Review: A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. Harrow

Links with an asterisk (*) are Ad: Affiliate Links, which means if you make a purchase through them, I'll make a small commission at no extra cost to you.

A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. Harrow

Published: 5th October 2021 | Publisher: TorDotCom | Source: Bought
Alix E. Harrow’s Website

It's Zinnia Gray's twenty-first birthday, which is extra-special because it's the last birthday she'll ever have. When she was young, an industrial accident left Zinnia with a rare condition. Not much is known about her illness, just that no-one has lived past twenty-one.

Her best friend Charm is intent on making Zinnia's last birthday special with a full sleeping beauty experience, complete with a tower and a spinning wheel. But when Zinnia pricks her finger, something strange and unexpected happens, and she finds herself falling through worlds, with another sleeping beauty, just as desperate to escape her fate. From The StoryGraph.

Purchase from Bookshop.org*
The StoryGraph | Goodreads

Trigger/Content Warnings: This book features blood, discussion of terminal illness, inevitable death, reference to sexual assault, violence against women.

Continue reading Review: A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. Harrow

Review: The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow (#Ad)

I received sent this eProof for free from Orbit via NetGalley for the purposes of providing an honest review.

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow

Published: 12th September 2019 | Publisher: Orbit | Source: NetGalley
Alix E. Harrow's Website

In the early 1900s, a young woman embarks on a fantastical journey of self-discovery after finding a mysterious book in this captivating and lyrical debut.

In a sprawling mansion filled with peculiar treasures, January Scaller is a curiosity herself. As the ward of the wealthy Mr. Locke, she feels little different from the artifacts that decorate the halls: carefully maintained, largely ignored, and utterly out of place.

Then she finds a strange book. A book that carries the scent of other worlds, and tells a tale of secret doors, of love, adventure and danger. Each page turn reveals impossible truths about the world and January discovers a story increasingly entwined with her own.

Lush and richly imagined, a tale of impossible journeys, unforgettable love, and the enduring power of stories awaits in Alix E. Harrow's spellbinding debut--step inside and discover its magic. The StoryGraph

Trigger/Content Warnings: This book features racism, an animal attack, animal cruelty, forced instituionalisation, self-harm, abduction, and torture.

Continue reading Review: The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow (#Ad)

Review: The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow (#Ad)

I received this eProof for free from Orbit via NetGalley for the purposes of providing an honest review.

The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow

Published: 13th Octover 2020 | Publisher: Orbit | Cover Designer: Lisa Marie Pompilio | Source: Publisher
Alix E. Harrow's Website

In 1893, there's no such thing as witches. There used to be, in the wild, dark days before the burnings began, but now witching is nothing but tidy charms and nursery rhymes. If the modern woman wants any measure of power, she must find it at the ballot box.

But when the Eastwood sisters--James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna--join the suffragists of New Salem, they begin to pursue the forgotten words and ways that might turn the women's movement into the witch's movement. Stalked by shadows and sickness, hunted by forces who will not suffer a witch to vote-and perhaps not even to live-the sisters will need to delve into the oldest magics, draw new alliances, and heal the bond between them if they want to survive.

There's no such thing as witches. But there will be. From Goodreads.

Rep: Disabled protagonist; lesbian protagonist; Black, lesbian main character, trans woman secondary character, Native American secondary characters.

Trigger/Content Warnings: This book features a (vague) sex scene; a description of an open wound; birth; abortion; mention of stillbirth; ableism; racism; homophobia; transphobia; an abusive, homophobic conversion school/prison; child abuse - physical violence; sexual assault; an angry, violent crowd; violence against women; torture; use of scold's/witch's bridles; a witch trial; discussion of burning witches, with descriptive detail.

Continue reading Review: The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow (#Ad)