Witchcraft for Wayward Girls

How it reads

Witchcraft for Wayward Girls is horror (historical occult horror, specifically), and its dominant mood is eerie. It's atmospheric and uncanny, with a sense that something is wrong. The pace is moderate — neither a page-turner nor a slow burn — so it holds up whether you read it in long sittings or short ones.

It's set in a small town setting, in the historical past, told in the third person across several viewpoints. Its central concerns are friendship, power and politics and survival. In weight it sits in the middle: substantial without being heavy going.

It stands alone, so there's nothing else you need to read first or after. The ending resolves happily. At 482 pages it's an ordinary novel's length. It's well known, the kind of book most keen readers have heard of.