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A review by syllareads
The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow
challenging
dark
hopeful
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
This was my first Alix E. Harrow book and I was not disappointed! Her prose is beautifully magical, weaving the story with expertise and care, her characters are flawed and human and so, so perfectly fallible it's painful to watch them live their story to its (or their) end.
Harrow intertwines the suffrage movement in America with the magic of ordinary women who just wanted more, underlining perfectly (and harrowingly) how difficult times were for a woman when she wanted to come into her own power and was denied any and all access to it by a world who pandered to no one but men in power. In fact, access to said power is often also denied by the powerless who feel the need to appease those who suppress them in order to get even a morsel of attention and, in this case, rights - a divide made clear when the three Eastwood sisters separate from the Women's Rights Association for exactly those reasons.
Throughout these historic moments, fairy tales and songs shine and simmer through the cracks, pulling the entire book together into a beautiful, fragile masterpiece. Magic gets passed down through songs, and stories, stitched into clothing and sewn into handkerchiefs, whispered between daughters and sisters like the secret it has to be.
I highly enjoyed the audiobook version of this book - the narrator Gabra Zackman had one of the most fitting voices I could have ever imagined for this book and the audiobook itself came with musical intervals that perfectly added to the magical feeling I got from the text itself
Harrow intertwines the suffrage movement in America with the magic of ordinary women who just wanted more, underlining perfectly (and harrowingly) how difficult times were for a woman when she wanted to come into her own power and was denied any and all access to it by a world who pandered to no one but men in power. In fact, access to said power is often also denied by the powerless who feel the need to appease those who suppress them in order to get even a morsel of attention and, in this case, rights - a divide made clear when the three Eastwood sisters separate from the Women's Rights Association for exactly those reasons.
Throughout these historic moments, fairy tales and songs shine and simmer through the cracks, pulling the entire book together into a beautiful, fragile masterpiece. Magic gets passed down through songs, and stories, stitched into clothing and sewn into handkerchiefs, whispered between daughters and sisters like the secret it has to be.
I highly enjoyed the audiobook version of this book - the narrator Gabra Zackman had one of the most fitting voices I could have ever imagined for this book and the audiobook itself came with musical intervals that perfectly added to the magical feeling I got from the text itself
Content Warnings
Graphic: Misogyny and Pregnancy
Moderate: Torture and Forced institutionalization