Alice Hoffman’s Practical Magic Series: The Spellbinding Family Drama That Makes Witchcraft Look Like a Sensible Life Choice

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The Complete Reading Order for the Practical Magic Book Series

If your idea of magic is confined to nostalgia for a ’90s cult classic film, it’s high time you expanded your horizons. Alice Hoffman’s Practical Magic isn’t just a whimsical movie; it’s part of an addictive, enchanting book series tracing the complicated, spell-soaked lives of the Owens family through generations.

What’s the Big Deal With These Magical Books Anyway?

Readers don’t just casually enjoy Alice Hoffman’s novels; they’re practically bewitched by them.

Why?

Maybe it’s the way Hoffman effortlessly mingles everyday chaos—family feuds, heartbreak, and life’s general messiness—with magical realism that’s surprisingly relatable. Or perhaps it’s the Owens women themselves: fiercely independent, refreshingly witty, and unapologetically magical.

Hoffman’s books resonate deeply because they manage to blend emotional depth and magical wonder seamlessly. Readers keep coming back for the vibrant characters, intricate family dynamics, and powerful themes of destiny, self-discovery, and empowerment, wrapped up neatly in enchantment and the occasional potion gone hilariously wrong.

Your Official Spellbook: The Definitive Reading Order

Whether you’re a newbie ready to be charmed or a returning reader eager to reconnect with your favorite magical family, you’ll want to tackle these books in just the right order. Skip the confusion and let this guide keep your magical experience enchantingly straightforward.

Ready to start conjuring some literary magic? Here’s where to begin:

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Magic Lessons: Practical Magic Book 1

Alice Hoffman

Horror, Paranormal Romance, Romantasy

Where does the story of the Owens bloodline begin? With Maria Owens, in the 1600s, when she’s abandoned in a snowy field in rural England as a baby. Under the care of Hannah Owens, Maria learns about the “Nameless Arts.” Hannah recognizes that Maria has a gift and she teaches the girl all she knows. It is here that she learns her first important lesson: Always love someone who will love you back. When Maria is abandoned by the man who has declared his love for her, she follows him to Salem, Massachusetts. Here she invokes the curse that will haunt her family. And it’s here that she learns the rules of magic and the lesson that she will carry with her for the rest of her life. Love is the only thing that matters.

The Rules of Magic: Practical Magic Book 2

Alice Hoffman

Horror, Paranormal Romance, Romantasy

For the Owens family, love is a curse that began in 1620, when Maria Owens was charged with witchery for loving the wrong man. Hundreds of years later, in New York City at the cusp of the sixties, when the whole world is about to change, Susanna Owens knows that her three children are dangerously unique. Difficult Franny, with skin as pale as milk and blood red hair, shy and beautiful Jet, who can read other people’s thoughts, and charismatic Vincent, who began looking for trouble on the day he could walk. From the start Susanna sets down rules for her children: No walking in the moonlight, no red shoes, no wearing black, no cats, no crows, no candles, no books about magic. And most importantly, never, ever, fall in love. But when her children visit their Aunt Isabelle, in the small Massachusetts town where the Owens family has been blamed for everything that has ever gone wrong, they uncover family secrets and begin to understand the truth of who they are. Yet, the children cannot escape love even if they try, just as they cannot escape the pains of the human heart. The two beautiful sisters will grow up to be the memorable aunts in Practical Magic, while Vincent, their beloved brother, will leave an unexpected legacy.

Practical Magic: Practical Magic Book 3

Alice Hoffman

Paranormal Romance, Romantasy

For more than two hundred years, the Owens women have been blamed for everything that has gone wrong in their Massachusetts town. Gillian and Sally have endured that fate as well: as children, the sisters were forever outsiders, taunted, talked about, pointed at. Their elderly aunts almost seemed to encourage the whispers of witchery, with their musty house and their exotic concoctions and their crowd of black cats. But all Gillian and Sally wanted was to escape. One will do so by marrying, the other by running away. But the bonds they share will bring them back—almost as if by magic…

The Book of Magic: Practical Magic Book 4

Alice Hoffman

Paranormal Romance, Romantasy

For over three-hundred years a curse has kept the Owens family from love—but all of that is about to change. The novel begins in a library, the best place for a story to be conjured, when beloved aunt Jet Owens hears the deathwatch beetle and knows she has only seven days to live. Jet is not the only one in danger—the curse is already at work. A frantic attempt to save a young man’s life spurs three generations of the Owens women, and one long-lost brother, to use their unusual gifts to break the curse as they travel from Paris to London to the English countryside where their ancestor Maria Owens first practiced the Unnamed Art. The younger generation discovers secrets that have been hidden from them in matters of both magic and love by Sally, their fiercely protective mother. As Kylie Owens uncovers the truth about who she is and what her own dark powers are, her aunt Franny comes to understand that she is ready to sacrifice everything for her family, and Sally Owens realizes that she is willing to give up everything for love.

Ready to Join the Coven?

Pull up a broomstick and get ready to immerse yourself in the captivating world of the Owens family. Trust us, once you dive into these magical pages, you’ll find yourself completely enchanted. Want more bookish magic?

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