Reviews

Alchemy of a Blackbird is based on the true story of surrealist artist Remedios Varo. It follows her 1939 escape from the Nazis in Paris, to tense days in Marseilles awaiting papers to flee France, to the rebuilding of her life, and reclaiming of her art, in Mexico.

I love historical fiction that features real people, and the inclusion of the occult and tarot made this a must-read for me, even though I typically avoid WWII literature (the market is oversaturated, IMO).

The story itself was interesting, but overall this book fell short of my expectations. While the occult was featured, it was more of a plot device, dropped in here and there to show the reader that Remedios worked with the divine but never really delved into. I think that had to do with the point of view, which was very removed from Remedios.

Each chapter began with Remedios in third person, then about two thirds of the way through, switched to whatever other character happened to be in that chapter in first person. The point of those inserts, which were jarring for me to read in the first few chapters, seemed a device to give another perspective on Remedios and the situation at hand. Unfortunately, they simply served to pull me out of the immediate story. There were so many historic names and dates dropped into some of them that it felt like the author simply wanted to use all of her research notes. I think the story would have been better served to have Remedios in first person and cut the other peripheral characters’ sections.

The occult is deep and the point of the book was to show Remedios’s transformation, yet the author never got into her head or heart. In the end, I felt like I was told a story instead of experiencing it for myself.

2.75/5 stars ⭐⭐+

torturedreadersdept's review

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emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Content Warnings

staceloren's review

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adventurous emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Alchemy of a Blackbird is a stunningly beautiful historical fiction novel about long-term relationships, and subjective transformation. Claire McMillan relates the story of celebrated artist, Remedios Varo, a painter who fled from Paris along with a cadre of other notable artists during the 1939 Nazi occupation of France. Remedios meets her lifelong artistic soulmate and confidante, Leonora Carrington, a wealthy socialite, escaping personal demons of her own. Eventually settling in Mexico allowed the two women to nurture their professional destinies and themselves. Remedios finds comfort and healing in the occult world of tarot and Leonora serves as her medium to the tangible world.

McMillan combines tarot with these women’s transcendent lives and careers, augmenting the plot with spirituality and uncanny wisdom. The author cleverly includes a tarot card in each chapter, depicting a character that narrates from their own POV, how they were affected by Remedios’s transformation and their role in her evolution.

Readers witness Remedios’s emergence from patriarchal shadows as she gained confidence, independence, and acknowledgement for her talent along the way. This was an absorbing novel with multiple layers of context. The intricacies of the occult world and the tarot card manifestations in Remedios’s and Lorraine’s lives were fascinating. I also enjoyed learning about the Surrealism cultural movement. I enthusiastically recommend Alchemy of a Blackbird as a book club pick, as it contains a variety of topics suited for discussion!

liblibby's review

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Nothing against this book—I understand what it’s about. I’ll buy some copies for the store but I don’t feel compelled to find out what happens next.

kdawg2009's review

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challenging informative slow-paced

Loveable characters? No

3.0

This was my first GoodReads Giveaway winning. For that, I thank the publication. I entered this giveaway because I am a big fan of historical fiction, I liked the title, and liked the cover.

Unfortunately this book was hard for me to get into. I found the men characters to be pretentious and largely unlikeable. The best part of this book is the relationship depicted between Leonora and Remedios.

I found Claire McMillan's writing to be sesquipedalian. Normally, I am able to determine the meaning of unknown words based on the sentence, but I frequently found myself lost with some of the terminology in this book.

Another confusing aspect is the chapter layout. There is a main story that composes the first half of each chapter. Each chapter has a picture of a tarot card in the middle with an explanation of how to read the card. However, the second half of the chapter is never a continuation of the first half. Rather, it is a related character's perspective of what is occurring within the chapter. As a reader, I found this confusing. I feel the 2nd half of each chapter would have benefited from having the speaker's name printed at the top, for less confusion.

I did find the information regarding tarot history to be interesting. I would have liked to have seen some pictures of Remedios artwork included as well.

buckchandra86's review

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5.0

*I received the Advanced Reader's Edition From Goodreads in exchange for my honest review.*
"Alchemy of a Blackbird" by Claire McMillan is an historical fiction novel set during WW2. This story follows a ficitionalized account of real life artist Remedios Varo from her Spanish upbringing, to a falling Paris, and eventually on to Mexico where she would become a national treasure. This story brings together philosophical, political and spiritual ideas through the lense of war and creation, which truly are two sides of the same coin. The story centers on Remedios as a female artist seeking her own authenticity in relation to a patriarchal society and the voice of her father echoing within about the importance of usefulness. The convergence of history, art and the occult all come together with the backdrop of tarot and interspersed tarot lessons for the reader. The author does presume a bit of interest or rudimentary knowledge of tarot on behalf of the reader. The story line shifts focus when presented with the image of a tarot card. Each tarot card page is meant to draw correlation between the character and the archetype. The pages that follow are from the pov of the character on the tarot card. This really helps the student of tarot to garner further perspective and nuance into the card meaning and translations. This is a niche read that suited my studies well. History of WW2, philosphy, politics, spirituality, tarot, magic, feminism. A great read and I can't wait to read more by Claire McMillan.

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