Heidi Eljarbo
Historical Fiction Author
Catching a Witch
Author: Heidi Eljarbo
Series: Duology about Clara Dahl
Genre: Historical Fiction, Clean Read with some scary elements with the witch trials.
What Would You Do to Save Your Best Friend from Burning at the Stake?
The year 1660 is when it all changed...
That's when a witch-hunter comes to Clara Dahl's seaside village in Norway. She's horrified to discover how fast her neighbors and friends are to turn against each other. She soon realizes her sleepy, little, picturesque corner of the world has been invaded by evil—and it has nothing to do with witchcraft.
As neighbor turns against neighbor, Clara finds herself drawn into the fray, forced to do what she can to protect her friends and loved ones. An educated and upstanding minister's daughter, Clara speaks out against the witch-hunter's unjust treatment of those accused of witchcraft. She sees how he plays the villagers, using their superstitions and religious beliefs to make good people accept horrible things.
When Clara’s best friend Bess is accused of being a witch, Clara must make an incredible sacrifice to save not only her friend, but the entire town… before it’s too late.
About the Book
In 1660, women had no voting rights, couldn’t own property, and were treated as second-class citizens. If that weren’t bad enough, many innocent women—especially poor women—were tried and executed for witchcraft. The people responsible for their deaths were often their own friends, family members, and neighbors.
Catching a Witch is a story about a young woman who's willing to do whatever it takes to protect the people she cares about most in this world.
You’ll love this book if you enjoy…
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Historical dramas
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Witches and witch hunting
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Historical thrillers
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The history of religion and superstitions
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A story with a strong female protagonist fighting for what’s right
Readers of similar books such as Year of Wonder by Geraldine Brooks, The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe, The Heretic’s daughter by Kathleen Kent, and The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare will love Catching a Witch.
Praise for Book:
"When Clara Dahl returns to the small Norwegian coastal town she grew up in, she takes great pleasure in being reunited with old friends and reacquainting herself with town life. The daughter of a minister, she has had an unusual life for a 17th-century woman. She is well-educated and well-traveled. The happiness of her return to her seaside home sours with the arrival in the town of Angus Hill. Hill is an Englishman, said to be an apprentice of Matthew Hopkins, known as the Witch-finder General, a man responsible for the death of numerous Englishwomen during the 1640s. Hill, like his mentor, is determined to find and root out witchcraft in all its forms.
The novel begins a little slowly, but the arrival of Hill signals a welcome shift in pace. Two innocent women are 'tested' as witches and quickly die in the process. Clara's close friend Bess, a midwife and healer, inevitably attracts Angus Hill's interest. To save her, Clara and her friends must battle against time and a community seemingly sucked in by Hill's rhetoric. A welcome sub-plot with two mean-spirited twin daughters of an important local family keeps the action flowing, and the threatening presence of the town's reclusive gravedigger adds another interesting character to the story.
This is an enjoyable read, strong on its portrayal of witch-hunting and sympathetic and interesting in its consideration of women's lives in the period, particularly with the tensions between medicine and healing, religion and superstition, and men and women's lives and education."
-The Historical Novel Society
Clara Dahl Duology:
