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hkeogh13 's review for:
Witchcraft for Wayward Girls
by Grady Hendrix
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This was a bit of a curveball for me, reading a fantasy book about witches, written by a middle aged man. I was bought in by the basic premise of the book: maternity homes in 1970s America.
I thought the book was pretty well researched and deep. It felt clear that Hendrix had skin in the game and wanted to do justice to a fraught historic theme which impacted so many young women. I appreciated reading the acknowledgements and understanding that this had touched people close to him.
The fact that young women were barely taught sex education, often raped or groomed, and then made to face traumatic months in homes like this, blamed for things which were very much not their fault, makes me sick. Hendrix captures the painful circumstances his characters found themselves in so well. He explores the sense of helplessness accompanied by the power of growing someone inside you. There's the discomfort and pain of pregnancy and childbirth, the loneliness and boredom of being taken so far from the life you knew. Most pressing is the sense that the place you're meant to be being kept safe is actually an arm of a hard, careless patriarchy.
It felt interesting to me how there could be too areas of evil: the Home and the witches. I thought that one of these would come to represent safety, but Hendrix managed to maintain the girls stuck between two worlds which were out to get them, with limited reprieve. It was so clear that they were only girls, and the way they were treated by all around them was shocking and, unfortunately, so believable. The only balm felt like the friendship that grew between the four main characters.
The use of flower names was clever as a way to put the world of the Home into a third place.
Whilst there were times when I felt taken out of the narrative and bored of the fantasy, I think this was a powerful exploration of power struggles and the way that female bodies have been policed. Sometimes the descriptions were slightly un-PC, though I understood that the context of the 1970s may have been the reason behind this (I am not sure race was always depicted fairly). There was also A LOT of description of the girls' bellies which was a little unnecessary.
I've put several content warnings, but the main one should probably be a heavy storyline around child sexual abuse and grooming from the church. This is described and returns as a theme for one of the characters, so if this is a personal trigger, I would advise against reading.
I thought the book was pretty well researched and deep. It felt clear that Hendrix had skin in the game and wanted to do justice to a fraught historic theme which impacted so many young women. I appreciated reading the acknowledgements and understanding that this had touched people close to him.
The fact that young women were barely taught sex education, often raped or groomed, and then made to face traumatic months in homes like this, blamed for things which were very much not their fault, makes me sick. Hendrix captures the painful circumstances his characters found themselves in so well. He explores the sense of helplessness accompanied by the power of growing someone inside you. There's the discomfort and pain of pregnancy and childbirth, the loneliness and boredom of being taken so far from the life you knew. Most pressing is the sense that the place you're meant to be being kept safe is actually an arm of a hard, careless patriarchy.
It felt interesting to me how there could be too areas of evil: the Home and the witches. I thought that one of these would come to represent safety, but Hendrix managed to maintain the girls stuck between two worlds which were out to get them, with limited reprieve. It was so clear that they were only girls, and the way they were treated by all around them was shocking and, unfortunately, so believable. The only balm felt like the friendship that grew between the four main characters.
The use of flower names was clever as a way to put the world of the Home into a third place.
Whilst there were times when I felt taken out of the narrative and bored of the fantasy, I think this was a powerful exploration of power struggles and the way that female bodies have been policed. Sometimes the descriptions were slightly un-PC, though I understood that the context of the 1970s may have been the reason behind this (I am not sure race was always depicted fairly). There was also A LOT of description of the girls' bellies which was a little unnecessary.
I've put several content warnings, but the main one should probably be a heavy storyline around child sexual abuse and grooming from the church. This is described and returns as a theme for one of the characters, so if this is a personal trigger, I would advise against reading.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Gore, Pedophilia, Sexual violence, Pregnancy