In “25 Best Books About Witches to Read in 2024: Spellbinding Books Filled with Magic and Mystery,” Marilyn Walters made John Updike’s The Witches of Eastwick her sixth pick. Topping the list was Circe by Madeline Miller, Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman, The Witching Hour by Anne Rice, The Familiars by Stacey Halls, and Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt.
“In the small town of Eastwick, Rhode Island, three women — Alexandra, Jane, and Sukie — discover they have magical powers after their marriages end.
“Their abilities get stronger when a mysterious man, Darryl Van Horne, comes to town and encourages their witchcraft. As they form a coven and use their magic, their actions lead to severe problems, including murder and chaos.
“The novel looks at themes of power, freedom, and the supernatural with a darkly funny twist. Set in the early 1970s, it reflects the social changes and liberal attitudes of the time.”
Here’s the link to the rest of the 25—24, actually, since one entry is a duplicate.
John Updike Society board member Sylvie Mathé was profiled in the series “Persistence of Character — Major interview: Archaeology of a journey” in e-Rea, electronic journal of studies on the English-speaking world. The series, published in French, tracks the breadth of an entire career of distinguished intellectuals, including early influences. An English translation exists in PDF form, but in a file to big to upload and no link to share. Here is the link to a French version online: 
Mathé talks about the full trajectory of her career, including the experience of spending her senior year in high school in Rock Island, Ill. “Compared to my final year in French, the amount of work was nothing like it was, nor the demands of the homework,” she told the interviewer. She shared that her host family was “extremely puritanical,” with the mother “surprised, even horrified, that I had read texts by Hemingway, or Sanctuary by Faulkner…It must be said that 1968 in a small town in Illinois was still the 50s. It had nothing to do with what was happening on campuses at the same time, with women’s lib, demonstrations against the Vietnam War, for civil rights, etc.” In summary, “Let’s say that compared to my final year in French, or my life in France, which was essentially focused on high school, work and success, it was a much more varied life, more entertaining…I was doing things I had never done before: I was caught up in the rhythm, I went to matches according to the football, basketball, baseball seasons,” and she dated, went to parties where there was drinking and marijuana brownies, and was generally inducted into American culture.
Mathé’s introduction to John Updike came when she went to Oxford and studied “Puritanism in John Updike’s Fiction” with Jeanne-Marie Santraud, “who was the only Americanist at Paris IV.” She would go on to write her master’s thesis on Updike and compose a monograph for the American Voices series edited by Marc Chénetier titled John Updike: Nostalgia for America.
