Short Story Review: St. Valentine, St. Abigail, St. Brigid
Happy Hump Day!
I can’t believe I’m already reviewing yet another work of fiction, but here we are!
This time around I went with another freebie from Tor.com entitled St. Valentine, St. Abigail, St. Brigid by C.L. Polk (click here for the free read).
Ironically I added Witchmark to my TBR (by the same author) this week and picked this story at random, not knowing it was by the same person. Oh, the irony!
All right, let’s do this!
Blurb
All magical requests come with a price. A girl with witchcraft, no friends, and only her mother’s bees to confide in will pay whatever’s necessary to keep the girl she loves safe.
The Review
I gave this short story three and a half witchy stars!
The blurb really pulled me in, so I gave this a read. While it wasn’t what I was hoping for, I did still enjoy this story a lot.
In a nutshell, the main character is a little girl named Theresa Anne. She’s got this huge crush on a girl named Lucille at her school. Theresa does her best to get to know Lucille, and once they make a connection, she wants to keep her safe from a bully by any means necessary.
This story was fun, a bit of magic realism.
The characters were fun. I liked how stern Theresa’s adoptive mom was and the little bits where Theresa showed some snarkiness and attitude. Lucille was alright, but she seemed to just crave Theresa’s attention. I didn’t really get any feeling of loyalty from her at all, but then again, the heart wants what it wants, doesn’t it?
The plot was simple but interesting, though in the end it went in a direction I wasn’t expecting. I didn’t not like it, but I didn’t necessarily love it either.
I think the main issue for me in reading this was the information the reader is missing. Given that this is a short story, we obviously might not pick up on everything, but I felt that too much was left unexplained about this world. I scratched my head here and there.
Overall, this is a fun, short read that might take you 30 minutes or so. It’s not perfect, but it’s definitely worth a quick departure from the world of reality. Give it a try, you might just love it!
That’s A Wrap!
Well that’s it for this short story review. I hope you enjoyed it!
Have you read this story? Are there other short stories you’ve read that you simply have to gush about? Feel free to leave a comment. I’d love to start a conversation!
Have a great day!
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Sounds completely different from its description. Thanks, Jonny. Great review.
Yeah, I wasn’t expecting witchy firefights, but it didn’t end up being quite what I was looking for.
A girl that confides in bees, how cool is that? Sounds like you enjoyed it even if the story wasn’t really what you expected.
Yeah, I find that the tor freebies are always hard to gauge based on their blurbs