The Balance

We follow Natalia, a sixteen-year-old girl who's failure to watch her brother playing results in him breaking his leg. The town doctor does what he can but without proper supplies, he'll likely have to amputate the soon infected leg. But Natalia knows stories of a witch that lives in the woods and she takes her brother to her...

While this does work out and the boy's leg is healed Natalia's very religious mother figures this out and turns her in which leads to the wrath of the Church and the obvious results afterward...

From there Natalia must deal with a tough decision while the town comes under attack by nature leading to many gory and great scenes. These were well detailed and the highlight of the story for me.

The plot moves rather quickly and nothing was dragged out. Although I found it to be mostly too straightforward with little surprises and would have liked there to have been more to shake it up.

The writing really brings the little town and surrounding forest to life. I have to admit though that I honestly would have never known it was set in the Cold War era if the book description didn't tell me so. I mean it was obvious it wasn't modern times but still.

It really commits to and explores its themes and was well thought out. Definitely worth the read.