"When a teenage boy dies suspiciously on Halloween night, Salem's chief of police, John Rafferty wonders if there is a connection between his death and a notorious cold case, a triple homicide dubbed "The Goddess Murders," in which three young women, all descended from accused Salem witches, were slashed on Halloween night in 1989. He finds unexpected help in Callie Cahill, the daughter of one of the victims newly returned to town."
Callie was actually present when her mother and two other women were murdered, but she was hiding in some bushes and didn't see anything. She wasn't found until the next morning when nuns at a nearby convent heard her screams. The title refers to an older style of crucifix with a 5-petaled rose which was clutched in the child's hand. Callie subsequently alternated between a series of foster homes and a home run by the nuns who told her that the woman who saved her had also died. Rose Whelan was a reknowned historian with expertise in the Salem witch trials; she was also a sort of stand-in grandmother who Callie and her mother had lived with. After the murders, however, she has became the local crazy bag lady, who believes she is harboring (bodily) the spirit of an evil banshee. When the present day murder occurs, Rose is blamed and the press about the event brings Callie back to Salem where she reconnects with Rose, who has been placed into a psychiatric unit at the hospital. Callie needs to solve the murder so that anti-witch hysteria does not take any more victims.
This is a well-researched book--5 years in the writing--skillfully blended with a multi-generational cast of characters and a complex plot. Lots of magic as well as ordinary human drama. I did not read the previous book involving these characters called The Lace Reader, but the story did not suffer as a result. Reviews from Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, and an interview with The National Book Review.
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