Tag: witches

October Reading Wrapup

November has been such a busy and turbulent month that reading and blogging have been on the back burner and I’m only just finding time to share my October reading wrapup midway through the month.

Not the End of the World by Hannah Ritchie 🎧

This book really requires the reader to keep an open mind as it challenges many of the preconceptions people worried about climate change hold. Having said that, I wholeheartedly agree with the central premise of the book that despair is as dangerous as denial when it comes to climate action, and that we have to remain hopeful that we can mitigate the worst effects of climate breakdown and adapt. Hannah Ritchie refutes most of the clickbait headlines by zooming out and taking a wider look at progress and trends over longer time frames. She also promotes focusing our efforts on a few actions that will have the greatest impact rather than stressing about lots of things that won’t actually make much difference. I found it a bit contradictory in places, and I still believe that individual actions pale in comparison to tackling corporate and industry emissions but this is an informative, pragmatic and hopeful book that counters climate doomism.

The Witches of New York by Ami McKay

I often feel a bit apprehensive about books that are over 500 pages, and I found this one had a very slow start as the story didn’t really grip me until 300 pages in. The story follows three witches, Eleanor and Adelaide, who run a tea shop in New York and their new apprentice, Beatrice who is only just discovering her powers. This was a bit reminiscent of the Practical Magic series, but set in the late 1800s, as the women navigate personal traumas, grudges and persecution. Overall I enjoyed this and loved the strong sense of female friendship and camaraderie throughout, but it was let down by pacing issues, and although the main storyline wraps up neatly, there’s a few subplots left open for a potential sequel.

The Secret of Nightingale Wood by Lucy Strange

Having thoroughly enjoyed, The Island at the Edge of Night, I was eager to read more of Lucy Stranger’s backlist and picked up her first book from the library. The Secret of Nightingale Wood is narrated by 12 year old Henrietta as her family move from London to Hope House in the countryside following the tragic death of her older brother. Henrietta is a plucky heroine who has to overcome her own fears, grief and survivor’s guilt in order to save her family from the scheming husband and wife villains who intend to use the family to further their own ambitions. It’s a tense, poignant children’s adventure from a writer who brilliantly captures the fears and feelings of helplessness of childhood.

Weyward by Emilia Hart

A powerful tale of three desperate women from the same line moving from fearful victims of male lust, spite and violence to survivors. The story follows three women from the Weyward family from Althea accused of witchcraft in the 17th century, to Violet a rebellious and determined young woman straining at the shackles her father and society have bound her in, and Kate in the present day fleeing an abusive relationship. This is very much a story about female choice and agency, but one that is often bittersweet as the three central characters have to make difficult choices based on circumstances beyond their control. I was completely hooked by this and adored it from start to finish.

Cackle by Rachel Harrison

What a strange and surprising but thoroughly enjoyable story this turned out to be about love, heartbreak, friendship, trust, fear, and spiders. Cackle follows Annie Crane, recently hearybroken and scared of dying alone as she moves from New York to the little town of Rowan and immediately falls under the spell of her new friend, the mysterious and charismatic Sophie. Cackle seemed like it was going to be light-hearted romance, but it was such a delightful novel about female empowerment with some unexpectedly unsettling moments and atmosphere.

The Invocations by Krystal Sutherland

This seemed like a cross between two of my favourites, Ninth House with all  occult elements and a female version of The Raven Boys as three teenage misfits band together to stop a serial killer hunting women. The plot follows Emer, a curse writer (or witch) who helps women willing to exchange part of their soul for magic; Jude, an exiled, filthy rich socialite looking for a witch to help her break a a curse; and Zara, a grieving woman investigating the murder of her sister. I devoured this supernatural murder mystery full of twists with a slow burn saphic romance in a couple of evenings, though I found it more gory than spooky, but the final section was particularly cinematic.

Have a lovely week. X

July Reading WrapUp

Sharing my reading wrapup very late as we’re all recovering from a bad cold that floored us for a week. July was a slow month for reading but I thoroughly enjoyed the three books I did manage to read.

Magic Lessons by Alice Hoffman

Magic Lessons was everything I hoped for in a prequel to Practical Magic (reviewed here) going back to tell the story of Maria the founding matriarch of the Owens family and the curse she cast to protect her descendents that ripples through the generations ever after. I absolutely adored Magic Lessons and found it gripping, heartbreaking and enchanting. Magic Lessons is a story of mothers and daughters, love and heartbreak, witchcraft and witch trials.

No Drama Discipline by Daniel J. Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson

I’d struggled a bit with The Whole Brain Child last year but decided to give this a try, and found it so much easier to understand and apply. Complex neuroscience is broken down into easy to grasp concepts about how to shape a child’s developing brain to teach them emotional regulation, morality, empathy and problem solving skills. No Drama Discipline is full of real examples of how to apply the whole brain discipline techniques that takes a contextual but long term approach to parenting, building a loving connection with your child and coaxing collaboration, though my personal favourite example was what to do when you’ve tried everything and none of it works.

The Book of Magic by Alice Hoffman

The bittersweet conclusion to the Owens family saga that ties all the threads together as Sally, Gillian, Franny, Jet and Vincent all work together to end the curse that Maria Owens cast over 400 years ago. I have loved this series so much and this was such a wonderful ending reuniting all the characters and introducing some new ones too that kept me hooked from start to finish.

Have a lovely weekend. X

The Whitby Witches by Robin Jarvis

The Whitby Witches

Jennet and Ben are orphaned siblings who have been shunted from one foster home to another since their parents died because of Ben’s ability to see ghosts, until they’re taken in by an eccentric, old lady, Alice Boston, who lives in the Yorkshire town of Whitby. Not long after the children arrive, the mysterious Rowena Cooper moves into a dilapidated old house nearby and strange, sinister events start to occur.

Whitby is a wonderful setting with descriptions of the ruined abbey overlooking the town and the infamous 199 steps featuring prominently in the story, and I really appreciated how well Robin Jarvis foreshadowed events and cleverly interspersed local history and folklore from the Barguest from Bram Stoker’s Dracula and St Hilda to the collapse of the central tower of the abbey in 1830 into the story.

The Whitby Witches2

The Whitby Witches is full of supernatural elements from witches and ghosts to demonic hounds and other fantastic creatures, and this was a lot more thrilling, atmospheric and scary than I expected a children’s book to be – it managed to give me goosebumps and it’s a perfect tale for a dark and stormy night. My only criticism is that the story never fully explained who Rowena Cooper (or her husband) was or where she came from.

The story works well as a standalone but The Whitby Witches is actually the first in a trilogy following Miss Boston, Jennet and Ben, though only the first book seems to have been re-issued so I’ll have to track down second hand copies of the sequels because I enjoyed this so much. Have a lovely week. X