The Witching Hour

Anne Rice

Nov 2010 · Lives of Mayfair Witches Book 1 · Sold by Ballantine Books

About this eBook

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the beloved author of the Vampire Chronicles, the first installation of her spellbinding Mayfair Chronicles—the inspiration for the hit television series!

“Extraordinary . . . Anne Rice offers more than just a story; she creates myth.”—The Washington Post Book World
 
Rowan Mayfair, a beautiful woman, a brilliant practitioner of neurosurgery—aware that she has special powers but unaware that she comes from an ancient line of witches—finds the drowned body of a man off the coast of California and brings him to life. He is Michael Curry, who was born in New Orleans and orphaned in childhood by fire on Christmas Eve, who pulled himself up from poverty, and who now, in his brief interval of death, has acquired a sensory power that mystifies and frightens him. As these two, fiercely drawn to each other, fall in love and—in passionate alliance—set out to solve the mystery of her past and his unwelcome gift, an intricate tale of evil unfolds.
 
Moving through time from today’s New Orleans and San Francisco to long-ago Amsterdam and a château in the Louis XIV’s France, and from the coffee plantations of Port au Prince, where the great Mayfair fortune is made and the legacy of their dark power is almost destroyed, to Civil War New Orleans, The Witching Hour is a luminous, deeply enchanting novel.  

The magic of the Mayfairs continues:
THE WITCHING HOUR • LASHER • TALTOS

Ratings and reviews

Read it several years ago. It was great. The second two books weren't as good but the twists and turns off the witching hour was great. Always wanted to make a family tree of the Mayfair family

One of the most well written, engaging me and sucking me into the story narrative completely! It was almost impossible to put the book aside in order to attend to day to day responsibilities.. have Loved her writing forever now. She is missed out here in the world.. RIP Fine Lady, and Thank you for so much!

I haven't tried a ebook much a audiobook. However I have read this book three times. The entire series as well. It's absolutely captivating. I had such the vivid mental pictures of every detail as I read each word. If ghosts, spirits, witches, and spells are possible ? I suggest this book. I couldn't put it down. The way she lays out the story, each characters description and what goes on with them. I felt like I could see it. I could feel it. I absolutely find this book and the others that follow to be favorites.

About the author

Anne Rice is the author of thirty-seven books, including the Vampire Chronicles, the Lives of the Mayfair Witches, and the Wolf Gift book series. Rice was born in New Orleans in 1941 and grew up there and in Texas. She lived in San Francisco with her husband, the poet and painter, Stan Rice until 1988, when they returned to New Orleans to live with their son, Christopher. In 2006, Rice moved to Rancho Mirage, California. She died in 2021.