Reviews
This is the story of a young woman growing up in the midlands in 1966 - a woman who may be a witch. As a baby, Fern was taken in by Mammy Cullen who schooled her in the art of old hedgerow medicine, of traditional midwifery, herbs, folk songs and tales. She comes of age in the 1960s but lives on the margins of society until a group of Beatniks descends on the small village she calls home. Then a young woman dies after visiting Mammy for a brew to stop her pregnancy, setting off a landslide of events that threatens everything Fern has ever known.
'Joyce's beguiling novel mingles elements of ancient lore, folk medicine, magic and 1960s bohemianism into a compelling brew... The humour generated by juxtaposing different world-views is delightful, as is the portrayal of a fast-vanishing, and now probably vanished, England, in which the outlandish and the mundane are interwoven.'
Christina Koning
THE TIMES
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