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A review by bloomed
Lady Macbeth by Ava Reid
1.25
Beautifully written, but not quite what it says on the tin, so to speak.
Lady Macbeth was my most anticipated read of 2024 after devouring the rest of Ava Reid’s catalogue; the premise of the book and her penchant for gorgeous, gothic stories seemed like a match made in heaven, and I spent actual hours yelling excitedly to friends after being approved for the ARC of this book. Genuinely, I can’t remember being more excited to read something in recent memory!
The good: Reid’s prose never, ever fails to disappoint. She knows how to write, and that’s just as true here as it is in her other books! There are so many lines that I highlighted while reading, just so I can look back on them later and admire how pretty they are. Some of them sincerely took my breath away. The atmosphere was also really, really captivating; there was a gloominess to the setting of Lady Macbeth that reminded me a lot of A Study in Drowning in the very best way. I loved the oppressive, salt-heavy, grey presence of the ocean and almost felt like it was an entire character all on its own. I was also really gripped by the story itself—it was just similar enough to Macbeth that I felt like I knew what was going on, but different enough that I *had* to see if I was right or wrong about my assumptions. The very definition of a page-turner; I had a lot of trouble putting it down, and I thought of it often, even when I wasn’t reading.
The bad: Lady Macbeth could’ve been pitched as a completely original story, or one only vaguely inspired by the play itself, and it probably would’ve been better for it. I felt really frustrated at points by how toothless Roscille often felt when weighed against her Shakespearean counterpart. Initially, I liked her way, way more than I do Mrs. M, but by the end… not so much. I don’t think this would’ve been the case if I hadn’t gone into the book with a specific set of expectations in my head, though! So, YMMV there, probably. She is still an interesting character, with a lot of moving parts that drew me in. She just didn’t manage to fill the shoes that I expected to see her step into.
The ugly: The attitude toward the Scots and Scotland, sexual assault, and womanhood vs. men was… not it. The book has a lot to say about how barbaric Scotland is in comparison to the obviously-more-civilized France, and every take Roscille has about it is never examined by the narrative itself. If anything, the book seems very, very invested in her being “right” about the conclusions she draws about the world and people around her, even when, from the perspective of a reader, it seems like she might be negatively biased or flat-our incorrect. On a similar note, it sketched me out a little bit to see a woman so paranoid about sexual violence, who seems to be unable to think about sex or sexuality without envisioning blood on her thighs and sheets, (from her perspective, at least) coerce someone into sleeping with her without any real second thoughts. There were points where the writing surrounding those two subjects specifically made me feel uncomfortable in a way that blindsided me, after seeing how well Reid handled similar topics in her other books.
The TL;DR: You’ll probably like this if you’re a fan of Reid’s other books, and you have an interest in dark, atmospheric, fairytale-esque stories, which are two points that probably go hand-in-hand! Don’t expect it to follow even the loosest structure of the original play, though, or you might be disappointed, especially if you’re a bit of a purist, or are especially attached to the original character of Lady Macbeth.
Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC, and the publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this funky little book!
Lady Macbeth was my most anticipated read of 2024 after devouring the rest of Ava Reid’s catalogue; the premise of the book and her penchant for gorgeous, gothic stories seemed like a match made in heaven, and I spent actual hours yelling excitedly to friends after being approved for the ARC of this book. Genuinely, I can’t remember being more excited to read something in recent memory!
The good: Reid’s prose never, ever fails to disappoint. She knows how to write, and that’s just as true here as it is in her other books! There are so many lines that I highlighted while reading, just so I can look back on them later and admire how pretty they are. Some of them sincerely took my breath away. The atmosphere was also really, really captivating; there was a gloominess to the setting of Lady Macbeth that reminded me a lot of A Study in Drowning in the very best way. I loved the oppressive, salt-heavy, grey presence of the ocean and almost felt like it was an entire character all on its own. I was also really gripped by the story itself—it was just similar enough to Macbeth that I felt like I knew what was going on, but different enough that I *had* to see if I was right or wrong about my assumptions. The very definition of a page-turner; I had a lot of trouble putting it down, and I thought of it often, even when I wasn’t reading.
The bad: Lady Macbeth could’ve been pitched as a completely original story, or one only vaguely inspired by the play itself, and it probably would’ve been better for it. I felt really frustrated at points by how toothless Roscille often felt when weighed against her Shakespearean counterpart. Initially, I liked her way, way more than I do Mrs. M, but by the end… not so much. I don’t think this would’ve been the case if I hadn’t gone into the book with a specific set of expectations in my head, though! So, YMMV there, probably. She is still an interesting character, with a lot of moving parts that drew me in. She just didn’t manage to fill the shoes that I expected to see her step into.
The ugly: The attitude toward the Scots and Scotland, sexual assault, and womanhood vs. men was… not it. The book has a lot to say about how barbaric Scotland is in comparison to the obviously-more-civilized France, and every take Roscille has about it is never examined by the narrative itself. If anything, the book seems very, very invested in her being “right” about the conclusions she draws about the world and people around her, even when, from the perspective of a reader, it seems like she might be negatively biased or flat-our incorrect. On a similar note, it sketched me out a little bit to see a woman so paranoid about sexual violence, who seems to be unable to think about sex or sexuality without envisioning blood on her thighs and sheets, (from her perspective, at least) coerce someone into sleeping with her without any real second thoughts. There were points where the writing surrounding those two subjects specifically made me feel uncomfortable in a way that blindsided me, after seeing how well Reid handled similar topics in her other books.
The TL;DR: You’ll probably like this if you’re a fan of Reid’s other books, and you have an interest in dark, atmospheric, fairytale-esque stories, which are two points that probably go hand-in-hand! Don’t expect it to follow even the loosest structure of the original play, though, or you might be disappointed, especially if you’re a bit of a purist, or are especially attached to the original character of Lady Macbeth.
Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC, and the publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this funky little book!