The recent history of this little northeastern town is sure to intrigue if you like reading about serial killers, covens, and curses. Although this is several books into the series and I haven't read any of the previous ones, I’m not having trouble following who is who among the investigators and chief suspects. Any recurring characters and their connection with Natalie are explicated (briefly) at the time they appear. There are a lot of witches, however: two historic covens plus scatterings of modern solitary witches who appear in a clump and must be gradually distinguished from each other going forward. Mostly they’re sweet, harmless women who have potlucks and volunteer at the food drive when not performing their rituals, but some have motives for wanting the dead witch out of the way.
Immediately following that heart-stopping prologue, we jump to a cosy 19th century mansion where our protagonist, Natalie Lockhart, is considering an important decision: whether or not to quit the police force. Her recent life has included more than one previous grisly murder case and she’s lost people dear to her, and she’s feeling very scarred by it all. So right now, there’s a lot of temptation to hunker down in this mansion with hot, handsome, devoted Hunter Rose, like “curling up with a leather bound Charles Dickens novel.” The imagery is poetic the character and setting feel very soothing. It’s great contrast to what has just gone before, and you can’t help but wonder how soon this gently Gothic upstate idyll will be overturned either by the discovery that Hunter and all he promises are not quite so idyllic as the vacation atmosphere that has so far permeated their relationship promises, or by witch purée being found on the nearby railroad tracks.
It is hard for this modern woman not to yell about the gilded cage awaiting Natalie if she slides into Hunter’s gilded world where he earns all the money and owns all the assets. Even though she is dreaming of unlimited time to paint and draw and just be herself, including lots of sex and good times with Hunter, quitting her job for this is abandoning her own hard-won career at 30 because some man promises a better vision. Whether the character or the author also sees that as a trap becomes clearer down the road.
The pacing is good, churning ahead with introduction of clues, suspects, fellow police, and a full net of red herrings. By the 10% mark you're well into the investigation's early stages, and one big flag has just turned up for it: the dead witch was doing research for a new book - presumably about witchcraft - in the same historic town that had killed three women during the Salem witch trials era, and been cursed for it. Detective Natalie doesn’t quite believe in curses, but she memorized the words of that particular curse way back in childhood and it sure seems, with yet another grisly death to investigate, that the town is prone to more than its share of evil deeds.
The book makes a distinction between modern 'good' witchcraft, or Wicca, and the various dark rituals commonly thought of as 'witchcraft' including neo-satanic rites invented by confused drug addicts who are hoping magic will turn their chaotic lives around better than NA meetings will. Blanchard can make a basic description of a pretty, snowy, woodland scene feel deeply creepy and potentially evil. Just imagine what she can do with a sagging cottage where a pair of tweakers - wannabe evil witches - have been squatting in squalor while making up weird rituals out of their drug-addled imaginations.
One intermittent flaw in the writing is that the author first does a great job of showing us the series of disasters that brought Natalie to the point of emotional and psychological brittleness and then spells it out in clumsy sentences like “Natalie felt tremendous guilt and pain and sorrow.” It’s like a kindergarten teacher came along and added a clarifying sentence. And there are occasional lines of description that don’t make a lot of sense, like “peeled off her coat with a stale crackle.”. It’s hard not to think that is a dictation typo that got left in accidentally.
Overall, though very well written, this book is unrelieved grimness apart from that briefly cosy opening scene in the mansion. There are no lighter moments to take the tension down a notch, only Natalie’s exhausted efforts to keep her web of personal and professional relationships functioning in the face of not only another hideous crime but her own fragile mental state. It's a tossup what is more compelling for the reader: following the police investigation to find the villains, or guessing whether Natalie's life & psyche will fall apart completely before the climax.
Be warned that readers who like full closure on their mysteries won't take kindly to this ending. There's a lot of emotional punch but ends left deliberately loose and lots of setup for the next book too.
This ARC was sent to J.E Barnard by NetGalley in exchange for honest review.
See reviewer Barnard's books (both the grim and the gleeful)
#novel #witchcraft #murder #witches #WitchingTree #AliceBlanchard #AliceHoffman #MacMillan #NatalieLockhart #NetGalley #Minotaur
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