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hardback 1995; paperback 1996, Berkley
It seems like these days some of the best fantasy is not being marketed to the typical fantasy audience. I don't know what this says about publishers' opinions of fantasy readers, when they flood the shelves with umpteen spinoffs from Magic: The Gathering and hide gems like Practical Magic away on the general fiction shelves. This book shouldn't be missed.
Orphans Gillian and Sally are sent to live with their elderly aunts, who turn out to be witches. Growing up, Gillian and Sally witness how the townsfolk revile and avoid the aunts by day, while secretly sneaking to their back door for love potions by night. The town's scorn also falls on the girls; Gillian copes with it by ensnaring men with her beauty and Sally, the responsible one, retreats into herself and devotes her life to taking care of others first.
The two sisters eventually move away from their aunts and grow apart from each other. Gillian embarks on a string of marriages and divorces. Sally's husband dies, leaving her to raise two girls, Kylie and Antonia. The two come together again, however, when Gillian shows up at Sally's doorstep with a corpse.
More than anything else, the story is about love in all its various guises. The writing itself is infused with magic, as in this passage about when Gillian falls in love for keeps with Ben Frye, a science teacher.
A circle of pale yellow light seemed to hover around Ben and Gillian; the light rose higher, then fanned out, across the street and above the rooftops ... On the afternoon when Kylie stood in front of Mrs. Jerouche's house, she wasn't the only one to sense something unusual in the air. A group of boys playing kickball all stopped, stunned by the sweet scent wafting down from the rooftops, and they rubbed at their noses. The youngest turned and ran home and begged his mother for lemon pound cake, heated, and spread with honey. Women came to their windows, leaned their elbows on the sills, and breathed more deeply than they had in years. They didn't even believe in hope anymore, but here it was, in the treetops and the chimneys.The only fault I can find in this book is that the ending is wrapped up rather suddenly and neatly. Problems are magically solved (quite literally) and everyone manages mostly to work out their emotional problems. The prose and the magic of Practical Magic are, however, sublime.
Review by Sara Lipowitz
Reviewed June 14, 1996
ISBN 0-425-16320-2
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