Amaranth by Rachael WadeMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
The Resistance Trilogy #1
Wow is my first and continued reaction. I literally could not put this book down, it is so intense, so endearing, so inspiring of empathy. What the protagonist Camille endures-and her exquisite talent at self-analysis-is riveting. Absolutely impossible to break away from this book. Without need for a spoiler, I can express this: Camille has a major crack in the foundation of her psyche. For whatever reasons, her inner strength and her intuition don’t seem to match up. What she is, is a magnet for domestic abusers, in her case relationship abusers, males who first build up their hold over her by verbal and psychological denigration, then “progress” to physical battering. Due to the quake faults in her psychological makeup, Camille gravitates to these, and magnetizes them; but when she encounters anyone who might be more “normal” and non-abusive, she can’t recognize that individual’s worth and tends to shunt him aside. Her only outlets seem to be a complete change of foundational beliefs, so that she can break away and then stay strong, on her own; or suicide; or enduring till one of these violent males eventually kills her. Not much of a choice, and to the reader, the only right option seems obvious; get real, get right, and get out.
But such a solution is not the way our heroine sees it: instead she turns to Hoodoo, the Southern Louisiana version of Voodoo as it has been practiced in Haiti and elsewhere. Camille intends to rely on protection spells to keep the abusers away and at bay-not legal protection orders-despite the fact that her local supplier insists there is more at stake than Camille realizes and that the protection spells may not stop the abuser’s advance. Where many modern-day women and girls would think first of abuse shelters, arrest warrants, and restraining orders, Camille heads for the paranormal resources: first, the Hoodoo spells; and then, the reappearance in her life of the sexy yet diffident Gavin Devereaux, whom she had first unexpectedly encountered two years earlier on a visit to Paris. Gavin, of course, is very much more than he appears. Camille is about to peel away a veil that has kept an entire different probability hidden from her-and she has tangled with powers greater than her own human strength.
This is a well- and carefully-thought-out novel, with skillful world-building, believability, and characters who ring with intensity and reality. The plotting (on both sides of the veil of reality) is extraordinary and very realistic-the reader will accept that any and all of it could actually come to pass. Whenever you begin this book, do set aside a block of time, for you won’t turn away from it till you’re finished, and you’ll find yourself longing for the next volume in the trilogy.
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