Review - A Forest, Darkly by A G Slatter

A Forest, Darkly

AG Slatter
Titan Books, 10 February 2026
Available as: PB, 368pp audio, e   
Source: Advance e-copy
ISBN(B): 9781835412565

I'm grateful to Titan for  giving me access to an advance e-copy of A Forest, Darkly to consider for review.

I think we all have authors whose books are a must read - you just need to know they’re coming to have them on pre-order. Angela (AG) Slatter is one of mine, and her “Sourdough” universe books, especially so.

A Forest, Darkly is described as a “standalone” in that universe. I think that means that the book isn’t directly connected to the recent sequence All the Murmuring Bones/ The Path of Thorns/ The Briar Book of the Dead/ The Crimson Road rather than that it is necessarily ensure unto itself - because having finished Forest, I can see so many ways that Slatter might expand on it; by giving us Mehrab, the forest witch’s, earlier life; or her later history; or the story of Rhea, the young girl who seeks her help. So much to explore and I hope to read some of those in future? It was fitting, though, to begin things with the middle-aged Mehrab, a splendid character.

Mehrab herself came to the forest seeking sanctuary. As a woman practicing magic, she’s hunted in this world, women like her persecuted by the Church and its “godhounds”. While some witches, like the Briars of The Briar Book of the Dead, are able to negotiate a precarious truce, most can only expect torture and death if they are captured, so they hide in obscure places like Berhta’s Forge, a town too insignificant to have either a church or a Lord. Mehrab's made a life there, a life disturbed when Rhea arrives, trailing a whiff of danger.

As if that’s not enough, Mehrab has begun to sense a change in the forest, an upset among the ancient spirits and demigods that live there. Something tries to trap her.

Then children begin to disappear in the village - and the villagers to turn against Mehrab…

While I may be biased (see my comments above!) I really did find A Forest, Darkly a meaty and entrancing read. Mehrab is such a rounded character, down to earth and competent at everything she she does: rather different from the stereotype fantasy lead which tends to be a young person out of their depth and trying to understand life as it changes around them. Indeed, as an older person (by no means old!) Mehrab has a perspective, faces challenges, and has to deal with issues, that are all very distinct. And also baggage from her past, both the distant past she fled from to the Forest, and her more recent life in the woods. Baggage such as lovers, natural and supernatural. Baggage such as her place in the village community. Baggage such as guilt for the things she did.

It all makes for an absorbing and well-realised story with plenty of surprises and new takes on older themes, and for Mehrab, something of a reckoning with her past.

A strong addition to the Sourdough books.

For more information about A Forest, Darkly, see the publisher's website here.

Review - The Crimson Road by Angela Slatter

The Crimson Road

Angela Slatter
Titan Books, 11 February 2025
Available as: PB, 368pp, audio, e   
Source: Advance copy
ISBN(PB): 9781803364568

I'm grateful to the publisher for giving me access to an advance e-copy of The Crimson Road  to consider for review.

I loved returning to the world of Slatter's Sourdough stories, for a tale that draws together the threads of her recent novels, All The Murmuring Bones, The Path of Thorns and The Briar Book of the Dead.

Like the young women who are central to of those stories, Violet Zennor is alone in what is ostensibly a very male world. A young heiress surrounded by men in authority - the lawyer, the Bishop - she might balk at the prospect that her story will be all about being married off (and indeed, there is a suitor in the wings). But in a twist the made me smile, Violet is already actually busy balking at the other plans her father laid for her, plans that involved her training relentlessly from childhood for deadly combat - and also involve somewhere mysterious called the "Anchorhold". So relieved is Violet by her father's untimely death, and at not having to live the fate that he laid down for her, that the idea of marriage may almost be welcome to her.

But life never goes smoothly for a protagonist in Slatter's world. Across those earlier books we have seen her explore ideas of inheritance, of coming into adulthood and of women finding a way to survive with integrity and freedom in that male world. These ways are never as simple as "having a lot of wealth" because, really, the sources of wealth are always murky (as Violet's proves). They are though various, though often magical, and I was eager to see how Violet would deal with this predicament. As her arm begins to be twisted to follow the course planned for her, we may wonder if she will ever be able to control her own destiny? 

Of course as we have also seen in those earlier books there are ways around, even if not through. And Violet is aided by a sisterhood of the women we've already met. This could have come across as a bit of a whistlestop tour of the earlier protagonists, but Slatter is better than that. These are all women whose own stories clearly had more to be told, so in visiting them again, she answers the need any reader will have to learn a bit more about what happened next. Their various life lessons, magics and centres of protection act both as supports for Violet in her time of need and as little candles of hope in what has become a very dark world for her, hunted as she is by both dark monsters and the hypocritical church, which is willing to use the women it condemns to protect itself from those same monsters.

It all culminates, of course, in absolute bloody slaughter, not unlike the cause her father steered Violet towards - but with one key difference: that victory, and survival - if she can find them - won't be primarily through those hours and years of martial training but through friendship, love and solidarity.

A fine and gripping book, and one that rounds off this quartet of Sourdough novels (though I hope there will be more to come in future).

For more information about The Crimson Road, see the publisher's website here.

#Review - The Briar Book of the Dead by A G Slatter

The Briar Book of the Dead
AG Slatter
Titan Books, 13 February 2024 
Available as: PB, 396pp, e   
Source: Advance copy
ISBN(PB): 9781803364544

I'm grateful to Titan Books for sending me a copy of The Briar Book of the Dead to consider for review.

The Briar Book of the Dead is a novel set in Slatter's Sourdough universe, recently explored by her in All the Murmuring Bones and The Path of Thorns. I was very pleased to revisit this intricate and intriguing world, its society centring on the witches who keep everything going and protect everyone else while themselves being persecuted by a venal Church.

This is a world where details matter, where social structures and indeed social infrastructure matter, where people matter. I think The Briar Book of the Dead explores that even more than its predecessors did. The story's set in Silverton, a remote hill town where the Briar family of witches have some prominence, since their powers enable them to fend off the dark Leech Lords. This means they're granted some tolerance by the distant church - so long as they know their place.

But when did Slatter's witches ever know their place? Far from that, the Briars - a matriarchal clan who came to Silverton three hundred years before and rescued the town from decline - actually run the place, dealing with a myriad of administrative, economic and social questions as well as with the magical. Such work isn't easy, however, and we see Silverton at a troubled time when the titular Witch has died suddenly and her role been passed on for the first time in a generation, as has that of the Steward, the family who ensures all those things listed above go smoothly. 

The story is told from the perspective of the new Steward, Ellie Briar, who's a bit of an embarrassment to the family because she has no witchcraft. What Ellie does have, unknown to anyone else, is a talent for speaking to - and for - the restless dead. This will be useful as the power of the Briars is tested to its limits. But it's a secret Ellie's determined to keep because the mere existence of ghosts in the town undermine's her family's mythology.

This was a magnificent story. Ellie is a fantastic mixture of the assured and competent - and the unsure. Being the only non-magical Briar means that while she may be loved, she's endlessly slighted by the others in unthinking ways. Despite recognising all the things that need to be done ahead of anyone else,  grasping how awkward situations can be defused and simply remembering what's next, Ellie has developed a habit of deference. So when only she seems to see what's going wrong, only she takes it seriously and only she knows what needs to be done, a tension inevitably rises between her and the other women of the family.

That is made worse as Ellie fancies the new priest who's been sent to shake up the town - a sign perhaps that the distant Church is finally paying attention to this remote corner? - so she has to juggle personal feelings, family history and romantic inclinations to find a way through. 

A fast-moving, enjoyable and positive (despite the dark things that happen) take on a fantasy world, this is a fun read and it was great to see mentions and hints about other storylines in this world, both those already in print and - dare I hope? - those still to come.

For more information about The Briar Book of the Dead, see the publisher's website here.

#Review - The Path of Thorns by AG Slatter

The Path of Thorns
A G Slatter
Titan Books, 28 June 2022
Available as: PB, 384pp, e
Source: Advance copy
ISBN(PB): 9781789094374

I'm grateful to Titan Books for a free advance copy of The Path of Thorns to consider for review.

The 'path of thorns' is, we are told midway through this book, the path a woman inevitably treads in this world: every step forward, you get a thorn in your foot. 

It's certainly the path that Asher Todd has trodden. Todd was brought up by Heloise, a loving mother if one increasingly disturbed as she sank under illness caused, Todd hints, by a life as a courtesan following exile from her wealthy family. Heloise's relationships with her clients have left their mark on Todd, as well. Asher also despises  the academics of Whitebarrow, who preyed on her mother even while refusing to educate Asher in their sciences and magics (men only, I'm afraid). Despite this she has become a skilled self taught witch - but therefore vulnerable to the Church, which persecutes women such as herself. Each step forward, another thorn.

Above all, though, Asher Todd she hates the family that threw her mother out. 

And now she's found them, and come for revenge. 

The background Slatter uses is this book is her 'Sourdough' universe, which has featured in many short stories and in a previous novel, All the Murmuring Bones (to which there are a number of references here). It's a comfortably vague world, pre Modern in some respects - people use horses for transport - with a degree of magic accepted (though that's increasingly being contested by the Church) and society divided between many small, feudal polities, most of which focus on the local (here the Morwood family and their nearest small town, the Tarn). 

While this world is in some respects culturally advanced with, for example, same-sex couples easily accepted and daughters able to inherit an estate such as that of the Morwoods, male privilege and patriarchy still permeates this story with abusive husbands and lovers, double standards in sexual conduct and a clearly male hierarchy in the Church. Asher will have to step carefully through all this (those thorns again!) as she seeks to shape her new home to her own ends.

There are mysteries here to be discovered - from that first presence Asher feels as she approaches the house - a persona to be maintained (posing as a governess may be absolutely in line with the template for a Gothic novel, but it's not work she's ever done before and the kids have sharp eyes) - and obligations that she has taken on in order to get this far. Conflicting obligations, perhaps. All that even before the house, and its inhabitants, begin to work their own magic, manipulating her sympathies in their own battles and struggles.

The Path of Thorns gives its reader a lot to engage with. A sensible, capable and determined protagonist in Asher, who has a pleasing dash of Flora Poste about her, (if Flora could work magic: perhaps rather Mary Poppins though from the books, not the films). Plenty of mystery in the woods and the house itself. A brooding, could-be villain (though, with themes of domestic abuse, this is one you definitely want to watch out for after dark). Some innocent(?) children to be won over but above all, protected - this in a world where kids who play in the river may find water sprites taking an interest...

The story moves at a fair pace, with plenty of jeopardy and some really nasty magic promised. A book I really enjoyed, though be warned - nobody here is innocent, not even Asher herself, and my abiding thought by the end was very much 'families - who needs them?'

For more information about The Path of Thorns, see the Titan website here.