"Did we just go back in time? Last I looked this was the twenty-first century, not the seventeenth!"
—Wisteria Allgood
Witch & Wizard is a dystopian future/fantasy YA series by James Patterson and a number of co-writers. The eponymous first book was released in 2009; subsequent novels were published in 2010 and 2011, with the fourth novel released in 2013.
Whitford "Whit" Allgood and his younger sister Wisteria "Wisty" have been accused of being a wizard and witch. The government decides that they're "different" and sentences them to death. However, as the page quote suggests, it’s not the time of the original witch trials, but 20 Minutes into the Future, when the New Order has taken over the government and condemned art.
At first, Whit and Wisty are convinced there must have been a misunderstanding, but then their powers start to show...and all hell starts breaking loose.
The series is being given a graphic novel adaptation by Yen Press and consists of four novels thus far:
- Witch and Wizard (2009)
- The Gift (2010)
- The Fire (2011)
- The Kiss (2013)
- The Lost (2014)
This series provides examples of:
- Added Alliterative Appeal: Both the title of the book and the names of the two protagonists.
- Adults Are Useless: Which is why there is a secret community of kids living in an abandoned department store.
- Air-Vent Passageway: Justified. Wisty turns herself into a mouse before attempting this.
- All Animals Are Dogs: Averted. Lions and weasels act like they're supposed to, and the New Order has ordered all dogs in their Utopian city litter-box trained.
- Animorphism: Wisty turns herself into a mouse.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: “Guns? Soldiers? In our house? In a free country? In the middle of the night? A school night, even.”
- Badass Family: The Allgoods, especially Whit and Wisty, are definitely this.
- Big Bad: The One Who Is The One.
- The Mountain King in The Kiss.
- Body Horror: A cockroach, who is really a human, gets his head bitten off by a giant rat.
- Pearce melts several people's faces in the third book. When this happens - again - in book four, it finally gives away that Pearce has survived and disguised himself as Heath.
- Book Burning: And art burning, museum razing, artist killing.
- Burn the Witch!: Has become popular again.
- Crapsack World: Hoo boy, is it ever ! The New Order has brainwashed people, banned books, art, and music, and they are taking innocent children and either torturing them, turning them into soldiers, or much, much worse. Not to mention, the distrust, bombs,
Shadowland... - Department of Redundancy Department: The One Who Is The One.
- Dystopia Justifies the Means: Rationale for the actions of General Bloom in Book 4.
- The Empire: The New Order is certainly one.
- Expy: Sasha is one of Fang from W&W's sister series, Maximum Ride.
- Fiery Redhead: Played straight with Wisty. (Ironically, it's something she doesn't like about herself.)
- Fun with Acronyms: N.O., The New Order. Lampshaded by Whit: "NO. It seemed totally appropriate, even a touch poetic."
- Good Girl Gone Bad: Wisty starts heading down this path in book 4.
- Gratuitous Foreign Language: A prisoner in the New Order Reformatory.
- Great Big Book of Everything: Whit's blank journal will occasionally show them something interesting or helpful, but it's a crapshoot.
- Heel–Face Revolving Door: Byron, between the first book and The Gift.
- How We Got Here: The prologue starts the book off at the Allgoods’ execution. The epilogue ends at the Allgoods’ execution.
- Improbable Weapon User: Wisty uses a drumstick as a magic wand. Though to be fair, it was originally one, just disguised.
- It May Help You on Your Quest: Before being taken away, Whit and Wisty are given an empty book and a drumstick, respectively.
- Kaleidoscope Eyes: The One has them.
- Killed Off for Real: Celia, Margo, and Sasha.
- La Résistance: A group of escaped kids hiding in a department store.
- Little Miss Badass: Wisty. She is fifteen years old and a truant, and yet, she is the most powerful witch in the story. Her brother is her equal, the One is greater than either of them, the Mountain King is at the One's level... and that's pretty much it. Sure, there are a few people in her weight class other than them, but only this three are actually 'stronger' or even as strong.
- Little Miss Snarker: Wisty.
- Magic Wand: Although it doesn’t look like one at first…
- Meaningful Name: The protagonists’ last name is Allgood.
- Meaningful Rename: Once a book. At the very end, Patterson lists parodied books and pop stars that have been banned. One banned book is called Ultimate Armstrong. Get it?
- The Mole: Jonathan. Someone certainly knows a lot about how to act around the New Order.
- Parody Names: At the back of each book (original trilogy only), there is a list of works and artists banned by the New Order. Among them- The Pitcher in the Wheat, The Thunder Stealer, Gary Blotter and the Guild of Rejects, The Firegirl Saga, The Eldest Dragon, We Shall Be Titans, The Walking Heads, Brawlers.
- Patchwork Map: The city where most of the action takes place is said, as of book 4, to be surrounded by a wide variety of dangerous landscapes. These include the Mountain to the west, a desert in the south, and a forest to the east, beyond a river too dangerous to cross.
- Playing with Fire: Wisty often catches on fire. "You want to see a real witch burning?"
- Portal Network: Leads into the Shadowland, which is basically a combo of the Nevernever and that creepy parallel dimension from "Little Girl Lost." These portals can only be accessed by "Curves;" those who cannot, called "Straight and Narrows," suffer Portal Slam instead.
- Pragmatic Adaptation: The manga compresses the books while still keeping the overall plot.
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!
- THESE KIDS…MUST…LIVE!
- Nobody. Ever. ESCAPES!
- "YOU. WILL. SLEEP. NOW!"
- Shout-Out: To the author’s other series, Maximum Ride. To be more specific "kids with wings. That's likely."
- Also, in the list of banned books at the end of "The Gift," we have Ultimate Armstrong, about a group of flying kids.
- Steven Ulysses Perhero: The heroes of this book are…the Allgoods.
- To Be Continued: How the first two books end, hinting at their sequels. Averted by the third book, which was originally meant to be the last one anyway.
- Too Dumb to Live: How The One Who Is The One treats any of his subordinates.
- Totally Radical: Much like James Patterson’s other young adult series, Maximum Ride.
- However, the slang isn't so much outdated as it is offbeat, particularly in the first book, which is jam-packed with terminology like "pukka" (cool), "erlenmeyer" (flat New Order-type person), and "mingus" (dirty place).
- Trilogy Creep: As with Maximum Ride the series was originally limited to a trilogy. However, a fourth book, The Kiss, was released in February 2013.
- Tsundere: Wisty. One minute, she's joking around, and the next, she's set herself on fire.
- 20 Minutes into the Future: Like Keys to the Kingdom, this might help explain the weird slang and advanced technology.
- We Can Rule Together: The One Who Is The One offers this to the protagonists, even teaching them how to control their magic a small bit.
- Weasel Mascot: There is indeed a weasel, but he’s really a human and the protagonists are kind of forced to take him with them.
- Witch Hunt: What the New Order is doing to those who go against their ideals.
- Would Hurt a Child: Virtually every villain in the series, especially Big Bads like The One and, in book 4, the Mountain King.
- You Can't Fight Fate: 6 prophecies have been made about the Allgood family, and so far it looks like they're all going to come true. Even the one about Whit and Wisty dying.
