August 2026

Dear ,

Consider the witch.

Witches existed in culture and myth long before America was colonized, long before the Salem Witch Trials began. In those stories and myths, witches were not always evil but they were powerful, and men feared them for their power — a witch could raise an army of the dead against you, or drown you at sea in a storm, or turn your crew into pigs. A witch could inflict harm, and would not hesitate to do so.

The Trials have always had their own mystique, less because anyone in recent history believed that the victims were actually witches and more because the behavior of the perpetrators has the malevolence of a spell — at least, that's been my sense. Some of the academic work surrounding the trials aims to demystify the victims and perpetrators in the same fell swoop; if the victims were not witches, not even midwives or apothecaries or anyone with any particular knowledge or power, but were instead social outcasts or people who had inconveniently claimed the land that someone else wanted, then the actions of the perpetrators become much less arcane. Mass hysteria certainly remains a possibility, but common bullying and greed appear just as likely as culprits.

I take no issue with the scholarship. I support any attempt to reveal the truth of a thing rather than the bastardized, romanticized version that proliferates in the mind of the general public.

But I do have beef with the particular way the zeitgeist has chewed up and spit out the truth of this one.

The past decade has seen a host of efforts — some of which I've loved — to provide nuance in the stories of women long deemed villains, from Jezebel to Medusa. Witches — not limited to specific witches, but the idea of witches, the mythology of witches — have been part and parcel of these efforts, and what began as an earnest attempt to give these women of myth a voice has attracted some of the worst aspects of modern ideology: the repackaging of the fifties housewife as "the divine feminine," and the pathological terror of being perceived as problematic or harmful.

The witch has been stripped of not just her villainy, but her power.

The reality of the Trials has been co-opted into new mythology. Rather than say the victims of the Trials were not witches, they have redefined the witch to mean a victim. Anyone with a houseplant habit and a tattoo can call themselves a social outcast, a little different, someone who never quite fit in, and can therefore be a witch. She does not have the capacity or desire for harm. She doesn't have any power, and therefore any responsibility. She's just a girl.

Many things changed between my first and final drafts of Fawn / The Devil Knows Her Name, but one thing that remained the same was Tess's refusal to be harmless, blameless, powerless. I intended to write a woman who took responsibility for her corner of the world, who reveled in her power and understood the cost of it. A woman who, given the choice between villainy and powerlessness, would choose villainy every time.

I wanted to reclaim the mythology of the witch.

If nothing else, I think I succeeded on that front. In just a few weeks, you'll be able to decide for yourself.

News and Events

If you’re local to the Western New York area, I hope you’ll join me for the official launch event of The Devil Knows Her Name at Act 4 Books.

I’m absolutely delighted to have V.A. Vazquez, author of the USA TODAY bestseller The Death Row Club, joining me for conversation, a Q&A, and signing.

The event is free but RSVPs are requested, so please sign up here if you’re able to attend!

If you can’t make it, you’ll also be able to catch me at…

• Walls of Books / Parma, OH / September 19th at 4 p.m.

• Warsaw Public Library / Warsaw, NY / October, exact date TBD

• A Writing Room / San Francisco, CA / October, exact date TBD

Your August Deleted Scene: Dream-Walking

Since we’re officially in launch month, I want to share a scene from Fawn / TDKHN that was left on the proverbial cutting room floor. There are no spoilers here, but it does feature characters and allude to events that are in the final version, so if you want to go into the story with no hints, save this one for later.

But, if you’re up for a little sacrilege…

A Moment in the Grass

Having author friends is so fun, and The Author’s Note put on an amazing launch for The Death Row Club. Plus, we celebrated Sylvie’s first gotcha day, I got to visit a brand-new (to me) bookstore in The Siren & The Sea, my goth daylilies bloomed, and I got some fun UK publisher mail (peep the fire on the foil of that Fawn special edition)!

Until next time,

-C