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beverleyleeauthor 's review for:
Wakenhyrst
by Michelle Paver
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This one ticked so many of my boxes! Historical setting (lovely to see Edwardian for a change) Wild and remote landscape (The Fens) Something dark from long ago (The Doom).
Add to this some wonderful characters and gorgeous prose, makes this an easy page turner.
The isolated manor house, Wake's End, is owned by historian Edmund Stearne (and what a fabulous example of a man you come to loathe), a man who slowly descends into madness as a terrible event from his childhood comes back to haunt him. But this is no redemption tale. He will stop at nothing to try to cast out the demons in his mind, demons he is convinced he is responsible for, after an old Medieval painting is uncovered in a local church.
But the story really belongs to Maud, his only living daughter, whose love for nature and the watery landscape she is forbidden to enter, carry this tale from her early childhood desperate for her father's love, to her later years where she secretly devours the contents of her father's diary, only to discover the kind of monster he is.
But this book is so much more. The misogyny of the times. The social injustices. Superstition still rife in villages.
It's very slow-paced. Very detailed. But if that's the kind of writing you love, this is a must-read!
Add to this some wonderful characters and gorgeous prose, makes this an easy page turner.
The isolated manor house, Wake's End, is owned by historian Edmund Stearne (and what a fabulous example of a man you come to loathe), a man who slowly descends into madness as a terrible event from his childhood comes back to haunt him. But this is no redemption tale. He will stop at nothing to try to cast out the demons in his mind, demons he is convinced he is responsible for, after an old Medieval painting is uncovered in a local church.
But the story really belongs to Maud, his only living daughter, whose love for nature and the watery landscape she is forbidden to enter, carry this tale from her early childhood desperate for her father's love, to her later years where she secretly devours the contents of her father's diary, only to discover the kind of monster he is.
But this book is so much more. The misogyny of the times. The social injustices. Superstition still rife in villages.
It's very slow-paced. Very detailed. But if that's the kind of writing you love, this is a must-read!