Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

hot take the vibe was good, but the magic system (or witchcraft, or what have you) suffered from some floppiness that ruins the tension

Weyward by Emilia Hart

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BINGO: “Green” — so much of the book is about the Weyward relationship t to nature, and while it’s more about animals than trees it still feels green to me It’s a classic issue: if there’s magic, there needs to be flaws which prevent our characters from just MacGuffin-ing their way to a happy resolution. Call it the Kryptonite Conundrum, wherein Superman is required to have a rather odd, easily transported weakness lest he turn up at every fight, punchy punchy stare-y stare-y and everyone […]

Suffers from classic sophomore novel syndrome

The Sirens by Emilia Hart

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Weyward was one of my favorite reads last year so I was excited when I saw that Emilia Hart had a new novel releasing this year. It’s always hard, though, to follow up a hugely successful novel because of the expectations it creates. I know it’s about the journey, not the destination, and as someone that reads a lot, I can often foresee where certain plot points might go. In fact, I think Emilia Hart expects that her readers see exactly how some things are […]

May Want To Avoid If You Are Insect-phobic. But Otherwise, Yes!

Weyward by Emilia Hart

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Three generations of Weyward women, about a hundred years apart, and each with a peculiar gift of working with potions and spells, and having a close connection with birds and insects.  Sort of a slightly more sinister Cinderella.  The birdies aren’t the cute ones, and there is a distinct lack of adorable little mammals.  The potions are mostly for women’s health issues, abortion in particular.  Lord knows their customers are in desperate need of some help. Of course this leads to them finding themselves frequently […]

The struggles, tragedies, and triumphs of three women in three time periods

Weyward by Emilia Hart

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My book club knocked it out of the park this month with Weyward.  Coincidentally,  Barnes and Noble chose it as this month’s speculative fiction pick.  Clearly we have excellent taste.  Emilia Hart has crafted a moving narrative across time by telling us the story of Altha Weyward in 1619, Violet Aryes in 1942, and Kate Aryes in 2019.  Altha, Violet, and Kate are Weyward women.  Born with the gift of being in tune with and connected to nature. For Altha, raised by her mother, another Weyward […]

Charming – Another Great Plane Read

Weyward by Emilia Hart

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This was actually recommended by Sarah Addison Allen in a newsletter.  Since I love all of her novels, without exception, I took her recommendations as gospel.  This was another plane read from The Great Hawaii Odyssey of 2023 (it took a long time to get home), and I was charmed by it. Told in three distinct voices from different centuries, Weyward tells the tale of a family of women who are both at one with nature, and a little bit… conventionally unnatural.  The men in […]

“We never thought of ourselves as witches….For this was a word invented by men, a word that brings power to those who speak it, not those it describes.”

Weyward: A Novel by Emilia Hart

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Weyward is a novel about three women in three different time periods but from the same family line — the Weyward women. It is a story of women who don’t fit, who are “wayward,” and as such are feared and abused. Yet this is also about women who find their strength in that which sets them apart and who learn to love and empower themselves as a result. There are some supernatural elements to this story, and while I think that adding the supernatural to […]



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