The Ruin of All Witches: Life and Death in the New World

"The narrative of this book centres on the frontier town of Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1651, when there were rumours of witches and heretics, and the community became ensnared in a web of spite, distrust and denunciation. This was the beginning of colonial America, where newly arrived English settlers’ dreams of love and liberty could give way to paranoia and terror, enmity and rage. Gaskill uses previously unexamined sources to tell the tragic story of one family, and through it, to expose an entire society in agonised transition between supernatural obsessions and the coming of a more enlightened age. Gaskill has written several books on witchcraft, but this one is a little different. He focuses on one specific episode 370 years ago to teach broader lessons about superstition, mental illness and human cruelty. He examines the misery of the isolation endured by pioneers far from home, trapped in an alien and frightening environment. The book is beautifully and clearly written and it has received great reviews. I was quite surprised to find that I was interested in witches after reading it."