About.com Rating



This Tudor historical romance is fairly light on the love story, concentrating instead on the main character's developing witch powers and the political intrigues of the people around her. The setting is the time just before Elizabeth I became queen of England, when superstition and religious persecution were rampant.

Publication Information

• Full Title:Witchstruck
• Series: The Tudor Witch Trilogy (#1)

• Author: Victoria Lamb
• Publisher: Harlequin Teen (US), Corgi (UK)
• Publication Date: 2013
• ISBN: 9780373210978 (US paperback), 9781460319680 (US ebook), B00CN0N8F4 (Kindle ASIN), 9780552566117 (UK paperback), 9781448120215 (UK ebook)

Intrigue

Meg is a young woman in the service of Elizabeth Tudor, daughter of Henry VIII of England, and sister to Queen Mary. Meg is also a witch, apprenticed to her aunt to learn the old ways of summoning spirits and working with the energies of the earth. Elizabeth knows what she is, and often asks her and her aunt to look into the future for her, to find out how long she'll be kept a prisoner in the decrepit country manor she's been exiled to, or if she'll ever be Queen.

Meg's cousin keeps trying to get her help to get near Elizabeth to gain support for a rebellion, and the local witchfinder is pressing Meg to marry him. Not only does she fear he'll discover she is a witch, but he is also an unpleasant man no woman would want to be with. And then Queen Mary sends a Catholic priest to Elizabeth to be sure she converts from Protestantism, and accompanying the priest is a young -- and devastatingly handsome -- novice who seems rather interested in Meg.

Words Have Power

The writing in Witchstruck is generally quite good, though it takes a little getting used to (not too much, fortunately). Because it's an historical tale, the style is a bit more formal than many readers will be used to, and comes off as stiff at times. It does suit the story, though, and a more laid-back, contemporary voice would have seemed out of place.

Nothing in the historical detail jumped out as being wrong, and overall everything felt true to the period, if sometimes a little vague. I didn't go through event-by-event to check for accuracy, though, since I'm happy to read the book as alternate history if the author chose to make changes (also, I'm lazy and just want to read a good story). The important thing for me is that events were plausible, with the addition of witchcraft being real in this version of the world, of course.

Headstrong

I liked Meg as a character, and I appreciated that the author chose not to make her helpless. Sometimes she was too sure of her power, to her detriment, which I liked. But I was less happy when Meg did stupid things for no good reason, like suddenly getting so angry she used witchcraft in full view of other people. I get that she was angry, but she's been training in secret her whole life, so it felt a bit out of character -- like something inserted so another character could step in and act.

As far as plot goes, there wasn't any real overarching storyline, which made the story feel a bit unfocussed at times, but there were threads and themes that ran throughout and helped tie it together. I would have liked there to be more dread about being found out as a witch right from the start, perhaps, and the end, where Meg is able to use her power far more than before, seemed a little too easy.

Don't Take My Word For It

Despite the flaws -- and I readily admit that many of the things I pointed out above are my own quirks and preferences -- I enjoyed Witchstruck a great deal, and I'm happy to find out it's only the first book in a trilogy. While the writing didn't blow me away, it was strong enough that I'll be keeping an eye out to see what else Victoria Lamb writes in the future.

For concerned parents: there is no sex, and only a few passing mentions, though there is one interrupted attempted rape that doesn't go very far before it's stopped. There is also violence, including a ducking (or swimming -- where a suspected witch is tied up and thrown in a pond) and a burning at the stake (not described in too graphic detail, but still horrifying), but it's very much in keeping with the historical period.



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