A review by kelsbookzone1
A Sweet Sting of Salt by Rose Sutherland

emotional mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.0

Thank you to NetGalley for an early release arc and Ballantine books.

A historical slow paced story starting with our midwife Jean, as she meets Muirin and slowly setting the stage for a slow build sapphic love story.

Jean and Muirin are both likeable characters albeit Muirin was pretty underdeveloped . As a folktale retelling, the story lost me a bit with the loss of explanation and I don’t want to give away who the retelling of the fantasy is in regards as I then had to do research. Which I wish I had
not, as I did find contradictions as the author even admits to not really researching ahead of time and going off of memory. I contemplated  DNFing this one. 
Boy was this story all over the place and inconsistent. One minute, we’re gasping over a character saying the f word and the next, we’re laughing at a crude joke by same character that gasped. I really couldn’t figure out what this story was trying to accomplish- one minute, it’s over explaining in narration, feeling repetitive questions and the next, it’s jumping from a to z, completely missing any explanation at all. It almost feels like being written by two different people, with two different goals. I hope this finished copy feels better edited, as this just felt like a first draft to me.