Michelle Grierson

“This love? It’s nothing. It will toss you about, take what it wants, then throw you back like an undertow. Wait until you become a mother. That is love. With more ferocity than any man or storm or sea.”

Becoming Leidah is the debut novel of Canadian author Michelle Griersen, set in the 19th century in Ørken, a fishing village in Norway. The story is an ethereal mix of magical realism, historical fiction, witches, selkies, shapeshifters and Nordic and Celtic mythology.

Fisherman Pieter is shipwrecked and finds and rescues the beautiful, mysterious titan-haired Maeva. Despite her otherness and constant longing to return to the sea, Pieter falls deeply and possessively in love with Maeva and wishes to protect her and their blue-skinned, web-fingered daughter Leidah from the harshness and suspiciousness of the villagers. Most of their neighbours have given up the old ways in favour of Christianity and hold a deep antipathy towards anything that appears different or magical, and are quick to turn on both Maeva and local midwife and healer Helgar Tormundsdatter. There is also an overarching story which blends the legend of the Fates, the Three Sisters weaving together the past, present and future, with the story of shape-shifting Norse God Odhinn.

I found this an intriguing story which shifted between the past and present and between different viewpoints, including the innocent wondering voice of 8 year-old Leidah. I enjoyed the way the story built in layers, with the magical nature of things becoming more clear with time, and Pieter and Maeva’s relationship not being what it first appeared. I wasn’t completely sold on the ending which suddenly shifted to become far less grounded and more fantastical than the rest of the story to that point. I also felt there were several loose ends not entirely tied up. The interest Hans showed in Maeva and Leidah seemed to building up to something but went nowhere. The whole scene with the cage wasn’t entirely explained. Overall this was a great story and I would be keen to read another by this author.… (meer)

Michelle Grierson's Becoming Leidah is one of those titles that does something so new and so unexpected that it almost leaves the reader open-mouthed and astounded. The setting may be familiar for readers of historical fiction: a small, isolated fishing village in 19th Century Norway where Christianity and the "old ways" both overlap and conflict. But Grierson does something remarkable with that setting.

The book jumps back and forth in time with multiple chapters titled "What Was" and another set of chapters titled "What Is." The "What Was" chapters show readers how a fisherman came to be married to a woman not completely human. The "What Is" chapters are presented in the voice of that couple's daughter, Leidah: an unusually small girl with blue, webbed hands and feet. Several chapters are narrated by Odhinn (Odin), one of the Gods of Norse mythology, who in Becoming Leidah takes on different animal forms as the book progresses. Over time, the reader assembles the entire story, myth and "reality," with frequent glimpses into individual characters that significantly change the way they're perceived.

Grierson's prose voice is lyrical and varied. Becoming Ledah is the kind of book a reader slows down for because compelling as the plot is, the language demands to be savored. One could read the novel in a few hours, but I expect most readers will choose to stretch it out over a longer time. Whether or not one is interested in Norse mythology Grierson's particular, magical version of that mythology is something that stays with the reader after the book is completed: a sort of half-world teetering between the struggles of everyday life and the unfathomable. This is a book to buy now and to read more than once.

I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via EdelweissPlus. The opinions are my own.… (meer)