The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

About the book
On Christmas Eve, 1617, the sea around the remote Norwegian island of Vardo is thrown into a reckless storm. As Maren Magnusdatter watches, forty fishermen, including her father and brother, are lost to the waves, the menfolk of Vardo wiped out in an instant. Now the women must fend for themselves.

Eighteen months later, a sinister figure arrives. Summoned from Scotland to take control of a place at the edge of the civilized world, Absalom Cornet knows what he needs to do to bring the women of Vardo to heel. With him travels his young wife, Ursa. In Vardo, and in Maren, Ursa finds something she has never seen before: independent women. But Absalom sees only a place untouched by God and flooded with a mighty and terrible evil, one he must root out at all costs.

Inspired by the real events of the Vardo storm and the 1621 witch trials, Kiran Millwood Hargrave's The Mercies is a story about how suspicion can twist its way through a community, and a love that may prove as dangerous as it is powerful.

Review
If you've read the blurb you might be expecting the standard witch trial story, but this is so much more. The author has created an insightful and beautiful collaboration of historical fact, culture and love. The purest of emotions and feelings of attraction when two people find they have more in common than they think.

The story is inspired by the real freak storm that hit the Varanger Fjord and killed the majority of the men in the small villages in the area. The storm set the stage as a so-called precursor to the witch trials that followed. Many of the indigenous Sami were at home in the area. Their ancestral and cultural practices were viewed as something akin to devil worship and witchcraft by the Christians, so it's an easy leap from neighbour to accusing someone as a witch.

It's easy to forget how old Ursa is, perhaps because it's the norm in her era, however the truth is she is a mere child and her marriage is arranged. She has been ripped from her family and moved to a place that couldn't be more isolated. Ursa isn't prepared for the people, the weather or being a wife to a man who seeks to make himself a name by ferreting out the evil among them.

She forges an unusual and cautious friendship to a local young woman called Maren, who finds it hard to believe that the people around her are capable of pointing the finger to ingratiate themselves, even if that finger means torture and death.

What Millwood Hargrave does really well is show the slow and insidious use of gossip, folklore and good ol' fear to malign the characters of the innocent. A healer becomes someone using magic, coincidences become summoned demons, and objects to help heal become harbingers of the devil.

It's historical fiction, a beautifully atmospheric tale of love, support and a demon called fear. Millwood Hargrave is a wonderful writer and this is a fantastic read.

Buy The Mercies at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher: Picador; pub date 6 Feb. 2020. Buy at Amazon com. Buy at Waterstones.

Follow @Kiran_MH on Twitter, on Goodreads, on Amazon, Visit kiranmillwoodhargrave.co.uk

Dear Mrs Bird by A.J. Pearce

Emmeline Lake his ambitious. She wants to be a journalist, a woman in a man's world, a Lady war correspondent. Someone who sniffs out the story and feeds it to the masses. When she answers an ad in the newspaper and gets the job she thinks all her eggs have hatched at once. Unfortunately she finds her new position is not only not at the newspaper it's only as the typist for the formidable agony aunt of a women's magazine with low readership.

Emmeline decides to see it asa temporary situation, a stepping stone to the bigger world of journalism, but she hasn't bargained with Mrs Henrietta Bird. Never has she met a more cantankerous, narrow-minded and prudish woman. The poor young girls and women who write to Mrs Bird aren't aware that their letters are judged and discarded within a moments notice. Never shall there be a mention of anything in any way scandalous or inappropriate.

Emmeline finds herself drawn to the worries, questions and concerns of the women. She makes an impulsive decision, which could potentially end her budding career.

This all takes place in London during WW2 and the heavy bombing of the town by the Germans. Trauma and fear play a poignant part in this story, and also the bravery of the men. women and children who tried to survive in the bomb plagued areas of England.

In a way this book puts the whole agony aunt column into perspective, well actually it shines a completely different light on it. That it might be a way of crossing the boundaries of oppression when it comes to topics which may be controversial or being the confidante for people who have no other person to confide in.

I wonder how many of us would do the same thing as Emmeline given half the chance. The possibility of easing the worried minds of a few women here and there, and of course the act of defiance against the patriarchy of society. Just the simple feeling of knowing that one isn't alone with a problem, be it a mundane one or one of a more serious nature. Women supporting other women.

It's amusing, and yet also a tale of bravery at the same time. Mrs Bird is an endearing story of hope, spontaneity, determination and courage.

Buy Dear Mrs Bird at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher: Picador; pub date Paperback Dec 2018. Buy at Amazon com.

Follow @ajpearcewrites, Visit ajpearce.com