BIBLIOGRAPHIC DETAILS
(Print: 10/6/2020; 978-1982108847; Simon & Schuster; 416 pages)
Audio: 10/6/2020; 9781797111254; Simon & Schuster Audio; duration 13:35:01 (13 parts).
(Film: No).

Series:
Practical Magic Book 0.1 (so, of course, a prequel written after the first two in the “Practical Magic” series.)

SUMMARY/ EVALUATION:
When I read about the Salem Witch trials in a book called “The Witches: Suspicion, Betrayal, and Hysteria in 1692 Salem” by Stacy Schiff, I was very thankful I had not lived in that place in those times, but Hoffman’s protagonist, Maria, does, and scarier, she IS a witch. Now you’d think, being a witch, one could get out of trouble, or would at the very least attempt to keep out of harms way, knowing just where it is…but, true to life, that’s not quite how it works. Not that this story IS completely true to life—we’ll go with ‘magic realism’.
This was my first Alice Hoffman book, and not knowing what to expect, I vacillated throughout this book with whether I liked it, overall, and had to keep postponing my decision. I generally need to like the protagonist to like a book. But now that you know that, I cannot say whether or not I liked it without spoiling it for you.
I did like that, according to the story, my husband was born on the luckiest day of the year (March 20). . . I think that’s what it said. Lucky, anyway. And, this will be meaningless to you also, but I also like that the author and the narrator are both Pisces. ( )

A beautifully written addition to the Practical Magic series. It has the perfect mixture of historical fiction and magic realism. I am looking forward to the next installment! ( )

Fantastically Magical!!! ( )

Suspending progress... While I am THRILLED to have snagged an advance copy (thank you, Tonie!), it was veering a little too close to disturbingly dark for me, at this time. Can't wait to come back to it when I am a little more resilient with such tones.

I'm losing the will to live: another three star bloater. Practical Magic is one of my favourite films, but the books are romance novels with literary pretensions. The author rhapsodises on the meaning of love so often that she sounds like the Love Is ... cartoons by Kim Casali from the 1960s. Why have a prequel about a strong woman like Maria Owens, the female ancestor who escapes hanging when the rope breaks, and make her a blithering idiot who falls for the first charmer she meets? Why make her story about men at all? Maria is the daughter of a witch who is raised by another woman also skilled in the 'Nameless Art', and her daughter Faith is even more powerful, yet half of the overblown and repetitive story is wasted on wall art philosophy like 'love someone who will love you back'. The author's only saving grace is her historical research and wry take on the hypocritical 'Puritans' of New England and the men - of course - who labelled as witches and then murdered women for not following the rules. So much for the New World! ( )