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A review by bookph1le
Hour of the Witch by Chris Bohjalian
5.0
Chris Bohjalian is one of those authors whose books can be very hit or miss for me. Looking back at my Goodreads history, I can see this is the fourth of his books I've given five stars, but I've also given one star to one of his books, and three to another. My conclusion is that his works are either really on for me, or they don't cut it. This book was one of his pitch-perfect works.
Bohjalian has always written very compellingly about misogyny, and this book is no exception. From the internalized misogyny of characters like Goody Howland to the outright misogyny of characters like Adams, this book is full of characters who express their disdain for women in a myriad of ways. Sometimes they're not even aware of their own low regard for women, such as with Catherine. At others, they're fully aware of it and not at all afraid of showing it. What this book does so well is show how impossible it is for women to navigate such a world. You either become complicit in propping it up--like Goody Howland or Catherine--or your risk becoming a victim of it because you defy it, even if you do so in subtle ways, like Constance. But no matter what you do, when you're a woman living in a misogynistic world, you always lose. I think this is why the book created such a sense of urgency in me, why I felt so strongly about what was happening in it. 21st century American can be surprisingly and disappointingly like 17th century America, as #MeToo has proved many, many times over.
That central, extremely important theme of this book might have been enough to carry the novel in and of itself, but the book paints so vivid a picture of 17th century life I found it impossible not to be immersed. I could almost smell, feel, and touch Boston as Bohjalian described it. If someone had told me I'd find a 17th century courtroom drama riveting, I'm not sure I would have believed them, and yet that is precisely what Bohjalian described. I could feel my anxiety rising with every scene.
The third and other most crucial thing Bohjalian does in his best works is create characters so compelling you actually worry about them as if they're real people. I felt that way about Mary, who I found so complex and so authentic I wished I could warn her to watch her step. Mary isn't a saint by any means, and she's sometimes oblivious to the machinations of others because she's a little too convinced of her own cleverness--and that is, in large part, why I liked her as much as I did. She's a woman who sees the world in a way that seems clear to her, but the problem is that the others surrounding her see it through their own lens.
I won't give away the ending other than to say it was unexpected and immensely satisfying to me.
Bohjalian has always written very compellingly about misogyny, and this book is no exception. From the internalized misogyny of characters like Goody Howland to the outright misogyny of characters like Adams, this book is full of characters who express their disdain for women in a myriad of ways. Sometimes they're not even aware of their own low regard for women, such as with Catherine. At others, they're fully aware of it and not at all afraid of showing it. What this book does so well is show how impossible it is for women to navigate such a world. You either become complicit in propping it up--like Goody Howland or Catherine--or your risk becoming a victim of it because you defy it, even if you do so in subtle ways, like Constance. But no matter what you do, when you're a woman living in a misogynistic world, you always lose. I think this is why the book created such a sense of urgency in me, why I felt so strongly about what was happening in it. 21st century American can be surprisingly and disappointingly like 17th century America, as #MeToo has proved many, many times over.
That central, extremely important theme of this book might have been enough to carry the novel in and of itself, but the book paints so vivid a picture of 17th century life I found it impossible not to be immersed. I could almost smell, feel, and touch Boston as Bohjalian described it. If someone had told me I'd find a 17th century courtroom drama riveting, I'm not sure I would have believed them, and yet that is precisely what Bohjalian described. I could feel my anxiety rising with every scene.
The third and other most crucial thing Bohjalian does in his best works is create characters so compelling you actually worry about them as if they're real people. I felt that way about Mary, who I found so complex and so authentic I wished I could warn her to watch her step. Mary isn't a saint by any means, and she's sometimes oblivious to the machinations of others because she's a little too convinced of her own cleverness--and that is, in large part, why I liked her as much as I did. She's a woman who sees the world in a way that seems clear to her, but the problem is that the others surrounding her see it through their own lens.
I won't give away the ending other than to say it was unexpected and immensely satisfying to me.