The Year of the Witching

The Year of the Witching (2020) is the debut dark fantasy novel by Alexis Henderson. The story follows Immanuelle Moore, an outcast in the rigid, patriarchal land of Bethel, who discovers her connection to a lineage of witches and must confront the dark power within her to save her community from a series of devastating plagues. The novel explores themes including The Corrupting Influence of Patriarchal Theocracy, Reclaiming Power Through Forbidden Knowledge and Heritage, and Breaking the Cycle of Vengeance.

This guide is based on the 2021 Ace trade paperback edition.

Content Warning: The source material and this guide contain depictions of graphic violence, religious discrimination, racism, child abuse, physical abuse, and sexual content.

Plot Summary

The novel opens in the puritanical land of Bethel, where Immanuelle Moore lives as an outcast due to the sins of her mother, Miriam. Miriam had been intended as the wife of Bethel’s prophet, Grant Chambers. She refused and fled into the forbidden Darkwoods surrounding Bethel. Months later, she returned pregnant and gave birth to Immanuelle, and she died calling the child a “curse.” Now nearly 17, Immanuelle feels disconnected from the fervent faith of her family, which includes her stern grandmother Martha, her grandfather’s second wife Anna, and Anna’s young daughters, Glory and Honor. While her only friend, Leah, prepares to be married to the Prophet, Immanuelle worries that her failure to have her first period is a sign of her sinfulness. During a Sabbath gathering, she is taunted about her mother by the Prophet’s newest wife, Judith.

Immanuelle’s grandfather, Abram, a former apostle who fell from power after Immanuelle’s birth, instructs her to sell a black yearling ram named Judas at the market. Martha forbids her from taking a shortcut through the Darkwood. At the market, Immanuelle fails to sell the ram. On her way home, a storm spooks Judas, who breaks his tether and flees into the Darkwood. Feeling called by the Darkwood, Immanuelle follows him. She becomes lost and, after nightfall, encounters the ghostly figures of two witches who she recognizes as Jael and Mercy, known as the Lovers. One of them gives her a leather-bound book. Immanuelle realizes that Bethel legend about four witches living in the woods are true. Shortly after, Immanuelle finds Judas’s severed head on a stump and flees the forest in terror. As punishment for her disobedience, Martha brands her palm with a hot poker.

Immanuelle discovers the book is her mother’s journal. It details Miriam’s forbidden love for Daniel Ward, who belonged to a class of impoverished immigrants known as Outskirters. Immanuelle learns that Ward was her father, and was executed by pyre for his affair with Miriam. The journal’s later entries are filled with frantic sketches of the witches, including the queen Lilith, and the repeated, prophetic words: “Blood. Blight. Darkness. Slaughter” (54). At Leah’s cutting ceremony, where she is formally bound to the Prophet, Immanuelle witnesses an illicit encounter between the Prophet’s son Ezra and Judith.

That night, drawn by mysterious voices, Immanuelle returns to the Darkwood and finds a witch she recognizes as Delilah. Delilah emerges and pulls her underwater. Immanuelle fights to the surface and is confronted by Lilith, the last of the four witches, with a deer skull for a head. As Lilith touches her, Immanuelle gets her first period, her blood flowing into the pond. The next day, the farm’s well water turns to blood. Immanuelle realizes her mother’s journal foretold four plagues, and the first, Blood, has begun.

Weeks later, the blood plague has devastated Bethel. At the cathedral, the powerful Apostle Isaac announces the plague is a curse activated by a blood sacrifice to the Dark Mother, leading Immanuelle to believe that she is responsible for the curse. Immanuelle convinces Ezra to give her access to the Prophet’s library to find a way to break the curse. They are nearly discovered by the Prophet, who orders Ezra to search census records for a woman with witch ancestry. To punish Ezra for a suspected tryst with Judith, the Prophet brutally injures his hand by forcing him to grip a dagger. The next morning, Ezra guides Immanuelle back to the pond, where she performs a second blood sacrifice. She is pulled underwater and has a vision of the first prophet, David Ford, massacring women and children. She emerges from the pond to find that Ezra has been ensnared by thorns and roots from the forest. Ezra experiences his First Vision, signaling he is the next Prophet. The blood plague ends, but the relief is short-lived as Immanuelle’s sisters fall ill with a feverish madness, heralding the arrival of the second plague, Blight.

Desperate to find a cure, Immanuelle travels to the Outskirts to find her father Daniel’s mother, Vera Ward, a witch who fled Bethel after Daniel was executed. A priest tells Immanuelle that Vera Ward is in the village of Ishmel beyond Bethel’s gates. Immanuelle finds the ruins of the Ward house, where she discovers magical sigils carved into the foundation. A path leads her from the house to the cabin from Miriam’s journal. Inside, she finds the walls carved with sigils and a prophecy that lead Immanuelle to believe that Miriam bound the plagues to Immanuelle in the womb, making her the vessel for the curse.

Enraged by this betrayal, Immanuelle burns the cabin down, vowing to find a way to save Bethel. She returns home to an interrogation by the Prophet, who shows sexual interest in her. Soon after, she is summoned to the Prophet’s Haven to assist Leah in a blight-fevered premature childbirth. Leah dies, devastating Immanuelle. At Leah’s funeral pyre, Immanuelle decides she must go to Ishmel to find Vera and learn how to break the curse. Ezra agrees to help her escape out of the heavily guarded Hallowed Gate.

Immanuelle escapes at night with Ezra, who insists on accompanying her. However, they are betrayed by Martha and chased by the Prophet’s Guard. Ezra urges Immanuelle to flee, and stays behind to fight them off. As the Guard closes in on Immanuelle, the third plague, Darkness, descends, plunging Bethel into total blackness and allowing her to escape.

After a treacherous journey, she finds Vera in Ishmel. Vera reveals that Lilith manipulated a grief-stricken Miriam because she recognized Immanuelle’s innate power as a vessel for the plagues. She teaches Immanuelle a reversal sigil that, when carved with a consecrated blade, will transfer the plagues’ power to her. However Vera warns that the plagues will rebound into Immanuelle, and warns that she might not be able to handle it. Their meeting is interrupted when the Prophet’s Guard storms the cottage and arrests them.

In Bethel, Immanuelle is imprisoned and tried for witchcraft. To save her, Ezra falsely confesses to all crimes. The Prophet then offers Immanuelle a deal: marry him, and both she and Ezra will be spared execution. She agrees, secretly planning to steal his consecrated dagger on their wedding night to carve the reversal sigil Vera taught her before killing him.

Immanuelle is wed to the Prophet and marked with the sigil of married women. At the grim feast that follows, the Prophet breaks his promise and orders Ezra to be brought forth for execution by pyre. Immanuelle protests, and offers herself as a sacrifice in Ezra’s place. The Prophet is forced to agree. As he brings down the consecrated gutting knife to kill her on the cathedral altar, Immanuelle seizes it and carves the reversal sigil into her arm. The sigil fails to end the darkness. Instead, it unleashes the fourth plague, Slaughter. The cathedral begins to collapse as the Unholy Four and a legion of beasts and spirits swarms the sanctuary, attacking the congregation. Lilith offers Immanuelle a place in her coven, but Immanuelle refuses. Enraged, Lilith sets a beast to kill Abram.

Immanuelle harnesses the power of the plagues now inside her to avenge her grandfather. She destroys Delilah, Mercy, and Jael with the three plagues before engaging in a brutal battle with Lilith. With help from Ezra and Vera, Immanuelle kills the witch queen with the gutting blade. The darkness begins to abate, signaling the end of the plagues.

The Prophet emerges from hiding and blames Immanuelle for the death and destruction, ordering her execution. However, Ezra defends her as Bethel’s savior. Vera, the Moores, Esther, and the other women gathered form a human shield around Immanuelle, turning against the Prophet and demanding his death. Ezra asks for the blade to kill his father, but Immanuelle urges him to consider mercy. Ultimately, Ezra leaves the decision to her, and she declares mercy for the Prophet. The crowd agrees, but the epilogue suggests that conflict is brewing over succession. Scarred but hopeful, Immanuel determines to help Ezra navigate the transition. She kisses him and names the coming year the Year of the Dawn.