The ending of this book was AMAZING!! The major plot twist at the end that I never saw coming was written perfectly. I was nervous as to how they were going to have a whole second book, but was not disappointed. It is the perfect amount of mystery along with drama that keeps you reading. I highly suggest this book to anyone who loves a good mystery and a plot twist!

Two for Joy is the second book in the The Magpie Society series and sadly couldn’t catch me at all. The main reason for this is that everything about this book just felt a bit flat and that the ending was so rushed and far-fetched. 

After the events of the first book, Clover disappeared, and Ivy and Audrey get invitations from the mysterious Magpie Society. Besides being occupied with those two conflicts, they still have to find out who killed Lola and find the murderer before they can kill other people. I had the hope that the story could get more interesting with a new focus on the society. Sadly, this wasn’t the case since

it doesn’t exist since anymore

. To be honest, the introduction of the society had no impact on the story whatsoever and its existence didn’t make sense in the first place which was just wasted potential. 

I can’t even say why, but I furthermore didn’t like the mystery elements as much in this book. Some things were a bit cliché and others didn’t make too much sense for me, like

why the girls never told anyone about the relationship between Mr Willis and Lola. So many conflicts could’ve been resolved if they just told anyone. It also sends a bit of a weird signal for younger audiences, to be honest

. After a third, we learn the big conflict of this novel, namely that

the school should be sold, and that Audrey’s dad is part of the deal

. She didn’t know about this before but because of miscommunication, we get some silly conflicts that could’ve been resolved so easily. Many other dramatic things happen, like

Patrick’s flat burning down together with Clover

but they barely had any impact on me since they were described so unemotionally. 

But like I’ve said above, what I liked the least about Two for Joy was the kinda rushed and far-fetched ending:

Mr Willis kidnaps Audrey by accident and then decides that he wants to kill her – I think? – but Ivy comes for her rescue. It honestly made no sense that Ivy could run as fast as the car Mr Willis was using. Also, I found him being the perpetrator just a bit unsatisfying, same goes for the solution for the selling of the school which was explained in like two sentences. The ending became more absurd though when it’s revealed that it was Ivy in reality that killed Lola. It’s only told to us that she already knew about the plans about the selling of the school, and it’s implied that she kills Audrey in the end. I hate endings like these since they make the whole story happening before kinda obsolete

. In my opinion, this twist didn’t make any sense at all and made me lower my rating from three to two stars. Additionally, all of this was simply told which made it feel even more unsatisfying. 

At least we learned some more information about Ivy and Audrey, especially about their families. I still had a problem with the fact that their voices sound quite similar, leading to me checking for than once whose POV I’m reading right now. Another problem I had with the characters was the romance between Audrey and Teddy. It just felt really flat, and it is only told how it developed the way it did, not shown. In comparison, I shipped Ivy and Audrey so much and wished that they would’ve become a couple. It also annoyed me that there was more fighting between the female characters, mostly because of silly things. But oh well, this is just how teenager girls are like. 

The Magpie Society as a series had so much potential but sadly, the execution was just not great. It was promised a boarding school book with a murder mystery and a secret society but all of those elements just stay flat. At least with the first book, I liked the plot around the podcast, and it was interesting what effect it had on the school life. But this plot is abandoned in the second book and is replaced by a not so interesting conflict. If I’m being honest, I probably wouldn’t recommend the series. The first book was at least interesting but this one was just flat and didn’t deliver a satisfying conclusion. 

I was really excited for this book to pick up from where book 1 left off, but honestly I was really disappointed with it. I will try to make this a review and not a rant but I think it’s going to be quite hard.

First of all, the first half of the book has awful pacing, it’s very slow and very repetitive (again I think this happens naturally with two authors) but there were some chapters where I really felt I was reading the same thing twice. The middle is filled with a lot of scenes that don’t feel necessary and I think the reason why I enjoyed this book so much less than I did the first is because the whole “who dunnit” aspect sort of gets eroded away. It doesn’t pick up the pace until the end (and I’ll admit the last section of the book genuinely had me hooked because finally we were getting some action - everything seemed to be coming together).

Secondly, just like the previous book, this one was also highly predictable. Some people may have been shocked by the ending but honestly I saw it coming a mile away

I mean, Ivy’s character had so much development in the first book, but in this book she turns into the most annoying person to read and just a flat out mean individual. Also if you read the inner blurb written for the first book it literally says how much Ivy dislikes that her new roommate is ‘poking her nose in other people’s business’ - it was so clear from the get go that Ivy was never going to be an innocent character. When her mother had such bitter feelings about her own daughter, that solidified it for me. Also side note, the teacher being the bad guy is such an overused trope in this genre - boring.

Again, the tone of the writing is slightly juvenile - the writing is so simplistic that I think I would have loved this book more when I was younger. But then, it’s not aimed at young teens since it’s YA and has swearing so I guess I’d call it good for beginners? Or people getting into the mystery genre? I don’t know honestly.

Thirdly, the plot really wasn’t that interesting. A lot of reviews say they love the Magpie Society storyline but I just don’t think it was executed in a stimulating manner because I found myself getting bored with it quite often. Audrey’s character also just confuses me because one second she doesn’t want to be involved and the next she’s playing detective besties with Ivy, but anyways I digress. I still love the dark academia setting, and I’ll give the authors credit for their ability to create atmosphere, because I loved the small-town, coastal feel to the book and I think they did a good job creating Winferne Bay.

Lastly, the ending felt wrong and out of place. Although I saw something like it coming, I think it was really thrown in there for shock factor because it was (or felt) highly unrealistic. To drop a surprise like that in a short epilogue at the end of the book just makes it feel unfinished (at least in my opinion). It was just a bit jarring to read and conclude the series like that, but hey.

It definitely wasn’t the worst book I’ve read by a long shot. Reading my review back I definitely sound really annoyed but for all it’s issues, I did enjoy reading the series, I love mystery and I love tension. I just think it could have been executed far better, which is disappointing because I wanted to love it.

ugh gosh i don’t even really know what to say - firstly like - who were these books written for ? cause it’s got the simplicity and writing style for like no even a tween, possibley like a 10-12 year old, but then it also has a good mix of swearing here and there so idk. the ending…made no sense. like what why i do not understand. i also really didn’t enjoy just like in the first one how like cringey and set up everything is / was? ALTHOUGH in saying that i guess it can slightly be justified with reasons because of the ending, but still it was like way more dramatic than it needed to be. one chapter audrey’s like that’s it i’m dOne with the Magpie Society and like a few pages later she’s like omg i <3 Ivy and the Magpie Society it means so much to me it’s my life. like sis chill! anyway yeah look i’m not complete against this book it’s not HORRIBLE but it’s also not great - better than the first one for sure. 



UPDATE:

okay so after finishing this book and discovering the plot twist i thought maybe i’d flip back through and see if it showed in any parts prior and OKAY WAIT it was actually written a little better than i thought - there’s a LOT of subtle hints that my brain just passed over before without even realising - like yeah the writing style overall is basic but there is little bits hidden in the context behind peoples words that could reveal the twist - i actually really wanna read the whole series again now to see it from a new perspective… ! i upped my star rating by a half hehe <3