onespaceymother 's review for:

The Witch of Portobello by Paulo Coelho

2.0

---

I really wanted to like this more than I did. It’s written like a series of interviews; narratives told from different speakers. Unfortunately, however, the voices of each of these different perspectives sounded pretty much identical in style and tone. He seemed to conflate sexuality with feminism, which coexist obviously, but one does not dictate the other. I didn’t care for (or really about) Athena. It felt like the author was too busy writing about a woman he loved and confusing it with spirituality? Anytime we started to deep dive into motherhood or femininity it definitely felt like a man writing about what he likes to imagine women think and feel. A weird romantic notion of paganism, mothering, and sexuality. The surprise ending also sort of rendered the fictional purpose of the book unnecessary and missing crucial voices.