The Year of the Witching

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ETA: I'm changing the rating I gave this book from a 3 to at least a 4 because I just can't get it out of my head. This was such an enjoyable book to read. Starting from the gothic atmosphere, the sinister dark vibe, the relevant theme, the feminism, the cute love story, and the relatable realistic topics. I really liked both the main characters, even though they were kinda basic, I was still cheering for them the whole time. The pacing was so good making the book so readable. In the lands of Bethel, where the Prophet’s word is law, Immanuelle Moore’s very existence is blasphemy. Her mother’s union with an outsider of a different race cast her once-proud family into disgrace, so Immanuelle does her best to worship the Father, follow Holy Protocol, and lead a life of submission, devotion, and absolute conformity, like all the other women in the settlement.

This is more revolutionist, reformist and outstandingly brave and powerfully feminist dystopian story! This is about a young woman’s fight to change the system, not to be victimized, harassed, abused by the men who used the law and religion to justify their wrongdoings. It’s bold, moving and fascinating. Because had my expectations for Alexis Henderson’s debut novel, The Year of the Witching been lower (or at least, more accurate), I suspect I would be writing a more positive review than the one I am about to write. Yet again, my hopes got the best of me. I mean, he spends a significant amount of the story mansplaining oppression to Immanuelle despite the fact that he’s the second-most elite white man in this racist and sexist society and she’s a biracial woman. She relies on him so much – Ezra gets her the books she needs, Ezra gets her the warrant and wagon she needs, etc. And even more than that she spends a large part of this feminist tale of coming to terms with society’s unfairness and malecentriticy thinking about Ezra and how she feels about him. That doesn’t seem quite right to me.

Sometimes I wonder if my secrets are better swallowed than spoken. Perhaps my truths have done enough harm. Perhaps I should take my memories to the grave and let the dead judge my sins." This is a fantasy that’s different than most others I’ve read in the genre. It’s definitely an adult fantasy, so keep that in mind when making comparisons, but I feel like it still had a differing tone. Much of the plot moves like historical fiction, likely based on a specific historical time period (I am bad at identifying stuff like this), even though this world is an invented one. The inhabitants of Bethel are terrified of all things magical and actively shun it. So the only time that Immanuelle is able to access magic is primarily when she ventures outside of her community. As a result, I think many of the non-magic portions of the book felt slower comparatively, which led to an uneven pacing at times. I also love the message that Henderson was going for here. A Puritan-inspired fantasy is a fresh idea and I appreciate her argument that women’s sacrifices in the name of duty and purity are at the heart of Puritan Christianity. She makes it clear that patriarchy is often masked by benevolence, its ugly hypocrisy hidden as men like the Prophet pretend holy authority but use their power to abuse women. It was also infuriatingly accurate that the Prophet frantically tried to hid this reality of his horrible actions by turning himself into a martyr unfairly persecuted malevolent women. (Witchunt, anyone?)

In the lands of Bethel, where the Prophet's word is law, Immanuelle Moore's very existence is blasphemy. Her mother's union with an outsider of a different race cast her once-proud family into disgrace, so Immanuelle does her best to worship the Father, follow Holy Protocol, and lead a life of submission, devotion, and absolute conformity, like all the other women in the settlement. I once read that the key to happiness is to lower one’s expectations in life. That the feeling of happiness is often more dependent upon whether life is better than originally hoped, rather than how well one’s life is flowing along overall. (Or something to that effect.) And imagine this: Immanuelle and best friend are actually in love and it’s through their continued relationship after she is married to the Prophet that we come to learn even more about the truth of Bethel’s injustices. Immanuelle secretly comes to visit her and she’s able to play a similar role in the story as Ezra, providing Immanuelle access to the Prophet’s secret materials and the items that she needs over the course of the story. Also she doesn’t die and she doesn’t just exist to talk about being raped and she and Immanuelle live happily ever after!!!!!! Pixieltd on Reading The Wheel of Time: Taim Tells Lies and Rand Shares His Plan in Winter’s Heart (Part 3) 4 hours ago a witchy fantasy-horror about a teenage girl trying to break a curse while living under the yoke of an oppressive patriarchal regime.

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My rating is purely selfish (driven by my love for Ezra 🙈). The last 30% was nail bitingly intense. The fate of our characters hanged in the balance. I was ready to raise hell and make sure the rating would suffer just as much if anything were to happen to him. Except for “ The Outsider” (2018) King has been releasing crime novels and adventure books instead of true horror in the past few years. Known mostly for his terrifying early supernatural novels such as “Pet Sematary,”“It,”“The Shining” and “Christine,” the 76-year-old author has diversified from what made him famous starting with “Carrie” in 1974.

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I’m giving my five impressed, mesmerized stars and I’m clapping the debut authorAlexis Henderson for her brilliant work. Much has been made of the story’s feminism, but little on its intersectionality. Immanuelle is not looked down on by her community solely because she is a woman or is genetically kin to the dark skinned people of the Outskirts; she is looked down upon because she is both. She exists at the intersection of dual oppressions, one based on gender the other on skin color. The social hierarchies forged by sexism and racism trap her at the bottom. Not even her relationships with the Prophet and his Heir can pull up her rank; white supremacy and the patriarchy made sure of that. It’s been a minute since Stephen King put out a short story anthology. But in 2024 a new one containing some original works is getting published just in time for summer. Even the book title “ You Like It Darker,”suggests the author is giving readers something more. women are married off by the dozens to men old enough to be their grandfathers as soon as they menstruate for the first time. such as leah, immanuelle’s best friend and one of the prophet’s many wives, who only ever seems to pop into the story to illustrate just how badly women are abused.