Book Review: Rebel Witch (The Crimson Moth Duology)

Rebel Witch by Kristen Ciccarelli

Genre: Romantasy

Length: 456 pages

Book 2 of 2 – Completed duology.

Currently available on Kindle Unlimited

Rebel Witch is the sequel to Heartless Hunter (The Crimson Moth). It is also the conclusion to the series. This series is a duology- it only has two books. There has been some confusion over this series because you can find both The Crimson Moth and Heartless Hunter online. These are the SAME BOOK. They simply have different titles and covers. For whatever reason book 1 of this series was sold as Heartless Hunter in North America and The Crimson Moth in other parts of the world. Do no let the different titles confuse you- there are only two books in this series. I have seen tons of videos where readers accidentally bought this book twice because of this.

*** Contains spoilers for book 1.

Rune Winters is in hiding after the love of her life, Gideon Sharpe, betrayed her and sent her to the purging block. She has been on the run with a group of witches, and helping Cressida (who she deeply despises) gather an army. Rune is in a dark place at the beginning of this book finding herself hating her life, missing her lost friend, missing her lost love, and engaged to a man who disgusts her.

Because of his relationship with Rune, Gideon is now the disgraced captain of the Blood Guard (witch hunters). The only way he can redeem himself? Killing Rune of course. But when he sees her, will he be able to do it?

Rune and Gideon are once again thrown together, fighting their feelings for one another. They need each other to survive, but can they trust one another?

“A WITCH…
Rune Winters is on the run. Ever since the boy she loved, Gideon Sharpe, revealed who she was and delivered her into enemy hands, everyone wants her dead. If Rune hopes to survive, she must ally herself with the cruel and dangerous Cressida Roseblood, who’s planning to take back the Republic and reinstate a Reign of Witches—something Cressida needs Rune to accomplish.

A WITCH HUNTER…
Apparently it wasn’t enough for Rune to deceive Gideon; she’s now betrayed him by joining forces with the witch who made his life a living hell. Gideon won’t allow the Republic to fall to the witches and be plunged back into the nightmares of the past. In order to protect this new world he fought for, every last witch must die—especially Rune Winters.

AN IMPOSSIBLE CHOICE…
When Rune makes Gideon an offer he can’t refuse, the two must pair up to accomplish dangerous goals. The more they’re forced into each other’s company, the more Gideon realizes the feelings he had for Rune aren’t as dead and buried as he thought. Now he’s faced with a terrible choice: sacrifice the girl he loves to stop a monster taking back power, or let Rune live and watch the world he fought so hard for burn.”

I really enjoyed this duology. It found me at exactly the right time and was just what I was looking for. After the intense ending of book one, I immediately dove into book two. I could not put it down. Rebel Witch picked up two months after the ending of Heatless Hunter and I was completely engrossed from page one. The stakes were just as high at the beginning of book two as they were at the end of book one and I really appreciated this.

Rune is a mess at the beginning of this book. She is no longer pretending to be a superficial socialite, but she is also not free to be herself. She is trapped in an engagement that she does not want in order to provide an army for a woman that she detests. She misses terribly and is confused by her lingering feelings for Gideon. She grows so much throughout this book and I greatly enjoyed watching Rune find herself in the midst of the chaos unfolding around her.

I said in my review of book one-miscommunication is one of my least favorite tropes. I find it very frustrating when characters cannot simply fix a misunderstanding or when important plot events depend on them misunderstanding each other. However, this makes perfect sense in the case of Gideon and Rune. Why would they trust each other enough to explain their sides of the story? Their relationship needs a lot of work in the beginning of this story and they spend a lot of time learning to trust each other before they can communicate their feelings properly. That being said-it did frustrate me a lot every time one of them would start falling for the other and then remind themselves that they couldn’t.

This book is marketed as YA and was much darker than I thought it would be. This was a pleasant surprise for me, but if you are buying this book for a teenage reader, you may want to read it first just in case.

The entire series was fast-paced and high-stakes. I loved the drama and the tension. The plot twists were not super surprising, but were still emotionally impactful. It definitely needed two books to tell the story, but didn’t try to extand the story passed what it needed to be.

Overall I really enjoyed this series and I would definitely read it again.

Witch and witch hunter

Love triangle

Blood magic

Political turmoil

Yes and no. There is a lot of tension in this book that could definitely be seen as mature content plus one closed(ish)-door intimate scene. It’s supposed to be YA, but again it may be a little graphic for the audience it’s supposed to be for. I will list the scene here. Whether you want to skip over it, bookmark it, or check to see if it is “YA enough”, I’m not here to judge.

Chapter 71

Loved this book?

Be sure to check out other books by the author!

A Dark Forgetting

The Iskari

Edgewood