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I have read Spellfall years ago. It how I remember it with a unique world and magic system. The story about Natalie being kidnap and her family going through that crisis. There no love interest. Perhaps a little with Tim and Joanna but, they're not the main characters. I like the friendship with Natalie and Marlin. Natalie sees how abuse Lord Hawk is to his son, Merlin. It sweet that she offers Marlin to stay at her house.

The magic system is unique using leaves from a soul tree to cast spells while being limited to what you can do.

Reading it for the first time the story may read like a thriller and seem a bit slow. Not necessary to get the plot going but, to devolve the characters and introduces the magic system.

The one problem I find with this book is the world building. The setting in our world can be anywhere and if Tim didn't mention moving from London, I would not imagine they were in the UK. This is only brought up ones. In Earthaven there the Soultree and we get to learn about it and it importance to the casters. What about the rest of Earthaven? Yes, the Soultree is the main focus because that where the spells come from. Spells are important to casters. Maybe there will be more in the squal.

Now I need to hunt for the squal. ( )

Spellfall is a great book for people between the ages of ten and twelve. This book is about a girl named Natalie who has lived with her dad, her stepmom, and a stepbrother. One day, Natalie and her friend Jo snuck out of their houses at six in the morning to go rollerskating in the parking lot of the grocery store. They thought it would be harmless since nobody is up that early in the morning and the grocery store was closed that early. Neither of them expected that Natalie would get kidnapped, especially by people who deal with magic.

The people who kidnapped Natalie were called casters. It was a boy named Merlin and his father, Hawk. They brought her back to their house and kept her in a room alone where she became disoriented and food deprived for several days. When they finally let her out, they tried to bond her to the magic powers that everyone living in the house had.
This book is meant for people between the ages of ten and twelve because it deals with a lot of magic and not many eighth graders are interested in magic. ALso, the way the author wrote the book I could tell I wasn’t interested in it. The book was confusing because they threw a lot of magic terms at the reader and it was hard to keep track of what terms meant what. I would rate this book three stars out of five.

This was a good book.Natakie is a normal girl ,so she thinks.Her father has been drunk since the death of her mother,she has a stepmother who treats her well but a stepbrother who does not.She finds a spell laying on the ground and things get very bad for her from there.She is kidnapped by an evil Caster,Hawk who is trying to excact his revenge for being banished from Earthhaven.She soon finds out her mother was a Spell Lady and its up to her to stop Hawk.She gets help from unlikely people,and as her stepmother says crisis brings a family closer. ( )

I thoroughly enjoyed this book by an author who was new to me. Tho' it's classed as young adult fantasy, it held up very well. Character development was good and I especially liked the heroine, Natalie. I wanted the story to continue a little longer and to know more about the other characters in the book to flesh out the story a little better. Exploring others of her books. The Og reminds me of Piers Anthony's Shade of the Tree. ( )