witch family | Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Weyward
Author: Emilia Hart
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Publication date: February 2, 2023
Length: 392 pages
Genre: Fantasy
Source: Purchased
Rating:

I am a Weyward, and wild inside.

2019: Under cover of darkness, Kate flees London for ramshackle Weyward Cottage, inherited from a great aunt she barely remembers. With its tumbling ivy and overgrown garden, the cottage is worlds away from the abusive partner who tormented Kate. But she begins to suspect that her great aunt had a secret. One that lurks in the bones of the cottage, hidden ever since the witch-hunts of the 17th century.

1619: Altha is awaiting trial for the murder of a local farmer who was stampeded to death by his herd. As a girl, Altha’s mother taught her their magic, a kind not rooted in spell casting but in a deep knowledge of the natural world. But unusual women have always been deemed dangerous, and as the evidence for witchcraft is set out against Altha, she knows it will take all of her powers to maintain her freedom.

1942: As World War II rages, Violet is trapped in her family’s grand, crumbling estate. Straitjacketed by societal convention, she longs for the robust education her brother receives––and for her mother, long deceased, who was rumored to have gone mad before her death. The only traces Violet has of her are a locket bearing the initial W and the word weyward scratched into the baseboard of her bedroom.

Weaving together the stories of three extraordinary women across five centuries, Emilia Hart’s Weyward is an enthralling novel of female resilience and the transformative power of the natural world.

Weyward has been on my radar since its release in 2023 — and while I’m mad at myself for not getting to it sooner, I’m thrilled to have finally read this excellent novel.

Weyward follows three women across three timelines to tell the story of a family whose women have special gifts — all of whom must break free from the rules and control of men to fully embrace who they are and what they’re capable of.

In 1619, Altha is a healer relied upon by her community, yet also viewed with suspicion. After a gruesome death, she stands trial for witchcraft.

In 1942, Violet is a teen whose cold, cruel father dictates every aspect of her life, while also denying her a life outside the walls of their estate and a chance to pursue the scientific education she yearns for.

In 2019, Kate flees her abusive boyfriend and takes shelter in the cottage she’s inherited from her great-aunt Violet. At first, she just wants a place to hide, but eventually, she learns more about her family’s heritage and what being a Weyward descendent truly means.

This wildness inside gives us our name. It was men who marked us so, in the time when language was but a shoot curling from the earth. Weyward, they called us, when we would not submit, would not bend to their will. But we learned to wear the name with pride.

The three stories swirl around each other through cycles of chapters. Each woman’s story is, in itself, compelling and utterly fascinating. Each character is wonderfully developed, with rich emotions and complicated circumstances. As a whole, the three stories paint a portrait of a family of powerful women, connected by their abilities, their knowledge, their affinity for the natural world, and their need to protect themselves from those who would do them harm.

By the final third of the book, I hated to leave each woman’s story to move onto a chapter about the next, only to find myself completely absorbed in that chapter and character as well. The interconnectedness of the three women’s lives is lovely to see unfold, and I found myself breathlessly tearing through the final chapters to see how it all came together.

I realize I’m not saying much about plot specifics, but that’s intentional. Weyward is a beautifully crafted, evocative story, and I think it’s best to read it without preconceptions or advance knowledge of details. I recommend enjoying it — slowly, if you can (I couldn’t!) — and savoring the texture and depth of the story as it develops.

I loved reading Weyward, and loved Altha, Violet, and Kate as characters. Highly recommended.

Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

From New York Times bestselling author of The Wicked Deep comes a haunting romance perfect for fans of Practical Magic, where dark fairy tales and enchanted folklore collide after a boy, believed to be missing, emerges from the magical woods—and falls in love with the witch determined to unravel his secrets.

Be careful of the dark, dark wood…

Especially the woods surrounding the town of Fir Haven. Some say these woods are magical. Haunted, even.

Rumored to be a witch, only Nora Walker knows the truth. She and the Walker women before her have always shared a special connection with the woods. And it’s this special connection that leads Nora to Oliver Huntsman—the same boy who disappeared from the Camp for Wayward Boys weeks ago—and in the middle of the worst snowstorm in years. He should be dead, but here he is alive, and left in the woods with no memory of the time he’d been missing.

But Nora can feel an uneasy shift in the woods at Oliver’s presence. And it’s not too long after that Nora realizes she has no choice but to unearth the truth behind how the boy she has come to care so deeply about survived his time in the forest, and what led him there in the first place. What Nora doesn’t know, though, is that Oliver has secrets of his own—secrets he’ll do anything to keep buried, because as it turns out, he wasn’t the only one to have gone missing on that fateful night all those weeks ago.

For as long as there have been fairy tales, we have been warned to fear what lies within the dark, dark woods and in Winterwood, New York Times bestselling author Shea Ernshaw, shows us why.

My Thoughts:

It’s interesting that the blurb mentions Practical Magic — I definitely got an Alice Hoffman vibe while reading this story. The language is very lyrical and has that tinge of magic that elevates it above ordinary storytelling.

Walkers cannot trust our own hearts — our slippy, sloppy bleeding hearts. They are reckless, stupid things. Muscles that beat too fast, that cave inward when they break. Too fragile to be trusted.

The plot itself has a really unique setting — an isolated lakeside community surrounded by forests that becomes completely cut off from the outside world once the snow starts to fall. Shades of The Shining, perhaps? In this remote location, Nora thrives in her own isolation, while keeping an eye on the camp for troubled boys across the lake. As her path collides with the boys from the camp, she becomes enmeshed in a mysterious event and its violent outcome. The ensuing events threaten everyone around the lake, even the woods themselves.

“Trees have a long memory,” I warn, my voice like gravel. The forest remembers who carved names into their trunks, with little hearts dug into the wood; who dropped a cigarette into a clump of dry leaves and scorched their raw bark. They know who broke a limb and tore off leaves and pine needles by the handful just to start a bonfire.

They remember. And they hold grudges.

I’m being intentionally vague on the plot, because it’s best to just immerse yourself in the writing and let it flow over you, no preconceptions allowed! The romantic elements of the plot didn’t do much for me, but I did appreciate the interweaving of magic and nature, and a pretty cool twist that comes about 3/4 of the way through the story.

End note: Just being a geek here, but I do need to add that I kept having to remind myself that Walker is the main character’s family name. Every time Nora has a thought about “Walkers” (which is pretty often), I’d start picturing zombies… definitely not what this book is about!

_________________________________________

The details:

Title: Winterwood
Author: Shea Earnshaw
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Publication date: November 5, 2019
Length: 336 pages
Genre: YA fantasy
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley