The Once and Future Witches Final Thoughts

[Sheri]

THis is the place for final thoughts, or thoughts about the book as a whole. If you don’t feel like doing multiple posts, here’s the place to sum up overall thoughts!

Did you like it? Why or why not?

What are your parting thoughts about this world’s witchcraft and womanhood?

How does sisterhood play a part throughout?

[Megan]

I liked it. I didn't love it. The premise was great, and there were so many amazing characters - but there was a coldness and flatness to the tone that made it hard for me to get fully immersed. It impressed me with its cleverness more than it drew me in.

The way that the author wove in real or real-ish people and events was a really clever way of shorthanding her thoughts without making the book even longer - so when she attributed things to witchcraft, you could see what she was going for with it being the underpinning of innate power. I liked how men could access it if they needed to, but only those men who were excluded from political and economic power ever had to, but women of all classes and cultures had no other recourse, so their magic came in more flavors. For me, that was the real genius of this world - not some poorly defined girl power or feminine mystique was revealed as a secret, but the rules of magic were consistent and logical.

I have a personal issue with stories that promote the idea that biologically defined family is somehow a guarantee of closeness, understanding, loyalty, etc. I appreciated that (to me at least) it was pretty clear from the beginning that any bond between the sisters was because of their shared history/trauma, not some random genetic connection. But that got muddied as the story went on, particularly with the earlier set of sisters also being actual blood relatives of one another. And the ending, with Bella and Agnes somehow deserving to go on and live their lives because they have love interests, but still being kind enough to periodically check in on Juniper, who was apparently forgotten by everyone else since she wasn't in a romantic relationship, made me want to throw the book across the room.

[Jen W.]

I liked the book a lot. I really loved the writing - I made quite a few highlights which I usually do when something strikes me or makes me stop and admire a turn of phrase.

Looking back on it now, a few weeks out from finishing it, it felt a little bit like a fairy tale or a legend, which I think was the author's intent. I didn't get particularly attached to any of the characters, but I also felt like that was part of that, a conscious, deliberate choice of the language and storytelling style to keep us a little at a distance from the three sisters. The villain majorly creeps me out, though.

I liked the tying together of women's suffrage with the women's power of witchcraft, and that the anti-suffragette was also in deep denial about her own witch powers. I agree with Megan: I liked the rules of witchcraft in this world as it was presented. I enjoyed how the author slotted the three sisters into the traditional Goddess roles of maiden, mother, and crone. I also really liked the clever twists on traditional stories and folktales to include witchcraft.

I'm an only child (with no female cousins either), so I feel like my perspective on sisterhood, or at least biological sisterhood, is that of an outsider looking in. Like, I understand what it should look like from media and seeing others interact with their siblings, but it's not an experience I'll ever have. I have friends who I consider like sisters, but I think that's a different experience as it's a chosen relationship. I did like that the trust and connection between the sisters was something they had to work at. They didn't suddenly get along just because they're related or because they were bonded by their powers; they had to work at healing and letting go of their trauma, and reexamine what they thought they knew about one another.

[Rebecca]

I didn't love this, but more in an "it's not you, it's me" way. I think there are two sides to feminism: the first is "women can do anything men can do!" and the second is "things that are coded as feminine are not lesser than those coded as masculine!" Both of these are important, and the second could perhaps use more emphasis in the discourse, but the first is where I generally find myself. I don't really identify with the maiden-mother-crone thing, I don't feel like the descendent of the witches you couldn't burn, I've never felt like the keeper of secret womanly knowledge. Not that the book doesn't make it clear that there are many ways to be a woman, but it's basically about reclaiming the power of the feminine, which is great but not really my scene.

I, too, appreciated that the magic was traditionally but not inherently feminine, for the reasons Megan mentions but also just because I would've bounced harder off the idea of the innate power of womanhood (however that would be defined). As I was writing this, it occurred to me to wonder whether Gideon Hall is an example of the way men can sometimes co-opt "feminine" pursuits to great acclaim, like women cook for the family but men are the great chefs, or women play piano in the parlor but men are the maestros.

I do have a sister, and we get along well, but I don't know that there's anything inherently special about that kind of relationship. We might share some inherited personality traits, but mostly we've just spent a lot of time together. I wasn't thinking that the original three were actually sisters - wasn't one of them Gideon/Hansel's sister? I don't have the book any more to check. I agree with Jennifer that the main protagonists' relationships seemed more meaningful because they had to figure out how to come back together after their estrangement.

I didn't initially think of Juniper's death as punishment for singledom, but yeah, I guess she's the dispensable one because she doesn't have her own family. I think it would've been cooler if she'd lived and, I dunno, travelled the backcountry liberating other abused girls, even if it would make the climax less wrenching or whatever. Her mostly-death also bothers me in that it breaks the symmetry of the triad. Maybe her sisters will eventually join her as the new not-quite-dead Three.

[Susan]

I read the first 125 pages in a book but had to return it to the library and then listened to the remaining 14 hours on audiobook. I am in the liked it but didn't love it camp also.

The book was long and there were several parts that were fairly gratuitous and could have been edited out and the book shorter. Frankly the whole suffragette movement and most of its characters were disposable. It was mostly irrelevant to the witchcraft movement. At points I felt the author was trying to check off some social construct checkboxes. Inez (I think that was their name) as a transgender character was discussed in about 3 sentences and being transgender felt like a checkbox and nothing else. The interracial relationship with Cleo was better developed as Cleo brought a lot to the table. And Bella being lesbian was also critical to her story.

I did enjoy the tie-ins with all the various nursery rhymes. That felt very clever and held my interest.

I found Juniper's death and the ending a bit unsatisfying. Having them just kill Gideon Hill would have been "too pat" I think so maybe the author was going for the dramatic. But I agree with the others that the mostly-dead limbo place feels unresolved which is where my dissatisfaction comes from.

As for the sisterhood, I mostly get it. I am the youngest of 4. I have two older sisters and a brother. I am closest relationship-wise to the oldest, 13 years older than me. However, the three of us talk to each other on the phone for close to an hour *every* weekend (individually, not all 3 at the same time). I rarely call my brother even though we have a fine relationship. I think it may be less genetics and more personality traits and shared events that defines who in my family I am and am not close to.

I have several very close friends but it is definitely different than my sisters. We're close, spend time together often, but, for all of us, our families come first. However, if I had to assemble my team for the zombie apocalypse it would be my friends.

[Megan]

Susan, you raise a great point - despite the framing, the actual concept of suffrage did turn out to be almost beside the point in terms of the plot and resolution. That didn't really hit me until you made me think of it, and it really does feel like a missed opportunity, particularly with Juniper's story arc as the one who wanted to get involved with the suffrage movement in the first place. It would have been cool to follow that thread to the end now that she's had more life experience and has met some less than stellar elected officials.....