Book Review “Heartless Hunter” by Kristen Ciccarelli

Stacey Leerhoff, Youth Services

I’m one of those people who gets a huge “book hangover” when I finish reading a book that I really love. It’s very hard for me to step out of that “book heartless hunter.jpg world” and into another totally different one, no matter how good the new one turns out to be. Very often, after I’ve finished a new favorite for me, it will take me a week or two to get interested in another book. I knew this was going to happen after I finished “When the Moon Hatched” by Sarah Parker because I wasn’t ready to be done with that world just yet. I tried TikTok this time for new book recommendations of books that I might like if I loved “When the Moon Hatched.” I came up with several new titles to try. After a week, I was still holding on to the book world, so I decided that I should try something totally different from what I had been reading and see if that would help. I picked up “Heartless Hunter,” a YA (young adult) novel by Kristen Ciccarelli. It’s the story of a witch and a witch hunter. Are they sworn enemies or true loves?

This story, like many others I choose, is told between the alternating points of view of Rune the witch and Gideon, the witch hunter. The three witch queens and their regime have been overthrown and now the cost of being a witch is public purging. Rune has experienced great family tragedy, must hide her true self, and is trying to secretly save all the witches she can from the new anti-witch regime. Gideon Sharpe has also experienced great family and personal tragedy and is now trying to hunt down every single witch and see them purged on the platform. His greatest nemesis is the crimson moth, a witch who eludes capture and continues to thwart Gideon.

Rune, along with her two best friends, decides that courting Gideon will be the fastest and best way to save more witches and in particular, her grandmother’s best friend, Seraphine. She courts danger every step of the way yet can’t stop her very real attraction to Gideon. As the story unfolds, and Gideon and Rune play a dangerous game of cat and mouse. As their “relationship” develops, we learn more truths that will shock us. These truths will take the story in new directions as the battle between good and evil, witch and witch hunter grows and continues. The plot builds and builds climaxing in an epic battle that leaves us breathless and hanging. Do the witch and witch hunter battle? Do they fall in love? Who is good and who is evil? Where do they go from here? To find your own answers, read “Heartless Hunter: The Crimson Moth Book One” by Kristen Ciccarelli and anxiously await the second installment along with me. Check it out today!