The Crowns of Croswald is part Harry Potter (with the chosen one and magical school setting) and part The Princess Diaries (with the MC Ivy being a strong heroine in the process of discovering and learning about her special heritage, and also embracing her gender and enjoying a pretty dress).
A School Life Story
Though it is a story about a heroine learning about her role in saving the world, The Crowns of Croswald is also very much a school story in which the heroine must attend to her role as a student even as she searches for clues to her identity. I love magical stories that take place in a school setting. It’s so much fun to learn about the world with the students as they attend class and, of course, sneak off on secret adventures.
A Compelling Mystery
Though Ivy’s heritage is pretty apparent from the beginning, there are many mysteries surrounding her situation, and more mysteries continue surfacing as she searches for answers. These mysteries kept me in suspense from start to finish, and even though most of the questions have been answered, there is enough left to keep me in anticipation of the next book in her story.
The Promise of Adventure
The Crowns of Croswald is filled with adventures in and out of class, and it ends with the promise of more to come. I like how this book sets the stage for the next part of Ivy’s journey.
Un-Memorable Characters
While I have a soft spot for some of the characters, none of them were particularly memorable in the end. They’re one dimensional and lack complexity; there are opportunities for the characters to show vulnerability and depth to them, but instead they continue moving forward as they have always done. Ivy, in particular, continues to exude self confidence and charisma in moments when she could have opened herself more to the reader and shown more to her character.
As for the supporting cast, we don’t see enough of any of them to get to know them beyond what is their relationship to Ivy (and how she views them). There were lost opportunities to flesh out their characters. An example: As much as we love to hate on Malfoy in the Harry Potter series, he’s still endearing—that’s because we see more to his character than someone who cares about the purity of a wizard’s blood. In comparison, Ivy’s “rival” is only portrayed as someone who loves attention as much as she enjoys tormenting Ivy.
A Harry Potter Retelling (for the first half or so)
There were many details in the first half or so of the novel that felt like they came straight out of Harry Potter. (Some examples – highlight to see: the chosen one who never knew he she had magical abilities, ghosts in the dining hall, the magical shopping district, the diminutive professor who needs a stack of books to be seen . . .)
For some time, I wondered if I was reading a Harry Potter retelling or fan fiction. Eventually, the differences did make themselves clear, but I do get a strong Harry Potter vibe from this book. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but there were a few too many strong similarities such that I wonder how large an influence the Harry Potter books were in the writing of this novel.
How or When Did This Happen? (Missing Explanations and Awkward Time Skips)
There are several incidents in which some things seem to happen without cause or an action was missing to explain a situation. There are also some awkward time skips where a summary of events would have helped facilitate the transition through the passage of time. The same awkwardness goes for descriptions of characters and the setting. For the most part, these incidents don’t hinder the reader’s understanding of the text, but they did make the difference of a star in my final rating.
Though the characters have yet to prove themselves to be particularly memorable, the plot and world building is interesting enough that I’m open to revisiting this world with the next novel in the series. As this is a first novel, there is room for the writing to mature. I look forward to seeing what D.E. Night brings to us next!
In Croswald, the only thing more powerful than dark magic is one secret…
For sixteen years Ivy Lovely has been hidden behind an enchanted boundary that separates the mundane from the magical. When Ivy crosses the border, her powers awaken. Curiosity leads her crashing through a series of adventures at the Halls of Ivy, a school where students learn to master their magical blood and the power of Croswald’s mysterious gems. When Ivy’s magic—and her life—is threatened by the Dark Queen, she scrambles to unearth her history and save Croswald before the truth is swept away forever.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling
The School for Good and Evil by Soman Chainani
Song of the Lioness series by Tamora Pierce
Spindle’s End by Robin McKinley
If you owned a magical crown, what special ability would it allow you to wield? (Possible answers: transform into magical creatures, set things on fire, freeze water. . .)
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Author: Crystal
A story girl at heart, Crystal is a bibliophile who can easily spend the day immersed in a good read. She writes under the name Kristy Wang. You can follow her writing adventures on X and Instagram @_kristywang.
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