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A review by elerireads
The Manningtree Witches by A.K. Blakemore
3.0
Historical fiction very closely following records of the time, with pretty much all the characters being actual historical people. An imagining of the kinds of women the Manningtree "witches" might have been, and how the witchhunting might have panned out. Vivid depiction of the dangerous ways that radical religion and superstition can manifest when combined with suffering and a power vacuum. Blakemore writes with such rage and black humour about the inevitability of suspicion falling on a group of independent, unmarried/widowed women who are friends and able to laugh with each other.
I wasn't particularly gripped though - it took me a very long time to read for a fairly short book.
The writing is absolutely gorgeous for the most part. The kind of prose where you think the perfect word has been found to express exactly what is meant and that the author had true mastery of the english language so every single word was at her disposal - there was such richness in every sentence that in some places I just had to read aloud. So when I got to the end and saw from the inside cover that Blakemore is a poet I was completely unsurprised. That said, there were a few places where it felt like the tone slipped - the odd sentence or paragraph that jarred. Mostly they were slightly preachy feminist comments or manhating. I kind of think the whole "show not tell" thing applies quite strongly here, because this is a book in which we seriously do not need to be told to hate the men.
One other tiny comment: I'm a bit baffled by the strange quip about losing two armies looking like carelessness. Was this an intentional Oscar Wilde reference? If so, what was the point of it? It just felt like quite bizarre, cheap plagiarism to me, and made me wonder if there were other weird references that I wasn't getting. If it was completely unintentional similarity then that's quite a funny coincidence.
I wasn't particularly gripped though - it took me a very long time to read for a fairly short book.
The writing is absolutely gorgeous for the most part. The kind of prose where you think the perfect word has been found to express exactly what is meant and that the author had true mastery of the english language so every single word was at her disposal - there was such richness in every sentence that in some places I just had to read aloud. So when I got to the end and saw from the inside cover that Blakemore is a poet I was completely unsurprised. That said, there were a few places where it felt like the tone slipped - the odd sentence or paragraph that jarred. Mostly they were slightly preachy feminist comments or manhating. I kind of think the whole "show not tell" thing applies quite strongly here, because this is a book in which we seriously do not need to be told to hate the men.
One other tiny comment: I'm a bit baffled by the strange quip about losing two armies looking like carelessness. Was this an intentional Oscar Wilde reference? If so, what was the point of it? It just felt like quite bizarre, cheap plagiarism to me, and made me wonder if there were other weird references that I wasn't getting. If it was completely unintentional similarity then that's quite a funny coincidence.