Whether the hunts are taking place in Salem or in the East Anglia of Matthew Hopkins, they provide a thematic buffet: an atmospheric period backdrop lashings of blood and brutality a substantial body of bizarre folklore and an opportunity to explore the politics of power and oppression.

The subject of witch-hunting has long been irresistible to horror writers. This is enough to awaken Lilith and her kindred, and Bethel is soon beset by a plague of blood, a plague of blight, a plague of darkness and finally a plague of slaughter.

She escapes only to return at a later date, during which she chances to have her first period – a blood offering to the witches. She finds herself in the surrounding Darkwood, still haunted by the ghosts of the Dark Mother’s most faithful: Lilith, Delilah, Jael and Mercy, the first four witches in history. Indeed, Immanuelle’s close friends Ezra and Leah each have familial ties to the Prophet: Ezra is his son, while Leah is the latest young woman to join his polygamous marriage.īut one evening Immanuelle strays from the town while chasing a runaway ram. Yet she does her best to fit into the community dominated by Grant Chambers – a man known simply as the Prophet. Immanuelle has been treated with suspicion from birth as her late mother, Miriam, was a witch. The Good Father of Bethel’s faith is opposed by a Dark Mother, a demonic figure associated with witchcraft and devilry. Immanuelle Moore is a teenage girl who lives in Bethel, a town gripped by an authoritarian religion.

Year of the witching book