One could hardly toss stones at such a loyal creature. He could not be chased off with pails of vinegar and water nor with shouts and threats.
In the child’s first days at Hannah’s cottage, the insistent bird beat his wings against the cloudy, pitted glass window, doing his best to be let in. Changeling or not, Hannah Owens carried the baby back into the woods, singing as they went, the first human words the baby would remember. Maria was a beautiful baby, with pitch-black hair and pale gray eyes, a silvery shade so unusual the old woman wondered if she wasn’t a changeling, for this was a place where strange things happened and fate could be a friend or a foe. That was how the old woman discovered the abandoned child, staring at a bird nearly as large as herself, fearless and wide-eyed from the start. She was a quiet baby, but as the day passed she began to fuss and then to cry, doing so unfailingly and with great effort, until at last a crow came to perch on her basket, peering at her with its quick black eyes. There was a foot of snow on the ground, but the sun was strong and whoever had named the child Maria had most assuredly loved her, for the wool of the blanket was of a very fine grade, certain to keep her warm, and she’d been well cared for, not lacking for comfort or food. She was found on a January day in a field where the junipers grew, wound in a blue blanket with her name carefully stitched along the border with silk thread. You can pick up your copy today, wherever books are sold, and start reading below. Centuries before Sally and Gillian raised a little hell in Massachusetts, Maria lived and loved by her own rules on both sides of the Atlantic.īrimming with heart, Alice Hoffman's Magic Lessons, is the sort of book we all need this Halloween. Magic Lessons reaches way, way back to find the foundling Maria - the Owens' family matriarch - adopted and raised by Hannah Owens in 17th-century England. The first, The Rules of Magic, centers on Sally and Gillian's aunts, Franny and Jet, growing up in New York City. Magic Lessons is the second of Hoffman's Practical Magic prequel novels. Alice Hoffman's Magic Lessons, the Practical Magic prequel, explores the events that led up to the Owens family's infamous curse - and if you're looking for a spooky, nostalgic new book, you can start reading it right now, exclusively on Bustle.
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