Jennet Stearne's father hangs witches for a living in Restoration England. But when she witnesses the unjust and horrifying execution of her beloved aunt Isobel, the precocious child decides to make it her life's mission to bring down the Parliamentary Witchcraft Act. Armed with little save the power of reason, and determined to see justice prevail, Jennet hurls herself into a series of picaresque adventures—traveling from King William's Britain to the fledgling American Colonies to an uncharted island in the Caribbean, braving West Indies pirates, Algonquin Indian captors, the machinations of the Salem Witch Court, and the sensuous love of a young Ben Franklin. For Jennet cannot and must not rest until she has put the last witchfinder out of business. “[An] intrepid, impeccably researched epic . . . [a] tour-de-force of early America.” - Publishers Weekly (starred review) “Dazzling . . . [A]n extravagant, expansive, erudite, energetic feast of information and adventure.” - Daily Telegraph (London) “This lively and thoughtful adventuer is filled with enough satire and plot to fuel two Mark Twain tomes.” - Pages Magazine “Grim and gorgeous, earthy and erudite as well.” - Seattle Times “Morrow seamlessly weaves fantasy with science and historical fact in one of the best novels of the year.” - Rocky Mountain News “[A] richly detailed, cerebral tale of rationality versus superstitious bigotry.” - Fort Wayne (IN) Journal Gazette “Endlessly exciting ... A grand picaresque tour of England and the American colonies ... Watch out for James Morrow: He’s magic.” - Washington Post Book World “Here are storytelling, showmanship and provocative book-club bait, all rolled into one inventive feat.” - New York Times “Read[s] like a collaboration between Charles Dickens and Henry Fielding...Morrow is long overdue for a mainstream audience.” - Denver Post “A book to delight fans of writers such as John Barth and T.C. Boyle. Or even Jonathan Swift.” - USA Today “An exceptionally engaging and piquantly thoughtful novel.” - Library Journal “This impeccably researched, highly ambitious novel -- nine years in the writing -- is a triumph of historical fiction.” - Booklist (starred review) “With its deeply humanist convictions, its manic humor, and its shameless melodrama, The Last Witchfinder may come as a pleasant surprise even to those of Morrow’s followers who have long annointed him as the heir of Vonnegut. - Locus “A grand yarn about the clash of reason and superstition, set in a fascinating time.” - Neal Stephenson Jennet Stearne's father hangs witches for a living in Restoration England. But when she witnesses the unjust and horrifying execution of her beloved aunt Isobel, the precocious child decides to make it her life's mission to bring down the Parliamentary Witchcraft Act. Armed with little save the power of reason, and determined to see justice prevail, Jennet hurls herself into a series of picaresque adventures—traveling from King William's Britain to the fledgling American Colonies to an uncharted island in the Caribbean, braving West Indies pirates, Algonquin Indian captors, the machinations of the Salem Witch Court, and the sensuous love of a young Ben Franklin. For Jennet cannot and must not rest until she has put the last witchfinder out of business. James Morrow is the author of nine previous novels, including The Last Witchfinder . He lives in State College, Pennsylvania. The Last Witchfinder A Novel By James Morrow HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. Copyright © 2007 James Morrow All right reserved. ISBN: 9780060821807 Chapter The First Introducing Our Heroine, Jennet Stearne, Whose Father Hunts Witches, Whose Aunt Seeks Wisdom, and Whose Soul Desires an Object It Cannot Name May I speak candidly, fleshling, one rational creature to another, myself a book and you a reader? Even if the literature of confession leaves you cold, even if you are among those who wish that Rousseau had never bared his soul and Augustine never mislaid his shame, you would do well to lend me a fraction of your life. I am Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy , after all — in my native tongue, Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica , the Principia for short — not some tenth-grade algebra text or guide to improving your golf swing. Attend my adventures and you may, Dame Fortune willing, begin to look upon the world anew. Unlike you humans, a book always remembers its moment of conception. My father, the illustrious Isaac Newton, having abandoned his studies at Trinity College to escape the great plague of 1665, was spending the summer at his mother's farm in Woolsthorpe. An orchard grew beside the house. Staring contemplatively through his bedroom window, Newton watched an apple drop free of its tree, driven by that strange arrangement we have agreed to call gravity. In a leap of intuition, he imagined the apple not simply as falling to the ground but as striving for