I really enjoyed this book. I started listening to it on audiobook, but I wasn’t very into it. When I started reading the physical book, however, I really got into it and there were places where I really didn’t want to put it down.
I loved Fleetwood Shuttleworth as a character, and Alice Grey, but I couldn’t really seem to connect with the others. Richard Shuttleworth, Fleetwood’s husband, I thought was a wet blanket at first, but we started to see his backbone and it was interesting following his development as a character, and the change in his relationship with Fleetwood as well. Roger Nowell I think was the villain that you really didn’t like – he was completely manipulative and determined to get his own way and rise in the world, no matter the consequences. In a way he was quite a sad character.
The story of Fleetwood’s pregnancy is haunting, having lost so many babies before they were born, and believing that she wouldn’t live to see this one grow up either. That’s the overarching theme of the book – the struggle of women in childbed and in doing things of their own free will without the guiding hand of their husband. It was a dark time for women – accusations of witchcraft, the fear of dying in childbed, men taking mistresses and the women having to accept it, being totally at the beck and call of a man. We see Fleetwood battle against all of these things to find her place in the world and help a friend in dire need.
I wanted to see more of the Pendle witches and the trials. I felt that, for a book set in this fascinating area and based around accusations of witchcraft, that felt a little lacking in places. There were bits and pieces about the accusations and the women who were being accused but it was largely second-hand rumour and gossip. I wanted to see more from the first-hand accounts of the women involved. That’s what let it down for me, story-wise.
I really enjoy Stacey Halls’s writing, having read ‘The Foundling’ before, and I’m really glad I finally gave in and read this one! I’ll look forward to reading Halls’s new book ‘Mrs England’ in the future.
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