Book Review: Witch Hill by Marcus Sedgwick

Title: Witch Hill

Author: Marcus Sedgwick

Genre: Contemporary, Horror, Middle Grade

Publisher: Orion Children’s Books
Publication date: First published 2001
Paperback: 154 pages

At first, Jamie isn’t too worried about the bad dreams he’s been having since coming to his aunt’s house. Most people awoken in the middle of the night to find their house burning down would probably have nightmares, too. But instead of fire, he keeps dreaming of a “horrible, scary old woman,” relentlessly coming after him for some awful, inexplicable purpose. Even though he’s come to Aunt Jane’s to recover from the fire’s aftermath, he doesn’t want to bother her or his cousin Alison with his silly fears. He can see that they are very busy with their village’s community service project–cleaning off an age-old carving on the side of hill that overlooks the town. But when the carving turns out to be a peculiar primordial figure instead of the “crown” that the people of Crownshill expected to see, and Jamie uncovers evidence of an ancient witchcraft trial in local history papers, he is swept into a centuries-old mystery to which he unwittingly has the key. Who is the old crone chasing him, and what does she want? Jamie will have to endure an experience worse than fire to find out.

Stand alone or series: Stand alone

How did I get this book: Bought

Why did I read this book: I am slowly making my way through Marcus Sedgwick’s backlist.

Review:

One of the things I love the most about blogging and reviewing is how it makes it possible for me to clearly see the evolution of my reading habits. Last year for example, I found myself navigating toward Contemporary YA as the sort of comfort read to fall back into whenever I went through a reading slump. Unfortunately, Contemporary YA doesn’t seem to be working for me lately. It wasn’t until I picked up Witch Hill to read that I noticed that this is the third Marcus Sedgwick novel I turned to as a comfort, safe read since the beginning of the year. “Safe” because it seems that regardless of premise or genre, I tend to enjoy his books enormously. Even when they are not as brilliant as Revolver or Midwinterblood, they are still quite good.

Witch Hill is a short horror story that follows 12 year old Jamie as his family sends him to spend time with his aunt and cousin in the aftermath of a terrible fire that destroyed his house. He is clearly traumatized, trying to cope with the memories of waking up to fire and the nightmares he’s been having recently are not helping – but strangely, they don’t seem to be related to his horrible experience but something else altogether: something to do with his aunt’s house, a witchcraft trial that took place in the village centuries ago and above all, the nearby hill and the ancient legend of an enduring evil.

In terms of narrative, Jamie’s first person narration is interspersed with illustrations from the author and the historical transcripts of the witch trial of a young girl in the 17th Century. Jamie is the main character but the girl’s story is as important – and although she doesn’t have a narrative voice of her own, she was still a vivid character and her story an extremely poignant one.

In terms of content, there are three different threads connected by the narrative: the historical aspect, the elements of horror and Jamie’s character arc.

The historical element is brilliantly incorporated in the narrative as Jamie’s aunt is running a village clean up of the chalk figure in the hill – the figure of a crown that gives the name to their village (CrownsHill) only to slowly discover that the figure might not be that of a crown after all. This story is set in the South of England where there are several of these types of Hill Figures and the connection between the figure and how the name of the village has evolved over time is really interesting. In addition, there is also a connection with the history of Witch Trials in England and although not necessarily news to me, it was interesting to read those from the perspective of a young boy.

With regards to the horror, I always love how Marcus Sedgwick incorporates elements of folklore and history in his horror stories and I feel a little silly to even say that – given how this is a MG novel – but I was completely terrified by Jamie’s nightmares, his paralysing fear when dreaming all too familiar.

Finally, the third element and the one that connects everything together is Jamie’s character arc. I loved seeing him learning about and researching history, connecting the dots to get to the bottom of the mystery. But his emotional arc felt a little bit contrived and even forced especially in the end in the manner he faced his guilt and his fears over his traumatic experience. Another thing that bothered me a little bit was how one of Jamie’s biggest insights was how Jamie realises that the two girls – his cousin and the girl tried as a witch in the past – probably were connected by the fact that they both have or had “boy problems”. His insight is how people don’t really change over time, and that the two sixteen year old girls would inevitably have the same problems and they would inevitably be about boys. This was quite disappointing for being so reductive and generalist: as though ALL 16 year old girls have boy problems. It should be obvious that whilst some 16 year old girls do, some don’t, some have girl problems, and some of them have a freaking variety of other problems altogether. I appreciate that the story is narrated by a young boy of 12 but I didn’t feel the text challenged this realisation in any way. What a shame.

Despite this gripe, I enjoyed Witch Hill even though it is not a brilliant novel as I know Marcus Sedgwick’s can be. Although I feel this is aimed to a much younger audience, Witch Hill was an easy, comfortable read, exactly what I wanted and needed.

Notable Quotes/ Parts: As terrifying as they were, Jamie’s nightmares were so vividly described, they easily became my favourite.

Rating: 7 – Very Good.

Reading Next: Loss by Jackie Morse Kessler

Buy the Book:

Ebook available for kindle UK