Impossible Causes, a novel by Julie Mayhew, is an intriguing blend of the classic The Crucible and The Craft. It explores the age-old battle of clashing ideologies, while managing to keep readers in a perpetual state of anticipation.

The story follows three strangers who come to Lark, an isolated island populated by only 300 people. When the arrival of the newcomers—the only male teacher, a mother, and her teenage daughter—is met with a swell of speculation and rumors, tensions begin to rise as the inhabitants attempt to make sense of the situation. Then, when a man is found dead in a nearby stone circle, the stakes of the small town mystery suddenly become even higher. The book puts its three teenage protagonists, plus the stranger from the mainland, under suspicion of murder, with dark pagan superstitions abounding in their wake.

Mayhew weaves her mysterious story with expert craftsmanship, leading readers to unpredictable outcomes and heartbreaking conclusions. As each of the characters struggles with the secrets they keep, their fates become tangled and ensnared in a gripping net of family feuds and deceptions. As all the clues come together, the fate of the island's population becomes ever more dire.

Impossible Causes is an electrifying novel that explores difficult questions while never losing its sense of mystery. With its vividly drawn characters, this novel offers a thrilling and thought-provoking journey into an isolated island and its ancient superstitions. Highly recommended for all mystery lovers.

Thanks very much to the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. Many thanks, Dave

I gave this a good go a couple of times, but I am afraid that I now must admit defeat and give up. Nothing wrong with the book it's just not the right book for me.

It's great to be in a position to recommend much more diverse books to our young people at school. Building the senior school library as a place where students actually come and find books that they want to read as opposed to books that teachers think they ought to read is an important responsibility and one we take really seriously.
Books like this are such a positive move as they will appeal to a broader set of readers than we are usually attracting. Dealing with modern issues in a clear and captivating way with a strong narrative voice and characters that the students can relate to is critical as we move forwards. This book is both an intelligent and compelling read that will hold even the most reluctant reader's attention and keep them turning the pages long into the night. It keeps the reader on their toes and ensures that you give it your full attention too. I found myself thinking about its characters and events even when I wasn't reading it and looking forward to snatching kore time with it and I hope that my students feel the same. An accessible, gripping and engrossing read that I can't recommend highly enough. Will absolutely be buying a copy for the library and heartily recommending it to both staff and students.

Unfortunately this book just wasn't for me. It had a very interesting premise, but the execution and writing style didn't work for me.

I very much enjoyed this book. It has a good story and excellent main characters. I would definately recommend this book.

found this book and writing style difficult and so was a fairly early on DNF - I did try a few times to resume and give it another go but wasnt for me

I was unable to read the Netgalley PDF of this book on my kindle due to formatting issues, but have since read a finished copy of the book and loved it. Impossible Causes was well written, tense and impossible to put down. I loved the island setting of the book and the superstitions of the island's tight knit community, which all added to the tension.

Whilst I ultimately enjoyed this book, I initially foud it difficult to get into. Once I hit the halfway point I found that it flowed much better and I had gotten used to each character and their points of view and outlook., whereas I had found this to be disconcerting at the start

This was a branch out into a newer read for me. It was fairly easy to get into and I did enjoy reading it

I requested this book not longing after starting on NetGalley and have just tried to read it in the aim to get my score up however I just found the writing so so difficult! It was hard to follow and hard to engage with. Sadly I’m having to DNF this one

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for this arc. I was intrigued by the premise of this book, and any blend of psychological suspense and witchcraft is catnip to me, also the stunning cover of Impossible Causes had my attention.
This story is set on a small island called Lark, just outside of Ireland. Lark has a tiny community and is embedded in a life of devout Christianity. Around autumn the main supplier ship is cut off, and doesn’t return until April. There’s very few shops, so people ration. They live an isolated life built on trust.
The story itself is divided into two narratives. One is set in 2018, and follows Viola, a redhead teenager who moved to the island from the city with her mother after a tragedy, and her dog, Dot. The books opens with Viola sitting atop a rock waiting for the police because she’s found a man’s dead body. But who’s?...And how did they die?...
The second narrative takes place a year before in 2017. This part of the story follows Leah Cedars, a teacher at the school. Leah is young and single, but there’s not any eligible men on the island. She has her neighbour, who indulges in tarot card reading, to read her future and is told a stranger will arrive on the island. And he does. Ben has arrived at Lark with just a backpack for a teacher trainee role. He’s in his thirties and handsome. It’s not long before the teachers are swooning over him. Leah is convinced he’s her knight of cups.
Then you have the three Elder Girls - Britta, Jade-Marie, and Anna - who are sixteen and the object of fascination, who pursue the island’s pagan rituals and dabble in witchcraft. Rumours circulate about the girls and Ben. Then the new girl, Viola, joins the group and things escalate into tragedy...

This is a tricky book for me to review. I liked the premise of this, but for me the execution of the story fell flat. I liked the island, the cloistered atmosphere and how rumours pick up momentum and there’s paranoia in small community and an intense keeping an eye/policing women, but the way the story was presented was too heavy handed. Also I found the characters inconsistent especially Leah’s character. I wanted more of her interiority, what was motivating her. Also tonally the book was all over the place. For example, when Leah and Ben have their first meeting Ben asks her about the school’s history, which is steeped in Catholic history, and if she is one herself, but she laughs and says, “No, Lark is its own thing.” Then when they sleep together Leah is a virgin. I assumed this was due to their not being any eligible men on the island, but then later she feels guilty and is overcome with the need to confess. So is this a Christian community or not? It was confusing. Also we’re told a lot of men have died a few summers ago, yet still the island is very patriarchal with the bar only permitting women to come in on certain days. But this is a community that has more women we’re repeatedly told so how has this community come to be how it is. I found this is a very confusing read as if the book wasn’t too sure what it was trying to do. Even though this had a contemporary setting it read as historical to me.
I felt there were too many characters and plot arcs, and none of them really come together properly. Ben’s character just disappears in the second half and he’s only mentioned in passing. Likewise the 3 elder girls are mentioned in passing. The problem was that I felt like this book was trying to be too many things at once and it just didn’t work. Overall this book needed better editing to tighten up the strands. It’s a disappointing 2/5 for me.

I'm a fan of Julie Mayhew's YA novels so I was thrilled to see she'd written one for adults. Impossible Causes is so atmospheric, it was easy to imagine the island setting and just how it would feel to live in the community. The story was intriguing, dark, and captivating. The ending was satisfying and hopeful.

'The truth of of a situation is always whittled away by history'

Isolated small town hypocrisies and disturbing events are brought to light in this sophisticated story of myth and religion, power and corruption.

This ambitious story ratchets up the tension in dual timelines that eventually meet, and see damage both brought and recognised.

I found the ending satisfying and stirring, and appreciated that there was still a degree of complexity in the conclusion.

There were also some lovely lines in this novel, such as - 'How can the telling of a final score ever convey the emotion of the game.'

This was a difficult book to get into, strange characters and narrative. I could not finish it as the storytelling did not draw me in.

This is definitely an interesting concept, but requires some work from the reader to keep up with timelines and changes of perspective. Deborah and Viola Kendrick come to Lark Island, a deeply isolated community of 300 which reeks of paganism and witchcraft. Escaping a traumatic past, they set up a new life in a community loaded with gossip, suspicion and witchcraft. This is primed as a cross between The Crucible and The Craft and there is definitely a lot of darkness in the story, particularly in the attitudes to women and girls. Murder mystery aside, this definitely provides an unusual setting and with some editing, may have be able to clarify things for readers to prevent them falling out of the tale.

When you get to the end of this book and realise what the storyline was, in what order things happened, and how they happened it's an enjoyable book. I can see why the author chose to jump backwards and forwards in time and I think, handled well, it could have been very powerful. But because one of the timelines, the 'now' timeline, consists of one day told in sections, separated by a lot of 'then' I found it hard to recall exactly what had happened at the start by the time I was 3/4 of the way through.

There was a lot of instances with characters not talking about things, allowing big misunderstandings to happen, part of that was for the sake of other characters, and part of it was for The Drama which I found very annoying. Initially I thought I would like Viola but she is too self-involved and likes messing things up for other people to save her own skin, or just because she wants to. I find that hard to like in a character and find it harder to read a book with protagonists I don't like. Leah was less annoying, but never talked things over properly with anyone.

The reveal of the issues of the island, while I expected it in some way was still quite shocking to me and I thought that was done well. It would have been good but I don't think the time jumping helped the book, just muddied the waters.

A promising premise - Wickerman meets feminist witchcraft - fails to deliver in this novel.

Lark is an isolated island community somewhere off the coast of the UK mainland, cut off by stormy seas during the winter months. It is a religious, rule-bound community with life centred on farming and fishing, the church and the schoolhouse. There is a reclusive Earl who nominally leads, but he has retreated into the depths of the big house after his wife and daughter left the island, and decisions are taken by the Council, made up of various men in positions of authority - the priest, the headmaster, the doctor, the harbour master.

Into this community, three strangers arrive from the mainland, and the stage is set for ructions and uncovering of long-held secrets. 16-year-old Viola has come here with her mother to escape the world after her father and twin brother are killed in a freak accident. Her mother refuses to let her go to school, for reasons that are never made clear, so Viola is reduced to following the three Elder Girls, so-called because they are the oldest in the school, as they head to the standing stones in the forest to try to practice witchcraft. The otehr stranger is Ben, who turns up to teach in the school with newfangled technology like a mobile phone that an take pictures. Leah, the youngest teacher at the school, starts a relationship with him.

There are hints that build about a culture of abuse that is tacitly accepted, and the events that take place over the winter come to a head with a murder which leads to uncomfortable revelations.

I found it quite difficult to get into this novel. It felt like it kept trying to build an increasingly menacing atmosphere, with tantalising hints of the dark secrets festering, witchcraft thriving alongside an old-fashioned brand of Christianity, and the island elders creating a throwback world where women are to keep their lowly place. But it all just got irritating - I could see what was coming from miles away, and it just felt as though it went on for too long and the big reveal was a bit of a damp squib at the end. It was also really annoying that we never properly got the back story of so many of the characters. it was curiously dissatisfying throughout.

Impossible Causes is played out on the Island of Lark, an isolated community with limited access to the world beyond their shores. To outside eyes Lark islanders live a safe, religious and idyllic existence and this attracts three newcomers, Deborah Kendrick and her teenage daughter, Viola and a new male teacher, Ben.
As the story develops we gradually learn that as well a religion playing a strong part in the Islanders lives there is also a history of paganism and witchcraft. Men rule the Lark, with women for the most part being treated as the weaker sex. As a reader you realise that this isn't the case, and through the twists and turns of the story the real truth of life on Lark is revealed under tragic circumstances. The story plays out right to the very last page.
I was given a copy of Impossible Causes to read by NetGalley and the publishers in turn for an unbiased review.

‘Impossible Causes’ was touted to me as a sort of feminist version of The Wicker Man. An isolated community that an outsider stumbles into full of witchcraft and murder. Sounds pretty great right? I was quick to request it and then I started to see a lot of low star reviews appear. Not one to let others sway my opinion I dived into the book with an open mind and was sorely disappointed.

Although a great concept, the book is very poorly executed. We dive into different perspectives as chapters change character narration and timelines repeatedly. Although this can be a nice way of creating tension and drawing out the plot in some books, here this just muddled and confused everything to the point where I had no idea what was really going on for a good 60% of the book.

The plot keeps all of its cards so close to its chest that the big reveal at the end of the book comes from nowhere. You spend the entire book trying to work out the motivations of The Elder Girls and why they are drastically overreacting to everything because the real reasons aren’t even hinted at. It means that you can’t really root or sympathise with them until about 400 pages in which is way too late. You also wait out the entire book to find out who the dead body is that is presented in the first few pages and by the time it’s revealed you are well past caring. Some bits of the world building also made no sense – I didn’t understand about the significance of hair colour on the island, for example.

The island to me didn’t really feel like this ‘female driven community’ that was stated in the blurb. The women are annoying and two dimensional, despite having chapters written from two female perspectives we don’t really learn enough about them to make a difference. I didn’t have any empathy for anyone involved and left with no one to care about I just found myself skimming the pages. I started powering through the book desperate to just get it finished which is a sure sign of a one star review.

Overall Impossible Causes could have been a great book but for me the confusion and vagueness of what was going on left it so hard to sympathise with any of the characters and ultimately let it down. Thank you to NetGalley & Bloomsbury Publishing PLC – Raven Books for a chance to read the ARC in exchange for a (very!) honest review.