First published 2009
Connie Goodwin plans to spend her summer researching her doctoral dissertation. Her mother has other ideas. She asks Connie to handle the sale of her grandmother's empty house near Salem. Connie agrees and travels to the old family property. While exploring the house, she finds an antique Bible from the 1600s. Hidden inside is an ancient key holding a scrap of parchment. Someone has written a name on it: Deliverance Dane. Connie becomes determined to learn who this woman was. Her search leads her to hunt for a physick book, a rare medical manuscript with secret knowledge. As Connie pieces together Deliverance's story, she experiences disturbing visions of the Salem witch trials from the 1690s. The deeper she digs, the more she realizes her family's connection to Salem's violent past runs deeper than she ever suspected. The investigation forces her to confront uncomfortable truths about her ancestry and her own identity.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, mystery, academic
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, suspenseful
Tropes: amateur-sleuth, family-legacy, supernatural-investigation
Setting: Salem
Period: 1600s, 1690s
371 pages · Hardcover · voice