The Folk Keeper by Franny Billingsley is set in a world where humans co-exist with the Folk and the Other Folk. It’s not a peaceful co-existence though. The Folk, who are perennially famished, require a tithe from the humans to let their cattle and crops alone. And the indigenous Other Folk, with their magical abilities, create havoc of their own from time to time.
The Folk Keeper’s job is to help keep the status quo by overseeing the tithe. Corinna Stonewall, disguised as a boy at the beginning of our tale, is one such Folk Keeper. She has lived a hard life, and is angry, so angry, at the world. It is no wonder then that she is so prickly, always on edge, and wants so desperately to be special, to have some power over those that have hurt her.
Top 5 Tuesday is a monthly-weekly meme hosted by MeeghanReads. This Tuesday’s topic is “Top 5 Books with Witches“. It’s October, after all!
Baba Yaga lived in a hut standing on chicken legs, in the middle of a dark forest. If you’ve read Russian folklore before, you know that Baba Yaga was often the stepmother’s wicked and wise relative, who would put the heroine to the test. If the heroine failed, she would be dinner. Baba Yaga remains the quintessential Witch for me.
Rachel Morganin Kim Harrison’s The Hollows Series. Rachel Morgan is a witch who works as a runner (police officer) for Inderland Security (IS). The IS is the police for the paranormal species of society, like weres, vampires, banshees, pixies, witches, demons, etc. The IS was established some 40 years ago, when a virus outbreak caused mayhem (when doesn’t it?) and forced the paranormal community into light. If you’re interested in the darker UF genre, The Hollows is your next series.
Laura Chant, in Margaret Mahy’s The Changeover. I wonder why Changeover is not better known. It won the Carnegie Medal in 1984 and since then, has also been made into a fairly decent movie (trailer below). Laura Chant’s toddler brother is possessed by an unnervingly wicked goblin-esque creature. Laura has only one way out: to change over and claim her “witchy” powers.
Elizabeth Proctor, in The Crucible by Arthur Miller. There are few tales as horrifying and enduring as that of the Salem Witch trials in The Crucible – and that, a 1953 play, no less. Witch-hunting is a theme that has been portrayed in countless books and shows, including Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon. But Crucible stands out, for exposing the hypocrisy and devastating power of socially-sanctioned violence. Here’s Miller on why he wrote TheCrucible.
Good Witch of the Northand Wicked Witch of the East, in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum. These were probably the first witches I ever read about (outside of Disney, I mean). Without the Good Witch, there would be no Yellow Brick Road, and without the Bad Witch, there would be no Silver Shoes. I think I’m not making any sense… But really, there’s no tale like The Wizard of Oz.
Margaret Coventry is having a small bout of rebellion against her match-making family, when she is kidnapped and taken by force into the alternate universe of Plenilune. You see, Rupert de la Mare, soon-to-be Plenilune’s overlord, has been challenged whether he can take a human wife, and the nefarious Rupert doesn’t let challenges slide.
This is only a small part of the plot (the blurb would make you think otherwise). Margaret is a fish out of water as she begins to learn – and love – the magical landscape and history of Plenilune and its people. Along the way, Margaret breaks a curse with the help of a dragon, hunts down a wild boar (not intentionally), and rescues a kingdom. Oh, and she meets Dammerung, the War-wolf.
Book Blurb: The fate of Plenilune hangs on the election of the Overlord, for which Rupert de la Mare and his brother are the only contenders, but when Rupert’s unwilling bride-to-be uncovers his plot to murder his brother, the conflict explodes into civil war. To assure the minds of the lord-electors of Plenilune that he has some capacity for humanity, Rupert de la Mare has been asked to woo and win a lady before he can become the Overlord, and he will do it—even if he has to kidnap her.
(The blurb really doesn’t do the book any justice, but I suppose the book cover art more than makes up for it. Book cover art is by Carlos Quevedo, his amazing work HERE.)
The first time I heard of The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe was in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey. (I think that’s the case for most people.) In Northanger, Catherine Morland’s fondness for Gothic novels and active imagination results in a disastrous misinterpretation, and Mysteries of Udolpho is one of those novels. Clearly, not very high praise when it comes to practical real life.
There is much villainy afoot …
… This led to the question, whether the spirit, after it has quitted the body, is ever permitted to revisit the earth; and if it is, whether it was possible for spirits to become visible to the sense …
In Mysteries of Udolpho, Emily St. Aubere’s father similarly admonishes her to not give in to impractical sentimentality. But then he dies and leaves her orphaned in the hands of his rather shallow sister, Madame Cheron. Madame Cheron and Emily do not get along, to put it mildly.
That situation worsens when Madame Cheron ends up marrying Signor Montoni, a stylish Italian whom everyone seems to admire but no one seems to like. Montoni is the quintessential Gothic villain who, gambles, drinks, cheats, broods and schemes. (I expect he had a mustache too, which he twirled a lot as he brooded.)
Poor Emily has a terrible time of it all. She learns her father was hiding a terrible secret from his salad days. Her engagement with young Valancourt is broken off and her hand promised to another without her consent. Her home and father’s impoverished estates in France are rented away, and Montoni packs them off (eventually) to the desolate castle of Udolpho.
Nestled in the Apennine mountains of Italy, Udolpho’s grandeur has faded with time and neglect. It once belonged to Montoni’s relative, Signora Laurentini, who died in mysterious circumstances. There are rumors that Montoni killed her off out of jealousy and to grab her estates. Certainly, nothing can be put past Montoni, who it turns out is now leading a band of mercenaries, the Condottieri.
We know that the stories of The Thousand and One Nights are set in the Middle Ages of the Persian Empire. But these were actually compiled over several centuries, in multiple countries and languages. When the Arab Traders of 8th Century travelled worldwide, they carried these tales with them – thus, also called The Arabian Nights.
Essentially, we are talking about stories that are more than 1300 old! And all of them told over a span of 1001 nights by the wily Shahrazad to pacify the Sultan. Here is a woman who with her spine of steel and love for the written word managed to change the course of (fictional) history.
But what was Shahrazad really like? How did she survive so long, married to a mad man, desperate and afraid every day whether she would live to see the next day, and the next, for almost 3 years? We get to know this side of Shahrazad, in Shadow Spinner.
The Tale of Genji (Genji Monogatari) is a 1987 anime movie directed by Gisaburō Sugii and is a surreal, melancholic mix of fact and fantasy. It’s based on (large portions of) The Tale of Genji written by Murasaki Shikibu back in the Heian period (794 to 1185) of Japanese history, also arguably the world’s first true “novel”.
Utagawa Kunisada & Utagawa Hiroshige – Tale of Genji, wood block painting 1853
