By Megan Amato
Content warning: spousal abuse, bloodletting
Let me tell you something that I hope you won’t judge me too hard for: I loathe The Great Gatsby. I dislike the self-absorbed, surface-level characters, the terrible decisions they make, and the fact that we are supposed to find some sort of meaning in the plot—or so our English teachers said. However, I do love the 1920s vibes. Francesca May’s Wild and Wicked Things somehow managed to deliver the glitzy and smoky atmosphere that I love along with flawed yet likeable characters.
After her father dies, Annie travels to Crow Island—a place where witches flout the laws banning the use of magic—to sort out his belongings and lick her wounds in a cottage by the sea. After settling, she visits her once-best friend, Beatrice, and Beatrice’s elegant husband who disparages all magic, particularly the seemingly languid and lavish witches in the mansion next door to Annie. Despite warnings from multiple sources to stay away, Annie can’t help but be drawn to the house and its enigmatic owner, Emmeline—especially when a discovery about her own dangerous and magical heritage draws her even closer. However, soon Annie discovers that an ill-fated spell is slowly killing Emmeline and the only way to save her is to get the selfish and bright Beatrice and her smooth yet formidable husband to pay what’s owed—his blood.
Someone with considerably less skill could have tried to write this story with its extremely flawed characters and failed to make us care about them. May, however, wove a story with characters so deliciously complex that I couldn’t help but root for even my least favourite characters. Beatrice is unlikeable, self-centred in her wants and desires, and uncaring in what she has to do or who she has to hurt to get them. And yet, I couldn’t completely hate her. While she doesn’t necessarily change as the novel progresses, her own fears and reasons for her actions elicit sympathy at her lowest and even have me rooting for her in the end.
Despite having more altruistic reasons for their actions, Annie and Emmeline aren’t faultless either. Drawn together like the tide to the sandy shore, unable to stay away despite the destructive force of their bond, both make decisions that have devastating consequences. Annie, determined not to be the boring girl she imagines herself, makes impulsive decisions that are detrimental to those she loves. And Emmeline’s determination to do everything herself causes her to risk not only her life but those of the people she would do anything to protect. Yet it's these flaws that make their stories all the more compelling and their tumultuous relationship convincing.
Wild and Wicked Things is a stunning novel full of shades of grey and despite being inspired by a classic, it felt original. The setting, magic, and building tension caused by the characters’ actions moved the plot in a way that had my pulse racing, both from the threat of immediate peril and the sexual tension. I will always be one to sign up for a sapphic retelling with magic and mystery, and May definitely delivered.