Witches hold a very special space in the literary sphere. They are women who can connect with various powers in their world to use to their advantage. Writing witches into stories takes more than just a wave of a wand; many don’t even use wands. As you research witches to understand how to incorporate them into your story, look at these five types of witches and book recommendations to help inspire your craft.
Nature Witches – The Nature of Witches by Rachel Griffin
Nature witch’s magic harnesses natural elements in the world. They can manipulate and absorb their magic through elements such as air, earth, fire, and water unless otherwise challenged in fantastical worlds, like how Adventure Time uses fire, ice, candy, and slime as their main natural elements. When you’re writing about nature witches, you must figure out what this means for the story and how it affects society in your world. Themes and morals of the story are placed through your character’s abilities and the incorporation of magic in your world.
In The Nature of Witches by Rachel Griffin, the atmosphere shifts into destructive behavior, leaving witches’ control over the climate to falter. Their only hope? Clara. A girl who wants nothing to do with her powers but contains magic that is tied to every season. Unable to control her power, the people she loves get hurt, but when winter rolls in and the climate becomes disastrous, Clara realizes she’s the only one who can help. Through training, love, and the ever-winding tornado of events that test her emotions and decision-making abilities, she must choose between her power and happiness as the world’s fate rests in her hands.
Sea Witches – The Sea Witch by Eva Leigh
Sea witches work specifically with elements in the ocean. This can mean manipulating the water, controlling sea creatures, or even affecting the climate to control sea levels. Depending on how writers create magic in their worlds, sea witches can be tied to the ocean or travel between land and sea. Sea witches tend to have personality traits similar to those of the ocean, which writers must figure out as they craft their characters. Bold, relentless, mysterious, and powerful are all characteristics seen in sea witches.
The Sea Witch by Eva Leigh follows Alys Tanner after she escapes Puritanical New England when she is condemned as a witch. Starting an all-female pirate crew, Tanner fends off the colonial British navy on their hunt to destroy what they cannot control, including witches. When her ship captures a naval navigator, an unlikely alliance is formed between him and our witch pirate captain as a quest arises amidst their meeting. A prisoner who follows the rules and a captain who can control the sea with her magic, these two find that desire can grow in international waters even with the chaos surrounding them.
Universal Witches – A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness
Universal witches deal with universal elements to conjure their magic. Writers who love science can have some fun as the laws of the universe come into play. Writers create rules dictated by the powers the universe wishes to give through its elements, and with those abilities, witches can manipulate their environments to harness their magic. This is where the intricacies of magic come into play for worldbuilders, as witches must learn how the universe works to control their abilities.
A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness follows Diana Bishop into a fantastical underworld after she finds an enchanted alchemical manuscript. Being a scholar and a descendant of witches, Bishop is thrown into a world she never thought she’d be in after discovering Ashmole 782 inside an Oxford library. Here, she’ll find the depths of magic and its intertwining elements with her ancestry alongside vampire geneticist Matthew Clairmont. As the two grow closer, their magic may lead her to romance as she finds her connection with the universe and the people around her.
Coven Witches – The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
Coven witches have strong powers when they work with other witches. While their magic may work independently, it is not as powerful as when they work with other witches. They tend only to be bound to one coven, which creates a connection between all of the women, but they can also be seen working with different women during different periods of their lives; this depends on the writer and how they view the connections of a coven. What they decide on can create meaning for the story of sisterhood and connections, and it will dictate the dynamics within the story.
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna shines a light on Mika Moon, who has been hiding her magic, aside from her online persona, pretending to be a witch. When she gets a message to come to Nowhere House, she tangles her life with the residents in the house. Having been orphaned and kept away from other witches so as not to draw attention to her powers, Mika finds her family on her travels. With evil attempting to get through the door, she realizes she must protect her new found family at all costs if she wants to keep the life they’ve all built together.
Everyday Witches – The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow
Everyday witches find magic in their everyday lives and harness its power through various methods. This is where we find our Sabrina Spellmans and Hermione Grangers. Magic can be found through objects, spells, rituals, or sometimes all three, depending on the lengths the writer will go to extend their witch’s magic. This can involve spellbooks, family traditions, schools, and other types of record keeping, as everyday witches tend to control various aspects of life. Writers need to be careful because the broad abilities of these witches must be able to find their limits. Diving into the magic separate from the character and world-building can be a good way to understand the strengths and weaknesses posed towards everyday witches.
The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow takes us to 1893 with the Eastwood sisters as they turn the women’s movement into a witch’s movement. With witch culture being lost to the burnings, women must find their magic in their everyday nursery rhymes and tidy charms. When the sisters join the suffragists of New Salem, they find themselves consumed by old magic and new alliances to defend themselves against the evils that try to silence them. This novel holds a powerful meaning on the feminist revolution as women find their power through forgotten words and household songs that will make the world realize that the witches never left.
No matter what kind of witch you plan to write, you must take the time to figure out the details of how magic works in your world, who can obtain it, and what its limits are. By examining the presence of witches in books by other authors, writers can get inspiration on how to incorporate magic in their craft while also understanding the different ways witches can be portrayed. Hopefully, these books can help inspire your next story as your witches become real characters your audience won’t get enough of.
For more book recommendations on witches click here.
For more book recommendations to help your writing, check out our Fantasy/ Sci-Fi Books with Insane World Building and Character Development bookshelf on Bookshop.org.
