![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Witches of Helcombe Review
Nov. 30th, 2019 06:36 pmI received a free copy of this book in return for an honest review. I’m leaving this review voluntarily.
---
As an infant, Isabel nearly died from a life-threatening illness. The only thing that saved her was the intervention of an old woman who lived on the outskirts of the village. But in curing Isabel, the woman also gave her a gift: magic.
---
The first third or so of the book details Isabel’s life as she gets married, has a child, and raises that child with her husband. It’s not until the second third that we’re introduced to Henrietta and her chunk of the story.
While I did find this book interesting, and it’s a very quick read, due to the fact that most of the paragraphs only consist of a sentence or two, it definitely has its flaws. I would have to say that it’s almost too quick of a read. Large passages of time happen with no warning, so we only get to see tiny glimpses of Isabel’s life. I would have liked to read and know more about her; her life in the village, raising her daughter, the extent of her powers, and how she made a living. Unfortunately, all of these things are glossed over very rapidly.
More than once, Isabel is nearly raped, which I found to be very distasteful. Not just because of the subject matter, but because there didn’t seem to be very much point to it actually being added to the story. It was written in, then written out just as quickly.
Once we get to Henrietta, the issue of her unborn baby is resolved just as quickly, with very little fuss. I also found her two physicians to be almost cartoonish in their villainous ways. All they really needed was a handlebar mustache to twirl while plotting their devious schemes.
This book really feels like an outline to a story, rather than the story itself. It’s very minimal and bare-bones. I also believe that the version I read was unedited, as it was filled with punctuation errors.
I’m afraid to say that what could have been a very interesting story was poorly executed, and not worth the time I spent reading it.
