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Wakenhyrst

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Wakenhyrst mostly takes place in the early 20th century, just prior to the first World War, and combines creepy medieval church art; old religious notions of witchcraft, demonic possession, and saintly miracles; lingering pagan superstitions (leaving a bowl of bread and milk at the door, for witches); a creaky old manor house; the eerie natural beauty of the watery fens. The details of a murder are provided upfront, the rest of the book covers the events leading up to it. So you get a great early hook, but it also means the book drags a little towards the end - knowing what’s coming, I grew impatient to finally get there, and it’s a real slow burn. Wakenhyrst combines elements of all the things I adore, medieval history and religious imagery, the Anglo-Saxon language, the unromantic beauty of the East-Anglian marshes, gothic themes, visceral horror, and the astute exploration of gender and class issues in Edwardian Britain.

Wakenhyrst by Michelle Paver review – dark goings-on in the

Like Alice, Maman had never been allowed to do anything; she’d always had things done to her. She had been ‘given in marriage’ and ‘permitted’ fine clothes – although only if Father approved of them. Her father, on the other hand, hates the landscapes, hates animals and forbids any pets (except the two horses needed for the carriage). It was not me who discovered Michelle Paver about five years ago, but my daughter when she pulled “The Wolf Brothers” off the shelf at our local library and then read all six books of the “Chronicles of Ancient Darkness” in short succession. So you may forgive me, that I had Michelle Paver down as a middle grade author until I saw Wakenhyrst on the shelf at the same library but this time in the adult section of “new and notable releases”. The magpie on the cover sealed the deal, because I adore the birds for their chatter and cheekiness. Along with the strong-willed Maud, my heart also became enamoured with the majestic wilderness that consistently surrounded her. I could not fail but to liken this to my favourite read, Wuthering Heights. Cathy Earnshaw is as much a product of the moors as she is her upbringing and the same can be said for Maud. Also, in both, the mirroring of tempestuous passions between nature and the characters traversing its plains dominate the texts. Both were about far more than nature's undisturbed beauty but that is what spoke so clearly to me, through the intricacies of the plot, and ensured both as eternally unforgettable reads.Spanning five centuries, Wakenhyrst is a darkly gothic thriller about murderous obsession and one girl’s longing to fly free by the bestselling author of Dark Matter and Thin Air. Wakenhyrst is an outstanding new piece of story-telling, a tale of mystery and imagination laced with terror. It is a masterwork in the modern gothic tradition that ranges from Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker to Neil Gaiman and Sarah Perry. With an elegant, dark undertone, Wakenhyrst transported me to a place where all gothic fans craving for. Eigentlich hat dieses Buch alles, was ich mag, und doch hat es mich nicht gänzlich überzeugen können. Ich habe es sehr gerne gelesen, fand es auch spannend, aber zwischendurch und immer mehr zum Ende hin gab es für mich auch mal einige Längen, wo meine Gedanken dann vom Buch abschweiften... Michelle Paver is well known for her chilling ghost stories, but to me this one is more historical fiction with a crime element. There is still some suggestion of the supernatural in Wakenhyrst, but that element of ambiguity, where the rational explanation and the spooky one are equally plausible, just wasn’t present here. I was Team Rational all the way. This did not diminish the story for me at all, but other readers expecting a Paver haunting might be disappointed. Maud’s a fantastic character. As she reads her father’s journal, her opinion of him changes rapidly and she starts to subtly annoy him on purpose. She saves and befriends a magpie, hence the cover, and she strikes up a friendship with the handsome gardener, someone below her station as far as her father is concerned. Through this it highlights the power imbalance caused by poverty.

Wakenhyrst ⋆ Curiosity Killed the Bookworm Wakenhyrst ⋆ Curiosity Killed the Bookworm

The most impressive nov­el of the year. It’s an utter triumph of a book, a pitch-perfect evocation of the stories of M.R. James and A.C. Benson filtered through a 21st-century sensibility. She must survive a world haunted by witchcraft, the age-old legends of her beloved fen – and the even more nightmarish demons of her father’s past. Maud’s battle has begun. She must survive a world haunted by witchcraft, the age-old legends of her beloved fen – and the even more nightmarish demons of her father’s past. Few authors write as well as Michelle Paver so clearly does. Her descriptions of The Fens breathe a unique beauty into the stagnant and miasmic nature of marshlands, her passionate yet restrained depiction of a strange young girl’s first kiss will leave you enraptured, and her mastery of suspense will make your hair stand on end.

The journals of painter and historian Edmund Stearne have been kept safely in Wake’s End since his admittance to an asylum for the criminally insane. He admitted he did it but that he never did anything wrong. 60 years later, his daughter releases his, and her, story to the world.

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