A review by keepcalmblogon
Lady Macbeth by Ava Reid

dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Most of you must know by now that I’m a huge fan of Ava Reid! I was so stoked I got approved for Lady Macbeth on Netgalley & even more excited to read it of course!

Needless to say, this book did not disappoint! I read Macbeth in college, & while I didn’t recall the nuances, I didn’t think I needed to. I did remember that Lady Macbeth’s character is often considered a villain, though, & that was definitely an important aspect to remember while reading Lady Macbeth. This book gives Lady Macbeth more context to her actions. She is considered “hagseed” by most, & a witch by the rest, simply because of the accident of her birth & her genetic predisposition to ethereal beauty. She is then married off (read traded for an alliance) to a foreign clan chief in a country quite dissimilar to her own (she is from Brittany, a Celtic region of North-Western France), & therefore she is as foreign to, & thus alienated from, them. She is further alienated by the sexist (even more so than the usual of that time!) tradition of separating women servants from castle life—immediately upon arrival Roscille’s handmaiden is removed.

Focusing on Lady Macbeth’s name is also quite an important nuance. In the original text, the character lacks a first name & is only referred to by her relationship with a man––thusly she is defined only by the men around her. Reid gives Lady Macbeth the name Roscille, which is changed upon her arrival to Scotland to the more Scottish Roscilla (another act of alienation & attempt of definition by the men around her). Throughout Roscille’s mistreatments by the men in her life (historical context: women were property & childbearers at that time), she learned from a young age that while her body may be owned by men, her mind could be free. So she sharpened her wit & attempted at every turn to use her wiles to keep herself as safe as possible from the men in her life. Unfortunately, that did not go very well for her, & she was often reduced to using her cunning in service to her husband, et al, to save her own life, the last thing she had besides her mind. Each time she was forced to choose between autonomy & breathing another day, she hated herself & resented even more the men around her. She recognized that the women of her time had very little to barter with, & even being a noble woman seemed to afford her less freedom, for she was expected only to produce male children, or else. 

In the end, there is so much more I can say, like the pan-Celtic symbolism of the animals of Scotland, Brittany, England, & even Wales Reid uses throughout the text, or further examples of the sexism of the time, the plight of the prisoner witches in the dungeon, or the small ways Roscille fights for feminism. But a good summation is a quote from the text: “Let them call you witch, as they do any woman who professes strength.” Five stars. Period.