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Wicked Enchantments by Joyce Froome6/22/2023 ![]() ![]() Halls’ description of the Well Tower in Lancaster Castle is the closest we get to understanding the harrowing ordeal that these real prisoners went through. Yet we experience Alice through the eyes of Fleetwood Shuttleworth, a privileged narrator far removed from the violence and poverty of the accused witches, who only rushes to help the midwife for personal gain. Alice Grey is a midwife who may or may not be associated with a familiar in the guise of a red fox, though any magic we see her perform is practical herbalism rather than supernatural spellcasting. Unlike other recent books on the Pendle Witches, Stacey Halls chooses a minor, overlooked historical character as her focal point. ![]() After a string of dangerous adventures, however, things reach a satisfactory conclusion. She enlists the help of a mysterious local wise woman – Alice Grey – who later becomes one of the accused victims. It tells of seventeen-year-old Fleetwood Shuttleworth’s plight to provide an heir for Gawthorpe Hall after three unsuccessful pregnancies. The Familiars is in many ways a modern gothic romance set against the backdrop of the Lancashire witch trials. ![]()
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