Book Review - The Witches by Peter Curtis

The Witches by Peter Curtis

Miss Mayfield, a schoolteacher recently returned from Africa, takes up a post in Walwyk, a remote Essex village where nothing is quite as it seems. From the outset, Miss Mayfield gets caught up in her concern for Ethel, a local girl who is evidently abused by her Granny Rigby.

Miss Mayfield's interference uncovers strange goings on, and mysterious deaths, and ultimately results in a mishap which changes the course of her fragile state of mind, and her employment at Walwyk school.

Deborah Mayfield, however, isn't one to let things lie. Determined to save Ethel, she returns to Walwyk and makes a final stand.

This book is beautifully written, and Miss Mayfield's antics capture the imaginations from the first page. There's something to be said about books written in what I term my 'grandma's era' in that the language and expression is so wonderful, and yet lost to modern literature.

The book's foreword is provided by Cyril Frankel, director of the classis Hammer film The Witches which was inspired by this book.

Peter Curtis is the pseudonym of Norah Lofts