Out of the Shadows/Heretic - Sarah Singleton

Elizabeth Dyer knows what it's like to feel alone - her family are the sole Catholics remaining in her village, and Catholics are viewed with extreme suspicion as plotting against the Protestant Queen Elizabeth. And now, to make matters worse, her brother has brought a Catholic priest to their home to hide.

When a moss-tinged girl who claims to have spent the past 300 years amongst the faerie turns up in the woods near the destroyed Catholic shrine that Elizabeth's family tends, Elizabeth befriends her, and the two set out to save Elizabeth's family from priest-hunters.

Cover: On the left is the US cover (Out of the Shadows) and on the right the UK cover (Heretic). I found it quite interesting that the US cover and title play up the paranormal and faerie aspects while the UK version focused more on the religious persecution and historical feel. I think they're both gorgeous - which would you have picked up?

My Thoughts: ** 1/2

To be honest, I think this story never quite figured out whether it wanted to be a paranormal story emphasizing Isabella's sacrifice or a historical one focused on the persecution of Catholics during Elizabethan times/wise women in general. I would have read either of those stories, but both seemed to get short shrift in Singleton's story.

The paranormal elements are largely told in flashbacks throughout the story when Isabella reflects on her past. I would have preferred if it had stayed like that, but there's a section near the end when the girls end up travelling through the Shadowlands that felt very oddly tacked on. Plus, it was confusing both as to how that section worked and in what way it was necessary to the plot.

The historical side of things is odd as well. There are some overly wise discussions of religious tolerance from Isabella (which I forgave since she had lived 300 years), but at no point does the author really focus on her issue - the religious persecution. While she implies that the persecution of Catholics during the Elizabethan age was wrong (which I don't deny), I thought it was odd that she didn't address at all the reasons behind the persecutions. Namely that the Pope had excommunicated Elizabeth in 1570 and exhorted all Catholics not to obey her lest they be excommunicated as well (which is a Big Deal at the time), and the numerous plots to kill Elizabeth hatched at the very seminary in Douai from which the priest arrives.

It seemed strange to me that it was never mentioned whether the Dyer family struggled with this order from the Pope or whether they were loyal to Elizabeth - the pope was a complete non-issue, which seems unlikely for a Catholic at the time. The entire lack of context and focusing only on how mean everyone was for being suspicious of the Dyers because they were Catholic really robbed the story of a lot of actual historical flavor for me. Instead, it felt a lot like a morality tale set during a 'convenient' time and without overmuch attention paid to historical detail. It doesn't help that (aside from the prevailing religion) there is nothing to set apart Elizabeth's life from Isabella's 300 years earlier.

Overall, Out of the Shadows/Heretic didn't really work for me, and I think the trouble was the attempt to blend the two stories. I liked both of the main characters, though I thought the depths of their friendship a little sudden. And I would gladly read either Heretic (the religious persecution historical) or Out of the Shadows (the loneliness and sacrifice of a girl leaving the Shadowlands), but this book tries to be both and, in my view, doesn't really succeed.