Tales of the Good Witch

Witches don’t exactly have a reputation for being good. For centuries, they’ve usually been depicted as frightening, wicked creatures, in everything from ancient classics such as Homer’s Odyssey to current TV shows like True Blood. We shudder over the Weird Sisters from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, who coined the phrase “double, double, toil and trouble,” and Minnie Castevet’s evil plot to see Satan’s son reborn in the film Rosemary’s Baby.

But a few good, or even goofy, witches have popped up in literature and movies, to offset their malicious counterparts. The Harry Potter series has plenty of good-hearted spellcasters. Some of our other favorite magical women include: Glinda from The Wizard of Oz (of course); Galadriel, an elf from J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings; and the Sanderson Sisters from Hocus Pocus. (Who doesn’t love Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy together, back from the dead?)

There’s another good witch who has been on our minds lately: Mrs. Risk, the heroine of Angela Zeman’s titles Tales of the Witch and The Witch and the Borscht Pearl. Mrs. Risk is an all-star sleuth who uses her psychic abilities to solve mysteries—both natural and supernatural—in her tiny Long Island hometown, Wyndham-by-the-Sea. The villagers Mrs. Risk is not entirely gentle, however. She does have a record of a few murders … but she only kills bad guys.

Zeman is a founder of the Mystery Writers of America and maintains a strong voice in the world of modern mystery literature. Her work is characterized by her clever wit and speedy plot development. Keep your eyes of newt peeled for the double ebook debut of Tales of the Witch and The Witch and the Borscht Pearl this June!