![]() ![]() ![]() “782” is, in fact, a book sleeping within a book - a magical palimpsest that, long ago, was bewitched to respond to Diana’s touch. Unfortunately, Harkness appears to have been bewitched by another sort of book. She still manages to start college at 16 and goes on to earn a doctorate in 17th-century chemistry from Oxford, where she opens that shimmering bundle of parchment and discovers that three pages have been removed, hinting at a bibliophiliac mystery a la A.S. Alas, neither their magical powers nor Harvard educations could save Diana’s anthropologist parents from nasty, witchcraft-inflicted deaths during a research trip to Africa, leaving their orphan daughter to be raised by her aunt, another witch. A whiz at whatever she turns her hand to, Diana stubbornly eschews the use of magic. Bishop is no ordinary historian. She is the last of the Bishop witches, whose ancestor was executed in Salem. “Traces of gilt shone along its edges and caught my eye. But those faded touches of gold could not account for a faint, iridescent shimmer that seemed to be escaping from between the pages.” Harkness’s book opens with Diana Bishop, an American academic, perusing a mysterious, alchemical manuscript known as “Ashmole 782,” in the reading room of Oxford’s Bodleian Library. ![]() Readers will get their answers, as well - mostly unsurprising ones, if they’re familiar with the novels of Stephenie Meyer, Anne Rice and Kelley Armstrong. ![]() “That leaves love,” his confidant retorts. “You have your answer, then.” ![]()
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