and his missing girlfriend Celia
- she loves her parents and life on the wrongside of the tracks
- while she’s a troublemaker in school, she’s not a criminal mind
Most importantly, she consistently describes events like a nightmare. What’s happening doesn’t truly settle in for her; there’s a way out if she can wake up. There’s a possibility of going home, serving her detention, and enjoying life as a normal teenager. Even combusting into flames multiple times doesn’t really settle the fantasy of this being a bad dream thanks to greasy pizza. Her brother, on the other hand, has a firmer grip on reality.
Whit, the Broken and Strong Wizard
Whitford Allgood, customarily called Whit, is your generic high school jock. Star quarterback, failing biology, cute girlfriend, sneaking alcohol. The sitcom dream until his girlfriend goes missing and he and his sister get kidnapped by armed goons.
When I said classic jock, you probably envisioned the annoying ones portrayed on tv shows. Whit’s less so. He’s generally a great guy that loves his family, is protective of his sister, and is getting used to his new height and muscle. Most of all, he’s broken. The loss of his girlfriend Celia and seeing her in flashes of his dreams reveals a vulnerable side to him. One of love, care, and loyalty that he’s not able to fulfill because he’s being overpowered by a force he doesn’t understand. He sees the danger, but he can’t protect those he cares for.
Not entirely at least. While Wisty is our rebellious primary POV, Whit takes on the baton of protector and leader. Where he can, he keeps Wisty from harm and tries to dissolve the situation into their favor. When her spunk sputters, he picks her up. His growth kicks off in the initial chapters as the clueless teen learns quick in order to keep his sister from harm and find his parents.
Byron Swain and the New Order
Remember the one guy you hate? That’s Byron Swain.
However Byron is the face we put on all the soldiers of the New Order as he personifies the infantry of the big bad. A classmate of Wisty and Whit, Byron is a normie rather than a witch or wizard. We’ll talk about the New Order in a couple weeks with the history breakdown, but for now you need to know that they came into power through democracy and then wiped the slate clean. Byron and others like him jumped on their propoganda, saying the witches and wizards that walk among us are evil. There’s also a prophecy to be considered, but for nuisances like Byron, they just want to exercise some authority.
It’s actually very fascinating; in skimming the teeny chapters (not tiny; we’re talking 2 pages each at most), the New Order soldiers and even primary governance come off as monkeys. Imagine young adults hyped-up on adrenaline and caffeine watching a cat fight. That’s the sort of energy we’re given from judges, law enforcement, and so on that should be stoic, hardened, and clear-headed. They say things they don’t seem to fully comprehend and make actions that no normal American would consider. For example, hanging 18-year-old witches like it’s the Salem Witch Trials.
I can’t fault their hyperactive energy though. They’re life has become a nightmare as much as Wisty’s and Whit. They’ve been told people with magic walk amongst them and threaten their lives. They see 15-year-old girls combusting into flames yet not being burned. Their worlds have turned upside-down and they’re told the way to mediate the problem and keep their families safe is to contain the threat.
What Would You Do?
The key question every writer wants a reader to ask while diving into a story. Actually, we have to ask ourselves this question first so our characters appear real.
This concept isn’t new, especially to the 21st century. X-men, Avengers, Justice League, The Boys. People with powers coming up in a world that fears or admires such abilities. To a degree though, these fictional references handle the concept with kid gloves. Especially now, normies are cannon-fodder for entertaining explosions and big fight sequences when heroes would reduce casualties in the past. Witch & Wizard takes a more realistic approach that relates to true events like Hitler and the Holocaust or the persecution of Christians in Syria. What if the government decided one day to collect a specific group of people and wipe them out? What would one do or feel in such a scenario?
For those of us who have seen plenty of “end of the world” dystopian movies, I think I’d make wildly different and more sensible choices than most of the characters. Witch & Wizard, however, is probably closer to the truth. Waiting for the nightmare to end like Wisty. Trying to make the best of a terrible situation like Whit. Heck, if I were a normie and saw someone shoot lightning from their hands, I might condemn them to death like Byron.
Big might; I may kill characters in my stories, but I’m not a violent person.
Part of what I love about Witch & Wizard is that the characters are as clueless as the reader. We’re literally chucked into the prison cell with them and walk through kangaroo courts and terrifying discoveries of our own abilities. Every step is like a dream of what ifs, our own journey of if the world went nuts out of our favor.
Only we can escape.