Be sure to check trigger warnings before reading this book!

I really like Slewfoot. It’s my first Brom book, but definitely made me want to read more.

Slewfoot is about a woman brought to a Puritan colony in America after being sold as a wife to one of the men there. While Abitha and her husband live outside the colony, they still go to church and are beholden to the morals of the townsfolk there. Abitha pokes at the Puritan religion through the entire book, and I feel it would have been more believable if there were another woman that also had doubts about their religion.

The book started out very slice-of-life, with a dash of horrific imagery and magic here and there. I really liked the magical aspects of this book. The combination of pagan and Christian morals was interesting. I also really liked how the magic was universal, with all of the gods and their followers being one.

However, I didn’t feel comfortable with the portrayal of native Americans in this book. Abitha kills an indigenous man and uses his body as a warning for trespassers. The native communities are glossed over and there is never a conversation about the impact of the Puritans on their culture and way of life. While this may not have been the point of the book, I feel it is still important to address in any colonizer narrative.

2/5 for being fun to read, would be a 4/5 if not for the disappointing glossing over of the indigenous perspective.