The Witches of Lychford is a quiet little novella about a small town in England and the supernatural forces that influence it. The book takes the three spheres of faith, science, and magic and looks at how those three things work together to shape the reality of the world Cornell has created. I really enjoyed it and quickly picked up the follow up when I finished it.
Lychford, for whatever reason, sits at the center of the roads between the many supernatural worlds and our mundane one. In order to keep the proper barriers in place there are physical lines drawn all over town to help reinforce the spiritual ones. The only person who’s really aware of this is the town crank, Judith Mawson (another story about a cranky old lady having adventures, YAY), and someone is trying to disrupt the town and remove those borders. Fortunately, she finds the backup she needs in two local women, the vicar (Lizzie) and the owner of the spiritualist shop (Autumn).
First, I really need to praise these three characters. They’re fully developed women, each with their own arc, and believably written. I ‘turned’ the last page on my kindle and was shocked, shocked, to find a male face staring back at me from the author information page. Cornell writes good women, and I love that. The three women also develop a nice friendship (or in the case of Lizzie and Autumn-repair their existing friendship) as they fight the forces of darkness who are trying to break into the world.
It’s a great little story, I highly enjoyed it, I’m enjoying the second one right now, and I look forward to more books in this world and featuring these women.