What We Sacrifice for Magic

July 1, 2024

DEBUT It's 1968, but the "Age of Aquarius" hasn't yet reached tiny Friedrich, MN, where the latest crop of high school grads are expected to follow in their parents' footsteps. Elisabeth Watry-Ridder, heiress to the leader of her family of protective, powerful witches, feels the walls of her future closing in, so she runs off to Minneapolis. It's only when her grandmother, the indomitable, irascible Madga, dies, leaving the family power in tatters and the town desperate for protection, that she learns her grandmother wasn't nearly always as right as either of them thought and that just because things have consistently been that way doesn't mean that she can't forge a new path for handling the burden she's always been expected to bear. VERDICT Readers who enjoyed the witchy cross-generational squabbles in Hazel Beck's "Witchlore" series, lovers of Alice Hoffman's Practical Magic, and anyone who adored the setting and the family dynamics of The Lager Queen of Minnesota by J. Ryan Stradal but wished it had a touch of magic will fall hard for DeWerd's debut, a coming-of-age and coming-into-power story about sacrifice and sisterhood.--Marlene Harris

Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 29, 2024
In this homespun debut, set in 1960s Minnesota, DeWerd serves up a hefty portion of comfort food and witchcraft. Eighteen-year-old Elisabeth Watry-Ridder longs to escape from her dysfunctional family, the insular immigrant community she’s grown up in, and the boy she dated through high school, but a spell cast by her grandmother Magda has locked half her heart in the family’s mysterious cedar chest. Magda has been tutoring her protégé in the dark arts since childhood and demands Elisabeth continue the family tradition of witchcraft, insisting that neither Elisabeth’s younger sister, Mary, nor her mother are gifted enough to do the job. Elisabeth starts to question this when she learns about a falling out between Magda and her mother that happened when Elisabeth was still a baby and witnesses Mary magically shield her paternal grandparents from a road mishap. Will Elisabeth be able to break away from her family—and if she does, will she be able to live without their magic? Though the plot slows to a snail’s pace as Elisabeth dithers over what to do with her life and how to free herself from Magda’s spell, there’s enough summer sausage, seances, and ’60s scene-setting to charm even the least nostalgic of readers. DeWerd should certainly win some fans.

August 1, 2024
Elisabeth Watry-Ridder has just graduated from high school, and she would like nothing better than to escape the confines of small-town Friedrich. It's 1968, and the world is rapidly changing. Unfortunately, Elisabeth's future was decided for her a long time ago. She is to marry her high-school boyfriend, stay in Friedrich, and take over as the head of her magical family. The Watry women have supplied the town of Friedrich with spells, charms, and energy healing for over a century. Because of the immense power Elisabeth showed at an early age, her formidable grandmother Magda trained her to harness the energy they call the ice floe. Elisabeth is torn between pride in her magical abilities and a desire to leave her familial responsibilities. Learning new information about her past drives her further away from Magda and leads to a Solstice where everything changes. DeWerd adds magic to a classic coming-of-age story, and the result is a magical historical-fiction debut. Readers, including older teens, will identify with Elisabeth's desire to forge a new path away from the expectations of her family.

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