Review: Wolf of Wessex

Wolf of Wessex by Matthew Harffy
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Month Read In: February 2022

Challenge: 

Beyond the Bookends February 2022: Feel Good 

PopSugar 2022: Found Family

Methodology: Ebook via Library on Libby, Audiobook read by Barnaby Edwards, via Library on Hoopla

Genre- Thriller/Suspense: Historical

Once I got the audiobook, I could not stop! While the ebook sat for 62 days on my digital shelf, the audiobook literally took 8 days to rush through. Barnaby Edwards immersed me in the world and his inflections were deeply impactful. Though the cover shows a Norseman’s axe, I wasn’t expecting a story that shared the full impact of the raids the Norsemen put on the people of Wessex, without a single fight between them.

This rating comes using CAWPILE v3.0 and therefore a true 5 star from my critical thinking side.

Recommended to me by The History Quill mailing list.  

The characters were fully developed and side characters had just enough development to make sense. The conflicts were immersed in historical context. I could smell the forest, feel the night, the era was fully immersive. The writing was paced well, vernacular felt truly real, I gobbled up the audiobook. Since the book is a historical fiction in a specific era & place, the plot is pretty predictable, but the underlying mystery kept things going. The steps from the beginning to get to the end is completely plausible for those who have looked into this era. Harffy did his research.

I must have been in a "physically reading words slump." The moment I switched from Ebook to Audiobook, I flew through this. Dates state that it took 69-70 days to get through this, but it was literally just the last 8.

Character: 10; Atmosphere: 9.5; Writing: 9.75; Plot: 9; Intrigue: 10; Logic: 9.5; Enjoyment: 9 = 9.54 avg. 5 Stars

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