A Discovery of Witches

I spent most of 3 days reading this book, and I was surprised to find, after dithering for ages (the library copy has been on my shelf since September!) I really liked it. UF is one of my favourite genres, I love books about scholars and Oxford(must have read Gaudy Night where Harriet Vane is researching in an Oxford college at least 10 times), I loved studying old books etc at library school, plus I adore the old Lovecraft stories where someone reads ancient mystical books like the Necronomicon and inevitably unleashes something nasty, but gamely continues to write out his tale even when the monster is slithering up the stairs to eat him! So there was plenty to enjoy here. I also loved the delightful old buildings in Oxford, the ancient castle in France, and the hilarious old witches house in Masachusetts, complete with ghosts, appearing rooms before guests arrive, and a cat called Tabitha, what else.

All that ticked a lot of boxes even before I started it, and certainly I thoroughly enjoyed it all, often despite the leisurely, sometimes very leisurely pace. Harkness's inexperience as a novelist does show up, especially in the later sections, with perhaps too much plot crammed into the last part of the book, where new characters turn up, perhaps too conveniently for the story developments, but all in all a very enjoyable book.