Once and Future Witches

What if witchcraft played a role in the fight for women's right to vote?  Once And Future Witches is a piece of historical fiction that is set in Salem, MA.  One of the conflicts once the group of witches that gets involved is that while they want to play a role in women's suffragette that the movement does not want to be associated with people who want to identify as witches for fear of coming off as being even more controversial.   Before this occurs they do show how the fight for women's rights to vote actually does make an effort to exclude African American women from the movement.  Unfortunately this is something that has a lot of solid historical facts as the movement had decided     that it would challenge the status quo even more than it already had by giving more space for African American women.

So the tension that it then proceeds to show with witchcraft serves as symbolism for how the women's suffragette movement refused to incorporate what we would consider today to be intersectional feminism. It first refuses to provide a space for African American women, then it refuses to provide a space for women who consider themselves witches. This serves as the acknowledgement that they were still seeking out to follow the other rules that were in places as best as they could. 

Not only does this symbolism play out so well, there is also a very beautiful incorporation of well known fairy tales, such as Rapunzel written in a way that portrays witches in a more positive way. One of the main characters has the project of rewriting fairy tales and the rewrites are interspersed throughout the novel. This is not only a joy to read, but it also serves as yet another way in which witches are being reimagined in this book, as people who are doing positive things and not being evil. The act of reading these tales elevates this book into a more lyrical fairy tale.

If you are looking for a more wicked type of October read, be aware this book follows more in the tradition of having witches as protagonist and facing persecution for being stigmatized for being witches. But then, that is part of what I personally love so much about the book! The type of horrors you will find in this book would be as if "The Crucible" had a supernatural twist. And even with the suspense that this story had it never stopped having a very lyrical writing style. If you want a magical, witchy tale for the Halloween season, I would highly recommend this book!