Hour of the Witch: A Novel

Chris Bohjalian

May 2021 · Sold by Vintage

About this ebook

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the acclaimed author of The Flight Attendant: “Historical fiction at its best…. The book is a thriller in structure, and a real page-turner, the ending both unexpected and satisfying” (Diana Gabaldon, bestselling author of the Outlander series, The Washington Post).

A young Puritan woman—faithful, resourceful, but afraid of the demons that dog her soul—plots her escape from a violent marriage in this riveting and propulsive novel of historical suspense.

Boston, 1662. Mary Deerfield is twenty-four-years-old. Her skin is porcelain, her eyes delft blue, and in England she might have had many suitors. But here in the New World, amid this community of saints, Mary is the second wife of Thomas Deerfield, a man as cruel as he is powerful. When Thomas, prone to drunken rage, drives a three-tined fork into the back of Mary's hand, she resolves that she must divorce him to save her life.

But in a world where every neighbor is watching for signs of the devil, a woman like Mary—a woman who harbors secret desires and finds it difficult to tolerate the brazen hypocrisy of so many men in the colony—soon becomes herself the object of suspicion and rumor. When tainted objects are discovered buried in Mary's garden, when a boy she has treated with herbs and simples dies, and when their servant girl runs screaming in fright from her home, Mary must fight to not only escape her marriage, but also the gallows.

A twisting, tightly plotted novel of historical suspense from one of our greatest storytellers, Hour of the Witch is a timely and terrifying story of socially sanctioned brutality and the original American witch hunt.

Look for Chris Bohjalian's new novel, The Lioness!

Ratings and reviews

Thank goodness attitudes about gender have changed over time! Because once you read this novel, you’ll understand how whimsically dangerous it was to be a woman in 1600s Boston. Mary Deerfield is the daughter of a prosperous merchant, full of curiosity and intelligence and aware of her own self-worth. Her parents arrange a financially secure marriage to an older, also prosperous, miller who is a widower with a grown daughter. So, what options are open to that same young woman in the Puritan world of the 1660s when she realizes she is married to a pillar of society who is also a vicious abuser? A husband who believes his cruelty is simply the necessary manifestation of a husband’s proper role as disciplinarian. What redress is possible? Is divorce available? Will the courts provide justice? Can Mary get help perhaps from the church? Or will her parents or friends intervene? Chris Bohjalian explores all these questions and more in this diffcult-to-read story of a society where women wield little power and men are quick to use religion, the law, and superstition to blame them for all that is misunderstood about the world. As a woman, I was extremely uncomfortable with Mary’s powerlessness and how easily individuals could make accusations against her —— with llittle or no proof— and still have those accusations believed. HOUR OF THE WITCH is NOT historical fiction that paints a flattering portrait of our country’s Puritans settlers. But it IS a very compelling study of historical gender roles and the constancy of our darker human nature.

Good

Hawk y6

About the author

CHRIS BOHJALIAN is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of twenty-three books, including Hour of the Witch, The Red Lotus, Midwives, and The Flight Attendant, which has been made into an HBO Max limited series starring Kaley Cuoco. His other books include The Guest Room; Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands; The Sandcastle Girls; Skeletons at the Feast; and The Double Bind. His novels Secrets of Eden, Midwives, and Past the Bleachers were made into movies, and his work has been translated into more than thirty-five languages. He is also a playwright (Wingspan and Midwives). He lives in Vermont and can be found on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Litsy, and Goodreads, @chrisbohjalian