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Wolves Among Us (2011)

by Ginger Garrett(Favorite Author)

3.6 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

0781448859 (ISBN13: 9780781448857)

languge

English

genre

Historical Fiction

publisher

David C. Cook

review 1: This book was hard for me to read. I kept finding myself getting angry. As a teacher I know how women in history were treated. I know that the church in the 1500’s in Europe held so much power that they felt they could do whatever they wanted and people had to obey or suffer the consequences. I would not have survived long in their time period.The book starts off in Germany during the 1500’s with the murder of a couple. The church immediately, along with the men decided that Catarina, the murdered was having an affair. They decide her husband found out and that the jealous lover killed them both. So what does Father Stefan do? He brings in an Inquisitor. When he suggested doing this to the Sheriff, the Sheriff advised against it. Once the inquisitor arrives ... morethings go from bad to worse. I felt extremely sorry for Mia, the Sheriff’s wife who stayed home and took care of not only her sickly child, but also her aged mother-in-law. What thanks did she get? None. Her husband constantly accused her of evil thoughts. He called her such vile names and constantly put her down. Mia is alone. The only friend she had no longer talks with her. It wasn’t just the sheriff who did this. The church had the men convinced that women were the reason for all of the evil things they did. Somehow they bewitched them and this caused them to do bad things. Mia prays constantly for healing for her daughter. She even goes so far as going to confession. The priest pretty much tells her that she is the reason that this stuff is happening to her daughter. It is the evil within her, the pride that causes her daughter’s illness.It is clear from the beginning when the story opens with the discovery that a wolf has killed two of the village’s sheep that this story is not about physical wolves. Yes they do catch and kill the wolf killing sheep. This is really about evil being all around us. During this period of time when most people were illiterate they had no way of truly knowing what the scripture said. They had to believe what the church “told” them the scriptures said. Women had it even worse. They were not allowed to read the scriptures even if they knew how to read. This is an excellent book to read to see how far we have come in church history. There are plenty of twists and turns in this book to hold your attention. I am happy that I was allowed to read this as an Inspy judge.
review 2: The quite village of Dinfoil is thrown into turmoil following the double murder of one of the villagers and his wife. Father Stefan, the long-standing village priest, wants to call for an Inquisitor to give an ending to this horrible event; Bjorn, the sheriff, has his own reasons for not wanting to bring an Inquisitor to their little village. Father Stefan calls for him anyway and Bjorn soon finds the answers to all his worries in one concept: witchcraft.Mia is struggling to be a good wife to Bjorn: she is caring for his disabled mother and their sick child, she keeps their house clean when his work keeps him away at all hours, and she defers to him in all matters. She is also trying to hide her past from the other villagers, scared that if they know about it they will shun her even more than they already do. She tries desperately to be a good Christian, to gain God's favour in the hopes that he will heal her daughter - her reason for being. Father Stefan cruelly informs her that God does not heal her child because she is guilty of the sin of pride. So Mia redoubles her efforts to be a good wife to a man who does not care about her.Soon, the Inquisitor Bastion arrives, a caged witch in tow, and informs the villagers that their little village is overrun with witches, women who cast spells on the men to make them sin, or cast curses on the other women. Mass hysteria ensues as numerous women are accused of, and then trailed for, witchcraft.Note: The synopsis is a little misleading. It says that they "discover the power of love over fear" but it is not romantic love, it is God's love.At times Mia frustrated me because of her meekness, the way she'd just present herself as a doormat for the men to walk all over, but at the same time I am fully aware that this was a woman's lot in that day and age. I felt sorry for her, with all that she had to put up with. It was refreshing to have a German setting as most of the books I've read about the witch trials tend to be set in Salem. There was quite a claustrophobic feel to the story, with it never leaving the village and the story did, of course, have quite a dark feel to it, but how could it have been light considering its subject?At various points throughout the story it is obvious that the author is a devout Christian and that she is putting her own thoughts and beliefs into the mouths of her characters. This led to some points in the story that I believe I was just supposed to take on faith. As I am not Christian and I look for a scientific explanation wherever I can, that left the story wanting at certain points. Why is Alma (the daughter) suddenly healed by a man with a glowing face who appears in Mia's dream? Why does Alma not suffer again after that? Why does God supposedly come to help Mia but he ignores all the other abused women in the village? Why does he talk to Stefan? Why does he appear before Bjorn? While some of these are just points in passing, others are not. Especially Alma's sickness. For the first half of the book she has difficulty breathing, then she seems to be on the point of dying, Mia dreams of a man whose face is so bright she cannot look upon it, and then when she wakes up Alma is suddenly better and no longer suffers from any breathing problems. There is no explanation given beyond that it was God's work. That is not an explanation that I accept. Alma had a medical problem and medical problems do not suddenly cure themselves, no matter how hard you pray.Stefan was very possibly my favourite character. At first I didn't like him very much, but he realised that he was the one who invited disaster to their village and that he was the one who needed to fix the situation. He stepped up to the mark, overcoming fear, and did what had to be done. I admire the courage of the character for that.The ending, or rather the post-ending, was something of a let down. Mia finds someone else, which is good for her, but that person is someone she had no contact with during the story. I would have preferred a better lead-in to that situation. less

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