∎ PDF Free The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane Katherine Howe Books

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane Katherine Howe Books

Download As PDF : The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane Katherine Howe Books

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane Katherine Howe Books

This book garnered some attention when initially published, and I clearly recall passing it up on in the bookshop because Salem witches are not a topic that intrigues me. But, when our book club selected this one, I crossed my fingers and started reading. Some of my friends were listening to the audio version, and I could see how this would be perhaps more appealing than just reading it with Howe's inconsistent phonetic spelling of the Boston Brahmin accent in her dialogue. Its use definitely slowed the already ponderous pacing. Howe's prose, in some sections, crossed the line into providing too much detail. It invited the reader to get caught up on inconsistencies (one scene involving a dirty kitchen sink had me reading and re-reading it several times).

It reminded me a lot of Elizabeth Kostova's The Historian, but with a less skilled protagonist. And though vampires certainly appeared in "new" twists in fiction, the Salem witch trials felt equally overdone to me. Nothing felt new about this book. And though it was easy to see why the author chose this topic (two of her relatives stood accused in the Trials - one even, who makes a cameo in the novel, was condemned to death), the mix of magic and scholarly mystery never flowed together for me. It felt forced and artificial. I never once felt swept into the story and other than the magical dog, I never felt worried or particularly invested in any of the characters' fates.

And on the topic of that dog, the book displayed some abrupt inconsistencies with the perspective. Arlo's viewpoint was used a few times (mostly to avoid romantic scenes, it seemed) and towards the end, even a rat's POV was offered.

But, my biggest problem with the book could lay entirely at the feet of this one sentence: "Like a lot of people who are known only by nicknames, Connie tended to forget that she had any connection to that word." As someone who also is known only by a nickname and who is married to someone known only by a nickname, I must attest to the sheer ridiculous convenience of the way that Connie managed to forget her first name for two months (when all along she must have been using it daily on her IDs and signing into all of these rather negatively represented archives and libraries)...

I really wanted to like the book, and though I never hated it, its elements never gelled for me. It will be interesting to see what the rest of the book club thought of it, though!


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The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane Katherine Howe Books Reviews

For all my interest in history, I know very little about the Salem Witch Trials. This book takes the story of an "unknown" witch and works it into the Salem story.

The good if you don't know much about the Salem story, you'll learn a good bit. If you don't know much about the way PhD candidates get this designation, you'll also learn a lot. If you enjoy seeing how mother-daughter relationships throughout history are usually tense (they may love each other, but moms and daughters drive each other crazy; always have and always will), it's also a fun story. And there's even a mild romance.

The not-so-good. The book is wordy. Okay, I'm an editor, so I'm going to notice things other readers may not, but really, if you threw out the extra "that" and "of" occurrences, you could probably get rid of close to a thousand words. There are also segments where the characters--particularly a certain professor--will go into rambling pages-long monologues, especially during a tense sequence. These sequences tossed me right out of the action and on my ear. I ended up skimming these parts just to get back to the action. Finally, there's very little explanation of what a witch/cunning woman really is, although it seems to be an inherited trait. Something like Samantha and Glendora on the ancient television show "Bewitched," maybe. At any rate, the shocking denouement, which seems pretty obvious about thirty pages into the book, isn't all that shocking.

To sum up it's a decent read. The writer has potential. I liked a lot of her descriptions and imagery. She just needs to learn that you don't slow down to describe the surroundings when you're in the middle of the spooky stuff.
It's hard for me to stop reading a book before it's finished, especially when I've paid for it. Luckily I only paid $1.99 so I stopped as soon as I realized it was going to be really bad. The written dialect is so bad I'm not sure what people are saying unless I sound it out and that's just too slow. Like most adult readers, I sight-read the majority of the time and sounding out dialog is horrible.
The "show stopper" for me? When Connie (a PHD candidate) finds the probate for a woman she believes was executed as a witch in 1692. I'm sure any historian would know that witches were stripped of their property and didn't have probates filed. It was just too much.
There is a ton of comments on Good Reads about this book back and forth on how historically accurate it is but personally, I liked it. As a history student and genealogy buff, this was interesting to me. I wouldn't ever take it as strict fact and I think that's where some people are getting bent out of shape. Yes, it is based on her family history and loosely follows what MIGHT have happened during that time period in their every day lives and the paranoia surrounding those who were accused. Just enjoy it as a fictional story, nothing more. It's not heavy into history, the occult or the specifics of the Salem trials. If you're looking for that, move on to more scholastic books on those subjects. This is just a re-imagined tale of someone's family history with the Salem trials with a supernatural spin and tinged with a budding romance. It's interesting and engaging. It's also a light, fast read - perfect for a weekend.
This book garnered some attention when initially published, and I clearly recall passing it up on in the bookshop because Salem witches are not a topic that intrigues me. But, when our book club selected this one, I crossed my fingers and started reading. Some of my friends were listening to the audio version, and I could see how this would be perhaps more appealing than just reading it with Howe's inconsistent phonetic spelling of the Boston Brahmin accent in her dialogue. Its use definitely slowed the already ponderous pacing. Howe's prose, in some sections, crossed the line into providing too much detail. It invited the reader to get caught up on inconsistencies (one scene involving a dirty kitchen sink had me reading and re-reading it several times).

It reminded me a lot of Elizabeth Kostova's The Historian, but with a less skilled protagonist. And though vampires certainly appeared in "new" twists in fiction, the Salem witch trials felt equally overdone to me. Nothing felt new about this book. And though it was easy to see why the author chose this topic (two of her relatives stood accused in the Trials - one even, who makes a cameo in the novel, was condemned to death), the mix of magic and scholarly mystery never flowed together for me. It felt forced and artificial. I never once felt swept into the story and other than the magical dog, I never felt worried or particularly invested in any of the characters' fates.

And on the topic of that dog, the book displayed some abrupt inconsistencies with the perspective. Arlo's viewpoint was used a few times (mostly to avoid romantic scenes, it seemed) and towards the end, even a rat's POV was offered.

But, my biggest problem with the book could lay entirely at the feet of this one sentence "Like a lot of people who are known only by nicknames, Connie tended to forget that she had any connection to that word." As someone who also is known only by a nickname and who is married to someone known only by a nickname, I must attest to the sheer ridiculous convenience of the way that Connie managed to forget her first name for two months (when all along she must have been using it daily on her IDs and signing into all of these rather negatively represented archives and libraries)...

I really wanted to like the book, and though I never hated it, its elements never gelled for me. It will be interesting to see what the rest of the book club thought of it, though!