A witch in Time by Constance Sayers - book review

Rating 4/5

Genre Romance, Magic, Fantasy

I am honestly surprised that there are not more people who have read this book(based on the number of ratings in goodreads) and found it impressive like me. With this book I learnt that I could appreciate a story with flawed characters and like them all despite the imperfections.

The main characters are powerful in a supernatural way and drive the narrative forward with their fated (sometimes impulsive) actions and suffer through the lasting consequences of those actions. When I picked this book, based on the title, I expected something to do with magic, spells, curses and was only half keen on reading it past a few initial chapters. I have been doing this a lot lately..just trying a book on before committing myself to read it through to the end. I soon found myself engrossed in a tale of fated romance spanning multiple lives, dark magic binding the souls into a dance with each other for eternity. It’s the same story that plays over and over again( in different settings, different bodies, different flavours) with no release for either party and it always comes to a crashing end whether they like it or not.

Disclaimer : Spoilers Ahead!!

There are three souls that are bound together in a curse for eternity until they find a way to break it. One of them is a demon, another a witch and the third an unaware human. The demon knows everything as it happens and is usually not surprised. The witch is the main player of the story(some parts of the story are narrated by her in current life). It all started in France when a young farm girl Juliet gets impregnated by a painter Auguste Marchant. She is his muse and he does many paintings of her. They are drawn to each other through intense physical attraction and become lovers when opportunity presents. The girl’s mother learns about her pregnancy and is irked. She is a minor witch and casts a binding spell against Marchant to suffer him to eternity. But due to her sloppiness, she ties Juliet with Marchant and introduces a third soul( a guardian demon) Lucas Varnier into the mix. Juliet is intensely attracted to Marchant but eventually finds that he doesn’t love her enough. So she moves onto Lucas who makes an attempt to distance her but finding no meaning to life, she kills herself by drowning.

The next life has the same dynamics. Juliet is born as Nora who is a film actress and Marchant as Billy, her film director. She is similarly attracted to him and they get married. But after marriage, to her shock, she learns of his homosexuality. She calls for help out of the situation and Lucas enters the scene. Through life like dreams she can access the memories of Juliet.  This time Lucas responds to her affections and they have a contented life till she dies at the age of thirty four(an aspect to the curse - also she cannot get pregnant).

The lives that follow are also same in dynamics but with different settings.. things fall out between the new versions of Juliet and Marchant, Juliet calls for Lucas and starts dreaming of all her past lives, gets into a relationship with Lucas and has to die..either killed, murdered or suicide(in first life).

So how many times does it play out the same way? Is there an end to this? Why is Lucas a part of the game? How do they break the curse? Who holds the key to the answer to this question? What price is demanded to reach a freedom..in the ultimate sense? Rather than me telling about it, it would be better for someone to read the book and learn for themselves. The multiple sub plots come together to make a meaningful whole..

There are several references made to making deals with the devil, contracts so that some kind of supernatural talent is provided for the soul in this book. I have heard about such a thing but wasn’t sure if there is such a thing for real. Although this is only a work of fiction and no way to reinforce my belief in such things, it felt good to read something on the subject.