Witches of Lychford
The Witches of Lychford series, Book 1
Paul Cornell
Tor
Fiction, Fantasy
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: Like many small English villages, Lychford has fallen into a slump in modern times. The superstore chain Sovo seems keen on expanding to their neck of the woods, but the people are split over whether to welcome the job opportunities and economic shot in the arm or reject the destruction and desecration of their landscape and way of life. For crusty old Judith, there's a lot more at stake than just economics: the village was built at a rare and delicate crossroads of many worlds, and construction will destroy the frail barriers, allowing malevolent entities to prey upon an unsuspecting world. But most people - including her own son - just think she's gone a bit dotty, and it's not like she's made many friends through the years.
Lizzie grew up around Lychford, but has been away for many years, enduring personal tragedy. Now she returns as a new vicar, just when she's lost her faith... and just when Lychford needs a spiritual leader, the divides created by Sovo's offer splitting the village asunder. She also hopes to see her childhood friend, Autumn, with whom she lost touch - but the woman has been changed in strange ways.
Autumn runs a New Age shop of magic items in Lychford, but knows none of it is real. If she admits magic is real, she has to admit that what happened to her was real and not, as doctors at the asylum told her after her year-long disappearance that was only a weekend to her, simply a delusion brought on by mental breakdown. But she no longer has the luxury of disbelief, not when Judith comes knocking on her door. Lychford needs witches to defend it, even witches who don't believe in magic.
REVIEW: There wasn't anything particularly bad about this story. It's perfectly serviceable, drawing on old English lore and traditions in an era that has forgotten its roots, just at the point where a faceless corporate future meets the fading past in a duel where only one can win. It just felt more like a setup than a full story, meandering and dawdling as it established characters that I never really enjoyed spending time with and a conflict that felt too... simple, I suppose is the word, as it's pretty obvious who the baddies are, with nothing that really hooked me or interested me. The setting did its job, as did the characters (often after being kicked in the head by the proverbial mule a few times to get over disbelief), but the ending felt a bit abrupt and convenient, and I never engaged with the story as a whole. I guess it's just not my kind of story, in the end.
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