A Forest, Darkly

Dealing with major changes in your life is not easy. You can find help in your community, but when you are a Witch who is hunted down, this is not so simple. Any other Witch that you come across is also being hunted or is too young to know what to do and needs a mentor. All Merhrab wants is to be left alone to deal with the rising power of the Fae in her woods, but that is just not going to happen.

The things in the woods may not be monsters but may be a person. A person hiding from society, from religious people who would see them dead. Is this person a Witch? If they are, who should care? They help the locals when needed and only ask to be left to themselves where possible. In A G Slatter’s A Forest Darkly, Merhrab is one such person, but when she is left with a charge to look after she has to deal with a young woman finding her magic, and her own problems too.

Forest is a book about evolution, a coming of age story, but not just about a young Witch coming into her power, but a middle-aged Witch also changing, and coming into her own form of power. This is an ethereal feeling novel, the type of magical realism story that has a slight dream quality to it, like a modern Fairy Tale. The protagonist is Merhrab, a refreshingly focussed and grumpy character. She reminds me of a Granny Weatherwax style of Witch, if Pratchett dealt more with children stealing minor Gods (which he did do a little bit of).

This book is a character piece, and one loaded with meaning. I have to admit to not catching all of it myself, but even I was able to notice some of the themes. It is the pressure of time, community and self-reflection that is prominent in the book. At times it feels like an inner dialogue of Merhrab just trying to get on with her life.

Story wise, it floats a little. Like with so many stories steeped in magic, it is hard to pin down what is real and what is not. That is part of the quality of the book, but means it has a loose feeling to something you would call a story. It is more like visiting with Merhrab and seeing a few months in her life.

There is plenty of character development throughout the book and Merhrab and her charge are not the same people they start off as. There is some interesting world building that speaks of a larger world than just the village and dark woods that surround it. The conclusion hints at a possible follow up that will open up the world and reveal more about the conflict between the old magics and new religions. It was not a book that I was able to get a firm grip of, but I can see that a lover of magical noir and ethereal story telling will enjoy it, and it will speak deeply to other readers than myself.