Happy Halloween Readers,
It’s the start of witches’ week and what a better way to
start than with The Witches of Vardø. The Witches of Vardø is a historical
fiction book that is steeped in historical facts. This novel brings the
complexities of that dark time in history to life. This story isn’t for the
faint of heart and full honestly it made my shed a tear. It asks some harsh questions as you take a deeper look at the
historic events, and to experience them for yourself.
It’s no secret that I’m a fan of novels that dip into the
history of witches and the witch trials and have strong opinions on the situation.
The Witches of Vardø was always going to be a winner for me. This
is another book that I have read where it was a complex time of being a woman. What
do I mean by a “complex tome of being a woman” well this book takes place during
the hysteria of the witch trials.
Before we get to far into this review, I just want to
place a little trigger warning. This novel is unflinching in its portrayal of
what waiting for a witch trial meant for the accused. It shows the brutal
reality of how men abused the accused with pleasure and how the innocent were
accused of the wildest things. It is not a novel for the fainthearted. Despite the
warnings I am giving this book isn’t all doom and gloom there is also a great
deal of love, strength and loyalty to be found among these pages.
Anya doesn’t shy away from the very real horrors of
reality of the witch trials and some of the descriptions of what these women
endured were graphic and detailed. The sad reality of the fact is despite if
you think this book is too graphic the very real things the accused went through
was even worse. Trigger warning: torture, death, suicide, miscarriage, rape and
more.
The Witches of Vardo is inspired by the very real and
terrible events of witch hunts which took place on the island of Vardo between
1662 and 1663. This was a new story for me as I have previously only focused on
the American and United Kingdom’s witch trials, so I learned quite a bit while
reading this book and I had to pause to do some research of my own.
Anya has carefully created a story that shows us just how
perilous it was to be a woman in the seventeenth century, particularly if you
were unlucky enough to be a widow, a midwife, intelligent, or even beautiful. Anya
also shows us the dangers of superstition and how gossip can spread faster than
flame.
Anya ‘s characters are based on real people, and you can’t
help but get emotional attached to them despite knowing there is an unlikely chance
of a happy ending foe them. I adored Ingeborg and Maren. The book alternates
between Ingeborg and Anna I thought this was a great choice by Anya as it gave
a different perspective to the story as we learn about their history and life
within the fortress.
I was captivated from the very first sentence. I enjoyed this retelling of the Norwegian witch trials as it is a
timeless but sad story that is bound to conjure strong emotions while you read.
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