“So I believe in heart’s oaths. They are the ones we should live by – for what life is worth living, with a stifled heart? None, that I know of.”

One of my friends recommended Corrag to me and wow, this was beautiful! I picked up the book because it’s about the Glencoe Massacre, which I learnt about on my trip to Skye, but I fell in love with it because of Corrag.

Corrag is the titular protagonist, but that is just one of her names. She is also known as ‘witch’ and ‘hag’, and when she meets Charles Leslie for the first time, it is in prison. Corrag is about to die and Leslie, a Jacobite, wants to hear what she knows about the Glen Coe massacre. But before she speaks of that time, Corrag insists of telling him about the years before.

This was such an intense book! From the very first page, Corrag has a strong voice and clear personality. To tell the truth, I was like Leslie in the first few pages – a bit suspicious and needing some time to get used to her. But as he warmed up to her and started to view her in a more fatherly light, I also started to empathise with her and long for her to have a happy ending. Although I suspect Corrag would disagree that her life was sad: it may have been hard, but she also experienced intense beauty and joy.

In terms of style, each chapter is divided into two. The longer narrative is Cora telling her story, and the shorter narrative is Leslie’s letter to his wife. At first, I was wondering why the book even needed Leslie, because it was Cora’s voice that was stronger and more captivating, but now that I’ve finished reading, I see that Leslie functions as a stand-in for the reader. We are suspicious when he is suspicious and as his feelings towards Corrag change, so do ours.

Something that I thought interesting about the book was that it didn’t contain any quoted dialogue. It makes sense, because it’s mostly Corrag telling the story and Leslie writing to his wife, so if anyone is speaking, the font of the text is changed (to italicised or not) instead of them being quoted directly. I don’t know if it’s my imagination, but the lack of quotation marks seemed to help keep Corrag’s narration flowing.

And Corrag’s narration! It’s beautiful. I love her description of the highlands and of the glen. I could picture them as she spoke and my heart broke towards the end, when she described the massacre. The writing here is masterful.

This is a book for everyone. It talks of difficult things, but it also contains love, beauty, and hope. I knew that the Glencoe Massacre was a very real tragedy, but I was pretty surprised to learn that Charles Leslie was a real person, and that Corrag may have existed. I think Fletcher did an excellent job weaving this story together, so that we not just learn about the massacre, but experience it through Corrag’s eyes as well.