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Impossible Causes
For readers of All the Missing Girls and You Will Know Me, Impossible Causes is a gripping thriller about isolation, power, and the lies that fester when witnesses stay silent.
For six months every year, Lark Island is fogged in, its occupants cut off completely from the mainland. The community is small, tight-knit, and deeply religious. Lark seems like a good place for 16-year-old Viola Kendrick and her mother to be alone as they mourn Viola’s father and brother, both killed in a tragic accident.
But the islanders are hiding dark secrets. As the winter fog sets in, Viola gets to know the Eldest Girls—the only three teenagers on Lark—and begins to learn about the island’s twisted history, including an old story of a young girl, whose death the islanders insist was accidental. When a man’s body is found at the end of Viola’s first winter on Lark, Viola finds herself at the center of a murder mystery: one that asks whether the man’s death was a righteous act of revenge, or a cold-blooded killing.
Eerie and menacing, timely and moving, Impossible Causes is an unputdownable thriller that examines the consequences of secrets kept at young women’s expense.
For six months every year, Lark Island is fogged in, its occupants cut off completely from the mainland. The community is small, tight-knit, and deeply religious. Lark seems like a good place for 16-year-old Viola Kendrick and her mother to be alone as they mourn Viola’s father and brother, both killed in a tragic accident.
But the islanders are hiding dark secrets. As the winter fog sets in, Viola gets to know the Eldest Girls—the only three teenagers on Lark—and begins to learn about the island’s twisted history, including an old story of a young girl, whose death the islanders insist was accidental. When a man’s body is found at the end of Viola’s first winter on Lark, Viola finds herself at the center of a murder mystery: one that asks whether the man’s death was a righteous act of revenge, or a cold-blooded killing.
Eerie and menacing, timely and moving, Impossible Causes is an unputdownable thriller that examines the consequences of secrets kept at young women’s expense.
432 pages, Hardcover
First published October 17, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 170 reviews
November 19, 2019
Impossible Causes by Julie Mayhew is a dark mystery/thriller that also crosses into paranormal horror. The story in this novel is one told from different points of view from an atmospheric, isolated island of Lark.
Viola Kendrick has moved to Lark with her mother after the tragic loss of her father. Also arriving on the small close knit island is Ben Hailley, a new young male teacher. All of the locals are infatuated with so many new comers to an island of less than 300 residents. Soon Viola meets a trio of local girls that are called the Eldest Girls who begin to welcome Viola into their group just as rumors of devil worship and witchcraft begin.
Impossible Causes is one of those novels that is an incredibly slow burning thriller, the kind in which have trouble holding my attention taking so long to make sense of the story. I found the setting quite creepy and intriguing but then toss me into a high school waiting for something more and it didn’t take long to realize this one wouldn’t be a favorite. The book does pick up in the second half but for me this wasn’t enough to make it an enjoyable read as I much prefer faster paced novels that immediately pull me in.
I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.
For more reviews please visit https://carriesbookreviews.com/
Viola Kendrick has moved to Lark with her mother after the tragic loss of her father. Also arriving on the small close knit island is Ben Hailley, a new young male teacher. All of the locals are infatuated with so many new comers to an island of less than 300 residents. Soon Viola meets a trio of local girls that are called the Eldest Girls who begin to welcome Viola into their group just as rumors of devil worship and witchcraft begin.
Impossible Causes is one of those novels that is an incredibly slow burning thriller, the kind in which have trouble holding my attention taking so long to make sense of the story. I found the setting quite creepy and intriguing but then toss me into a high school waiting for something more and it didn’t take long to realize this one wouldn’t be a favorite. The book does pick up in the second half but for me this wasn’t enough to make it an enjoyable read as I much prefer faster paced novels that immediately pull me in.
I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.
For more reviews please visit https://carriesbookreviews.com/
October 17, 2019
Impossible Causes is a book that caught me completely off-guard. It touts itself as a thriller but it is that and so much more; Julie Mayhew is an author to watch. This is a tense tale of isolation, witchcraft and murder with a very thought-provoking and accurate message about the insidious nature of rumour, gossip and suspicion. Set on the fictional and extremely remote North Atlantic island of Lark we are treated to a richly Gothic and often uncomfortably religious atmosphere which felt rather cult-like in its ways. The twists and turns in the plot get darker as you move through the book and it is beautifully written. However, I feel there were too many characters that were unnecessary to the plot and the multiple threads made the narrative a little too busy and confusing to some.
If you can overlook the difficulty in immersing yourself in the story at the beginning then you will find you are rewarded by a creepy, hypnotic tale which is both clever and original. It's is a potent mix of mystery, crime, religion, dystopia and paranormal and I was gripped by the unease between the Christian and Pagan religions on the island. Despite the minor issues I enjoyed Impossible Causes with its quasi-feminist undertones and odd structure. The Eldest Girls and the teacher, the main characters, were superbly developed and, like everyone in this book, were intriguing. I honestly believe that it could've been much more chilling and effective had it been edited down a bit and the story tightened up, but on a positive note I know I will remember the atmosphere. Many thanks to Raven Books for an ARC.
If you can overlook the difficulty in immersing yourself in the story at the beginning then you will find you are rewarded by a creepy, hypnotic tale which is both clever and original. It's is a potent mix of mystery, crime, religion, dystopia and paranormal and I was gripped by the unease between the Christian and Pagan religions on the island. Despite the minor issues I enjoyed Impossible Causes with its quasi-feminist undertones and odd structure. The Eldest Girls and the teacher, the main characters, were superbly developed and, like everyone in this book, were intriguing. I honestly believe that it could've been much more chilling and effective had it been edited down a bit and the story tightened up, but on a positive note I know I will remember the atmosphere. Many thanks to Raven Books for an ARC.
October 17, 2019
Impossible Causes is set on an island called Lark, population 253. Like Rebecca Wait's The Followers, it depicts an isolated, cultish community existing in the present day – with all the attendant questions and implausibilities that idea throws up. Like Catriona Ward's Little Eve, it begins with a girl sitting in a stone circle in the aftermath of a tragedy.
Along with her mother, the girl – Viola Kendrick – is a relative newcomer to Lark. The Kendricks' arrival coincides with that of a new teacher, Ben, as well as an outburst of uncharacteristic misbehaviour from the island school's three oldest students, Britta, Jade-Marie and Anna. The Lark islanders practice Christianity, but more pagan beliefs persist too, so the suggestion that the girls are dabbling in dark magic is quickly taken seriously. Fascinated, Viola cooks up a scheme to join their group. Meanwhile, Leah Cedars, a Lark-born teacher, is getting involved with Ben.
Part of the book is told from Leah's point of view, and it is through her that the reader comes to understand the intricacies of Lark society. She is an appealing character whose naivety (believable but not limiting) is handled well. However, Viola's narrative is badly paced and suffers from character problems: Viola seems like an annoying brat, there is little sense of how her family's trauma has affected her, and the 'Eldest Girls' are more like symbols than people, lacking any individual personality at all. What makes this particularly frustrating is that Mayhew writes Leah so well – perhaps if some of the younger characters had been given first-person narratives, they might've been more compelling. This is important; while Leah's voice dominates, the girls are at the heart of the story being told here.
The blurb for Impossible Causes promises a tale of witchcraft and murder ('The Crucible meets The Craft'). In fact, it turns out that events on Lark are a sort of analogue for recent sexual harassment/abuse scandals and in particular the Me Too movement. This approach is clearly well-intentioned but comes off, as such stories often do, as somewhat heavy-handed. I was perplexed, too, by the ending, which is devoid of any real sense of justice for the victims, any freedom for those who escape. It leaves the vulnerable either stuck in the same place they were abused and deceived (with inadequate support), or attempting to survive alone in a world they have no experience of.
I am drawn to stories about cults and remote communities, yet when I look through my reviews of those I've read, I notice a pattern: I'm often underwhelmed, and even those I enjoy (Little Eve, The Rapture, Foxlowe) tend to prove unmemorable. This is my note-to-self to stay away from them for a while. Impossible Causes is intriguing, and it held my interest well enough (I read the whole thing within 24 hours), but at the end I just felt a little... deflated.
I received an advance review copy of Impossible Causes from the publisher through NetGalley.
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Along with her mother, the girl – Viola Kendrick – is a relative newcomer to Lark. The Kendricks' arrival coincides with that of a new teacher, Ben, as well as an outburst of uncharacteristic misbehaviour from the island school's three oldest students, Britta, Jade-Marie and Anna. The Lark islanders practice Christianity, but more pagan beliefs persist too, so the suggestion that the girls are dabbling in dark magic is quickly taken seriously. Fascinated, Viola cooks up a scheme to join their group. Meanwhile, Leah Cedars, a Lark-born teacher, is getting involved with Ben.
Part of the book is told from Leah's point of view, and it is through her that the reader comes to understand the intricacies of Lark society. She is an appealing character whose naivety (believable but not limiting) is handled well. However, Viola's narrative is badly paced and suffers from character problems: Viola seems like an annoying brat, there is little sense of how her family's trauma has affected her, and the 'Eldest Girls' are more like symbols than people, lacking any individual personality at all. What makes this particularly frustrating is that Mayhew writes Leah so well – perhaps if some of the younger characters had been given first-person narratives, they might've been more compelling. This is important; while Leah's voice dominates, the girls are at the heart of the story being told here.
The blurb for Impossible Causes promises a tale of witchcraft and murder ('The Crucible meets The Craft'). In fact, it turns out that events on Lark are a sort of analogue for recent sexual harassment/abuse scandals and in particular the Me Too movement. This approach is clearly well-intentioned but comes off, as such stories often do, as somewhat heavy-handed. I was perplexed, too, by the ending, which is devoid of any real sense of justice for the victims, any freedom for those who escape. It leaves the vulnerable either stuck in the same place they were abused and deceived (with inadequate support), or attempting to survive alone in a world they have no experience of.
I am drawn to stories about cults and remote communities, yet when I look through my reviews of those I've read, I notice a pattern: I'm often underwhelmed, and even those I enjoy (Little Eve, The Rapture, Foxlowe) tend to prove unmemorable. This is my note-to-self to stay away from them for a while. Impossible Causes is intriguing, and it held my interest well enough (I read the whole thing within 24 hours), but at the end I just felt a little... deflated.
I received an advance review copy of Impossible Causes from the publisher through NetGalley.
TinyLetter | Twitter | Instagram | Tumblr
October 26, 2019
“How contagious evil can be... dressed in the guise of justice”
This is an odd one, a unique one.
The writing style has a feeling of the action, the characters, the story, all being behind a pane of frosted glass that the reader is trying to peer through. Everything is just slightly semantically obscured in a way that has a dreamlike effect, almost as if the story is taking place on a different plane of reality.
Everything that is, except for the setting. The location is so perfectly described, and the slightly opaque writing style adds to a very particular mood. I can picture the stormy Atlantic island of Lark so perfectly, even as I feel no connection to the characters within. The claustrophobia, the superstition (both of modern and more ancient religious sorts), the paranoia... it all comes together to paint a vivid picture of a remote community.
We are introduced to the isolated island of Lark through the eyes of newcomer Viola Kendrick and her mother. Paralleled with their arrival is another "coycrock" in the form of a new teacher, Ben Hailey. The suspicion awarded to these outsides adds another layer to the setting and fuels much of the story.
The most interesting theme throughout for me was the spreading of rumours within a small, isolated community. There are essentially three voices in this book - Viola's point-of-view chapters, Leah's first person chapters, with the third voice being the whisper of gossip travelling like wildfire across the island. This resulted in a strong point about the dangers of a secret known by a whole community, that is deliberately "forgotten", and how that only leads to more victims of its truth over time.
The Eldest Girls – largely the focus of the story – feel unknowable outside of the gossip. Even as Viola gets close to them, they’re talked about from a distance. Until the final few chapters, no interactions are even witnessed by the reader between Viola and the girls in an active way – occasionally they're mentioned as passive anecdotes. This kept them mysterious and added intrigue to the story – are they really witches? are they evil? what are they trying to achieve? – but I do feel like as a result, some understanding of their motive was sacrificed.
This book took me a long time to get into. The first half - it didn't drag, but it didn't remotely grip me, either, and the constant changes not only of point-of-view but of timeline too didn't help this. And then I reached about the halfway point, and everything changed. I had to force myself to go to bed after cramming in an hour or two of reading at the end of a busy day, because otherwise I would have stayed up all night to finish it.
Two scenes in particular hit me pretty hard. One a poignant uprising, and one a tragic twist. Both are towards the end of the book, so I shan't spoil, however they are reason alone to keep reading if you find the book a little difficult to get into.
As for a rating, I found this hard to decide upon one. I really wouldn't be surprised if months down the line, I return and change the star rating, depending on how the book sits with me after I've had time to let it stew a little.
For now, I'll go with 3.5/5, rounded up to 4.
This is an odd one, a unique one.
The writing style has a feeling of the action, the characters, the story, all being behind a pane of frosted glass that the reader is trying to peer through. Everything is just slightly semantically obscured in a way that has a dreamlike effect, almost as if the story is taking place on a different plane of reality.
Everything that is, except for the setting. The location is so perfectly described, and the slightly opaque writing style adds to a very particular mood. I can picture the stormy Atlantic island of Lark so perfectly, even as I feel no connection to the characters within. The claustrophobia, the superstition (both of modern and more ancient religious sorts), the paranoia... it all comes together to paint a vivid picture of a remote community.
We are introduced to the isolated island of Lark through the eyes of newcomer Viola Kendrick and her mother. Paralleled with their arrival is another "coycrock" in the form of a new teacher, Ben Hailey. The suspicion awarded to these outsides adds another layer to the setting and fuels much of the story.
The most interesting theme throughout for me was the spreading of rumours within a small, isolated community. There are essentially three voices in this book - Viola's point-of-view chapters, Leah's first person chapters, with the third voice being the whisper of gossip travelling like wildfire across the island. This resulted in a strong point about the dangers of a secret known by a whole community, that is deliberately "forgotten", and how that only leads to more victims of its truth over time.
The Eldest Girls – largely the focus of the story – feel unknowable outside of the gossip. Even as Viola gets close to them, they’re talked about from a distance. Until the final few chapters, no interactions are even witnessed by the reader between Viola and the girls in an active way – occasionally they're mentioned as passive anecdotes. This kept them mysterious and added intrigue to the story – are they really witches? are they evil? what are they trying to achieve? – but I do feel like as a result, some understanding of their motive was sacrificed.
This book took me a long time to get into. The first half - it didn't drag, but it didn't remotely grip me, either, and the constant changes not only of point-of-view but of timeline too didn't help this. And then I reached about the halfway point, and everything changed. I had to force myself to go to bed after cramming in an hour or two of reading at the end of a busy day, because otherwise I would have stayed up all night to finish it.
Two scenes in particular hit me pretty hard. One a poignant uprising, and one a tragic twist. Both are towards the end of the book, so I shan't spoil, however they are reason alone to keep reading if you find the book a little difficult to get into.
As for a rating, I found this hard to decide upon one. I really wouldn't be surprised if months down the line, I return and change the star rating, depending on how the book sits with me after I've had time to let it stew a little.
For now, I'll go with 3.5/5, rounded up to 4.
September 10, 2019
This is a tricky one to review, and it is certainly a book that was difficult to really get into for some time. However, by the end I was gripped and can certainly see the parallels with something like The Crucible.
Our story takes place on the remote island of Lark. We focus on the narration by Leah, a teacher on the island, who is privy to many of the secrets of the island but who seems rather detached from everything. This sense of ‘otherness’ does become important later on, as it explains why Leah acts as she does.
The island of Lark is cut off from the mainland, physically unreachable for months. So it is of great interest when an outsider, Ben Hailey, comes to the island to teach.
He - and, as a result, we - comes to learn of the superstitions regarding what are referred to as the Eldest Girls. There are three girls aged 16 who, now, are given what seems like carte blanche to act as they like. There is talk of witchcraft and odd behaviour, but it is what has always been and people turn a blind eye. The inclusion of new girl Viola seems to act as a catalyst for the behaviour to escalate.
Before too long we get told of a dead body and people start to talk about what is happening. As things become more personal for Leah, the ‘new arrivals’ force the villagers to confront what is happening under their eyes.
Initially this seemed to be going in one direction and it was a little hard to follow. Details were vague, but as we learn the truth of Lark it seems there is a reason for this vagueness. By the end, when the true horror of Lark’s dark secret was revealed, I really wasn’t sure what to make of it. Chilling, and definitely worth a look. Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me the opportunity to read this prior to its scheduled November publication.
Our story takes place on the remote island of Lark. We focus on the narration by Leah, a teacher on the island, who is privy to many of the secrets of the island but who seems rather detached from everything. This sense of ‘otherness’ does become important later on, as it explains why Leah acts as she does.
The island of Lark is cut off from the mainland, physically unreachable for months. So it is of great interest when an outsider, Ben Hailey, comes to the island to teach.
He - and, as a result, we - comes to learn of the superstitions regarding what are referred to as the Eldest Girls. There are three girls aged 16 who, now, are given what seems like carte blanche to act as they like. There is talk of witchcraft and odd behaviour, but it is what has always been and people turn a blind eye. The inclusion of new girl Viola seems to act as a catalyst for the behaviour to escalate.
Before too long we get told of a dead body and people start to talk about what is happening. As things become more personal for Leah, the ‘new arrivals’ force the villagers to confront what is happening under their eyes.
Initially this seemed to be going in one direction and it was a little hard to follow. Details were vague, but as we learn the truth of Lark it seems there is a reason for this vagueness. By the end, when the true horror of Lark’s dark secret was revealed, I really wasn’t sure what to make of it. Chilling, and definitely worth a look. Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me the opportunity to read this prior to its scheduled November publication.
December 18, 2019
Originally published on The Nerd Daily | Review by Marla Warren
While its never quite sure what it wants to be, Julie Mayhew’s Impossible Causes is still a creative story that follows an original path. At times, there is a strong historical fiction feel, and at other times, the isolated setting gives an almost post-apocalyptic vibe. Neither of these is actually the case and it occasionally grew frustrating as it made the novel difficult for me to ever settle in to.
Mayhew does an excellent job of describing the setting and giving the feel for this remote island, but that unfortunately comes at the expense of the thriller or mystery elements. Additionally, the large cast of characters keeps the reader from feeling connected to anyone in the story and with very few exceptions, the reader gets to know only a minimal amount about most characters – enough to tell them apart, but not really enough to care about them.
Leah, the character we focus on the most, is fully fleshed-out and very interesting, but it is as if she is in a town with a bunch of cardboard cut-outs. Other characters don’t get the attention that Leah gets so we end up with only surface details. They don’t feel like real people the way Leah does.
I did, however, enjoy some of the story-telling elements Mayhew employed. Similar to the first season of the Netflix series Bloodline, the book opens toward the end of the story, so we know what is going to happen (at least partly) but we don’t know how we are going to get there, or how things will ultimately be resolved. That non-linear type of storytelling isn’t for everyone, but I love it!
Unfortunately, the downside of telling the story that way is that the time jumps can be confusing, and they definitely were in this case. It became difficult to keep dates straight and might have been easier if passages had been labelled “the previous fall” or “the next spring” rather than with specific dates.
While every aspect of reading and reviewing a book is ultimately up to the individual preferences and expectations of the reader, I found myself wondering if the extensive uses of Biblical references and/or pagan concepts might have a significant impact on how a reader feels about this particular story. Feelings about the Bible, Christianity, and religion in general vary greatly from family to family, state to state, and country to country, and the individual feelings about these concepts would greatly change the readers perception of the world where this story takes place. Two people with contrasting views of the Bible and Biblical beliefs will have sharply differing opinions about the story they just read.
Possibly my favourite things about Impossible Causes is how the author did not end the book with some of the clichés and tropes that you think are coming, and that some authors might have mistakenly chosen. Mayhew shifts things just enough to provide a satisfying and thought-provoking conclusion.
While its never quite sure what it wants to be, Julie Mayhew’s Impossible Causes is still a creative story that follows an original path. At times, there is a strong historical fiction feel, and at other times, the isolated setting gives an almost post-apocalyptic vibe. Neither of these is actually the case and it occasionally grew frustrating as it made the novel difficult for me to ever settle in to.
Mayhew does an excellent job of describing the setting and giving the feel for this remote island, but that unfortunately comes at the expense of the thriller or mystery elements. Additionally, the large cast of characters keeps the reader from feeling connected to anyone in the story and with very few exceptions, the reader gets to know only a minimal amount about most characters – enough to tell them apart, but not really enough to care about them.
Leah, the character we focus on the most, is fully fleshed-out and very interesting, but it is as if she is in a town with a bunch of cardboard cut-outs. Other characters don’t get the attention that Leah gets so we end up with only surface details. They don’t feel like real people the way Leah does.
I did, however, enjoy some of the story-telling elements Mayhew employed. Similar to the first season of the Netflix series Bloodline, the book opens toward the end of the story, so we know what is going to happen (at least partly) but we don’t know how we are going to get there, or how things will ultimately be resolved. That non-linear type of storytelling isn’t for everyone, but I love it!
Unfortunately, the downside of telling the story that way is that the time jumps can be confusing, and they definitely were in this case. It became difficult to keep dates straight and might have been easier if passages had been labelled “the previous fall” or “the next spring” rather than with specific dates.
While every aspect of reading and reviewing a book is ultimately up to the individual preferences and expectations of the reader, I found myself wondering if the extensive uses of Biblical references and/or pagan concepts might have a significant impact on how a reader feels about this particular story. Feelings about the Bible, Christianity, and religion in general vary greatly from family to family, state to state, and country to country, and the individual feelings about these concepts would greatly change the readers perception of the world where this story takes place. Two people with contrasting views of the Bible and Biblical beliefs will have sharply differing opinions about the story they just read.
Possibly my favourite things about Impossible Causes is how the author did not end the book with some of the clichés and tropes that you think are coming, and that some authors might have mistakenly chosen. Mayhew shifts things just enough to provide a satisfying and thought-provoking conclusion.
November 4, 2019
The elements of this book reminded me of lots of others: the quasi-mystical, quasi-feminist witchiness; the closed off and insular island community hiding secrets; the unstable danger of adolescent girls; the plot revolving around sex and death - and the tarot cards that mark the stages of the story. It's atmospheric, for sure, but also feels a bit like a mash-up of, say, Ann Cleeves' Shetland series with The Wicker Man and other book that make use of the uneasy relationship between Christian and pagan religions. If you've read similar books, the central mystery will be transparent.
August 7, 2019
With a general synopsis vaguely reminiscent of The Wicker Man, Julie Mayhew’s latest work sees a young teacher travel to the fictional island of Lark, a secretive, deeply religious community populated mostly by women. The new arrival, Benjamin Hailey, quickly generates quite the excitement – he is one of very few young men on the island following a tragic drowning which saw the annihilation of most of Lark’s young male population. Two more subdued arrivals are that of Viola Kendrick and her mother, keen to grasp at some semblance of a fresh start after the death of Viola’s father and brother. Keen to fit in, Viola muscles her way into a trio of teenagers known as the Eldest Girls. Their late night meetings give rise to rumours of witchcraft, and when the corpse of a man is discovered one morning they escalate to accusations of murder.
What a concept! The Wicker Man with added Carrie White’s Mom vibes! If only the product lived up to the hype. Contrarily, I spent most of my time with Impossible Causes feeling sadly underwhelmed. The book is quite a weighty 432 pages, and really could have done with shaving off a hundred or so. Its lengthy narrative flits lazily between different times and narratives in a move that is not nearly honed enough to have any other effect than general confusion and broken immersion. For the first hundred pages, I had no idea who Viola was or what purpose she served in the narrative, with none of the chapters following her past adding anything truly noteworthy until her first meetings with the Eldest Girls. I feel as though the novel’s general flow would have heavily benefited from the removal of most of these Viola chapters, which are too vague to truly contribute to the wider narrative. Entirely too much time is spent establishing the community and its inhabitants, at the expense of pace and plot. The result is a slow, trudging read which doesn’t even speed up in its final act as many slow burners tend to do. Major questions and events, which should really be given attention due to the amount of time the reader has spent building up to their conclusions, are left dangling.
Impossible Causes presents a fascinating idea with a chilling atmosphere, but is ultimately overwhelmed by its own hype.
What a concept! The Wicker Man with added Carrie White’s Mom vibes! If only the product lived up to the hype. Contrarily, I spent most of my time with Impossible Causes feeling sadly underwhelmed. The book is quite a weighty 432 pages, and really could have done with shaving off a hundred or so. Its lengthy narrative flits lazily between different times and narratives in a move that is not nearly honed enough to have any other effect than general confusion and broken immersion. For the first hundred pages, I had no idea who Viola was or what purpose she served in the narrative, with none of the chapters following her past adding anything truly noteworthy until her first meetings with the Eldest Girls. I feel as though the novel’s general flow would have heavily benefited from the removal of most of these Viola chapters, which are too vague to truly contribute to the wider narrative. Entirely too much time is spent establishing the community and its inhabitants, at the expense of pace and plot. The result is a slow, trudging read which doesn’t even speed up in its final act as many slow burners tend to do. Major questions and events, which should really be given attention due to the amount of time the reader has spent building up to their conclusions, are left dangling.
Impossible Causes presents a fascinating idea with a chilling atmosphere, but is ultimately overwhelmed by its own hype.
July 18, 2019
This is a sinister novel set in a small, isolated community on a remote British island, Lark, which has neither mobile phones nor the internet, so is stuck in the past. Rumours abound that the 'Eldest Girls', three 16-year-olds and the eldest pupils at the local school are witches and dance naked of an evening at the standing stones. When the August ship brings three outsiders - known as coycracks by the locals - the community is stirred. There's Deborah Kendrick and her red-haired daughter Viola, who are escaping grief and tragedy on the mainland, and then there's Ben Hailey, a handsome young teacher. Local teacher Leah Cedars is attracted to Ben, but is he up to something sinister with the Eldest Girls? With echoes of The Wicker Man, the superstitions and wild ideas of the community seem to be hiding a much darker truth. This is an engaging novel, told from several points of view, and in two timelines, one in the recent past, and one on a significant date, Friday 13th April 2018, when a dead body is discovered near the stone circle. Compelling and rather chilling, it's not for the faint-hearted.
September 17, 2019
Thank you to Net Galley for sending me a copy in exchange for a honest review.
This was a very intriguing plot, but I felt it could have been executed a little better. For me, there wasn't much of an opportunity to connect with or get to know the characters, and I didn't like the religious aspects of it, as the religion itself wasn't truly explained.
The changes in POVs and also time jumps back and fourth were a little confusing and didn't flow very well.
The book follows an island community, based on an island far off the coast of the UK called Lark, that is closed off from the outside world for around 7 months of the year as it is unapproachable by air or sea due to weather. The community is incredibly religious and misogynistic. We follow Viola who moves to the island with her mother to get over some trauma on the mainland, as well as one of the school teachers who has always lived on Lark.
One of the aspects I really didn't like was that the women and girls on the island, although they make up the majority of the population on Lark, are treated by the men in a very condescending way. The girls are patted on the head, their cheeks are pinched and they're spoken to as if they're not very bright simply because they're female, and then when the girls reach 16 years old they're suddenly seen as women and finally old enough to be lusted over (which is...no. They're still children).
There's one pub on the whole island and women are only allowed in there at the weekend - when the 3 girls on the island who have turned 16, all of the pub patrons suddenly think it's okay to talk about them in a sexual way and how they'd give 'them all one'. This didn't sit well with me because there was no point where the author mentioned that this was not appropriate. No character commented how that was wrong and I just didn't like it, probably more so because it was a modern setting and we know as a society that this behaviour is wrong.
I really did want to enjoy this one, but I just couldn't get into it. Sadly, I wouldn't recommend this but this has all just been my opinion - if you like the sound of this book then by all means give it a go and let me know what you thought!
Trigger warnings for misogyny, sexualisation of minors, explicit descriptions of sex.
This was a very intriguing plot, but I felt it could have been executed a little better. For me, there wasn't much of an opportunity to connect with or get to know the characters, and I didn't like the religious aspects of it, as the religion itself wasn't truly explained.
The changes in POVs and also time jumps back and fourth were a little confusing and didn't flow very well.
The book follows an island community, based on an island far off the coast of the UK called Lark, that is closed off from the outside world for around 7 months of the year as it is unapproachable by air or sea due to weather. The community is incredibly religious and misogynistic. We follow Viola who moves to the island with her mother to get over some trauma on the mainland, as well as one of the school teachers who has always lived on Lark.
One of the aspects I really didn't like was that the women and girls on the island, although they make up the majority of the population on Lark, are treated by the men in a very condescending way. The girls are patted on the head, their cheeks are pinched and they're spoken to as if they're not very bright simply because they're female, and then when the girls reach 16 years old they're suddenly seen as women and finally old enough to be lusted over (which is...no. They're still children).
There's one pub on the whole island and women are only allowed in there at the weekend - when the 3 girls on the island who have turned 16, all of the pub patrons suddenly think it's okay to talk about them in a sexual way and how they'd give 'them all one'. This didn't sit well with me because there was no point where the author mentioned that this was not appropriate. No character commented how that was wrong and I just didn't like it, probably more so because it was a modern setting and we know as a society that this behaviour is wrong.
I really did want to enjoy this one, but I just couldn't get into it. Sadly, I wouldn't recommend this but this has all just been my opinion - if you like the sound of this book then by all means give it a go and let me know what you thought!
Trigger warnings for misogyny, sexualisation of minors, explicit descriptions of sex.
November 11, 2019
An isolated island, a murder, three strangers and rumours abound.
Impossible Causes was a bit of a hit and miss for me. I wanted to really like it, between the cover and the blurb I was very excited for the story. What I did like about it was the setting. The landscape and isolation of Lark was brought to life and I do love a good slightly unsettling seaside town/island based story. That said...
I did not enjoy Impossible Causes as much as I hoped, it wasn't bad per se but I struggled to connect with the characters. I found it really hard to care about the characters and so I wasn't able to get completely invested in the story. That and although I loved the setting the small-town mentality got too much. I mean that's obviously a big part of the story so this is probably just a me thing but the closed-minded, religious folk just grated after a while. And so because I couldn't connect with the characters (or in some cases just didn't like them) it meant that the story fell flat despite an otherwise immersive setting.
If you are keen to read it I'd still suggest you check Impossible Causes out because in this case it was more of a me not the book thing and it might work for you.
*I received a review copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own*
This review and more can be found at https://wildheartreads.wordpress.com/
Impossible Causes was a bit of a hit and miss for me. I wanted to really like it, between the cover and the blurb I was very excited for the story. What I did like about it was the setting. The landscape and isolation of Lark was brought to life and I do love a good slightly unsettling seaside town/island based story. That said...
I did not enjoy Impossible Causes as much as I hoped, it wasn't bad per se but I struggled to connect with the characters. I found it really hard to care about the characters and so I wasn't able to get completely invested in the story. That and although I loved the setting the small-town mentality got too much. I mean that's obviously a big part of the story so this is probably just a me thing but the closed-minded, religious folk just grated after a while. And so because I couldn't connect with the characters (or in some cases just didn't like them) it meant that the story fell flat despite an otherwise immersive setting.
If you are keen to read it I'd still suggest you check Impossible Causes out because in this case it was more of a me not the book thing and it might work for you.
*I received a review copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own*
This review and more can be found at https://wildheartreads.wordpress.com/
October 2, 2019
Oh, here we go again. Yet another one of those feminist dramatic thrillers about remote communities that promise utopia and deliver oppression instead. Impossible Causes takes place of a remote island of Lark, far off the coast of UK. There a small community survives in a more or less self sustained manner, virtually cut off from the world at large for 7 months at a time or so. The community is religious, ruled by men…and surprise, surprise, abusive to women. So as the book progresses, we are slowly cued into the levels and pervasiveness of the abuse, especially as it centers on the Eldest Girls, a few 16 year olds with Charlie’s Angels differently colored manes. Eventually, again to no one’s surprise, but maybe the islanders themselves, accusations of witchery start up. Well, of course, they do. You can’t just be all insular and backwards and pressive to woman and not mention witches. So that’s about it, really. The narrative alternates in a slightly confusing manner from one of the Eldest Girls (a newcomer to the island) to a teacher, a local spinster at the ripe old age of nearly 30,who’s been there for a long time. Their experiences and perspectives vary to provide a panoramic view of the situation, especially as it gets exacerbated by the arrival of a hunky new male teacher. The book is as atmospheric and claustrophobic as these stories tend to be and there’s even attempt at an old supernatural darkness, but in general it doesn’t really do much to merit the time it takes to read it. And I went into it deliberately ignoring the overall tepidness of others’ reviews, because I do so love a good isolated community/utopia gone to sh*t/ cult like story, but…but in the end I must agree, kind of a tepid book. Some reviews mentioned disliking the split narration and other things, but for me it was mainly that the story just wasn’t original enough and I didn’t especially care for any of the characters. I know, that’s fairly vague, but just now sure how much specificity I can provide. It isn’t even necessarily the book’s fault, the writing was perfectly ok. It just didn’t engage me on any level. Which may very well be a personal reader/book lack of chemistry. Albeit one experienced by a good number of other readers also. On a positive note I was able to speed read this thing, so it only took (almost to a second) 240 minutes to get through 432 pages. Being a completist who compulsively finishes every book I start, it was nice not to be stuck with one I didn’t especially enjoy for a long time. So yeah, that’s it, pretty standard modern feminist message fiction, pretty bland. Quite slow. Wouldn’t recommend it, but user mileage may vary. Thanks Netgalley.
Read
December 9, 2019Welcome to Lark, a remote island in the North Atlantic inaccessible to visitors for seven months out of the year. Inhabited by a small, religious community, it proudly touts its safety and adherence to an almost-forgotten way of life, in an ongoing attempt to draw immigrants to supplement the dwindling local populace. Well, the right immigrants anyway: there are a lot of forms to fill out and examinations to pass before applicants may be considered a good fit. But the promise of seclusion and safety drive Deborah Kendrick to jump through all these hoops in order to secure for herself and her daughter Viola a place there in the aftermath of personal tragedy on the British mainland.
Once on Lark, however, Deborah discovers that a change of scenery isn’t necessarily a panacea for her crippling depression. Though fiercely protective of her daughter, she will at least concede it safe enough for Viola to roam the small island with only her miniature schnauzer, Dot, for company. The red-headed teenager soon draws attention in a place where all the domesticated creatures are working animals: the idea of a pet is thus met with deep suspicion. The fact that Viola doesn’t go to Lark’s single school either sets tongues wagging, especially since the locals want her to join the top form, currently occupied by only three young women known the island over as the Eldest Girls. The same age as Viola, the Eldest Girls are beginning to exhibit worrying signs of rebellion and other deviltry. The presence of a fourth, it is hoped, will help settle them all down.
Viola has her own, more natural reasons, for wanting to befriend the girls. Who doesn’t want friends their own age, after all?
Read the rest of Doreen Sheridan's review on our blog!
Once on Lark, however, Deborah discovers that a change of scenery isn’t necessarily a panacea for her crippling depression. Though fiercely protective of her daughter, she will at least concede it safe enough for Viola to roam the small island with only her miniature schnauzer, Dot, for company. The red-headed teenager soon draws attention in a place where all the domesticated creatures are working animals: the idea of a pet is thus met with deep suspicion. The fact that Viola doesn’t go to Lark’s single school either sets tongues wagging, especially since the locals want her to join the top form, currently occupied by only three young women known the island over as the Eldest Girls. The same age as Viola, the Eldest Girls are beginning to exhibit worrying signs of rebellion and other deviltry. The presence of a fourth, it is hoped, will help settle them all down.
Viola has her own, more natural reasons, for wanting to befriend the girls. Who doesn’t want friends their own age, after all?
And so it came to pass—three became four. The red-haired girl joined the Eldest Girls’ number.
The women of the community had wished for it; they couldn’t say that they hadn’t.
Four corners, they’d talked of, four pillars, a wholesome union of love, faith, hope and luck—the allusions were endless. This would make the girls a balanced group, strong, with no need for illicit rituals. Though what those women failed to see was that their belief in numerology was an illicit ritual in itself. It could not be trusted, and sure enough, as soon as three became four, doubt made its way in, as slippery as an eel.
Read the rest of Doreen Sheridan's review on our blog!
August 16, 2020
Un romanzo che parte da una buona idea, una ambientazione interessante, ma si sviluppa in modo troppo confuso a mio avviso. Resta comunque una lettura di intrattenimento piacevole.
November 20, 2019
‘Impossible Causes’ was touted to me as a sort of feminist version of The Wicker Man. An isolated community that an outsider stumbles into full of witchcraft and murder. Sounds pretty great right? I was quick to request it and then I started to see a lot of low star reviews appear. Not one to let others sway my opinion I dived into the book with an open mind and was sorely disappointed.
Although a great concept, the book is very poorly executed. We dive into different perspectives as chapters change character narration and timelines repeatedly. Although this can be a nice way of creating tension and drawing out the plot in some books, here this just muddled and confused everything to the point where I had no idea what was really going on for a good 60% of the book.
The plot keeps all of its cards so close to its chest that the big reveal at the end of the book comes from nowhere. You spend the entire book trying to work out the motivations of The Elder Girls and why they are drastically overreacting to everything because the real reasons aren’t even hinted at. It means that you can’t really root or sympathise with them until about 400 pages in which is way too late. You also wait out the entire book to find out who the dead body is that is presented in the first few pages and by the time it’s revealed you are well past caring. Some bits of the world building also made no sense – I didn’t understand about the significance of hair colour on the island, for example.
The island to me didn’t really feel like this ‘female driven community’ that was stated in the blurb. The women are annoying and two dimensional, despite having chapters written from two female perspectives we don’t really learn enough about them to make a difference. I didn’t have any empathy for anyone involved and left with no one to care about I just found myself skimming the pages. I started powering through the book desperate to just get it finished which is a sure sign of a one star review.
Overall Impossible Causes could have been a great book but for me the confusion and vagueness of what was going on left it so hard to sympathise with any of the characters and ultimately let it down. Thank you to NetGalley & Bloomsbury Publishing PLC – Raven Books for a chance to read the ARC in exchange for a (very!) honest review.
For more reviews check out www.kindig.co.uk
Although a great concept, the book is very poorly executed. We dive into different perspectives as chapters change character narration and timelines repeatedly. Although this can be a nice way of creating tension and drawing out the plot in some books, here this just muddled and confused everything to the point where I had no idea what was really going on for a good 60% of the book.
The plot keeps all of its cards so close to its chest that the big reveal at the end of the book comes from nowhere. You spend the entire book trying to work out the motivations of The Elder Girls and why they are drastically overreacting to everything because the real reasons aren’t even hinted at. It means that you can’t really root or sympathise with them until about 400 pages in which is way too late. You also wait out the entire book to find out who the dead body is that is presented in the first few pages and by the time it’s revealed you are well past caring. Some bits of the world building also made no sense – I didn’t understand about the significance of hair colour on the island, for example.
The island to me didn’t really feel like this ‘female driven community’ that was stated in the blurb. The women are annoying and two dimensional, despite having chapters written from two female perspectives we don’t really learn enough about them to make a difference. I didn’t have any empathy for anyone involved and left with no one to care about I just found myself skimming the pages. I started powering through the book desperate to just get it finished which is a sure sign of a one star review.
Overall Impossible Causes could have been a great book but for me the confusion and vagueness of what was going on left it so hard to sympathise with any of the characters and ultimately let it down. Thank you to NetGalley & Bloomsbury Publishing PLC – Raven Books for a chance to read the ARC in exchange for a (very!) honest review.
For more reviews check out www.kindig.co.uk
August 6, 2019
My thanks to NetGalley and publisher Bloomsbury Publishing Plc - Raven Books, for the ARC.
This book has loads of atmosphere - a 300-strong isolated community on the island of Lark - a 3-day North Atlantic crossing to get there - one landline computer and no phone mast. If you want to leave something behind, that's the place to go to.
However, I really struggled to make sense of most of the narrative and the eternal musings of main characters sending thoughts and story-parts off on strange and surrealistic tangents.
Lark has a pagan past and a circle of stones, one school where 3 girls have turned 16 and are referred to as The Eldest Girls, an island Council ruled with an iron fist by the Headteacher, and a reclusive Earl. All new arrivals are vetted for suitability as tenants.
Viola Kendrick (16) and mum Deborah arrive, leaving tragedy behind them. Later a young male teacher for the school arrives.
The Eldest Girls, knowing little of mainland life, have their eyes opened by Viola and a cascade of secrets are revealed.
That, I'm afraid, is the best summary I can make. I did consider giving up several times because I just couldn't get into the writing style, let alone really follow a story - although, thankfully, it became clear by the end.
I was intrigued by the description, but really it was not for me.
This book has loads of atmosphere - a 300-strong isolated community on the island of Lark - a 3-day North Atlantic crossing to get there - one landline computer and no phone mast. If you want to leave something behind, that's the place to go to.
However, I really struggled to make sense of most of the narrative and the eternal musings of main characters sending thoughts and story-parts off on strange and surrealistic tangents.
Lark has a pagan past and a circle of stones, one school where 3 girls have turned 16 and are referred to as The Eldest Girls, an island Council ruled with an iron fist by the Headteacher, and a reclusive Earl. All new arrivals are vetted for suitability as tenants.
Viola Kendrick (16) and mum Deborah arrive, leaving tragedy behind them. Later a young male teacher for the school arrives.
The Eldest Girls, knowing little of mainland life, have their eyes opened by Viola and a cascade of secrets are revealed.
That, I'm afraid, is the best summary I can make. I did consider giving up several times because I just couldn't get into the writing style, let alone really follow a story - although, thankfully, it became clear by the end.
I was intrigued by the description, but really it was not for me.
August 13, 2019
Impossible Causes tells the dark and disturbing story of life on the made-up island of Lark, where a small cult-like community reside. On the surface the island’s inhabitants seem like pious, morally conscious people, but there is something very evil lurking just beneath the surface.
I loved many aspects of this book and I thought the story and characters were good, but I found its narrative style a bit awkward and confusing at times. It is not told chronologically and the characters’ versions of events differ wildly from each other. It could have been really clever, but I don’t think the author successfully pulled it off, as it made for a somewhat disjointed read.
But despite that, I was still gripped and drawn into the chilling and sinister atmosphere this book created.
I loved many aspects of this book and I thought the story and characters were good, but I found its narrative style a bit awkward and confusing at times. It is not told chronologically and the characters’ versions of events differ wildly from each other. It could have been really clever, but I don’t think the author successfully pulled it off, as it made for a somewhat disjointed read.
But despite that, I was still gripped and drawn into the chilling and sinister atmosphere this book created.
May 27, 2019
A very atmospheric, chilling story, and a great setting of the island of Lark. I loved the themes of mysticism, witchcraft and religion, the way I was left guessing right up to the end. I found there were a lot of characters, and occasionally the timelines got confusing. Great premise, though, and definitely packs a punch.
Read
August 15, 2019I'm afraid I didn't finish this book.
The writing style wasn't my cup of Tea at this time.
Each time I picked it up,I was having to go back a few pages to remind myself what happened.
Not all books suit all people.
The writing style wasn't my cup of Tea at this time.
Each time I picked it up,I was having to go back a few pages to remind myself what happened.
Not all books suit all people.
June 21, 2020
I won this proof in a Twitter giveaway held by the publisher. What I have written is an honest review.
Trigger & Content Warnings are under a spoiler button as there are a few of them.
When I saw a giveaway for a proof of Impossible Causes - Julie Mayhew's adult debut - on Twitter, after looking it up, I knew that this book was right up my street. It sounded like a really intriguing thriller, and I was excited to read it. What I didn't expect was to read an incredibly heartbreaking and rage-inducing story that blew my mind.
After her the death of her dad and her brother, Viola and her mum move to the isolated and almost forgotten British island of Lark. With a small population and a tight-knit community, Lark is safe, and safety is what Viola's mum needs right now. Due to bad weather conditions, the island can only be reached between April and August, the rest of the time, this very religious community is shut off from the rest of the modern world; there is one radio telephone and one computer (used for placing orders only) on the whole island, no-one has mobiles, and all the movies on the island are several years old. To some, it sounds idyllic, but others feel trapped. When Viola meets the Eldest Girls - Britta, Anna, and Jade-Marie, the three eldest students on the island, she discovers there's more going on, on this island than anyone is willing to talk about, and finds herself becoming involved in the girls' experimentation in Paganism and witchcraft. When a dead body is discovered, the island must face what they have always kept hidden.
Impossible Causes is so brilliantly written! There are three perspectives; Viola's third person perspective; a teacher at the school, Leah Cedar's first person perspective; and an omnipresent third person narrative that shows us glimpses of conversations that neither Viola or Leah are witness to. With Viola's perspective, it jumps back and forth in time; the book starts on Friday 13th April 2018, when Viola has discovered the dead body of a man and reports it, and keeps coming back to this day and the events that happen after the body is found, but it also goes back to when Viola and her mum first moved to the island, and tells her story linearly from there, showing the events that lead up to Friday 13th April. It might sound complicated, what with three different narrations, and with Viola's jumping back and forth, but each chapter stays in a particular perspective and time, and you know from the beginning of each chapter who you're following and when. The skip in the narrations and the jumping back and forth in time is brilliantly done to keep the readers guessing. At the beginning, four questions are the reader's focus: who has been killed (because although Viola knows, it's not revealed to the reader at the time)? Why have they been killed? Who killed them? And what secrets is the town hiding? What's also really interesting is how Impossible Causes doesn't have the amount of dialogue that I'm used to. While you'd imagine this would involve a lot of telling instead of showing, it actually really works because of this omnipresent narrator, through which we get glimpses into the behaviours and minds of people we wouldn't otherwise. And it just really helps to create an atmosphere that drew me in, as well as the mystery
The whole mystery of the story was exciting! I was completely gripped, getting to know all the characters and the world of Lark, trying to figure things out for myself. The town is ridiculously patriarchal and sexist, with women not being allowed on the Council, and only being allowed to go to the pub at the weekend, stuck in the past where there were jobs for women and jobs for men. While this wound me up, for the most part, I was just rolling my eyes at the ridiculousness of it all, but kind of accepted it, because the whole island is cut off from the rest of the world, and they're stuck in the past in so many ways, it was kind of understandable, if not acceptable, that this was the way they lived and what they accepted as normal. There was middle-class pearl-clutching gossip between the ladies when they got their hair done that they absolutely revelled in - relishing in the latest scandal and saying what they really thought about certain people, while being nice as pie to their faces. There were the men in their pub and their outrageous sexist talk that went beyond what you might expect, and was quite shocking, insulting, and uncomfortable. It was also so hypocritical, yet completely expected; these people who quote scripture at the drop of a hat, are all holier-than-thou, and have certain expectations on how people should behave, and yet behind closed doors are absolutely disgusting. And after a while, my excitement for this mystery dwindled, as alarm bells started ringing, and the penny finally dropped.
And everything came crashing down. What's happening on the island is so strongly alluded to before it's actually stated, that there can be no doubt. There are no words for the immensity of the dread and the sadness and the rage. It just comes down to who and when and for how long. And how - how on Earth could this be happening in such a small town. How?! So you go back to the main mystery of the body. Who is it? Who did it? How did they do it? And now there's a greediness to wanting to know these answers, a righteousness to this death, this murder, because although I didn't know who it was, I believed I knew what they did. I had so many theories of who the dead body was. I kept jumping from person to person, because Mayhew has written this book so fantastically, only giving certain information here and there, and sometimes those hints are just the assumptions of Leah or Viola, and they're not necessarily correct. It could be any of a number of people. My heart had broken and I was raging, and I needed to know who had died, and that they suffered. And then there's a twist. The biggest twist of all. Something absolutely no-one will see coming, because it's just impossible to. And my heart broke all over again. The truth, the truth of everything, is almost too much to bear. My rage intensified, and I just wanted to shout at these people, "Look! Look what you did!"
I want to touch on the Paganism and witchcraft in Impossible Causes. I didn't know about this side of the story originally, before starting, but I was so pleasantly surprised! It isn't a massive element of the story; we don't see a huge amount of what the Eldest Girls actually get up to. We just know they go to their stone circle, wearing old fashioned nightdresses, they cast circle, they invoke gods, and they cast spells. We don't know the details of those spells - what they are, nor what they're intention is - partly because if we know what and why they were casting spells, their reason for turning to witchcraft, it would spoil some of the mystery. We do find out, but we find out later. But it warmed my heart to see them discussing deosil and widdershins (clockwise and anti-clockwise), and the what and the how don't matter so much as the intent does. It's nor just kids having a laugh, they're serious about it, and they're respectful, and it's written about respectfully. There's also Margaritte, Leah's elderly next door neighbour who she visits for tarot readings every Tuesday evening, who has books and books about dreams, astrology, runes and pastlives, and so on. Margaritte is an outcast in this very religious community, and originally, the Eldest Girls and their antics are dismissed with derision as child's play, but unholy nonetheless. That is until things start to become more serious, and there's religious outrage and disgust that is reminiscent of the witch hunts of the past. As awful as it was, it was believable of the community of Lark; they wouldn't have reacted in any other way. I loved that Mayhew not only included Paganism and witchcraft, and treated it respectfully, but also this nod to the witch hunts and what innocent people suffered.
At intervals of the story, there are images of the Major Arcana tarot cards, which was just amazing! I loved how Mayhew used them to tell the story; each card related to a specific part of the story in some way, whether it was directly about the name of the card, like Death or Justice, or the themes of the card. As someone who is learning to read tarot cards, I really appreciated this, and the insight it gave me into what could be coming up, and then relating what I was reading to the card if it wasn't quite so obvious at first. This was just a brilliant addition to the story, and fantastic storytelling, because each card, in chronological order, told the story, really - or the story was written around the order of the cards and their names/themes. This was just so very clever, and I absolutely loved it!
Something else I also want to talk about, before I end this review, is the age category. I originally thought this was YA, because there's no mention of any protagonist other than Viola in the description I read. However, it's marketed as Mayhew's adult debut, and published by an adult imprint. When it comes to Leah's perspective, and occasionally the omnipresent narration, it does feel kind of more adult - not in regards to content, because YA covers similar topics, just the way it's written, the writing style for the adult voices. There are a few short sex scenes from Leah's perspective, and while not gratuitous or overly graphic, the writing of those scenes felt different to YA sex scenes, too. I think Mayhew does an absolutely fantastic job of switching from the YA feel of Viola's voice to the adult voices of Leah and the narrator. All of this is to answer the question, would teen readers want to read Impossible Causes? As a reader and a bookseller, I think this would probably be more appealing to older teens, but in my opinion, it's definitely a crossover novel, and I don't think it's necessarily "inappropriate" for teens. It really depends on the individual teen reader, what they like reading, and what they feel ready for - and whether they think they would enjoy the older voices, because of the different styles.
Impossible Causes is an absolutely incredible, but a very hard-hitting, unbearable story that ripped me to shreds. There is so much more I could say, so much more I want to discuss, but can't without spoiling the story. But it's such an important, powerful book, and I absolutely implore you to read it. This is one book I won't be forgetting in a very long time.
Thank you to Raven Books for the proof.
Trigger & Content Warnings are under a spoiler button as there are a few of them.
When I saw a giveaway for a proof of Impossible Causes - Julie Mayhew's adult debut - on Twitter, after looking it up, I knew that this book was right up my street. It sounded like a really intriguing thriller, and I was excited to read it. What I didn't expect was to read an incredibly heartbreaking and rage-inducing story that blew my mind.
After her the death of her dad and her brother, Viola and her mum move to the isolated and almost forgotten British island of Lark. With a small population and a tight-knit community, Lark is safe, and safety is what Viola's mum needs right now. Due to bad weather conditions, the island can only be reached between April and August, the rest of the time, this very religious community is shut off from the rest of the modern world; there is one radio telephone and one computer (used for placing orders only) on the whole island, no-one has mobiles, and all the movies on the island are several years old. To some, it sounds idyllic, but others feel trapped. When Viola meets the Eldest Girls - Britta, Anna, and Jade-Marie, the three eldest students on the island, she discovers there's more going on, on this island than anyone is willing to talk about, and finds herself becoming involved in the girls' experimentation in Paganism and witchcraft. When a dead body is discovered, the island must face what they have always kept hidden.
Impossible Causes is so brilliantly written! There are three perspectives; Viola's third person perspective; a teacher at the school, Leah Cedar's first person perspective; and an omnipresent third person narrative that shows us glimpses of conversations that neither Viola or Leah are witness to. With Viola's perspective, it jumps back and forth in time; the book starts on Friday 13th April 2018, when Viola has discovered the dead body of a man and reports it, and keeps coming back to this day and the events that happen after the body is found, but it also goes back to when Viola and her mum first moved to the island, and tells her story linearly from there, showing the events that lead up to Friday 13th April. It might sound complicated, what with three different narrations, and with Viola's jumping back and forth, but each chapter stays in a particular perspective and time, and you know from the beginning of each chapter who you're following and when. The skip in the narrations and the jumping back and forth in time is brilliantly done to keep the readers guessing. At the beginning, four questions are the reader's focus: who has been killed (because although Viola knows, it's not revealed to the reader at the time)? Why have they been killed? Who killed them? And what secrets is the town hiding? What's also really interesting is how Impossible Causes doesn't have the amount of dialogue that I'm used to. While you'd imagine this would involve a lot of telling instead of showing, it actually really works because of this omnipresent narrator, through which we get glimpses into the behaviours and minds of people we wouldn't otherwise. And it just really helps to create an atmosphere that drew me in, as well as the mystery
The whole mystery of the story was exciting! I was completely gripped, getting to know all the characters and the world of Lark, trying to figure things out for myself. The town is ridiculously patriarchal and sexist, with women not being allowed on the Council, and only being allowed to go to the pub at the weekend, stuck in the past where there were jobs for women and jobs for men. While this wound me up, for the most part, I was just rolling my eyes at the ridiculousness of it all, but kind of accepted it, because the whole island is cut off from the rest of the world, and they're stuck in the past in so many ways, it was kind of understandable, if not acceptable, that this was the way they lived and what they accepted as normal. There was middle-class pearl-clutching gossip between the ladies when they got their hair done that they absolutely revelled in - relishing in the latest scandal and saying what they really thought about certain people, while being nice as pie to their faces. There were the men in their pub and their outrageous sexist talk that went beyond what you might expect, and was quite shocking, insulting, and uncomfortable. It was also so hypocritical, yet completely expected; these people who quote scripture at the drop of a hat, are all holier-than-thou, and have certain expectations on how people should behave, and yet behind closed doors are absolutely disgusting. And after a while, my excitement for this mystery dwindled, as alarm bells started ringing, and the penny finally dropped.
And everything came crashing down. What's happening on the island is so strongly alluded to before it's actually stated, that there can be no doubt. There are no words for the immensity of the dread and the sadness and the rage. It just comes down to who and when and for how long. And how - how on Earth could this be happening in such a small town. How?! So you go back to the main mystery of the body. Who is it? Who did it? How did they do it? And now there's a greediness to wanting to know these answers, a righteousness to this death, this murder, because although I didn't know who it was, I believed I knew what they did. I had so many theories of who the dead body was. I kept jumping from person to person, because Mayhew has written this book so fantastically, only giving certain information here and there, and sometimes those hints are just the assumptions of Leah or Viola, and they're not necessarily correct. It could be any of a number of people. My heart had broken and I was raging, and I needed to know who had died, and that they suffered. And then there's a twist. The biggest twist of all. Something absolutely no-one will see coming, because it's just impossible to. And my heart broke all over again. The truth, the truth of everything, is almost too much to bear. My rage intensified, and I just wanted to shout at these people, "Look! Look what you did!"
I want to touch on the Paganism and witchcraft in Impossible Causes. I didn't know about this side of the story originally, before starting, but I was so pleasantly surprised! It isn't a massive element of the story; we don't see a huge amount of what the Eldest Girls actually get up to. We just know they go to their stone circle, wearing old fashioned nightdresses, they cast circle, they invoke gods, and they cast spells. We don't know the details of those spells - what they are, nor what they're intention is - partly because if we know what and why they were casting spells, their reason for turning to witchcraft, it would spoil some of the mystery. We do find out, but we find out later. But it warmed my heart to see them discussing deosil and widdershins (clockwise and anti-clockwise), and the what and the how don't matter so much as the intent does. It's nor just kids having a laugh, they're serious about it, and they're respectful, and it's written about respectfully. There's also Margaritte, Leah's elderly next door neighbour who she visits for tarot readings every Tuesday evening, who has books and books about dreams, astrology, runes and pastlives, and so on. Margaritte is an outcast in this very religious community, and originally, the Eldest Girls and their antics are dismissed with derision as child's play, but unholy nonetheless. That is until things start to become more serious, and there's religious outrage and disgust that is reminiscent of the witch hunts of the past. As awful as it was, it was believable of the community of Lark; they wouldn't have reacted in any other way. I loved that Mayhew not only included Paganism and witchcraft, and treated it respectfully, but also this nod to the witch hunts and what innocent people suffered.
At intervals of the story, there are images of the Major Arcana tarot cards, which was just amazing! I loved how Mayhew used them to tell the story; each card related to a specific part of the story in some way, whether it was directly about the name of the card, like Death or Justice, or the themes of the card. As someone who is learning to read tarot cards, I really appreciated this, and the insight it gave me into what could be coming up, and then relating what I was reading to the card if it wasn't quite so obvious at first. This was just a brilliant addition to the story, and fantastic storytelling, because each card, in chronological order, told the story, really - or the story was written around the order of the cards and their names/themes. This was just so very clever, and I absolutely loved it!
Something else I also want to talk about, before I end this review, is the age category. I originally thought this was YA, because there's no mention of any protagonist other than Viola in the description I read. However, it's marketed as Mayhew's adult debut, and published by an adult imprint. When it comes to Leah's perspective, and occasionally the omnipresent narration, it does feel kind of more adult - not in regards to content, because YA covers similar topics, just the way it's written, the writing style for the adult voices. There are a few short sex scenes from Leah's perspective, and while not gratuitous or overly graphic, the writing of those scenes felt different to YA sex scenes, too. I think Mayhew does an absolutely fantastic job of switching from the YA feel of Viola's voice to the adult voices of Leah and the narrator. All of this is to answer the question, would teen readers want to read Impossible Causes? As a reader and a bookseller, I think this would probably be more appealing to older teens, but in my opinion, it's definitely a crossover novel, and I don't think it's necessarily "inappropriate" for teens. It really depends on the individual teen reader, what they like reading, and what they feel ready for - and whether they think they would enjoy the older voices, because of the different styles.
Impossible Causes is an absolutely incredible, but a very hard-hitting, unbearable story that ripped me to shreds. There is so much more I could say, so much more I want to discuss, but can't without spoiling the story. But it's such an important, powerful book, and I absolutely implore you to read it. This is one book I won't be forgetting in a very long time.
Thank you to Raven Books for the proof.
March 9, 2020
Hmmm. Not sure about this one yet.
Viola and her mother move to the isolated island of Lark in the Atlantic Ocean to leave behind ugly memories in England. What they don't know is that Lark has its own ugly secrets.
There's a lot in this one: old British paganism, a suspicious community, a world separated from modernity, dark secrets (aren't there always?), and the power and silencing of women's voices.
I liked it. I kept turning the pages, even though about half-way through, I guessed what happened during the central mystery, although Mayhew saves a few tragic twists for the end.
I think I would have liked it more if I had felt more connected with either of the two narrators - Viola and Leah. Both are deeply flawed, and there was something in Mayhew's writing that kept me from truly empathizing with either. Both still felt cold and distant, even at the end of the novel when they were at their most vulnerable.
All in all, I found the setting on the remote island of Lark absorbing with its strange ways and wary people. The characters were complex, and I did find myself wondering about each of their motivations and actions throughout. The plot itself actually became less important as the story progressed than the characters and why they were acting as they were and what would happen once all of Lark's secrets were revealed.
A different, dark and complicated read. I'd read more by Mayhew.
*language, sex, violence
Viola and her mother move to the isolated island of Lark in the Atlantic Ocean to leave behind ugly memories in England. What they don't know is that Lark has its own ugly secrets.
There's a lot in this one: old British paganism, a suspicious community, a world separated from modernity, dark secrets (aren't there always?), and the power and silencing of women's voices.
I liked it. I kept turning the pages, even though about half-way through, I guessed what happened during the central mystery, although Mayhew saves a few tragic twists for the end.
I think I would have liked it more if I had felt more connected with either of the two narrators - Viola and Leah. Both are deeply flawed, and there was something in Mayhew's writing that kept me from truly empathizing with either. Both still felt cold and distant, even at the end of the novel when they were at their most vulnerable.
All in all, I found the setting on the remote island of Lark absorbing with its strange ways and wary people. The characters were complex, and I did find myself wondering about each of their motivations and actions throughout. The plot itself actually became less important as the story progressed than the characters and why they were acting as they were and what would happen once all of Lark's secrets were revealed.
A different, dark and complicated read. I'd read more by Mayhew.
*language, sex, violence
June 30, 2021
It’s an interesting concepts, sometimes predictable - but still a good read. I enjoyed the pace and general tone of the book although some elements seemed a bit random.
I did feel lots of things still weren’t properly explained by the end, but it was alright.
I did feel lots of things still weren’t properly explained by the end, but it was alright.
February 1, 2024
3.5. I expect this will be an HBO limited series at some point. I love a book that has a map at the beginning, but some aspects of the story just didn’t work for me, and the ending left me deflated. Overall I enjoyed reading it!
Read
August 4, 2019DNF. The story sounded interesting, but this writing isn't appealing to me at all.
February 5, 2020
- thanks to @bloomsburypublishing for sending the book my way!
I must admit I had high expectations for this book because... witchcraft! The cover is subtlety witchy, and it screams 'read me', and of course I couldn't resist.
The writing style was a bit over-descriptive, dense and lengthy for my liking, and although I was curious about the plot development, I struggled to come back to it every single time. I pushed forward because I needed to know: what the hell is going in this island? Why everyone acts so weird? But what I mainly kept asking myself right until the end was: where is the witchcraft, the magic? The book is filled with 'witchcraft' insinuations and utterly bizarre situations, but that is all there is. This does contribute to give the island sort of a 'mystifying' vibe but that the lack of palpable 'magic' was disappointing.
There wasn't enough character development to properly connect with or like any of the characters. The 'Eldest Girls' had so much potential yet we don't get to know anything relevant about them, apart from the revelations at the end, which don't say much about them but a lot about other people. They are everywhere, but we don't know who they are, or what are they like; they are more of a 'thing' than 'real people', and I failed to identify them individually due to the lack of characterisation.
The general inconsistency of the plot and the dreadfully slow development were real killers. I was confused, yet I had high hopes to get to a befitting ending; however, it was purely perplexing. The twists came out of nowhere, and I didn't buy the whole thing, although I do understand the intention was to round everything up with something astounding.
Overall, Impossible Causes was not my cup of tea. I missed the opportunity to connect with the characters; the story loses its credibility along the way, and the absence of anything witch related disappointed me. I hope other readers enjoy it way more than I did!
I must admit I had high expectations for this book because... witchcraft! The cover is subtlety witchy, and it screams 'read me', and of course I couldn't resist.
The writing style was a bit over-descriptive, dense and lengthy for my liking, and although I was curious about the plot development, I struggled to come back to it every single time. I pushed forward because I needed to know: what the hell is going in this island? Why everyone acts so weird? But what I mainly kept asking myself right until the end was: where is the witchcraft, the magic? The book is filled with 'witchcraft' insinuations and utterly bizarre situations, but that is all there is. This does contribute to give the island sort of a 'mystifying' vibe but that the lack of palpable 'magic' was disappointing.
There wasn't enough character development to properly connect with or like any of the characters. The 'Eldest Girls' had so much potential yet we don't get to know anything relevant about them, apart from the revelations at the end, which don't say much about them but a lot about other people. They are everywhere, but we don't know who they are, or what are they like; they are more of a 'thing' than 'real people', and I failed to identify them individually due to the lack of characterisation.
The general inconsistency of the plot and the dreadfully slow development were real killers. I was confused, yet I had high hopes to get to a befitting ending; however, it was purely perplexing. The twists came out of nowhere, and I didn't buy the whole thing, although I do understand the intention was to round everything up with something astounding.
Overall, Impossible Causes was not my cup of tea. I missed the opportunity to connect with the characters; the story loses its credibility along the way, and the absence of anything witch related disappointed me. I hope other readers enjoy it way more than I did!
December 16, 2019
When you get to the end of this book and realise what the storyline was, in what order things happened, and how they happened it's an enjoyable book. I can see why the author chose to jump backwards and forwards in time and I think, handled well, it could have been very powerful. But because one of the timelines, the 'now' timeline, consists of one day told in sections, separated by a lot of 'then' I found it hard to recall exactly what had happened at the start by the time I was 3/4 of the way through.
There was a lot of instances with characters not talking about things, allowing big misunderstandings to happen, part of that was for the sake of other characters, and part of it was for The Drama which I found very annoying. Initially I thought I would like Viola but she is too self-involved and likes messing things up for other people to save her own skin, or just because she wants to. I find that hard to like in a character and find it harder to read a book with protagonists I don't like. Leah was less annoying, but never talked things over properly with anyone.
The reveal of the issues of the island, while I expected it in some way was still quite shocking to me and I thought that was done well. It would have been good but I don't think the time jumping helped the book, just muddied the waters.
There was a lot of instances with characters not talking about things, allowing big misunderstandings to happen, part of that was for the sake of other characters, and part of it was for The Drama which I found very annoying. Initially I thought I would like Viola but she is too self-involved and likes messing things up for other people to save her own skin, or just because she wants to. I find that hard to like in a character and find it harder to read a book with protagonists I don't like. Leah was less annoying, but never talked things over properly with anyone.
The reveal of the issues of the island, while I expected it in some way was still quite shocking to me and I thought that was done well. It would have been good but I don't think the time jumping helped the book, just muddied the waters.
July 15, 2019
The description appealed but I'm afraid that that was as far as it went for me. Yes an isolated island (although mot likely to be that wooded given it was supposed to be off the coast of north western Britain) with a fundamental religion - think Outer Hebrides and the "Wee Frees". I did feel for some of the youngster yearning for what they saw as the bright lights of mainland/towns/cities before they appreciated what they had on the island especially when incomers arrived. It seemed like a sort of coming of age story. What I really disliked was the sentence - -1, gap -0 and another sentence +1. I think, but reiterate the 'think', that it might have been the author's way to weigh the pros and cons of whatever the character was thinking about at the time, but maybe not. It could be some publishing gremlin for all I know. I found it totally distracting anyway and I gave up just under half way through. Not my normal behaviour at all. Thanks to NetGalley and Bloomsbury Publishing Plc (UK & ANZ) for an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.
May 5, 2020
This book was so bad I almost didn’t list it on here, but I figured a write up would be a good reminder of why I hated it so much.
The book is trying too hard to be too much: it tries to be vague and mysterious, doling our tiny crumbs of information in an effort to keep the reader guessing, but it is too little. I spent the first third of the book trying to figure out what was happening and who all the (many many) characters were. On top of that, it keeps switching perspectives and introducing rumors in an effort to further obscure the truth and confuse the reader. All this adds up to a book so sloppy, disjointed, and confusing that I am getting angry justing thinking about how I wasted any time reading it.
All of the characters are terrible selfish people, with paper-thin motivations and no character development. I hated every single person in this book.
The big reveal was so juvenile I thought it was a joke. It isn’t cathartic, it isn’t empowering, it isn’t comforting, it’s just pathetic.
The book is trying too hard to be too much: it tries to be vague and mysterious, doling our tiny crumbs of information in an effort to keep the reader guessing, but it is too little. I spent the first third of the book trying to figure out what was happening and who all the (many many) characters were. On top of that, it keeps switching perspectives and introducing rumors in an effort to further obscure the truth and confuse the reader. All this adds up to a book so sloppy, disjointed, and confusing that I am getting angry justing thinking about how I wasted any time reading it.
All of the characters are terrible selfish people, with paper-thin motivations and no character development. I hated every single person in this book.
The big reveal was so juvenile I thought it was a joke. It isn’t cathartic, it isn’t empowering, it isn’t comforting, it’s just pathetic.
May 24, 2020
I feel at a loss trying to parse out my feelings about this book. Did I like it? No. Will it probably linger in my mind for a while? Yes. The timeline continued to jump around and piss me off, the characters are complicated and messy; I feel like I stumble-read my way through and...frankly, I’m uncertain the effort was worth it.
November 16, 2019
Couldn't get into it, - read about 3 chapters. Just didn't connect with the main characters and didn't care about them.
Quite disappointed as it was quite highly hyped in a newspaper as being a good thriller.
Wouldn't read another of hers based on this book, neither would I recommend.
Quite disappointed as it was quite highly hyped in a newspaper as being a good thriller.
Wouldn't read another of hers based on this book, neither would I recommend.
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