I read VenCo by Cheri Dimaline for the readers retreat I attended in early June. The retreat exceeded my expectations ... this book did not. Witchy magical fantasy is not my genre, so I didn't expect to love this, but I enjoyed discussing it with 19 fellow readers, many of whom shared my opinions.
Lucky St. James is a young woman with a troubled past who's doing her best to support herself and her beloved grandmother Stella, the only source of stability in childhood. One night she's drawn to an unusual site and discovers a silver spoon engraved with SALEM. Soon after a visitor promises Lucky a more meaningful life if she visits the offices of VenCo in Salem. The meeting leads to a road trip which results in an encounter Lucky will never forget.
The relationship between Lucky and Stella felt real and nuanced. I appreciated the feminist theme and diversity in the coven of North American witches, but so much of the plot is used to reveal how each discovers her silver spoon, I didn't know them well enough to care about their origin stories. The 'big reveal' was fairly obvious to me, and the ending with the villain was very strange and cringy.
Apparently VenCo is book one in a planned series. The next novel may be more interested since the worldbuilding was explained in this book, but I'm not sure I'll read it.
Thank you to William Morrow and Libro.fm for the advanced listening copy of the audiobook narrated by Michelle St. John.
Lucky St. James is a young woman with a troubled past who's doing her best to support herself and her beloved grandmother Stella, the only source of stability in childhood. One night she's drawn to an unusual site and discovers a silver spoon engraved with SALEM. Soon after a visitor promises Lucky a more meaningful life if she visits the offices of VenCo in Salem. The meeting leads to a road trip which results in an encounter Lucky will never forget.
The relationship between Lucky and Stella felt real and nuanced. I appreciated the feminist theme and diversity in the coven of North American witches, but so much of the plot is used to reveal how each discovers her silver spoon, I didn't know them well enough to care about their origin stories. The 'big reveal' was fairly obvious to me, and the ending with the villain was very strange and cringy.
Apparently VenCo is book one in a planned series. The next novel may be more interested since the worldbuilding was explained in this book, but I'm not sure I'll read it.
Thank you to William Morrow and Libro.fm for the advanced listening copy of the audiobook narrated by Michelle St. John.
