Blue Hawk

BLUE HAWK follows Joan, a young girl living in 17th century Gloucestershire. Business-minded Joan begs her father for the chance to try and save her family’s failing millworking business—and succeeds. But in an era in which women are meant to be mothers and wives and no more, Joan finds herself continually underestimated and forced away from her true calling again.

This book is gritty, well researched and unique—everything I’m looking for in historical fiction! I love stories about women who don’t fit into society’s rules for them, and Joan struggles as a young woman to balance motherhood with her career and passions. Joan and her sister Alice’s complicated relationship through the years is another central part of the book, as well as the horrors of poverty, which I feel like other historical fiction authors can sometimes romanticize or glorify.

I highly recommend this for fellow literary historical fiction lovers!

A superb novel focusing on Joan's story of weaving and dyeing in 17th Century Gloucestershire.
Starting in 1663 when Joan was around 13, Blue Hawk follows Joan's life into adulthood and ultimately widowhood. It outlines the trials and tribulations of a woman who has education, talent and ambition and how gender restrictions and societal expectations make life difficult for such women. Beautifully researched, Turner acknowledges that no particular woman was the inspiration for her story but that hints and omissions in the archives allow for such a story to have possibly existed.
Left motherless at a young age, Joan and her sister Alice must navigate womanhood on their own. A drunken and saddened father does not help and Joan finds the support of Mrs Freme a local widow who has the taint of witchery about her. But the friendship with Mrs Freme proves to be a godsend for young Joan who is obsessed with colour in her otherwise grey life. Mrs Freme manages a dye garden for her absent lodger and calls on Joan's help to tend the space. This sets Joan up to try and transcend the family's poverty. Their hand to mouth existence is brilliantly portrayed by Turner's research into living conditions during this time.
Against a backdrop of religious and martial history, Joan's life and story are small. But it's also writ large against the natural landscape and huge skies which present liberty and possibility.
A wonderfully engaging story, beautifully written - a strong recommendation.

Blue Hawk by Chloe Turner blew me away. As a debut novel, it is powerful, insightful and highly polished and celebrates the tenacity and fortitude of a woman faced with extreme adversity in a time where help without a price was not an option

Joan lives in 17th century Gloucestershire, but when the actions of her drunken millworker father force the family toward poverty and destitution, Joan decides to take action to save them and their reputation. However, no woman in these times should be able to create the colours and shades in cloth that she is creating? Fingers start pointing, she must be a witch!

Exceptional research and great authenticity transports the reader to another era, where life was completely different, and women were no more than chattell. The story follows the impending demise of a family, the bitterness and jealousies, the be pettiness and strife and it is written with such eloquence and clarity that I could almost be in the room

Absolutely outstanding

Thank you to Netgalley, Deixis Press and the author Chloe Turner for this stunning ARC. My review is left voluntarily and all opinions are my own