Book Review
Title: I am Grimalkin (The Wardstone Chronicles #9)
Author: Joseph Delaney
Genre: YA/Paranormal/Fantasy
Rating: ***
Review: After the ending of the Spook’s Destiny, Grimalkin takes the Fiend’s head and runs with it, hoping to keep the body and head separated long enough for Tom, Alice and Mr. Gregory to find a way to destroy the Fiend once and for all and this is where we join her. Grimalkin knows she can’t run forever, first of all it isn’t in her nature, and second the number of dark creatures after her increases daily and soon there will to may to fight or outrun. We learn that Grimalkin always had a dislike of the Fiend even as a child but bore him a child to keep him away from her but when he killed her son who had been born completely human, neither abhuman or witch, her grief slowly transformed into a need for revenge which she is helping to satisfy with the help of the Spooks and Alice. However, the Fiend warns her that something dark and even more deadly than her is stalking her now and when she is set upon but many dark creatures she senses something completely unknown to her, it is powerful and she wonders if this is the creature the Fiend spoke of but fears nothing yet. She quickly learns that creature chasing her is a kretch, a being born of a she-wolf and a demon, crafted by an alliance of witches, mages and abhumans with the sole purpose of killing her and despite trying to outrun she has to turn and fight. She temporarily wounds the kretch giving her time to put some distance between them but she has been scratched by one of the kretch’s poisoned claws and she needs aid quickly but there are few she can trust. The only one she can turn to is her apprentice, Thorne.
As we approach the ¼ mark in the novel, the poison is affecting Grimalkin greatly and soon she is too weak to continue so she summons Thorne to her side and asks her to keep the head of the Fiend out of the hands of her enemies should she die and her apprentice agrees. However, Thorne isn’t willing to let her master die just yet so she takes her to Agnes, Alice’s aunt, a talented healer to get Grimalkin help but the poison seems to be too strong even for Agnes to cure. In a last effort before her death Grimalkin uses shaman magic to protect her soul from her body and travels to Malkin Tower, the last place of refuge she has now she is being hunted by all manner of dark creatures. She encounter the lamia sisters but they are greatly changed from their feral forms. The one sister is still mostly feral but she has the ability to speak and the other sister is more human than beast now and quickly banishes Grimalkin from the tower. Upon awakening Grimalkin learns that Agnes did manage to create an antidote but the lingering effects on her body are unknown but soon she and Thorne leave for Malkin Tower.
As we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, Grimalkin and Thorne enter Malkin Tower but are quickly confronted by the more feral lamia sister, Grimalkin explains who she is and that she has an alliance with Tom Ward who they have sworn to protect and they share an enemy in the form of the Fiend, whose head she carries, so they are permitted to enter the tower. We learn that the sisters are called Slake and Wynde, Wynde being the more feral of the two. The sisters explains that they will give them sanctuary in exchange for their help in trying to find a way to destroy the Fiend once and for all, that night Grimalkin recounts a tale of her first kill to Thorne, and we learn that she disrupted a Deane ritual to attack the Fiend and to this day they don’t know it was her and it must remain a secret or she will be hunted down by the entire Deane clan.
As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, I wasn’t enjoying this book as much as the others despite looking forward to it. I think this is down to the narrator, the previous narrator for the first 8 books voiced perfectly what I thought Grimalkin sounded like and this narrator is clearly female and the voice just doesn’t sound right for the kind of person Grimalkin is. Grimalkin and Thorne stay with Slake and Wynde for a while but the peace doesn’t last when Grimalkin receives an important message from Agnes telling her that the witches have invited the kretch and its creators into Pendle and they are coming for her, then Grimalkin. Throne does wonder why they are going for Agnes and it turns out it is because she doesn’t support the Fiend and has been aided Grimalkin. As Grimalkin refuses to hand over the head of the Fiend, Agnes is tortured and killed but her heart remains so Wynde buries her in the witch dell where she can come back to life. In the aftermath, Wynde attacks the kretch and despite injuring it, the mage who created it makes it impossible for Wynde to fly and the kretch quickly kills her and eats her heart so there is no hope of her returning. Slake felt her sister’s death and prays to their God, the mother of lamias, Thomas’ mother and receive instructions from her spirit to defend the tower and the chests alone as she is sure they hold the key to destroying the Fiend once and for all. We get some backstory of how Tom’s mother hobbled the Fiend, but there isn’t anything in Grimalkin’s eyes that will help to Tom destroy the Fiend but they have no choice to leave Malkin Tower as it needs to be protected and Grimalkin knows the servants of the dark will follow her as long as she has the head of their master. We also learn that the Fiend killed his and Grimalkin’s child because he knew if the child reached adulthood it would be a threat to him and that child was replaced by Tom, it was strange to see how affectionate the Fiend was with Grimalkin almost like he genuinely cared for her but couldn’t have any threat to his power, even his own child which was a little heartbreaking.
As we cross into the second half of the novel, there is a boy in the castle they take refuge in called Will who was kidnapped by bandits for ransom and he agrees to help the witches if they return him home. As his father is a knight he will be bound by the promise Will has made to the witches even if he doesn’t like them but as soon as they set off, Grimalkin learns that the kretch is on their tail. As they evade the kretch Will leads them to his home where his father Sir Gilbert offers them sanctuary in return for returning his son to him and he even offers to help them fight the kretch in the same manner he destroyed the great worme many years before. Grimalkin is thankful for the help as the kretch is formidable but when the kretch challenges Sir Gilbert to single combat he can’t refuse and very quickly the battle isn’t turning in his favour. Grimalkin knows the witches won’t keep to the agreed terms of the battle and leading a small party of her own she turns to face them. They manage to free Sir Gilbert from the kretch’s jaws and retreat to the safety of the castle but the knight quickly dies, as his son is too young to take his place the priest is given command and he doesn’t want the witches there. He even goes as far as capturing them and torturing Thorne but Grimalkin isn’t fazed as she quickly rescues her apprentice and escapes leaving Will a warning to rule well.
As we cross into the final section of the novel, the pair head to witch dell as it seems the most sensible place to make their stand against the kretch and there is even some hope of them finding some allies within the dell who will help deal with the numerous witches and the mage that helped create the kretch. We get more tales from Grimalkin’s past but she refuses to answer Thorne when she asks if she has ever taken thumb bones from the living. The battle at the dell doesn’t go well as the Fiend’s head falls into the hands of the enemy and Grimalkin loses the only person she ever cared about on the planet. In desperation she turns to Alice who is the only person that can help her, with her new found power Alice heals Grimalkin of the poison’s effects and gives her some magic but at a cost to herself. She also manages to destroy the ship their enemy is escaping on, giving Grimalkin the chance to kill them all while she recovers. She manages to get the Fiend’s head back into her possession again but it isn’t without great cost and Grimalkin is aware that this is only the beginning of the battle to destroy the Fiend once and for all.
Overall, I didn’t like the narrator of the audiobook so I read half in audio and half physically, which did take away some of the experience for me. I also wanted much more backstory of Grimalkin, we know she wasn’t even 17 when she gave the Fiend his child. I really wanted some flashback scenes from that time to see how their relationship developed, Grimalkin’s pregnancy and birth, the death of her child. I was expecting all of this and got none of it. So at times the story did feel very flat with little emotional weight but it was action packed. Apart from one of the early books this is one of only a few that I haven’t given 5 stars to, I think it is mainly because I had so many expectations going into it and the book actually met very few of them.
Buy it here:
Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
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