The Book of Magic

Author Alice Hoffman has written over thirty novels, plus another eight for young adults. This book is the fourth in the series following Practical Magic. Although it is claimed that one can read the books in any order, this last in the series was difficult for me to follow. Unquestioningly, fans of this series will want to have a long story about the family of witches and their adversaries. For one not given to fantasy genres, the story lacked appeal. The Owens family witches labor under a curse that sentences their beloved to certain death. The curse demands a personal sacrifice from the family, which is undertaken by the older generation. They are impelled by love and a close bond within the family. If readers have fallen under the spell of the previous books, they will certainly want to read the resolution of this story. For the rest of us, it seems overlong with distracting and unnecessary details.