Beautifully if oddly written; mixes stark reason and the lunatic occult. ( )

Mire a su esposa. O, si no está casado, mire a la esposa de cualquer otro hombre. Ahora imagine que es una bruja. Imagine que todas las mujeres son brujas... y que todo lo que los hombres creemos hacer por nuestra propia voluntad es lo que ellas nos obligan a hacer con sus hechizos. ¿La idea le parece ridícula? Eso mismo pensaba Norman Saylor. Así que cuando encontró a su esposa practicando la brujería, la hizo desistir de sus sortilegios y destruir sus amuletos. A partir de entonces, aquello fue un infierno. Literalmente, un INFIERNO.

“But a scientist ought to have a healthy disregard for coincidences.”

Oh ought he? What about finding out your wife of many years has been protecting you and your career by practicing witchcraft? And that she's not the only one...

The lightning flickering while he buries Totem, the murdered cat, is a good, creepy scene! As is the repeated utterance of the phrase, “I want my soul.” I also really liked the ending with the final battle between the witches! If you are into witchcraft, I think this book will be to your liking! It does start fairly slowly, but gathers steam near the end! ( )

Imagine that all the women in the world were witches, some good (white), some bad (black), and there was a constant battle between these good and bad forces and in this way a sort of balance is maintained. Now imagine all the "rationalistic" men in the world haven't got a clue (I know some will say this part is easy). There you have the gist of Conjure Wife.

Norman and Tansy are a stereotypical 1940s young couple. Norman is a college anthropology professor driven by everything scientific and Tansy is a white witch trying to nudge his career along a bit through magic but mainly trying to save his ass from all the evil forces, jealous black witch university spouses, trying to run him down. One day Norman finds some of Tansy's witchy things while going through her personal stuff, something he does regularly when she is not around (which is creepy by itself). Norman enraged demands that Tansy give up all this superstitious nonsense and she like a good wifey does. Well this is a supernatural story so you can see where this is all going. Predictably everything in Norm's and Tansy's life goes downhill really fast. The rest of the story is how this mess is going to be resolved.

The primary theme that drives the novel is the tension between the rational and irrational. Norm is a pig headed asshole who dearly loves Tansy but in my opinion takes way too long to come around. They are pretty much in the basement of the outhouse by the time Norm even starts to "get it," and poor Tansy, not Norm, has the worst of it. Even then Norm is really only going through the motions instead of actually believing in what is really happening and what he is doing to set things right. He just can't set his rationality aside even for love or death.

There is a critical juncture late in the novel where the suspense finally takes us. I'm not going to tell what it is, but the male gets to be the typical hero. I would have liked a more ambiguous ending. I think it would have been more profound. Having discussed Tiptree a lot recently I wondered what she would have done with this idea. There was an entire gender aspect that could have been a more explored part of the story.

I had two problems with the believability of the plot. One, as I said, Norm takes way too long (maybe even never) to "get it," and concede his rational view of the universe is just plain wrong. I know that if he came around sooner we get a short story and not a short novel, so good ol' Fritz needs to drag this out for there to be a novel. Two, Tansy is way too intelligent to be the good wifey and to let this thing get as out of hand as it does. She KNOWS what shit is possible. True she loses her conjure book at one point, but somehow she manages to eventually come up with some pretty mojo magic without it and spell it out for dimwit Norm from this side and from beyond the grave as well.

The novel starts out sort of slow, for the first third, but eventually becomes a pretty suspenseful supernatural thriller; a real page turner for the last 2/3. Despite being gender dated it was a good read. Lots of subsequent secret coven plots used ideas pioneered here. ( )

I choose to describe Conjure Wife as a cautionary tale and parable about how closed mindedness, sexism and arrogance (in this case in 1950's academia) can damage those that we love. Norman, a sociology professor at a small, second tier university, is quite full of himself. He describes his wife as "his most prized possession" and, for reasons that are unclear, has chosen to snoop on her and look through her closet and private possessions. As a result, he discovers that his wife is in actuality a practicing witch, and a good one at that. Being the modern scientist and responsible for his wife's well-being (as he sees it) he immediately must sit her down and didactically enlighten his wife, who he clearly considers to be child-like and in need of his guidance. The extended scene in which he describes his patient attempts to help her make the logical steps to "realize" that witchcraft is just a delusion of less advanced societies is nauseating in its paternalism and condescension. She finally agrees to throw it all away. He is finally convinced that he has helped his wife Tansy mature and that this dabbling in primitive customs is behind them. The problem is that the witchcraft is very real and so is the danger created by the sudden removal of all the spells that were protecting him for years. He is about to learn that there are more witches out there and that some can be pretty nasty.

I think that the use of the first person narrative voice was brilliant, even necessary for this novel to have the proper effect. We are able to hear Norman tell the story from his point of view and in his own words and roll our eyes wondering if this pig-headed snob is EVER going to open his eyes to what is happening around him. Ultimately, just as he would accuse primitive societies of being trapped by their ignorance, he is likewise trapped by his own self-imposed rigid mindset. In his world view, men are cognitively and emotionally superior to women and all "reality" is merely a reflection of science and mathematics. Anything not "scientific" or at least scientific in is definition, is not reality. It is amusing and sometimes horrifying to watch him rationalize the supernatural events occurring around him.

Finally, with his wife's help (who actually would have been MUCH better off without his meddling in the first place) he is able to right what was wrong and get everything back the way it was before he intervened. You can't help but smirk when you read how he slants the action so that it always looks like he is the hero that saves the day. The real brilliance of the novel is that Norman's narration is transparent. Even while he tells you about his application of scientific principles and logical solutions to the horror confronting them, you can see the terrified Norman cowering behind it all. This Norman knows that he has left himself and Tansy naked to an evil onslaught and that he is completely out of his depth. He retreats into depression and alcohol and lashes out in frustration at those around him. It is pathetic to watch him, even though he believes in the reality of the magic, attempt to sell himself on the idea that everything that is going on is explainable by scientific, psychological, or medical causes.

Well, good triumphs over evil and at the end Tansy asks him if he has changed his mindset or if he is already rationalizing the whole chain of events into a scientific explanation. We don't get the answer, but clearly we hope that Norman has learned a bit from his wife, who has shown a tremendous amount of patience with her stubborn and close-minded husband. ( )