Category Archives: Witch Trials

Selected Listening

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I don’t know about all of you, but I find listening to the news difficult these days. More and more, I find myself ducking away from current affairs, not catching up on the latest, and just kind of ignoring it all and hoping it’ll go away. I imagine that after the past year, I’m not the only one doing this!

However, I do like to listen, either to music or to the radio, and unless I’m hooked on a particular show, I’m not much of a telly-watcher. In particular, I like to listen to things which make me think, or which teach me something, and I’ve been fortunate to find some great podcasts to listen to in recent times. Those of you who follow me on social media may have seen me sharing some of these, but I thought today I would pull together a short post all about podcasts I have enjoyed, and why I would recommend them. So, here we go…

The Ghostly Lady in Green – Haunted History Chronicles

This is a great podcast series if you enjoy history with a paranormal twist. Michelle is brilliant on the history of different historical buildings, many of which she has visited and experienced herself. I’ve enjoyed so many of the episodes in this series that it was hard to pick a favourite, but on reflection I think I would have to choose the episode about Sudeley Castle. Having visited Sudeley myself and been spellbound by both the location and its relationship to Queen Katharine Parr, it was a pleasure to hear the castle’s rich and moving history presented with such knowledge and enthusiasm. You can listen here.

Yours truly in front of the banqueting hall ruins at Sudeley Castle in 2016.

Stepping Out: A Short History of Solitude – BBC Radio 4

I know, strictly speaking this is a radio series rather than a podcast, but I had to highlight it as I enjoyed listening to this so much last year. Stepping Out was my favourite episode, and I found that Thomas Dixon’s exploration of romantic ideas of solitude in nature in the nineteenth century really resonated with me in the lockdown times. You can listen here.

Perilous Places: Spaces of Solitude – Queen Mary University London

Yes, I know – more solitude. You might be sensing a theme here! I loved this whole series, but this episode and its discussion of Emily Dickinson and the ‘Graveyard Poets’ particularly captured me. I pondered the ideas this raised about the darker side of being alone for days afterwards. You can listen here.

The Witches of Shetland – Witches of Scotland Podcast

This podcast is a fairly recent discovery of mine, and I’ve only listened to a few of the thirty-four episodes currently available. So far, my favourite was the discussion of the Shetland witches. This caught my eye as I’m due to visit Shetland this summer. For someone who knew nothing about Shetland’s witches, this was an excellent discussion and a fascinating insight into the subject. You can listen here.

The Bigamy Trial that Scandalised Georgian England – BBC History Extra Podcasts

BBC History Extra are prolific on the podcast front, and from the hundreds of episodes available online, it is so hard to highlight just one that I love. Perhaps because of the period I’m currently writing about in my forthcoming novel, I’ve tended to seek out their podcasts concerning the Georgian and Regency eras. This one about Elizabeth Chudleigh’s bigamy trial really caught my attention, and was fascinating to listen to. I love how History Extra’s podcasts are so good at bringing lesser-known episodes in history to wider attention. I’ve certainly learned a lot from listening to them. You can listen here.

So, there you are – a brief summary of my recommended listening. Do you have a favourite podcast you would recommend? If so, feel free to drop a note of it in the comments below.

Spotlight Part 4: The Pendle Witch Girl

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In today’s spotlight is my fourth book, and the last instalment in the Witches of Pendle trilogy, The Pendle Witch Girl. This book is also my only novella to date, and was published in 2018.

The Pendle Witch Girl cover

In the spotlight post I did for A Woman Named Sellers, I mentioned that originally I wanted that book to cover Jennet Device/Sellers’ whole life, but found early on that to do so would have made the book far too cumbersome. So, after publishing that book I decided that I would write one final story, covering Jennet’s childhood and her pivotal (and tragic) role in the 1612 trials. Of all my Witches of Pendle books, this one draws closest to events leading up to and during the trials in Lancaster in 1612. Whereas The Gisburn Witch operates on the periphery of the Lancashire aspect of the story, The Pendle Witch Girl concerns the character who was at the centre of it.

Release day promotional poster

It was quite a challenge to tackle such an infamous story, particularly in trying to understand some of the accusations of witchcraft which arose and their context, and to represent those convincingly in fiction. I also had to bear in mind that the key primary source for the trial, The Wonderful Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster written by court clerk Thomas Potts, contains its own biases, as it approaches events from the authorities’ point of view. Therefore, a good deal of reading between the lines was required.

When writing, I worked hard to avoid falling into the trap of ‘explaining away’ the superstitions and alleged magical events, or of putting too much of a modern slant upon them. Instead, I tried to get into the minds of my characters, to see the world through their eyes and to do justice to their stories. It’s important to remember, I think, that the accused and their accusers believed in witchcraft just as fervently as the authorities, and therefore saw events and the actions of neighbours, friends and even family through this lens. I also had to remember that I was writing from the point of view of a child, whose view of the world was not only steeped in superstition but also her immaturity and her own family dynamic. That dynamic, I felt, was key to understanding why she did what she did, and why events unfolded so dreadfully in the summer of 1612.

More information about The Pendle Witch Girl can be found here.

Spotlight Part 2: A Woman Named Sellers

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Last week I started a series of ‘spotlight’ posts, focusing on each of my novels in the order I wrote them, and talking a little about their subjects and themes, what inspired me to write them, and so on. In today’s spotlight it’s my second novel, and the second book in the Witches of Pendle trilogy, A Woman Named Sellers.

Published in 2016, A Woman Named Sellers picks up the Pendle witches’ story twenty years after the first trials. It follows the story of former trial child witness Jennet Device, now living as Jennet Sellers. Following the death of her father, Jennet moves to a new village to live with relatives she hardly knows. She tries hard to carve out a new life for herself, and finds solace in new friendships, particularly with her fellow newcomer William Braithwaite, a stonemason from Cumberland. However, Jennet’s past continues to haunt her, and with witch hunters once again prowling the Pendle countryside, she’s not sure if she can ever be safe.

After writing The Gisburn Witch, I really wanted to focus on the story of the other, arguably more famous Jennet in the Pendle witch tale. Originally I planned to cover her whole life story but realised that her childhood and adult tales were too lengthy and complex to put into one novel. So, I decided to focus instead on her adulthood and possible involvement in the 1634 trials. Due to some of the gaps and contradictions in the evidence, we can’t know for certain that the Jennet Device named in the 1634 trial records was the same as the Jennet Device of 1612, although, on balance, it seems likely. I was really captured by the notion that her tragic life probably did come full circle – from witness to accused.

When I was writing this book, I was also really interested in reflecting some of the changes going on in wider society in the 1630s. These were the years leading up to the civil wars, and society was changing – we can see that in the shifting attitudes to witch-hunting, but also in the religious landscape, with many new Christian groups emerging. One of the major characters in the book, William Braithwaite, is a Grindletonian, a sect which sprang up in the northern village of Grindleton during these years. Groups like the Grindletonians were really very radical, placing emphasis on the individual’s relationship with God, rejecting the need to be ordained to preach, and believing that accepting God’s spirit was all that was required to attain salvation. William is one of the few fictional characters in the story, and to this day he remains one of my favourites. Some readers have also commented on how much they liked him, and a few have even asked if I’d consider writing a spin-off about him!

The 1634 trials are less well known that those in 1612, which is a shame as they are fascinating in their own right. Indeed, the echoes of 1612 are all there – child witnesses, tensions between neighbours, outlandish accusations, and the persistence of witch-hunting zeal in the north of the country. The results, however, were somewhat different from 1612. You can read more about the 1634 trials and Jennet’s possible involvement here.

More information about A Woman Named Sellers, including where to buy, is available here.

Spotlight: The Gisburn Witch

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As the year tumbles towards its conclusion, I’ve found myself in a reflective mood. Let’s be honest, there’s a lot to reflect on this year, and not a whole lot of it has been good! However, in recent weeks I have been staying positive (mostly) and busy, working on the first draft of my next novel, and really enjoying the experience of delving into a different world which writing it affords. After all, 2020 could not be a better excuse for a little escapism, could it?

I’ve also found myself looking back on the books I’ve written and the things I’ve achieved so far. It is good to take stock once in a while, to look at your work and to think ‘wow, I did that’. I began writing my first novel in 2014, published it in 2015 and I haven’t really stopped since. As it is almost the end of another year, I thought it would be fun to shine a spotlight on my books in the order I wrote them, and say a little bit about them – what they’re about, what inspired me to write them, and so on.

So, in today’s spotlight is my debut novel, The Gisburn Witch.

Published in 2015, The Gisburn Witch is a historical fiction novel which tells the story of Jennet Preston, one of the so-called Pendle witches, who found herself caught up in the trials in Lancashire in 1612. I’d always had an interest in the Pendle witch trials, and wrote my university dissertation on the subject. Jennet had particularly drawn my interest as she was geographically separate from the other accused, living in Gisburn in the Yorkshire/Lancashire borderlands. She was tried separately, too, in York rather than Lancaster. I really wanted to dig deep into Jennet’s story, to understand how she ended up being accused of witchcraft. The Gisburn Witch is my imagining of that story.

In 2016, I wrote an article for Edinburgh University’s Dangerous Women Project, all about Jennet and the other ‘witches’ and some of the aspects of their lives and stories which made them vulnerable to witchcraft accusations. You can find it here.

You can find out more about The Gisburn Witch and where you can get a copy here.

Next time in the spotlight will be my second novel, and the second book in the Witches of Pendle series, A Woman Named Sellers.

An Accidental Week

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Happy Saturday! For me at least, it’s been something of a long week, but by no means an uneventful one. It’s also been a bit unlucky. Over the last seven days I’ve managed to hit myself in the face with an I pad resulting in a bit of a colourful right cheekbone (thank goodness for make up), and I’ve got yet another cold which has caused laryngitis. Yesterday evening I lost my voice completely; thankfully my voice seems to be coming back now but squeaking at my family is far from ideal!

Fortunately, my bad luck hasn’t affected my writing, which has been progressing well. This week I hit 65,000 words in my first draft of The House at Kirtlebeck End. I shared this teaser extract on social media:

I hope this has you intrigued! I’m really excited about this book and the more I write, the more I can’t wait to share it with you. I aim to have the first draft finished in the next couple of months.

I also took some time to catch up on how my other books are doing, and noticed that The Gisburn Witch has a new review on Amazon UK. It was lovely to see that a reader has given it five stars and left some really positive comments about the book. It’s no exaggeration to say that good reviews really do make my day.

The Pendle Witch Trials have been getting quite a lot of attention again, generated by big new releases in the literary world such as Stacey Halls’ The Familiars, and television shows such as Channel 5 (UK)’s Digging Up Britain’s Past. I have finally found some time to catch up with this series and watch the episode about the Pendle witches. The episode focused on an archaeological dig to try to locate the remains of the lost Malkin Tower, home of the Device family. I won’t spoil it by telling you if they were successful or not, but it is good to see that after hundreds of years this tragic tale is still attracting interest and attention. If you want to find out more about the TV show, check out the review on the Radio Times website.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend – I’m off to try and get The House at Kirtlebeck End up to 70,000 words before Sunday night! It’s all about setting goals…!

 

The Other Pendle Witch Trial

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August 18th 2018 marked the 406th anniversary of the Pendle witch trials at Lancaster Castle in 1612. It is an anniversary which always causes me to pause, and one which I never forget. Growing up in Lancashire, I was captivated from a young age by tales of the Pendle witches. For a child there is, after all, something irresistibly and gruesomely fascinating about the likes of Old Demdike and Chattox doing their worst with magical misdeeds before meeting their own horrible fate. As I got older my interest developed into something altogether more academic, with a dissertation on the subject for my undergraduate degree at Lancaster University and, of course, several works of historical fiction since then! Over the years, the Pendle witches have been a big part of my intellectual and creative life.

Although perhaps not as widely known internationally as other later trials, notably those which occurred in Salem in 1692/3, there is no doubt in my mind that across the breadth of English history the 1612 trials have grown in stature and notoriety over the years. I don’t think it is an overstatement to say that 1612 has become the stuff of legend, or that it contributes enormously to the cultural and artistic life of the north of England, and of course to tourism and the economy. This activity and interest in the trials reached fever pitch in 2012 for the fourth centenary, with commemorative activities, events, sculptures and new works of literature and scholarship on the subject, and such activities have continued ever since; for example, this year there was a family weekend of events at Lancaster Castle.

What is less well-known, however, is that a second round of witch trials occurred in Pendle in 1634. In late 1633, a boy named Edmund Robinson gained local fame and notoriety as a witch-finder. It seems that upon returning home later than expected one day in early November, he told his father a tale;  a story of his abduction by witches, of women turning into animals and of a great, unholy Sabbath. The story quickly spread around the local area and the boy became something of a celebrity. Edmund’s father, perhaps sensing there was fame and fortune to be found in such a reputation, began charging people to see his son’s ‘performances’ and taking him on a tour of the local churches.

It was only a matter of time, of course, before a story of this magnitude reached the local Justices of the Peace and in February 1634, young Edmund finally told the story to the authorities. As part of his deposition, Edmund gave a considerable list of local people who he claimed had been involved in his fantastical tale.

One of the names which appeared on Edmund’s list was that of Jennet Device.

We don’t know for certain, of course, if this Jennet Device was the same Jennet who had been the star witness of the 1612 trials; however, to imagine that it might have been is truly the stuff of stories. My second Witches of Pendle novel, A Woman Named Sellers, is a story woven on the supposition that it was the same Jennet, that in 1634 events in Pendle came full circle, that the witness became the accused.

As in 1612 the accused, including Jennet, were found guilty at the Lancaster Assizes. However, in a move which signaled how times were beginning to change, the judges deferred sentencing to seek further advice from the authorities in London. The Privy Council duly dispatched the Bishop of Chester to undertake a further investigation into the case. They also requested a number of the accused be sent to London for further examination. Four women were sent on the long journey south, where they were subjected to a physical examination by the king’s physician, further questioning, and an interview with King Charles I himself. We can only imagine how utterly terrifying and bewildering that experience must have been.

The Privy Council’s intervention led to the 1634 case falling apart, with the authorities ultimately finding that the story was a fabrication exploited for financial gain and ordering the arrest and imprisonment of Edmund Robinson’s father as a result. The accused were all acquitted, allegedly pardoned by their monarch, and their four representatives were sent home to Lancashire. However, the ending of the story is not a happy one: despite the acquittal many remained in prison, probably as a result of being unable to pay the debts they had accrued after so many months of being unjustly detained at His Majesty’s pleasure.

The tragedy of the 1634 case is that whilst the changing attitudes of the London authorities were able to prevent this tale ending at the gallows, the accused were nonetheless undone by poverty and powerlessness, by being at the bottom of the social heap and by being without the means to free themselves from a justice system which was always stacked against them. It may be less well-known that its 1612 counterpart, but in many ways the story of the 1634 trials is no less poignant. I hope that when the fourth centenary comes around in sixteen years’ time, the other Pendle witch trials will be given the recognition they deserve.

More information about my second Witches of Pendle novel, A Woman Named Sellers, which focuses on the 1634 trials, can be found here. 

 

The Pendle Witch Girl is Live!!

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Today is release day for The Pendle Witch Girl. I am delighted to publish the third installment in my Witches of Pendle series and to share with you my re-imagining of young Jennet Device’s fascinating and tragic story.

What was it like, to grow up in a world of spells and curses, of magic and misdeeds?

What was it like, to believe that your family was capable of the most wicked acts?

What was it like, to be a girl caught up in one of the most notorious witch trials in English history?

Delve into this Witches of Pendle novella and find out! The Pendle Witch Girl is available now, e-book £1.99 and paperback £5.99, from Amazon / iTunes / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords / Kobo

And if you’ve not read the first book yet, The Gisburn Witch e-book is available for just 99p / 99c. This is a special offer for release week only, and will run until 24th August 2018. So don’t miss out! Grab a copy now from Amazon / iTunes / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords / Kobo

Exclusive Preview: The Pendle Witch Girl

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In one week the third installment of the Witches of Pendle series, The Pendle Witch Girl, will be released. Today I am delighted to publish an extract from the book – I hope very much that you all enjoy it!

Prologue

Spring 1609

‘Crumbling Stones’

“Ouch!” Jennet exclaimed as she scraped her knees across the large stones which were strewn across the ground. These piles of rubble were all that remained of the back wall of the out-building now; last winter had been harsh and the old walls hadn’t had the strength to resist the relentless frost and biting wind. One day, just after fresh snow had fallen on to the frozen ground, she had wandered outside and round the corner as she usually did and the wall had gone. Just like that – gone.  It shouldn’t have been a surprise, really. For as long as Jennet could remember, the building had served no purpose other than to sit there, crumbling. She had asked her mother and grandmother repeatedly what it was for and both had shrugged, claiming not to know. Even when she badgered them for an answer, both continued to plead ignorance. She found adults so irritating when they were evasive like that; they probably did know and they just didn’t want to tell her. Who cares about old buildings and their uses when you’ve grown-up things to worry about?

Still, Jennet felt sorry for the old stone hut, sitting there all alone and falling apart. She decided that if the rest of her family weren’t interested in finding a use for it, then she would take it upon herself to do so. She would give it a purpose. Last summer, it had been her den, a little house all of her very own, but now that the back wall had gone it didn’t make a particularly good or cosy home any more. This spring, she decided, she would play on the rocks instead. That had seemed like a good idea until just a few minutes ago, when she had scraped her knee. Now she had drawn a little blood and her knee ached.

“Mama!” she shouted as she ran back towards her house. She ran inside and slammed the heavy wooden door of Malkin Tower behind her. “Mama!” she called again. “I’ve hurt my knee! Can you look?”

Slowing her pace and feigning a slight limp, Jennet walked to the back of their cottage, where her mother was sitting in the kitchen near to the hearth, chattering away with her friend, Jennet Preston. On Jennet’s lap sat her daughter, Bess, who was wriggling around, dribbling over a piece of soggy bread. Jennet shot the child a disdainful glance.

“Mama, I’ve hurt my knee,” she repeated, offering up her leg for her mother’s examination. There was quite a lot of blood now; it had trickled down her shin and settled on her ankle, where it had begun to dry.

Elizabeth Device wasn’t amused. “It’s nothing, Jennet. Bit of blood is all. No need to make such a fuss,” she said, sharply. “Honestly, you’re eight years old and still acting like a baby!”

“Shouldn’t Grand-mama have a look?” Jennet asked, deciding to pursue the matter of her injured knee and ignoring her mother’s jibe. “Grand-mama is good at mending people,” she added, smiling at Jennet Preston.

Jennet Preston returned the child’s smile. “Yes, your grandmother is good at a great many things,” she replied affirmatively. “You are very lucky to have her.”

“Grandmother’s sleeping,” her mother replied. “Please don’t wake her. Now, go and play, Jennet,” she added, gently but insistently.

“I’ve no one to play with!” Jennet whinged. “James and Alison are both out, and even when they’re here they don’t want to play with me. They think they’re grown up now, too. Everyone’s a grown up except me!” She gesticulated wildly with her arms for dramatic effect. It was a fair point, she thought. Her brother and sister really did think they were too old for her games.

The two women simply laughed at Jennet’s outburst. “What a lass you are,” her mother said, rubbing her hair affectionately. This gesture was intended to offer comfort but Jennet only found it infuriating.

“Can Bess come and play with me?” Jennet asked, glancing warily at the drooling child. Bess’s face was always wet and she couldn’t talk much yet, but she could walk and that meant she would do for a friend, for today at least. Maybe Jennet could teach her to climb on the rocks carefully without scraping her knees.

Jennet Preston chuckled. “Bess is too little, Jennet,” she replied gently. “In a few years when she’s grown a little more, I’m sure she will be your very best friend. Just like your mama is my closest friend,” she added, giving Elizabeth Device a warm smile.

“I can’t wait that long,” Jennet answered rudely. She paused for a moment, allowing the two women to stare at her with confused faces. Jennet enjoyed moments like this, when adults stopped talking about boring things and listened to her. “By the time Bess is old enough to play with me, all the walls on my house will have fallen down and there will be nothing left. I won’t need a friend then, if there’s nothing left to play with.”

 

Later that day, Jennet watched from behind the front wall of her house as Jennet Preston and Bess finally left. She took care to make sure that she wasn’t seen; she liked the sense of watching other people without being spotted. Her brother James had once remarked that she was so good at it, perhaps she could go and spy for the King! The King indeed! James could be so silly at times. What would the King want with a little girl from Pendle?

Jennet watched her mother’s friend as she carried her daughter down the hill and disappeared into the distance. She liked Jennet Preston; she was always kind and friendly to her, but she talked a lot which was no use if Jennet wanted to speak to her mother. With Jennet Preston around, she could never get a word in edgeways. A couple of years ago, which felt like a long time ago to Jennet, her mother’s friend had lived at Malkin Tower for a little while. Jennet had quite forgotten all about it, and perhaps would have forgotten forever if her sister Alison hadn’t reminded her. Alison liked to talk about people she knew and everything she knew about them, especially if she knew bad things. As young as she was, Jennet knew that if you wanted to know about something bad, you could go to Alison and she would tell you.

“Do you know why Jennet Preston lived here?” Alison had asked mischievously once she knew that her little sister was hanging on to her every word.

“No. Why?” Jennet had replied, her eyes wide with wonder.

“Because she had to run away when everyone in Gisburn found out that she was having Master Lister’s baby,” Alison answered, her tone matter-of-fact but catty.

“Who’s Master Lister?” Jennet had asked innocently.

“A gentleman,” Alison replied, tossing her head sharply, as though to emphasise the importance of this man’s rank. “And he wasn’t her husband. Jennet Preston seduced a gentleman, can you imagine it?” she added with a giggle.

Jennet had been confused. She didn’t really understand a lot of what Alison was telling her, but guessed that this Master Lister must have fallen in love with kind, smiling Jennet Preston. That was quite clever of Jennet, she thought, to make a gentleman fall in love with her.

“How did she do that?” Jennet asked.

“Who knows,” Alison replied. “Maybe she bewitched him!” she added with a mischievous cackle.

“Alison! You can’t say things like that!” Jennet exclaimed.

“Why not?” asked Alison with a casual shrug. “I only mean that she might have cast a love spell. People do spells all the time, for all sorts of things. Look at what Grandmother does. She’s started teaching me too, so that I might know spells and remedies for everything, just like she does.”

“Can I learn?” Jennet asked eagerly.

“When you’re much older,” replied Alison haughtily. “And only if you have the gift. Not everyone has the gift, you know. Even if you do have it, Grandmother will want to be sure that you won’t use it for ill-wishing before she’ll teach you. Ill-wishing is witchcraft.”

“I would never do anything bad!” Jennet exclaimed. “I only want to mend people, like Grand-mama.”

Despite her pleas, neither Alison nor their grandmother had checked to see if Jennet had the gift. Alison didn’t share any of her learning with her younger sister, and no amount of prying or pleading could persuade her to loosen her tongue. Now, sitting in her crumbling den, Jennet was reminded of how much she wanted to have her grandmother’s gift and some of her powerful knowledge. She realised, however, that she could still pretend. She could make up her own spells in the safety of her den and pretend that she was turning milk to butter, or making ale taste better. She’d no use for love spells yet, but she could pretend to cure a few sick animals. If she pretended to do all these things now, she was sure that when her grandmother decided she was old enough to learn properly, she would be even better prepared than Alison.

 

It was almost dark when Jennet decided to venture back indoors that evening. She had been so absorbed in her game of magic that she hadn’t noticed the fading light. She approached the door of Malkin Tower with some trepidation, feeling certain that her mother would be waiting behind it, armed with some harsh words and a cross expression. Carefully, she opened the door, trying to prevent it from creaking so that she could sneak in without drawing attention to herself.

To Jennet’s surprise, however, the sound which greeted her was not her mother’s scolding tone but raised voices coming from the back of the house. Unable to dissuade her curiosity, Jennet crept towards the kitchen and hid around the corner, close enough to hear but out of sight. She immediately recognised the two voices as those of her mother and Alison. She sighed disappointedly. Arguments between her mother and Alison were nothing new; Alison was forever disappearing into the countryside for hours on end, and her mother never knew what she was doing or who she was with. She was about to lose interest and walk away from her hiding place, when something Alison said caught her attention.

“You know what John Robinson says about you?” Alison asked her mother. Even from her hiding place, Jennet could sense the vindictiveness in her sister’s tone. She shuddered. She hated it when Alison behaved like this.

“No, Alison,” her mother sighed in reply. “Tell me, what does he say?”

“He says you’re a whore,” Alison spat. “He knows that you had a child with Richard Sellers when my father was still alive.”

“Yes, I’m sure he does know that, Alison,” replied her mother, forcing her tone to remain even through gritted teeth. “I’m sure everyone round here knows that. You’ve known about it yourself for a few years now, and I really wish you’d stop bringing it up. She’s your sister, Alison.”

Jennet’s interest began to dissipate. Her mother was right; Alison was always bringing up the fact that she and Jennet had different fathers. Like Alison, Jennet knew that Richard Sellers was her father, and that she only had the Device name because her mother chose not to mark her as different from her siblings. None of this was anything new. She thought about leaving her hiding place again. Perhaps she could go and find her grandmother, or James.

“How do you feel about people calling you a whore, mother?” Alison demanded, recapturing Jennet’s attention with her raised voice. “Does it not make you angry? Does it not make you ashamed?”

“Ashamed? Never!” said her mother in response, her voice growing louder now as she became angrier. “No one can understand my actions, no one can understand how I felt at the time, and no one should judge me!”

“So it makes you angry?” Alison goaded. Jennet could sense the pleasure she was taking in riling her mother. She shuddered again, feeling glad now that she was still hiding.

“Yes it makes me angry! A pox on John Robinson, and his brother too! A pox on them both!” her mother screamed.

Silence followed. To Jennet it was a long, worrying silence, since from her hiding place she couldn’t see what had happened. Stealthily, she crept towards the door and peered round into the room. There, she could see her mother, sat down, the dog they called Ball spread across her lap. Ball must have come in for scraps before the argument had ensued. Poor Ball, thought Jennet, caught in the middle. He didn’t even live here really; he just came in when he felt like a meal and a fuss.

“It’s alright Ball,” she could just about make out her mother’s muttering. “It’s alright. We’ll show them, won’t we? We’ll teach them to hold their nasty tongues. I curse the Robinson brothers. I curse them both.”

Jennet gasped. This was the first time she’d heard her mother speak in that way. She tiptoed away from the doorway, unseen, and went through to the bedroom where she slipped silently under a blanket. She didn’t feel like eating now, she didn’t want to see her mother; she just wanted to hide away. After a while she fell into a restless slumber, disturbed by the thought that her mother had just wished away two lives, that the Robinson brothers might suffer dreadful deaths as a result of her words. Tossing and turning, she cried out in her sleep, her dreams plagued by images of death and suffering. In the middle of the night, surrounded by darkness, Jennet awoke suddenly, a sharp gasp of air escaping from her lungs as she sat up straight. In the pitch black silence, a terrible thought suddenly occurred to her. If her mother had the gift, she realised, then she had just used it to ill-wish someone, to throw a curse upon them. Alison’s words rang in her ears. Ill-wishing is witchcraft.

Jennet gulped hard. Had her mother just done the work of a witch?

The Pendle Witch Girl will be released on 18th August 2018 and will be available in e-book and paperback from Amazon, Kobo, Smashwords, iTunes and Barnes & Noble.

The Pendle Witch Girl: Cover & Blurb Reveal!

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Today I am delighted to reveal the cover and blurb for my forthcoming novella, The Pendle Witch Girl. This third installment of the Witches of Pendle series revisits the infamous trials of 1612, focusing on the childhood story of Jennet Device, an impoverished and impressionable young girl who finds herself at the very centre of Pendle’s first witch hunt, with tragic consequences.

The Pendle Witch Girl will be released in ebook and paperback format on 18th August 2018 – the 406th anniversary of the start of the trials in Lancaster.

What should you do when you discover that you’re the child of witches?

This is the predicament which faces Jennet Device. An illegitimate and lonely child, Jennet can only look on in horror while her family engage in the dark side of the folk magic learned from her grandmother, the notorious cunning woman known as Old Demdike. As terrifying tales of bewitchment and murder sweep through the Forest of Pendle, Jennet is forced to realise the power of their vengeance, and her powerlessness to stop it.

When her family’s practices come to the attention of the local sheriff, Jennet suddenly finds herself at the centre of a witch trial which could destroy them all. The little girl from Pendle is now the court’s star witness, and she has a terrible choice to make: can she bring herself to lie to protect them, or find the courage to tell their stories to the world even if it could cost them their lives?