4.25 Stars

When Hannah Owens finds an abandoned baby in the snow, she brings her home and cares for her as her own. Hannah is a healer and teaches the child, Maria, about the “Unnamed Arts,” though it’s clear early on that Maria is a blood witch with special abilities of her own. Hannah’s first important lesson to Maria: “always love someone who will love you back.” Maria is abandoned by the first man she thinks she loves, setting the course for a life filled with hardships, and a curse that will follow generations to come.

I have not read Practical Magic (watched the movie a million times) or Rules of Magic, but knew I needed to read this prequel to those books. Magic Lessons is in essence a book about love. Being blessed and cursed by it, fighting and ignoring it. How love can destroy a life or make one richer. The extremes people will go for it. What and who you choose in love determines the life you’ll get. Love was the central driving force in all of the choices made by the characters in this book.

I loved the deep history of witches that filled the pages. Hoffman clearly did a lot of research. There are magical recipes and spells, such as Courage Tea- which is used often, and magical elements such as familiars and scrying mirrors. The book details the Salem Witch Trials as well as the anti-semitism in the 1600’s- the latter something I never knew about. Even though Hoffman’s narrative is more telling than showing, it still paints a vivid picture of the settings (England, Curaçao, Massachusetts, and New York City) and the characters.

Some portions of the story felt repetitive as the message is driven home, but with well developed characters and an engaging plot, I found this to be an easy and compelling read. I now plan to read the other two books.


*Thank you to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest and voluntary review.

Having read ‘Practical Magic’ and ‘The Rules of the Magic’ I was so looking forward to reading ‘Magic Lessons’ which is a prequel to the others. It definitely did not disappoint. I have to admit it did not hook me in right away, but once it did I could not put it down. I felt as if I were right there watching Maria and John, and then Maria and Samuel. Loved Cadin and Keeper. The setting of the tale has intrigued me since I was a child, Salem in the 1600’s, and Hoffman captured the incredulous nature of the mind sets during this horrific time in history. Having visited Salem many times over the years and read several nonfiction books, I was impressed with the ease with which Hoffman incorporated the setting and horrors inherent of the times into her magical tale so flawlessly. So admired the strength of the women in the face of such adversity. Hopefully there will be many more tales following the Owens women. Many many thanks to Alice Hoffman, Simon and Schuster, and NetGalley for providing me with the opportunity to read this amazing arc soon to be published on October 6th. Hoffman’s many fans will not want to miss this magical tale and hopefully she will add many more new fans that will love her amazing books.

Another great installment in the Practical Magic series from Hoffman. We all already know that Hoffman is a great writer, and I'm enjoying the backward approach she is taking to her Owen's family story.

The setting for this installment is cozy, magical, and whimsical. Perfect for fall just around the corner. It's told more like a fairy tale rather than an intimate story and while sometimes it felt hard to relate to the characters, it did add some mysticism that felt right for the book. As in the other stories, there is great emphasis on female relationships and the consequences of magic.

One thing that I didn't really love compared to the other stories was that, Maria was fighting herself rather than magic like her ancestors. It was harder to get behind a heroine who made her own problems rather than actively fighting against curses that weren't their fault.

I enjoyed this book. Nice to learn more about the Owen's family. ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.

Thank you Net Galley for the opportunity to read this ARC. THIS BOOK, Magic Lessons, will go down as one of my favorites of all time. It is unforgettable. It is intricately woven. I have never been a lover of Magic stories, but this one changed my mind. Beautiful!! I loved every word.

Excellent; I felt like I was reading a Grimm’s fairy tale through much of it because the atmosphere was otherworldly and surreal. There are some continuity problems with the stories but that could be attributed to details changing as stories are handed down over the generations.

4.5 Stars. This book - WOW. As always, Alice Hoffman just gets you right in the heart. The perfect amount of magic, love, family and the power of healing. I have read all the books in the Practical Magic series and the Owens' women, just hold a special place in my heart. It was truly an amazing experience to get to read about Maria, the matriarch of the family and how she came to be and love and grow her family. I loved how every character was formed and how you got to see through that, how the Owens family came to be. I loved every second. Thank you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for the ARC.

This was my first Alice Hoffman book -- and it completely won me over. Set in England, Curacao, and Salem (MA), Absolutely engrossing historical fiction about the period at the very end of the Salem witch trials. I loved the settings and the main characters. The characters' differing attitudes toward magic interested me -- and I loved how genuine those attitudes all were. I'll be back to read much more Alice Hoffman.

I took my time wth this book, savoring each page, not rushing because I knew I would want it to go on as long as possible. It seems that everyone knows and loves Practical Magic, both the movie and the book. Next came The Rules of Magic, which takes place prior to the beloved story. It is a deeper loo at the personalities of the well known aunts, and shares some of the rules they had to learn.
Now we go back in time once again, all the way to the beginning, back to a time where being accused of witchcraft easily means death - and not an easy death! We learn about historical philosophy, the thoughts of the general populace, how love can be a blessing or, more often, a curse. Why the Owens descendants should avoid love, for more reasons than just emotional pain.
We learn how the significance of RED, hair and shoes or boots. We feel the pain of betrayal and abandonment and never being included. Being different or even unknown means not to be trusted and included.
For some, the book may seem to start slowly, a bit disparingly dark. Stay with it. You will take these women (and children) into your heart and find you can relate to their experiences.
Even if you don't, this is a wonderful story.

What is there to say, really? Alice Hoffman is such a master story-teller, I knew the book would be amazing. And it was. Hoffman takes us all the way back to the 1600’s where we meet Maria Owens, the matriarch of The Owen’s Family featured in The Rules of Magic and the Practical Magic Series.

Maria’s life isn’t easy, orphaned at a young age, and then left to take care of herself after she loses her foster mother, she basically has nothing. Only her magic. She pulls herself up by the bootstraps and goes on a journey from Curacao to NYC, to Salem, just in time for the witch trials.

It’s an amazing story of resilience, fortitude, and love. But not just the good part of love, the part that tears us apart and rips us down and jeopardizes everything we hope to become in life. No spoilers here. This is a book that you want to enjoy as you pull back each layer one by one.

Magic Lessons releases on October 6, 2020. A welcome distraction from our current situation as summer turns to fall. Special thanks to Simon and Schuster and Netgalley for an advanced e-galley in exchange for my honest review. My review will be posted to my blog, Women in Trouble Book Blog on September 23, 2020.

Introduces us to Owen's women dating back to 1600’s, their paths and obstacles in the way. Story of relationships, family ties that go beyond bloodlines, bonds formed in love or selfishness.

We meet the Owen's women whose courage was to pursue intellect, nurture their gifts, help others, and choose between use of talent without self-interest and horrors of evil. Well written story of bonds of love, mother/daughter, animals, and nature.
The story also gives us a glimpse of women who have been given no voice in their lives, destined to live a life of servitude and how the Owen woman broke these barriers while others did not.

A beautiful story of character's/.character and life's messages. Appreciated the richness of story-line. Valued the reverence to nature weaved into story.

Wonderful story, held my attention reading. I found many special life's messages throughout book. Magic Lessons does not disappoint. Alice Hoffman once again performs magic with her words.

Some of my favorites I have highlighted are:
"Achingly beautiful weather made the loss cut more deeply"
“Words have power. And they can't be taken back"
“Do as you will, but harm no one. What you give will be returned to you threefold.”

For a good read, gets my thumbs up.

Magic Lessons
How does a bastard, orphan, daughter of a witch and a criminal Englishman dropped in the middle of a forgotten spot in the Caribbean grow up to be a heroine and a mother? Chronicling the nearly but not quite tragic then triumphant origin story of the matriarch of the illustrious Owens clan, Magic Lessons (Simon & Schuster, $27.99, 9781982108847), is an overwhelming triumph. Alice Hoffman’s prequel to Practical Magic is lush, evocative and enchanting. Maria Owen was found abandoned on the banks of the river as an infant. By the age of 19 she’s witnessed ample evidence of love’s destructive power -- her birth mother who had to give her up and her adopted mother Hannah, accused of being an abomination by a man she thought loved her. Women beaten, betrayed, bought and sold by men who should have protected them. So when she meets a good man who only wants to love her, she doesn’t trust it.

The truly terrifying part is that Magic Lessons is steeped in history as well as horror. The real horror is the persecution of these women in the 17th century. The story is bracing. Hoffman is at the height of her powers. There are two stories of true love interwoven into this multigenerational tale-- the love of a woman and a man, the love between a mother and a daughter. A child is stolen and neglected. Animals are hurt in this story, but it is not gratuitously or casually told. Their lives feel as precious within the context of the story as those of almost anyone else in this cast, and it is completely convincing.

Feminist in the most organic and optimistic way. A woman with little power rises but she finds a way to not just save herself but make systemic change along the way. It is heartbreaking and heart healing.

A magical and incredibly addictive book. The story takes place during the seventeenth century, Maria Owens has been unlucky enough to be abandoned during a freezing night in rural England. Fortunately, Maria is adopted by Hannah who raises her and teaches her many important skills. Among those skills that Maria learns are the "Unnamed Arts", as she has a talent for learning that knowledge. But the most important lesson that Maria learns is to always love back whoever loves her. One day, Maria sets sail for Salem, Massachusetts, as the man who swore true love to her abandoned her. Maria wants to invoke a curse on this man's family. But also, in this city, she will have the opportunity to learn the rules of magic and many more lessons. A magnificent book, which describes the problems of Maria and her surroundings. I loved that the story describes some of the ancient languages ​​that were supposedly utilized for magic like Latin, Greek, etc. The city of Salem has always intrigued me, reading a book in which it is mentioned excites me because I have always wanted to know how people thought during this time. I find Maria's intelligence fascinating not only for magic but for everyday life. I am very happy to have read this book that I definitely recommend. I thank NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for my honest review.

I LOVED THIS BOOK! Let me start by saying, I did not read Practical Magic, but it is one of my favorite movies. I did read Rules of Magic and I liked it, but in my opinion it did not compare to this story.

This is the story of Maria Owens and how the curse of the Owens' women came into fruition. This novel was dark, witchy, intelligent, and emotional. I caught myself yelling out to the characters and actually putting my ereader down at times to prepare myself for what I knew I was about to read.
This story ties in true facts from the Salem Witch Trials and teaches us that "Love is the only answer".

Easily one of my favorite reads this year! 5 stars!

This one started so very slowly... I almost gave up on it. About halfway through it picked up and was pretty good from there. I wasn't a huge fan of the movie Practical Magic and never read the book but I really enjoyed Maria's history as it was given here.

I know I am eternally biased to the genius that is Alice Hoffman, but I really did love this book. It took a little bit to warm up, but you begin to care so much about Maria's story. If you have ready Practical Magic & Rules of Magic, you know not everything is going to go great- but you still want to know all that happens. Heartbreaking in usual Hoffman fashion, this book delivers.

his is the story of Maria Owens and Faith, her daughter. It is the prequel to the Practical Magic books, which I loved so much! Finally, we know how the Owens women became so powerful and feared. What a story!

I first saw Practical Magic when it came out as a movie with Sanda Bullock and Nicole Kidman. I was mesmerized and enchanted. I bought the soundtrack. I sang along to my favorite white witch, Stevie Nicks, rock goddess, Gold Dust Woman. I loved everything about the movie. I owned the CD and watched it more than a few times. It was, well, magic. I did not know who Alice Hoffman was.

Years later, I have found goodreads....I am a NetGalley reader; and I begin seeing Rules of Magic coming out on my news feed. I request in and I get it instantly. I am giddy! I loved that book. I loved knowing about the sisters and their backstory. The aunts that danced around the kitchen making margaritas and singing "lime in the coconut". The book was dark but positive too. It was a feel good for me. I did go back and read Practical Magic, needing to know the whole story as Hoffman wrote it. In some ways, I enjoyed the movie more tho. Maybe it was just so familiar. And beautiful.

So..fast forward and now I get an invite to read this one...Magic Lessons. Heck yeah!!! I must know everything about this family. The beginnings. The makings of these strong women. I was soooooo excited. I read it right away. I want to say here tho, it was very dark. Much darker (for me) than the other two books. I was struggling at the beginning. But I was sooooo glad when Maria did not die when I thought she might. I kept on. I had to know what happened and how she survived against all odds. The ending I was hoping for came. No spoiler. It might not be the ending you want. It was right. There are a lot of troubling scenes. Deaths I wish had not occurred.

It is so well written I can't find any fault with the author. The story is heavy. A lot of sadness. But, I was so invested with the characters of Faith and Maria. I cared a great deal about what happened to them. I wanted to hurt those that hurt them.

This is one of my favorite and most memorable reads of 2020. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a digital copy to read for review. I highly recommend it!

I'd like to thank the author, publisher and Net Galley for providing a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I love anything to do with the Salem Witch trials. The subject has always been an interest of mine and I have read everything on the topic - even slightly related - or so I thought. I'm not sure how I missed this author and her books, but I haven't read any of these books. Maybe because I didn't care much for the movie, Practical Magic. So I wasn't sure what to expect going into this book.

Overall, I enjoy the book. The character development, setting and overall story telling was engaging. I actually felt like I was getting to know these characters rather than just reading words on a page. I felt like the author has probably done research and has an interest in the subject and that shows in the writing.

Overall, I'm not dashing out to get the other books by this author, but I will keep those other books on my list to look for. For a subject that I've read and researched so much about, it can be tough to really judge a book by just the book. But hearing another point of view or different aspect of the story can be interesting too.

Alice Hoffman did it again. From already being one of my top 5 FAVORITE authors. She blew me away with this one. I loved reading this like I loved reading all the rest. I felt like I was right in the story!

Beautiful. This is an entrancing story. Loved it. Everyone should read it. You do not have to have read the other books to enjoy this one.