Blog Tour/Guest Post: The Lure of the Good Witch by Jeanette Baker

Welcome to part two of Literary R&R's involvement in Jeanette Baker's book blog tour for her book, Catriona, promoted by Pump Up Your Book!

Part one was an interview with the author that you can read by clicking here.  The third, and final, part of our involvement with this tour will be on September 4th.  On that day, a review of Catriona by Literary R&R reviewer Charlene will be posted.  Today, though, we have a guest post by Jeanette Baker.  So, please, take a minute or two and read what Jeanette has to say about:

The Lure of the "Good Witch"

Catriona, my fifth novel, was first published in 1997 by Simon & Schuster.  At the time, I was teaching elementary school in one of Southern California's most conservative communities.  One evening, while researching the supernatural, magic and Wiccan spells in a local bookstore, two mothers with children attending the school where I taught were shopping in the same store.  They happened to notice the subject matter spread out on the table around me.  The very next day I received an early morning visit in my classroom from the school principal who asked me carefully worded questions about my intentions regarding my curriculum.  I managed to convince him that my students were quite safe and I was not interested in converting them to any religion at all, pagan or otherwise.

Interestingly, even though fourteen years have passed and I've written many more novels, the questions still come: why do you write paranormals? What is so intriguing about the supernatural?

The answer to those questions is the same as the one I gave to those who wonder why I explore the possibilities of DNA memory and time travel or why I create left-handed characters with interesting mutations and clairvoyant heroines who dabble in white witchcraft.  The unusual fascinates me.  It has since that September 17, 1964 evening when beautiful, blonde Samantha Stephens, the star of the television series, Bewitched, twitched her turned-up nose, hooking me forever.  Wouldn't it be wonderful, I thought, to have the power to sway the mortal universe to my way of thinking? I remember rolling my pre-teen eyes at the doddering predictability of Samantha's husband, Darrin who, with typical mortal myopia, wanted an ordinary wife.  I empathized with Endora, her mother, over the stupidity of mortals and cheered when Aunt Clara's magic actually worked.

Years later, during post-midnight feedings, I introduced my children to the magic of Samantha's spirit world, occasionally twitching my own nose in credible imitation, hoping that my colicky, wide-awake infants would magically fall asleep. Sadly, the gift of magic continued to elude me until I first put pen to paper and realized I could create my own bewitching heroines, endowing them with all the characteristics I longed to claim as my own.

The results of course, are my paranormal novels, Legacy, Witch Woman and my newly reissued Catriona, the story of Kate Sutherland, one of the twice-born who five centuries before walked the earth as Catriona Wells, daughter of an English earl and a Scots princess, first cousin to James IV of Scotland, English spy and harbinger of a shameful secret.

I hope you enjoy reading Catriona as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Slain abhaile,                                                             
Jeanette
jeanettebaker.com

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