Lessons in Magic and Disaster

by Charlie Jane Anders

Genres: Science Fiction

Synopsis

In the vein of Alice Hoffman and Charlie Jane Anders's own All the Birds in the Sky comes a novel full of love, disaster, and magic.

A young witch teaches her mother how to do magic--with very unexpected results--in this relatable, resonant novel about family, identity, and the power of love.

Jamie is basically your average New England academic in-training--she has a strong queer relationship, a working esoteric dissertation proposal, and inherited generational trauma. But she has one maybe extraordinary secret: she's also a powerful (though fledgling) witch.

Jamie's mother Serena has been hiding from the world in an old one-room schoolhouse for several years, grieving the death of Mae (her wife and Jamie's mom), as well as the simultaneous explosion in her professional life. All she has is her memories--and those aren't always as comforting as they could be.

It's not like Jamie doesn't have enough on her plate, but she wishes she could have Serena back still, so now she's decided to teach Serena to cast spells, so her mother can get her life back.

But Jamie doesn't know the whole story of what happened to her mom years ago, and those buried secrets lead Serena to do some destructive magic. Now it's up to this grad student and literature nerd to understand the secrets of a three-hundred-year-old magical book before her mother ruins both of their lives.

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Release date: August 19, 2025

Publisher: Tor Publishing Group

Print pages: 368