The Once and Future Witches Review: Sisterhood, Suffrage, and Spells

Source: FantasticFiction

Witchcraft has never been just about potions, spells, and broomsticks. It’s always been about power. Who has it, who fears it, and who is punished for daring to wield it. In the 1600s, women in Europe and America were dragged to trials, accused of signing pacts with the Devil. In African traditions, the line between healing (ubungoma) and harming (ukuthakatha) determined whether someone was respected as a healer or feared as a witch.

Alix E. Harrow’s The Once and Future Witches takes that history and rewrites it with fire, magic, and rebellion. It’s 1893 in New Salem, a time when suffragists fight for the vote and whispers of witchcraft linger like smoke. Three estranged sisters — James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna — reunite to reclaim both spells and power.

In this The Once and Future Witches review, I’ll share what makes Harrow’s novel such a spellbinding Halloween read, how it connects to the cultural roots of witchcraft, and why it resonated so deeply with my own novel, The Girl Who Knew The Medicine. Because sometimes the scariest magic isn’t in cauldrons or curses — it’s in the way survival itself becomes a ritual.

Plot Overview: Spells in the Shadows

Harrow’s novel begins in 1893 New Salem, where witchcraft has been stamped out — at least, officially. The old ways linger in fragments: rhymes passed down as lullabies, charms hidden in household rituals.

The story follows the three Eastwood sisters:

• James Juniper, fiery and wild, fleeing abuse.

• Agnes Amaranth, practical and cautious, carrying secrets of her own.

• Beatrice Belladonna, bookish and thoughtful, devoted to knowledge.

Separated by circumstance, the sisters reunite at a suffragist rally. But their reunion is more than family drama — it sparks something larger. They begin weaving suffrage and sorcery together, fusing political struggle with magical rebellion.

The novel takes the familiar shape of gothic fiction — mysterious figures, whispered curses, dangerous rituals — but grounds it in a new narrative: witchcraft as survival, witchcraft as empowerment. The suffragists aren’t just chanting for votes. They’re casting spells for liberation.

It’s a story about resistance, about how magic survives in the margins, and how women turn fear into power.

Themes and Atmosphere

Sisterhood: Power in Unity

The Eastwood sisters are the heart of the story. Each one alone is vulnerable, flawed, and burdened. But together, they’re unstoppable. Their sisterhood becomes a metaphor for collective strength — a reminder that witches in stories are rarely solitary, despite the stereotype.

This echoes something I explored in The Girl Who Knew The Medicine: what happens when someone stands alone against suspicion and accusation. In contrast, Harrow shows us the power of solidarity. Where one woman might be silenced, three together can rewrite history.

Suffrage as Sorcery

One of Harrow’s most brilliant choices is blending suffrage and witchcraft. Campaigning for the vote becomes a magical act — dangerous, subversive, transformative. The link is clear: both suffragists and witches frightened the status quo. Both were accused of disrupting the natural order.

This isn’t far from history. In European witch trials, outspoken women were often the first accused. In Nguni traditions, too much knowledge or power could tip a healer’s reputation into witchcraft. The fear wasn’t just of magic — it was of women claiming space.

Witchcraft and Survival

For Harrow, magic is less about fantasy than survival. The sisters use spells to protect themselves, to resist, to endure. This feels strikingly familiar to African traditions, where the line between healing and harm is often drawn by survival itself. Ubungoma — the sacred calling of healers — is revered. Ukuthakatha — harmful sorcery — is feared.

In The Once and Future Witches, the spells aren’t flashy fireworks. They’re whispered rhymes, charms stitched into clothing, sigils drawn in secret. Small acts of survival. And that makes them all the more powerful.

Why It’s Frightful

At first glance, The Once and Future Witches might seem more magical than terrifying. But gothic horror isn’t always about blood and gore — it’s about the weight of fear.

1. Fairy-tale Shadows

   Harrow writes in a lyrical, fairy-tale style that feels timeless and unsettling. Nursery rhymes and chants, familiar yet strange, weave a sense of uncanny dread.

   
   

2. Systemic Fear

   The novel shows how fear isn’t always supernatural — it’s political. Institutions work to erase witchcraft, just as they silence women. That systemic erasure is chilling in its own right.

   
   

3. The Haunted Past

   Witchcraft here isn’t just present-day practice. It’s memory, history, inheritance. The ghosts of trials past haunt every whispered spell.

   
   

This resonates with The Girl Who Knew The Medicine. In my novel, suspicion of witchcraft (ukuthakatha) seeps into everyday life — in schools, families, and communities. The haunting isn’t always literal. Sometimes, it’s the weight of stories passed down, stories that define who is feared.

The Once and Future Witches Review: Final Thoughts

Alix E. Harrow’s The Once and Future Witches is a spellbinding blend of history, magic, and feminist gothic. It transforms the witch from a figure of fear into one of survival, while never letting us forget how fragile that survival can be.

In this The Once and Future Witches review, I’ve shared why the novel lingers: its lyrical writing, its rich atmosphere, its weaving of suffrage and sorcery into one act of rebellion. But what stays with me most is the reminder that the witch has always been political.

For readers of The Girl Who Knew The Medicine, this story will feel familiar. Both novels explore how communities decide who holds power — and how quickly that power can be branded sacred or destructive.

So, would you join the circle? Would you chant the words, cast the spell, and risk being named a witch? Or would you stay silent, watching from the shadows, hoping fear doesn’t turn on you?