The Sorceror’s Whore by Samantha Grosser: Review

I received a copy of Saman­tha Grosser’s The Sor­ceror’s Whore for review pur­pos­es through His­tor­i­cal Fic­tion Vir­tu­al Book Tours. As always, all opin­ions expressed below are my hon­est thoughts on the book.

The Sorcerer’s Whore
by Samantha Grosser

Pub­li­ca­tion Date: July 16, 2019
eBook: 330 Pages

Series: Pages of Dark­ness, #2
Genre: His­tor­i­cal Fiction/Historical Fantasy

 

 

A cursed child, a dan­ger­ous path, and a price to pay…

Six-fin­gered Mary Spar­row dreams of escape from the broth­el that is the only world she knows. But when a mys­te­ri­ous old man dri­ves her friend to mad­ness, she begins to fear for her life.

Toby Chyrche also hopes for a bet­ter future, away from the con­fines of the tailor’s shop where it seems his fate is set in stone. So when a chance meet­ing with an old man at the broth­el offers him a dif­fer­ent path, he is only too eager to accept. Then the dis­cov­ery of an ancient book of mag­ic throws a new and shock­ing light onto the past — his moth­er had a broth­er, and that broth­er was a witch.

As the old man’s shad­ow over Bank­side length­ens, Mary is drawn into the grow­ing web of dark­ness. Unable to escape its reach, she turns to Toby for help. But Toby has dae­mons of his own to face. Will pos­ses­sion of the book be enough to pro­tect them from the old man’s pow­er? And what price will they have to pay for victory?

For the Sorcerer’s Whore, noth­ing is as it seems …

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My Review

The novel fol­lows Toby Chyrche, son of Sarah Stone, and Mary Spar­row, a Bank­side pros­ti­tute with her own ties to the not-so-dis­tant past. With Mary as a com­pan­ion and source of comfort, Toby learns more about him­self, the secrets that haunt the fam­i­ly, and the mys­te­ri­ous powers all around them. 

Because Shakespeare’s Witch already had me invest­ed in Sarah’s sto­ry, it didn’t take very long for me to have a strong inter­est in Toby’s as well. At first, I was a bit dis­ap­point­ed by the less­er pres­ence of the Play­house and its rowdy com­mu­ni­ty, but the sto­ries quick­ly inter­twined. It was the perfect effect to mir­ror Sarah’s own dis­tance from the place that once felt home–as well as the impact it would have as fig­ures from the past came into her life once more.

Toby and Mary play off of one another won­der­ful­ly, both as char­ac­ters in their own world and in a more lit­er­ary sense. Tru­ly, it seems that the fates inter­fere in their lives time and again, and Hecate’s pres­ence is a com­fort­ing reminder that there are much larg­er pow­ers at play then courtships and broth­els.

Of course, the mag­ic weaved in the pages of The Sor­cerer’s Whore is a sell­ing point–who doesn’t love a bit of mag­ic? But the real mag­ic is in the words and world that Grosser brings to life. While this would read well as a stand-alone nov­el, I loved it all the more for the way it expert­ly inter­twines this new time­line with those of the past, both with­in Shakespeare’s Witch and in the actu­al his­torical past.

In short, I thor­ough­ly enjoyed this nov­el and would whole-heart­ed­ly rec­om­mend it, par­tic­u­lar­ly if you’ve had the chance to read the first book of the Pages of Dark­ness series. I can’t wait to see what comes next from this series and from Saman­tha Grosser!

About the Author

His­tor­i­cal fic­tion author Saman­tha Gross­er orig­i­nal­ly hails from Eng­land, but now lives on the sun­ny North­ern Beach­es of Syd­ney with her hus­band, son and a very small dog called Livvy.

Com­bin­ing a life­long love of his­to­ry with a com­pul­sion to write that dates from child­hood, Saman­tha is now bring­ing her pas­sion for telling com­pelling sto­ries to the world.

Saman­tha has an Hon­ours Degree in Eng­lish Lit­er­a­ture and taught Eng­lish for many years in Asia and Aus­tralia. She is the author of wartime dra­mas Anoth­er Time and Place and The Officer’s Affair, and The King James Men, set dur­ing the tur­bu­lent ear­ly years of 17th Century.

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Blog Tour Schedule

Mon­day, August 12
Review at Gwen­da­lyn’s Books

Wednes­day, August 14
Review at Pas­sages to the Past

Sun­day, August 18
Fea­ture at Diana_bibliophile

Mon­day, August 19
Review at Pen­cils & Pages

Tues­day, August 20
Review at Chicks, Rogues and Scandals

Thurs­day, August 22
Review at His­tor­i­cal Fic­tion with Spirit

Giveaway

Dur­ing the Blog Tour, we are giv­ing away one eBook and one paper­back copy of The Sor­cer­er’s Whore! To enter, please use the Gleam form below.

Give­away Rules

– Give­away ends at 11:59 pm EST on August 22nd. You must be 18 or old­er to enter.
– Give­away is open to the US & UK only.
– Only one entry per household.
– All give­away entrants agree to be hon­est and not cheat the sys­tems; any sus­pi­cion of fraud will be decid­ed upon by blog/site own­er and the spon­sor, and entrants may be dis­qual­i­fied at our discretion.
– The win­ner has 48 hours to claim prize or a new win­ner is chosen.

Sor­cer­er’s Whore