The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane (2009) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

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Characters edit see section history

• Connie Goodwin: The novel's protagonist, a Harvard graduate student planning to spend her summer doing research for her doctoral dissertation
• Deliverance Dane: A seventeenth century woman, accused of witchcraft
• Manning Chilton: Connie's academic advisor.
• Samuel ("Sam") Hartley: Steeplejack, preservationist and Connie's boyfriend.
• Grace: Connie's hippie mom
• Liz: Connie's roommate
• Arlo: Connie's dog, a mongrel with characteristics of both hound and terrier.
• Sophia: Connie's grandmother aka Granna or Grace's mother
• Mercy Dane Lamson: Daughter of Deliverance

Quotes edit see section history

• “She was always puzzled that people say that darkness falls. To her it seemed instead to rise, massing under trees and shrubs, pouring out from under furniture, only reaching the sky when the spaces near the ground were full.”

  Connie Goodwin

• “Connie and Liz had often joked that grad students make terrible dinner party guests, because they cannot be gotten away from reading the spines of the books.”

  Connie Goodwin

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• We can understand the world only through the language that is at our disposal. Every period has its own linguistic—and perceptive—lens.

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• “Science still knows how to doubt, but it has lost the ability to believe. Faith is what distinguishes the alchemical mind from the purely scientific one. And this is where the real value of alchemical knowledge lies.”

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• “One of the weirdest things about this time period is that it’s before the Scientific Revolution. They didn’t have the scientific method, and so they couldn’t tell the difference between correlation and causation. The world would have seemed like a big, incomprehensible progression of random occurrences and acts of God.”

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• ’Tis forever women leaping to condemn each other, she reflected. She wondered why that was. Women posed dangers to one another that they somehow did not pose to men.

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• AGLA. A kabbalist notarikon that is thought to refer to Atah GiborLeolam Adonai, an unspeakable name for God sometimes translated as “Lord God is eternally powerful.” Ref. Appears 1615 in the alchemical treatise Spiegel der Kunst und Natur together with Gott, the German word for God, as well as the Greek letters alpha and omega.

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• “Most cases of witchcraft occurred sporadically,” she continued. “The average witch was a middle-aged woman who was isolated in the community, either economically or through lack of family, and so was lacking in social and political power. Interestingly, research into the kinds of maleficium”—her

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• The University of Virginia online archive of Salem witchcraft papers held in special collections all over New England enables an ease of research that an earlier generation of scholars could only dream about; see http://etext.virginia.edu/salem/witchcraft/.

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• simulacrum of a first-period, pre-1700 house, with furnishings of subsequent generations added gradually over the centuries. Except that the house was not a simulacrum.

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• On the block, Connie saw carved a simple stick figure of a man, about one foot tall, wearing a hat or headdress, hands and feet held out straight. Next to the left hand was carved a five-pointed star, next to the right a crescent moon, by the left foot a sun, and by the right foot a serpent or lizard. The carving was untutored and imprecise, errant chisel marks still visible in the old stone. It had clearly not been wrought by a headstone carver or other person trained for such work. Above the rough picture was carved a single word, in all capital letters: TETRAGRAMMATON.

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• cordwainer who was forever volunteering for town committees. Appleton snorted with distaste. Palfrey had sat on almost every jury this year, on top of being elected town fence viewer. There were rumors he was putting himself forward for full

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• Harvard University: The novel opens at Harvard University where our protagonist is taking her doctorate orals.
• Marblehead, Massachusetts: A coastal community on the Nahant peninsula where Connie's grandmother's abandoned house is located.
• Salem Village, Massachusetts: Site of the famous witchcraft outbreak

First Sentence edit see section history

Table of Contents edit see section history

Glossary edit see section history

• cunning woman: Practictioner of folk magic
• Shadow book: Book containing religious text, generally Wiccan, and instructions for magical rituals
• antediluvian: of or belonging to the period before the Flood. Gen. 7, 8. or very old, old-fashioned, or out of date; antiquated; primitive:

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

• Witchcraft: Describe this theme.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Katherine Howe (Author)

Other Contributors:

1. Jessica Shantan Heslin (Designer) - Designer, print edition
2. Katherine Kellgren (Performer) - Audible edition Performed By Katherine Kellgren

First Edition edit see section history

Awards edit see section history

• Booklist Editors’ Choice: Media, 2009 (2009)

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
• Dewey: 813.6

Notes for Parents edit see section history

Descriptions of hanging might be too much for younger readers

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Literature & Fiction › Contemporary

More Books Like This edit see section history