Greetings, fellow book lovers and bewitching souls! What’s brewing?
As the head witch around here, I am conjuring up some thrilling changes for our blog just in time for the most enchanting season of all – Halloween. My chanting theme for this season, you ask? Witches, of course! With a sprinkle of magic, I unveiled our new blog and reading group name – “Traveling Witches.” “There’s a little witch in all of us.”~ Alice Hoffman
Follow us on our mystical journey as we travel through our reading list, discovering secrets, chills, and thrilling stories. Our cauldron of adventures is bubbling with tales waiting to be uncovered.
I couldn’t resist diving into the spooky spirit a little early and have grabbed my broomstick and I am ready to soar through the pages of the most enchanting stories because magic and reading go hand in hand at Traveling Witches. 🌟📖
Let the spellbinding adventures begin, with my witchy reading list
The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow
In 1893, there’s no such thing as witches. There used to be, in the wild, dark days before the burnings began, but now witching is nothing but tidy charms and nursery rhymes. If the modern woman wants any measure of power, she must find it at the ballot box.
But when the Eastwood sisters–James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna–join the suffragists of New Salem, they begin to pursue the forgotten words and ways that might turn the women’s movement into the witch’s movement. Stalked by shadows and sickness, hunted by forces who will not suffer a witch to vote-and perhaps not even to live-the sisters will need to delve into the oldest magics, draw new alliances, and heal the bond between them if they want to survive.
There’s no such thing as witches. But there will be.
The Burnings by Naomi Kelsey
Nothing scares men like witchcraft . . .
1589. Scottish housemaid Geillis and Danish courtier Margareta lead opposite lives, but they both know one thing: when a man cries “witch”, no woman is safe.
Yet when the marriage of King James VI and Princess Anna of Denmark brings Geillis and Margareta together, everything they supposed about good, evil, men, and women, is cast in a strange and brilliant new light.
For the first time in history, could black magic – or rumours of it – be a very real tool for women’s political gain?
As the North Berwick witch trials whip Scotland – and her king – into a frenzy of paranoia, the clock is ticking. Can Margareta and Geillis keep each other safe? And once the burnings are over, in whose hands will power truly lie?
The Familiars by Stacey Halls
To save her child, she will trust a stranger. To protect a secret, she must risk her life . . .
Fleetwood Shuttleworth is 17 years old, married, and pregnant for the fourth time. But as the mistress at Gawthorpe Hall, she still has no living child, and her husband Richard is anxious for an heir. When Fleetwood finds a letter she isn’t supposed to read from the doctor who delivered her third stillbirth, she is dealt the crushing blow that she will not survive another pregnancy.
Then she crosses paths by chance with Alice Gray, a young midwife. Alice promises to help her give birth to a healthy baby, and to prove the physician wrong.
As Alice is drawn into the witchcraft accusations that are sweeping the North-West, Fleetwood risks everything by trying to help her. But is there more to Alice than meets the eye?
Soon the two women’s lives will become inextricably bound together as the legendary trial at Lancaster approaches, and Fleetwood’s stomach continues to grow. Time is running out, and both their lives are at stake.
Only they know the truth. Only they can save each other.
The Witching Hour by Anne Rice
Demonstrating, once again, her gift for spellbinding storytelling and the creation of legend, Anne Rice makes real for us a great dynasty of witches—a family given to poetry and to incest, to murder and to philosophy; a family that, over the ages, is itself haunted by a powerful, dangerous, and seductive being.
On the veranda of a great New Orleans house, now faded, a mute and fragile woman sits rocking… and The Witching Hour begins.
It begins in our time with a rescue at sea. Rowan Mayfair, a beautiful woman, a brilliant practitioner of neurosurgery—aware that she has special powers but unaware that she comes from an ancient line of witches—finds the drowned body of a man off the coast of California and brings him to life. He is Michael Curry, who was born in New Orleans and orphaned in childhood by fire on Christmas Eve, who pulled himself up from poverty, and who now, in his brief interval of death, has acquired a sensory power that mystifies and frightens him.
As these two, fiercely drawn to each other, fall in love and—in passionate alliance—set out to solve the mystery of her past and his unwelcome gift, the novel moves backward and forward in time from today’s New Orleans and San Francisco to long-ago Amsterdam and a château in the France of Louis XIV. An intricate tale of evil unfolds—an evil unleashed in seventeenth-century Scotland, where the first “witch,” Suzanne of the Mayfair, conjures up the spirit she names Lasher… a creation that spells her own destruction and torments each of her descendants in turn.
From the coffee plantations of Port au Prince, where the great Mayfair fortune is made and the legacy of their dark power is almost destroyed, to Civil War New Orleans, as Julien—the clan’s only male to be endowed with occult powers—provides for the dynasty its foothold in America, the dark, luminous story encompasses dramas of seduction and death, episodes of tenderness and healing. And always—through peril and escape, tension and release—there swirl around us the echoes of eternal war: innocence versus the corruption of the spirit, sanity against madness, life against death. With a dreamlike power, the novel draws us, through circuitous, twilight paths, to the present and Rowan’s increasingly inspired and risky moves in the merciless game that binds her to her heritage. And in New Orleans, on Christmas Eve, this strangest of family sagas is brought to its startling climax.
Some of my Favorite Witchy Books I Have Read
Weyward by Emilia Hart
My review
Weyward is a compelling story that combines historical fiction, magical realism, and modern feminism that weaves in some of my favorite themes around the oppression of women while exploring the conventional idea that a woman’s identity and role is to marry and have children. Told through three distinct, brave, resilient women, all victimized, oppressed, and controlled by weak men and subject to their whims and abuse in different ways. The story alternates between Altha, who is on trial for murder in 17th-century British witch trials, and her fate is in the hands of men. In the 1940s, Violet, who her father isolates and controls as she unravels the secret of her mother’s death by mysterious circumstances, and our modern witch Kate, who escapes her controlling, abusive husband who sees Kate as someone to give him a child.
It’s all about female power and resilience but not about female revenge and rage, even though I do love a good female revenge/rage story. We see each woman find strength and power from their connection to their female line and to nature. Emilia Hart gives each woman something unique as they can creepily communicate with nature in a yet powerful way. While even the thought of some brings on some irrational fears, it felt empowering and fitting to the story.
The story is well-paced and beautifully written with vivid imagery, with a strong connection between the characters that come together with a rewarding ending.
Magic Lessons (Book #1 of the Practical Magic Series) by Alice Hoffman
My review
The rule of magic “Never deny who you are!!”
Magic Lessons unveils the centuries-old curse that has followed the Owens family in Practical Magic and The Rules of Magic. I started to read Practical Magic but didn’t get a chance to finish it before it disappeared from Overdrive. It is on it’s way to my mailbox now. What I did read, I thought it was more whimsical and magical then Magic Lessons. I read The Rules of Magic in our Traveling Sister Goodreads group, and all of us loved it. It created an exciting discussion, and I am sure Magic Lessons would as well and be an excellent choice for a group discussion.
The Owen family’s story starts with Maria Owens, and in Magic Lessons, we learn her story. It is a story of powerful and strong women at a time when women were powerless and were treated as less or evil, dangerous and needed to be grounded by men. The Owens women here are not grounded by the cruelty of men. At first, we see their vulnerabilities as they follow their hearts and through the lessons they learn and their drive to reach their goals and overcome their conflicts, we see them developed and grow into the women they become. Alice Hoffman creates some magic here with the lesson she provides us here in this unforgettable insightful story.
“Maria understood that a woman with her own beliefs who refuses to bow to those she believes to be wrong can be considered dangerous.”
I loved the magic and witchcraft here that Alice Hoffman blended so well with the history of the story. I loved the lessons learned here about love, life and kindness. I loved the love that flowed as easily as the words did in the story. It was entertaining, exciting, insight and thought-provoking while portraying women well. I highly recommend for better reading.
“Know that love is the only answer.” “Always love someone who will love you back.”
Year of the Witching by Alexis Henderson
Year of the Witching is a dark feminist fantasy and not one I would have picked up on my own. I decided to download this one after it was mentioned in the sister group, and I read it with my reading sister Debra. I am so glad I read this one and had Debra to discuss this one with.
I often get lost when reading stories with fantasy or supernatural elements to the story, so it took a while to get into this one, and I had to go back and reread some parts. Once I got into the flow of it, I couldn’t put down my kindle until I was done reading it. After reading and thinking about this one, I began to realize the depth to the story.
Alexis Henderson brilliantly blends horror, a paranormal dark, twisty witchy tale set the dystopian world of Bethel where the Prophet makes the rules everyone must follow. She weaves in real-world themes like racism, oppression, power and religion. The Prophet uses fear, cruelty and religion to gain power and control over the people.
Our main character Immanuelle is a strong realistic character here with her traits and development. She starts off vulnerable and flawed by her Mother’s choices and lives in the shadows. She grows into a multi-layered strong character with conflicts of her own and ones she must overcome to save her family, community and home. Not only is Immanuelle a complex, fascinating character, the dynamics between her and the other characters are also.
The setting is haunting beautiful and creepy that adds a deliciously bleak and eerie feel to the story with the danger that lurks in the Darkwoods.
With every page, the tension rises to that exciting climate of a showdown between the characters, and I was gripping my Kindle, hoping no one would bother me till I was done. This is an impressive story, and like no other I have read. I highly recommend it.
The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave
The Mercies is inspired by the real events of the Vardø storm and the 1621 witch trials. Taking these historical events, Kiran Millwood Hargrave creates a story centered around a community of powerful, independent, strong female characters.
After the storm took the men’s lives in a small Norwegian village in 1617, the women are left on their own. They must find a way to survive and live on their own. Maren is left grieving the death of her father, brother, and fiancé with her mother and sister in law. Through the strength of each other, the women have built a life for themselves without men. We see into their daily lives as they fish, tend to livestock, and plant, and at times, the pace was a little slow going. They have grown strong as a community but not without struggles as they deal with their grief, loss, beliefs, and accepting the differences in each other. Three years later, a Commissioner arrives to see what evil lurks in the women who can survive without men. A witch hunt begins, and we start to see themes of feminism here while exploring oppression. It is easy to draw modern-day parallels to. It also explore organized religion used to control the women and what happens when they don’t conform to it.
The Mercies is an empowering, beautifully written story; however, the author does not shy away from disturbing details. It’s intense thought-provoking, insightful story of love, friendship, evil, power and control with women we can learn from! I highly recommend it.
The Lighthouse Witches by C.J. Cooke
My review
A gothic thriller with a lighthouse on a remote Scottish island, witches, and tales of disappearing children coming back as wildings !! I am all in!
So did it evoke feelings of suspense, danger, fear and creeped me out with the supernatural elements to the story?…. Yes
I loved the isolated lighthouse, and the rumors it was built on a cave where witches were tortured centuries ago gave me a creepy uneasy feeling of danger.
The suspense created with the children coming back and figuring out where that was going.
The feminist undertones to the story
Witch Words 