The Secret Circle: The Initiation and The Captive Part I [平装]

The circle's power has lured her home

Forced to move from sunny California to gloomy New England, Cassie longs for her old life. Even so, she feels a strange kinship to a terrifying group of teens who seem to rule her school. Initiated into the coven of witches that's controlled New Salem for hundreds of years, she's drawn into the Secret Circle, a thrill that's both intoxicating and deadly. But when she falls for the mysterious and intriguing Adam, Cassie must choose whether to resist temptation or risk dark forces to get what she wants—even if it means that one wrong move could ultimately destroy her.

From Booklist

The dramatic black cover, with blood-red lettering and a close-up photo of an intense young woman with dark red lips, might suggest vampires, but the series title (The Secret Circle) gives it away: here there be witches. Quiet, shy Cassie and her single mother reluctantly move from California to New Salem, Massachusetts, to take care of Cassie’s grandmother, who looks suspiciously witchy and seems to know an awful lot about herbs. The local high school Cassie now attends is dominated by a very exclusive group of teens known as “the Club.” It won’t take the reader long to figure out that Club members are teen witches descended from the witches who survived the Salem witch hunts by leaving that town and starting their own. Our hapless heroine is, of course, a witch herself (though only half, as her absent father was not of that community), and in this first title in the series she begins to find her power and her position within the group. Fans of Smith’s Vampire Diaries series will find the same basic formula here: plenty of foreshadowing, lots of action, mild creepiness, and instant infatuation. Characterization is minimal, but those seeking lightweight, mildly scary, somewhat romantic titles will gobble this up and eagerly await the sequel. Grades 7-10. --Debbie Carton