1963 novel about an advertising man married to a witch
Posted by Arfies on September 25, 2021, 10:48 am
I first encountered the existence of this book in the comment section of a blog post (with the wrong title) and decided to find it. The post claimed that Mary Savage, the author of this book, sued "Bewitched" because it was about an advertising man married to a witch, as her book was, and they settled. However, I doubt this happened, because I can't find any evidence of it. So I assume it's just the internet being the internet. I don't have a newspaper archive subscription anymore to check.
The correct title of the Mary Savage book is "A Likeness to Voices." I haven't finished it yet, but beyond that premise, it's not really very similar to "Bewitched." Still, it should be an interesting read. It's partially told by a cat.
Thanks for the link. I'm on page 23 and agree that it's not the same story, but the cat Rasputin has drawn me in and I'm going to finish the novel Sow's ears are not made into silk purses by the addition of a few dandelions, Samantha!
Re: 1963 novel about an advertising man married to a witch
Over a year later and I FINALLY finished it. It was...okay. Other than an advertising man married to a witch, as noted, there aren't any similarities to "Bewitched." It's much darker.
SPOILERS: Stanley Withers, a human recently fired from an ad agency, doesn't know his wife Jessica is a witch. She was raised by her aunt Persy to be "Venefica," an evil one, without her knowledge. His son Tommy has unknowingly inherited some of his mother's gifts. Sybil Harling, another witch pretending to be Tommy's teacher, tries to take him under her wing with her boss, "Thorny." She's also using the many-lived cat Rasputin as a spy to the Withers family. The narrator switches from a third-person omniscient of Stanley to a first-person account from Rasputin the cat. Chapters are usually opened with a quote from a witchy source- I can tell Mary Savage read a lot about it.
I'm glad the cat lived after all. The overall tone actually reminded me of Al Hine's "Bewitched" novel, witchy with random adult situations that seemed more placed for shock value than anything else.
Characters sometimes didn't get enough introduction, throwing me for a loop (I STILL don't know who the "Captain" is. Just thrown in there). I feel like a lot wasn't explained in the book itself; just sort of happens.
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on September 25, 2021, 10:48 am