Her astonishing debut takes the reader to a Reconstruction-era Southern plantation, where two little girls-the enslaved child of the local healer and the planter's cloistered daughter-become unlikely friends. 'If you are grieving for Toni Morrison, Afia Atakora is the young writer to read now: the kind of historical novelist who makes you believe she must have somehow seen the places she describes and known these characters herself. Conjure Women is a story of the lengths we’ll go to save the ones we love, from a stunning new voice in fiction.

And now she knows she must face her fears – and her ghosts – to find a new way forward for herself and her people. It has shaped her life and her mother’s before her.

What secrets does she keep amidst the charred remains of the Big House? Which spells has she conjured to threaten their children? And why is she so wary of the charismatic preacher man who promises to save them all? Rue understands fear. When sickness sweeps across her tight-knit community, Rue finds herself the focus of suspicion. But this new world brings new dangers, and Rue’s old magic may be no match for them. Times have changed since her mother Miss May Belle held the power to influence the life and death of her fellow slaves. The other is that Miss Rue – midwife, healer, crafter of curses – will know what to do. That’s one thing the people on the old plantation are sure of. But how do you escape the ghosts of the past? A stunning debut novel with echoes of Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing and Sara Collins’ The Confessions of Frannie Langton The pale-skinned, black-eyed baby is a bad omen. A Stylist Best Book of 2020 You’re free to decide your future.

Conjure women