A historical slow paced story starting with our midwife Jean, as she meets Muirin and slowly setting the stage for a slow build sapphic love story.

Jean and Muirin are both likeable characters albeit Muirin was pretty underdeveloped . As a folktale retelling, the story lost me a bit with the loss of explanation and I don’t want to give away who the retelling of the fantasy is in regards as I then had to do research. Which I wish I had
not, as I did find contradictions as the author even admits to not really researching ahead of time and going off of memory. I contemplated DNFing this one.
Boy was this story all over the place and inconsistent. One minute, we’re gasping over a character saying the f word and the next, we’re laughing at a crude joke by same character that gasped. I really couldn’t figure out what this story was trying to accomplish- it’s over explaining in narration, feeling repetitive questions and the next, it’s jumping from a to z, completely missing any explanation at all. It almost feels like being written by two different people, with two different goals. I hope this finished copy feels better edited, as this just felt like a first draft to me.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for granting my wish to read this! That being said, I really wished that I liked this one, unfortunately it just couldn't hold my attention (definitely a me thing and not the book itself)

Had to put this one down for now. Just couldn’t get into it, but will attempt to pick up at another times do revise my feedback as appropriate.

This debut novel by Rose Sutherland was fantastic! I am afraid I can't say the right things to express how much I enjoyed it. It is beautiful, atmospheric, and suspenseful. The slower pacing is perfect for fully developing the setting and building tension. I never got bored or lost interest. I was on the edge of my seat throughout. I love the main characters and supporting actors as well. A Sweet Sting of Salt is a sapphic take on the Selkie Wife lore from a female perspective. I had never read about this before, so I went in with fresh eyes. I devoured it. There is solid found and birth family support and a strong sense of right and wrong. Formidable women fighting for love and justice drive the plot. The epilogue was a nice bow on top, and the author's notes a special bonus. The writing style and word/phrase choices drew me in and made this period piece believable. Despite the serious nature, there were also a few chuckles here and there.

"It wouldn’t do to trip over a root making her way up the slope, and go ass over teakettle in the dead leaves."

The editing was great, no blatant distractions. The MC's relationship grew organically over time and did not feel forced. This book is one that I highly recommend and have already added to my re-read list. Plus for bi, lesbian, gay, and indigenous representation.

Big thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publish Group for this arc by Rose Sutherland. Wow. A Sweet Sting of Salt is an amazing debut novel! I had never heard of the Selkie Wife folktale going into this and still absolutely LOVED it. It’s definitely not a fast read but one to be savored late into the night on a cold evening by a fire. This is a sapphic retelling of the Selkie Wife set in Nova Scotia and it’s angsty with a lot of tension while still feeling cozy. This was so good and I can’t wait to read more from this author.

A gorgeous tale of sapphic yearning laced with a slow-building sense of Gothic dread. Sutherland’s captivating debut is an intensely beautiful experience you won’t soon forget. I need a physical copy of this novel now!

Jean leads a quiet life in 19th century Nova Scotia: living out the outskirts of the village where she is the midwife, she keeps to herself and her small homestead. But one night, in the middle of a storm, a from outside cry wakes her, and Jean discovers a heavily pregnant woman with little English, lost in the marsh. After delivering a perfect (yet slightly odd) son, she learns that this women, Muirin, is the new wife to her equally reclusive neighbor. Despite the healthy mother and son, and happy and supportive husband, something doesn't sit right with Jean. Drawn to her new friend, and determined to make sure Muirin is safe, Jean ventures closer, and learns things she never expected,

This book lacks nothing. With strong friendship, found family, fighting for love, and a twist of myth, A Sweet Sting of Salt should be just your cup of tea. A sweet and gentle romance, reinforced by friendship and fierce loyalty, twines through this story of overcoming other's opinions of you to fight for those you love.

A good solid story that takes on the selkie myth. Loved it and kept my interest for the whole evening.

Thank you Ballantine/Dell for my free ARC of A Sweet Sting of Salt by Rose Sutherland — available Apr 9!

Read this if you:
🧜‍♀️ are a fan of folktale retellings
💛 love strong women and their stories
🐢 don't mind a relaxed pace with a lot of detail

Jean is an accomplished midwife, though the town keeps her at arm's length because of her past. When she finds an unknown laboring woman outside her cottage in the middle of the freezing cold night, she is shocked but takes her in and helps with the birth. Things only get stranger when Jean finds that Muirin knows basically no English, despite being married to a local man. And why does Muirin act so odd in his presence? Is something sinister going on up at their house? Jean feels compelled to intervene and protect Muirin, no matter the cost to her own personal safety.

This was an interesting retelling of selkie folklore, which isn't super common so I enjoyed that aspect. It did, however, feel absolutely interminable in the middle section of the book, and then the climactic action of "good versus evil" was incredibly swift and kind of a letdown. Despite that, I loved Jean and Muirin as characters, and I love how things worked out for them in the end. Snap this one up if you don't mind a slower pace in your books! The detail is lovely, there was just too much of it for me.

⭐️⭐️⭐️

I absolutely adored this Sapphic retelling of The Selkie Wife. It has a historical fantasy/gothic feel to it that is chef's kiss. The characters are fully fleshed and the writing is impressive. Every history/fantasy lover will enjoy this.

I really liked this book. I thought it was a sweet, slow-burn sapphic love story, and none of the queer characters die! The one thing I don't like is that, because of the blurb and synopsis, as the reader, you know the story has selkies in it, but any magical realism isn't until the last bit of the book. I felt like the overall novel could have benefited from Jean understanding there was a bigger picture. I also felt like Jean was a little oblivious in general, but I quite enjoyed that. She was a little cinnamon roll that just wanted to protect people.

Jean meets Muirin while Muirin is in labor outside in a storm. Muirin basically ends up on Jean's doorstep while fleeing. After Jean helps her deliver a healthy son, Jean can sense something isn't right, but can't get answers to her questions because Muirin doesn't speak English. When Muirin's husband, Tobias, shows up, Jean doubles down and insists Muirin stay with her while recovering from birth. Tobias relents, only wanting what's best for his son and his wife. Over the course of a week, Jean watches Muirin blossom into motherhood and helps her learn English.

When Tobias comes to get Muirin and their son, Muirin closes up. Jean realizes Tobias is what's wrong in the picture. From there, a beautiful gothic love story unfolds. The author did her research and included some historical events and included indigenous people in the story. I love when authors take care with their characters and history. This story is just so full of detail, I felt the longing and I felt the isolation.

This was a good story built on longing and the power of women; there could have been more awareness in the main character and a quicker reveal of magical elements. Overall, a good read.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine and Dell Books.

A historical fiction with a dash of magical realism (selkies) that features a beautiful sapphic love story. I ended up enjoying the slow pacing of this and was glad for the happy ending.

A strong 3.5.

This story was very clearly lovingly created. I knew a little of the myth that it is based on, which something that I think not too many people these days will actually know without having to look it up first. That's not a bad thing. You can go into this story knowing the basic premise or rules, or you can go in blind, and either way you're in for a beautiful story.

The true strength of this story is the tension that Sutherland is able to build throughout. Many of the beats of this tale are obvious, but the journey through them is filled with moments of acute unease. The setting of this story helps tremendously to add to the tension and Sutherland does an excellent job at setting the stakes and slowly but surely raising the heat. It is at times uncomfortable, but in the best of ways.

The romance at the heart of the story is obvious from the outset, but it does feel earned in the end. Its also important that the story and myth speaks to the need for acceptance of others, of autonomy of person, especially women, in a way that is unique (given the circumstances) and how the ideal can turn a good person inside out in order to achieve it, and keep it.

Intriguing - good setting and writing. I don’t love retellings but I think someone who does will truly enjoy.

A Sweet Sting of Salt is a gorgeous, sapphic reimagining of the legend of the Selkie wife. Rife with atmosphere and thick with longing, I absolutely adored Rose Sutherland debut and can’t wait to read more of their writing.

As a diehard fan of yearning (the angstier the better) I fell head over heels for Muirin and Jean and the tender romance that blossomed amidst trauma. The Nova Scotia setting is rich with Gothic imagery so thick I could feel the cold wind in my hair and taste the salt on my tongue. I love books where the setting is as much a character as the people, which is definitely the case here. Genuinely, I can’t say enough about this book and am astounded that it’s a debut. Historical sapphic stories are such an underrated genre and it’s amazing to see such a strong book come into the space. I’ll early read anything else Sutherland may write!

A Sweet Sting of Salt absolutely took my breath away! I am a sucker for a good retelling and the Selkie myth happens to be one of my favorites. Sutherland absolutely nails her take on the myth -- it's feminist, dark, and gorgeous, and I love her prose so much. In Sutherland's take on the myth, we follow Jean, a midwife who lives alone on her farm. Jean's life is small and insular, ever since her best friend/possibly more than that, Jo, got married and moved away. One night, Jean wakes to a cry from outside -- her neighbor Tobias's wife is giving birth. Muirin doesn't speak much English, but it's clear that she needs to stay with Jean -- though Tobias seems the picture of a doting husband, Jean can sense something below the surface. And besides, how can she let Muirin go, when her cold heart is slowly beginning to crack open for this mysterious stranger?

I love everything about this book, from the slow pace to the gothic sense of dread that infuses every page. Sutherland's eye for characters is simply sublime and I love that, though this is a historical setting, her cast is predominantly queer. The romance between Jean and Muirin is beautifully done, and I cannot recommend this enough!

Many thanks to NetGalley, Random House Publishing - Ballantine, and Rose Sutherland for gifting me this e-ARC in exchange for my honest review! I could've lived inside Jean and Muirin's world for a thousand more pages and never gotten tired -- I cannot wait to see what Sutherland writes next!

🚦holding to posting on social media til the end of the month for more hype for it.
small towns by the sea

⭐ sapphic historical fiction
⭐Selkie mythology
⭐strong females
⭐eerie, haunting
⭐great atmosphere
⭐lgbtq+

🛑disclaimers: toxic marriage relationship, mild abuse, animal death, kidnapping, homophobia

I am sooo happy I had not heard the folklore of selkies because I felt it made the story much more interesting. I am afraid if I had known I may not have enjoyed it as much.
Being part Scot myself and hearing Gaelic when I was younger this brought back some nice memories. I absolutely loved how the author set the environment and atmosphere. I was pulled in right away. The touch of fantasy with the hard hitting historical of a womens life in the 1800's was fantastic. I could feel the tension from the beginning.
I did fall of just a little towards the middle when the slow burn started to bother me. I wanted a little more fantasy at that point or just a little more going on.
However, it did pick back up. I was wondering though why the main character never thinks that the other women could be lying to her. She just believes so strongly that it is wrong. I guess it was women intition but it was kind of scary in that way to me because people decieve others all the time. This defintely what I felt her mentor trying to get at in her warnings.
I also liked the mens story but wanted a little more of it also cause the return at one part of it. yesssssss.
I have to see the babe and the little nose bumps made me smile every time.
I do not like slow burns and at times I wanted a little more so I felt I could not give this book a full 5 star rating. I still VERY much loved this book and thank the author for highlighting something I had never known in my own family history.
I recommend people to at least try it and going in blind is recommended by me.

5 STARS!

Trigger Warning: For Death, Sexuality Aggression, Kidnapping (kinda), Toxic Marriage, Stalking

I adored this book so much when I decided to pick it up and experience the story that Rose Sutherland decided to retell of a classic story. I am happy I opened this book not knowing about the classic folktale or that it was going to necessarily be about since all I read was "Once a young woman uncovers a dark secret about her neighbor and his mysterious new wife, she'll have to fight to keep herself..."
and immediately requested to read it. I know the type of friends and family that I will be able to recommend this book to when they are searching for a sapphic Gothic tale that is a slow burn but page turning story.

Jean is a midwife in her small town, who lives alone after the death of her father and her interest in women causing a dislike from the town. One night during a storm, Jean finds a pregnant woman by her house during a storm in the midst of labor pains and unable to speak English. She helps this woman and when her neighbor, Tobias, comes looking for his wife, Muirin, Jean begins to feel unease about the relationship that leads her to believe that there is something wrong. Tobias allows Jean to befriend his wife, and she learns that he is possessive and begins to be jealous over their relationship. When he finds out that Jean is interested in women it makes his life easier to turn against her and threaten her life if she ever comes near "his" wife or child again.

Jean has to figure out if her need to protect Muirian is because she has found herself loving her or if she truly just wants to protect her just to be a good person and protective midwife. This was an enjoyable tale because it touched on finding love in unexpected places as well as working through love and what that actually means in the end of it all. I recommend this book for those who enjoy a sapphic tale, a story that is quick moving, and a retelling of old tales that you may not have heard about before.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the early copy for an honest review!

I enjoyed this queer retelling of the folktale "The Selkie Wife". I liked the main character, Jean, but I really enjoyed the supporting cast of Aneke and her son, Laurie. Aneke, an indigenous midwife, was so accepting of both Jean and her son, and I wanted to know more about her! Laurie and Jean's brother-sister dynamic was really fun to read. Sutherland's writing is captivating and really pulled me in. Her descriptions of the landscape, how to make cheese (!!), and how nature can really guide us were interesting elements of the story. The little red fox was a cute element. I almost thought Jean possessed the power of talking to animals. Or maybe it was her familiar? Overall, a very well done story.

✨small towns by the sea
✨sapphic historical fiction
✨Selkie mythology
✨strong females
✨eerie, haunting

I went into this story completely blind and I’m so glad I did. I couldn’t put this book down and it grabbed me from the beginning. I absolutely loved it.

Sutherland writes so well and descriptively. I felt like I was back in the 1800’s in Nova Scotia. This is based off of the Selkie Wife folklore which I knew nothing about. I’m so glad I didn’t because I feel it added so much more to the story for me.

This novel is beautiful and so wonderfully written. Sutherland tells the story of a young midwife and weaves in folklore and love.

This book just passed all the vibes for me and would be a perfect read during a stormy night. It is eerie, cozy, and full of love.

This book comes out April 9th! Grab a copy if you are interested in this sapphic historical fiction!

I can’t wait to see what Sutherland writes next!

Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for this arc.