Toil & Trouble
15 Tales of Women & Witchcraft
Tess Sharpe, Jessica Spotswood, Brandy Colbert
Readers rate it 3.8 (22 on Hardcover)
Released 2018 · Harlequin Teen
Content report card
Toil & Trouble parent’s guide: what’s inside
Substance use
What it offers
Positive messages
Positive role models
Educational value
A note for parents
This YA short story collection centers on girls reclaiming power through witchcraft and magic, with themes of self-belief and resistance. While the collection includes diverse characters and LGBTQ+ representation, some stories contain violence (murder investigation, soldiers invading, girls fighting captors) and mature themes that suggest an older teen audience. The stories are generally empowering but occasionally dark in tone.
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From the publisher
Scorn the witch. Fear the witch. Burn the witch. History is filled with stories of women accused of witchcraft, of fearsome girls with arcane knowledge. Toil & Trouble features fifteen stories of girls embracing their power, reclaiming their destinies and using their magic to create, to curse, to cure--and to kill. A y... Scorn the witch. Fear the witch. Burn the witch. History is filled with stories of women accused of witchcraft, of fearsome girls with arcane knowledge. Toil & Trouble features fifteen stories of girls embracing their power, reclaiming their destinies and using their magic to create, to curse, to cure--and to kill. A young witch uses social media to connect with her astrology clients--and with a NASA-loving girl as cute as she is skeptical. A priestess of death investigates a ritualized murder. A bruja who cures lovesickness might need the remedy herself when she falls in love with an altar boy. A theater production is turned upside down by a visiting churel. In Reconstruction-era Texas, a water witch uses her magic to survive the soldiers who have invaded her desert oasis. And in the near future, a group of girls accused of witchcraft must find their collective power in order to destroy their captors. This collection reveals a universal truth: there's nothing more powerful than a teenage girl who believes in herself.
Shelved under
- Young Adult Fiction
- Diverse Characters
- Unloveable Characters
- Weak Character Development
- Loveable Characters
- Strong Character Development
- A mix driven
- emotional
- mysterious
- Adventurous
- dark
- inspiring
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ISBN 9781335016270 · Harlequin Teen