Scan barcode
A review by charidabelle
Black Candle Women by Diane Marie Brown
emotional
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This book follows four women who are a family of hoodoo practitioners as they navigate life and interpersonal relationships while living under a family curse. The curse being that anyone they fall in love with will die.
We get POVs of each woman but I felt that some perspectives were stronger than others and it made parts of the book tedious to get through. Nanagusta was my favorite as we learn the history of the family book and the curse.
Mostly though it felt like the characters all spent so much of their time literally in their own heads and not enough time communicating with each other. So many of the problems in this book would have been solved by talking things out that it was extremely frustrating at times.
I wish we'd spent more time with the loa and magic aspect of this book. It felt like a really big part in the beginning but takes a backseat as the book progresses.
Although we get to see them break the curse, a lot of the issues that the characters have with each other are never quite resolved or addressed plainly and it feels quite anticlimactic.
We get POVs of each woman but I felt that some perspectives were stronger than others and it made parts of the book tedious to get through. Nanagusta was my favorite as we learn the history of the family book and the curse.
Mostly though it felt like the characters all spent so much of their time literally in their own heads and not enough time communicating with each other. So many of the problems in this book would have been solved by talking things out that it was extremely frustrating at times.
I wish we'd spent more time with the loa and magic aspect of this book. It felt like a really big part in the beginning but takes a backseat as the book progresses.