Reviews

Water Shall Refuse Them by Lucie McKnight Hardy

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pindication's review against another edition

5.0

Gripping and thoughtfully written. I usually consider myself to be good at picking up on foreshadowing and predicting the plots but this particular book kept me guessing up until the end. A wonderful portrayal of grief and anger.

milperks's review against another edition

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4.0

This was slow to start but once it did I found it gripping. It's a really creepy, eerie story and you do feel pulled in to the arid landscape. Nif is a really odd character and at times I felt really uncomfortable reading this book. Overall I really enjoyed it but wish there had been more of a conclusion to the end.

mhewza's review against another edition

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4.0

A dark little children’s book about power and oppression and witchcraft.

_hannaht's review against another edition

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2.0

This book had the makings of something spectacular but it failed to take me where I hoped it would. Despite the pages being filled with adjectives I found it painfully hard to visualise. Pretty disappointing as I had high hopes.

softstarrynights's review against another edition

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4.0

Water Shall Refuse Them id the debut novel of Welsh writer Lucie McKnight Hardy. I was lucky enough to meet Lucie on one of her Waterstones tour stops and get my copy signed, as Water Shall Refuse Them is Waterstones' Welsh Book of the Month. When I first read the synopsis it sounded very similar to Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle which I first read a couple of years back (and coincidentally I intended to re-read this month ahead of the film's UK release on July 29th) and lover's of Jackson will know that it's a tough bar to meet. Water Shall Refuse Them met that bar with ease. This novel was enchanting from the first sentence to the very last and I could not stop reading. Nif was a fascinating character perspective as she describes her experiences living in this Welsh village for the summer. Her coming-of-age journey was perfect, and while I did see one reveal coming that did not detract from the overall experience of reading this novel. Lucie brilliantly captures this suffocating ominous sense that something bad has happened, is happening, and will happen to the point that no page feels safe. I will eagerly await Lucie next book, and in the meantime devour this all over again. This is not a novel you want to miss!

audreykerr's review against another edition

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2.0

not as witchy as I was expecting and not my style of horror, I wouldn't even call it horror. The atmosphere wasn't really there and the "mystery" guessable from early on, not that the book is dependant on the mystery element. idk, just left underwhelmed and the ending ??

Spoiler

show us her killing or trying to kill Mally? we've already read worse...none of this "the reader can decide what happens next~~~

I just feel like the author finished on a question because she didn't know how it would resolve. The story was gripping for the most part, but mostly just in a 'when is the witching stuff actually going to happen?' and will people get their comeuppance - it just didn't deliver

CW: lots of animal torture/abuse - there's other small things too but there is no indication that that's going to appear as much as it does.

and I want the very best life for Lorry.

ellenorange's review against another edition

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4.0

Trigger warning: violence against animals

This is a difficult book to review. It is dark, violent and highly uncomfortable. However it is incredibly well written and has an uncanny knack for stripping away the sympathy you typically feel for a first person protagonist - this is the first book I’ve read which has made me actively hate the narrator.

Did I enjoy reading it? Absolutely not, but I feel about it the way I feel about horror in general - it was compelling enough to push me past the discomfort, I did get something out of it and I can appreciate how clever it was.