Our Gifted Hearts Book Review

Synopsis

When she’s accused of witchcraft, Fortune must flee her village to spare her neck, marrying a man she barely knows. But is the man who promises to be her saviour all he seems?

Fortune Blyth suffered the loss of a secret child when she was sixteen and vowed never to let another man touch her. Ten years later she is content with Ma and her beloved birds. 

But when witch hunters come to town it isn’t long before fingers are pointed at the spinster and she is forced to choose; stay and hang, or marry a man who can offer her safety far from home. She chooses marriage.

Her husband’s island home is not the safe haven she expected, with a surly housekeeper and an eccentric mother-in-law to contend with. And there is something else; secrets hiding in the walls, demons creeping in her nightmares. Something sinister in the concealed tunnels below the house. It turns out she is not his first bride... Perhaps she would have been better off hanging after all.

REVIEW

This one has all the right ingredients, especially for this time of year! A dark, feminist Bluebeard retelling with witchy undertones and a setting and vibes straight out of Rebecca or Jane Eyre??? Yes, please! I loved the atmosphere and the gothic tension, and if you’re into slow, eerie stories that build on mood and isolation, this will definitely hit the spot. However, after a devastating loss, a whispered devil’s bargain, and a desperate escape from an accusation of witchcraft (by way of marriage to a complete stranger who whisks Fortune, the FMC, off to an isolated island…), the story slows way down. For a large portion of the book, not much happens beyond Fortune’s unease and the strangeness of her new home. It’s more about mood than momentum, and I found myself wishing for a little more. Still, the themes—feminine rage, biding one’s time, survival—are powerful, and I’m glad I read it.

Thanks so much to Angry Robot Books for the gifted copy!

Publication date was 14 October 2025.