When her widower father inherits a castlelike estate in the mountains of West Virginia, 12-year-old Jen is thrilled. It seems like a wish come true. But she quickly realizes that not all change is positive. Her dad has a mysterious new girlfriend, Moura, who slowly drives a wedge between Jen and her father. Furthermore, Moura has an unusually strong—almost obsessive—interest in the antiques that fill the mansion, especially a beautiful glass globe that Jen finds hanging in a window. When Jen’s cat accidentally breaks the globe, which Moura calls a “witch catcher,” strange things begin to happen. . . . An odd-looking girl wearing a torn dress appears, seemingly out of nowhere, and Moura’s behavior becomes more sinister, leading Jen to believe that her father is a pawn in an evil scheme. Soon Jen finds herself caught in the midst of a supernatural war, with the fate of an enchanted race—and her family—at stake. Inspired by the age-old legend of witch catchers, Mary Downing Hahn brings a magical cast of characters to life in this compelling fantasy adventure. Author’s note.

The magic and suspense of Graceling meet the political intrigue and unrest of Game of Thrones in this riveting fantasy debut. Your greatest enemy isn't what you fight, but what you fear. Elizabeth Grey is one of the king's best witch hunters, devoted to rooting out witchcraft and doling out justice. But when she's accused of being a witch herself, Elizabeth is arrested and sentenced to burn at the stake. Salvation comes from a man she thought was her enemy. Nicholas Perevil, the most powerful and dangerous wizard in the kingdom, offers her a deal: he will save her from execution if she can break the deadly curse that's been laid upon him. But Nicholas and his followers know nothing of Elizabeth's witch hunting past--if they find out, the stake will be the least of her worries. And as she's thrust into the magical world of witches, ghosts, pirates, and one all-too-handsome healer, Elizabeth is forced to redefine her ideas of right and wrong, of friends and enemies, and of love and hate. Virginia Boecker weaves a riveting tale of magic, betrayal, and sacrifice in this unforgettable fantasy debut.

Life for Honesty and his sisters Mercy and Patience is not a bundle of laughs. His family are strict Puritans and singing, dancing and anything that sounds like fun is forbidden. Life, Honesty thinks, can't get much worse when Christmas is cancelled by order of the government. But he is wrong - the real problem is Gran who has one tooth, a hooked nose, a very hairy chin and a pet toad called Merlin. Honesty suspects she may be a witch, especially since she's been helping the neighbours with love potions and cures for sick pigs. When the WitchFinder General - Ezekial Bones visits the village, Honesty is convinced his family's terrible secret will be discovered. Can he save Gran from the terrible Three Tests for Witches (eg pond ducking - if she swims she's a witch, if she drowns she's innocent.) For a boy who has never told a lie in his whole life - it's asking a lot.

Scholarly reprint of the writings of the Witchfinder General and his accomplice.

Today the baseball catcher is a familiar but uninspiring figure. Decked out in the so-called tools of ignorance, he stolidly goes about his duty without attracting much attention. But it wasn't always that way, as Peter Morris shows in this lively and original study. In baseball's early days, catchers stood a safe distance back of the batter. Then the introduction of the curveball in the 1870s led them to move up directly behind home plate, even though they still wore no gloves or protective equipment. Extraordinary courage became the catcher's most notable requirement, but the new positioning also demanded that the catcher have lightning-fast reflexes, great hands, and a cannon for a throwing arm. With so great a range of needed skills, a special mystique came to surround the position, and it began to seem that a good catcher could single-handedly make the difference between winning and losing.

Cade Doyle has moved back to his father's hometown of Smithfield, Rhode Island. It is a typical New England town full of history and legends. The city was founded in 1636, making it older than most towns and cities across the country. Roads wind through rolling hills and pass fields of stacked stone walls built centuries ago by the town's founders. Massive oak trees rise high along the side of the roads peacefully signaling Mother Nature's seasons. There is, however, one tree that differs from the rest. It sits in the middle of the street surrounded by a three-way intersection called the crossroads. Scars from screeching tires and metal can be seen on the bark of the thick trunk. Every year, the thin sick-looking branches claw their way up and resist the town's attempts to cut them down. Known as the Witching Tree, its stories date back to the town's earliest days. It is said if a person goes around the tree three times reciting an old incantation, the witch will appear and attempt to kill them. Cade and new friends will find out if the legend is true and dig up a long buried secret within the town.

Occult historian and scholar Montague Summers offers his narration of The Discovery of Witches, an essay written by the notorious witch hunter Matthew Hopkins. Working in the 1640s, Hopkins was the driving force behind the execution of more than a hundred alleged witches. The Discovery of Witches was designed as a guide to finding, interrogating and executing suspected witches. Various marks upon the body are mentioned as devilish, while tests of witchcraft such as swimming - whereby a woman was forcibly immersed in water - were devised as a means of determining a person's affinity to illicit magic. Summers offers an extensive introductive commentary, describing characteristics of various cases found in historic court records from Medieval times onward. Both male and female individuals were accused of possessing magical powers, and were hauled before local magistrates or barons to face punishment. On some occasions, maladies suffered by locals or livestock were attributed to destructive curses placed by the purported magic user. Such cases were frequent until the early 18thcentury, when laws involving illicit wizardry and witching were removed from England's statutes.