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Alice Hoffman is an American author that wrote ‘Practical Magic.’ Born in 1952 in New York City to a family of Jewish descent, she attended Valley Stream North High School, Adelphi University (Bachelor of Arts), and the Stanford University Creative Writing Center (Master of Arts).
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Order of Practical Magic Series
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Practical Magic | 1995 | Description / Buy | |
2 | The Rules of Magic | 2017 | Description / Buy | |
3 | Magic Lessons | 2020 | Description / Buy | |
4 | The Book of Magic | 2021 | Description / Buy |
Chronological Order of Practical Magic Series
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Magic Lessons | 2020 | Description / Buy | |
2 | The Rules of Magic | 2017 | Description / Buy | |
3 | Practical Magic | 1995 | Description / Buy | |
4 | The Book of Magic | 2021 | Description / Buy |
Order of Water Tales Series
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Aquamarine (Short Story) | 2001 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Indigo (Short Story) | 2002 | Description / Buy |
Order of Green Angel Series
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Green Angel (Short Story) | 2003 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Green Witch (Short Story) | 2010 | Description / Buy |
Order of Inheritance Collection Series
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Can You Feel This? (Short Story) | 2019 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Zenith Man (Short Story) | 2019 | Description / Buy |
Order of Alice Hoffman Standalone Novels
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Property Of | 1977 | Description / Buy | |
2 | The Drowning Season | 1979 | Description / Buy | |
3 | Angel Landing | 1980 | Description / Buy | |
4 | White Horses | 1982 | Description / Buy | |
5 | Fortune's Daughter | 1985 | Description / Buy | |
6 | Illumination Night | 1987 | Description / Buy | |
7 | At Risk | 1988 | Description / Buy | |
8 | Here on Earth | 1990 | Description / Buy | |
9 | Seventh Heaven | 1990 | Description / Buy | |
10 | Turtle Moon | 1992 | Description / Buy | |
11 | Second Nature | 1994 | Description / Buy | |
12 | Local Girls | 1999 | Description / Buy | |
13 | The River King | 2000 | Description / Buy | |
14 | Blue Diary | 2001 | Description / Buy | |
15 | The Probable Future | 2003 | Description / Buy | |
16 | The Ice Queen | 2005 | Description / Buy | |
17 | The Foretelling (Short Story) | 2005 | Description / Buy | |
18 | Incantation | 2006 | Description / Buy | |
19 | Skylight Confessions | 2007 | Description / Buy | |
20 | The Third Angel | 2008 | Description / Buy | |
21 | The Story Sisters | 2009 | Description / Buy | |
22 | The Red Garden | 2011 | Description / Buy | |
23 | The Dovekeepers | 2011 | Description / Buy | |
24 | The Museum of Extraordinary Things | 2014 | Description / Buy | |
25 | Nightbird | 2015 | Description / Buy | |
26 | The Marriage of Opposites | 2015 | Description / Buy | |
27 | Faithful | 2017 | Description / Buy | |
28 | The World That We Knew | 2019 | Description / Buy | |
29 | The Invisible Hour | 2023 | Description / Buy |
Order of Alice Hoffman Short Stories/Novellas
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | The Bookstore Sisters | 2022 | Description / Buy |
Order of Alice Hoffman Short Story Collections
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Blackbird House | 2004 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Faerie Knitting (Short Story) | 2018 | Description / Buy |
Order of Alice Hoffman Standalone Plays
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Conjure (Short Story) | 2014 | Description / Buy |
Order of Alice Hoffman Picture Books
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Fireflies: A Winter Tale (Short Story) | 1997 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Horsefly | 2000 | Description / Buy | |
3 | Moondog (Short Story) | 2003 | Description / Buy |
Order of Alice Hoffman Non-Fiction
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Survival Lessons (Short Story) | 2013 | Description / Buy |
Order of The Year's Best Dark Fantasy & Horror Series with Gary A. Braunbeck, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Robin McKinley, William Nolan, Robert R. McCammon, Brian Hodge, Richard Christian Matheson, Greg Bear, Michael Swanwick, Karen Joy Fowler, John Kessel, R.A. Lafferty, Lisa Goldstein, Ursula K. Le Guin, Pat Cadigan, Michael McDowell, John Farris, Stephen Gallagher, Charles de Lint, Chet Williamson, Daniel Abraham, Lewis Shiner, Edward Bryant, Lisa Tuttle, Joan D. Vinge, Tanith Lee, Lucius Shepard, Jeff VanderMeer, Dan Simmons, Neil Gaiman, Terry Dowling, Mary Robinette Kowal, Peter Straub, Jane Yolen, Joan Aiken, Patricia C. Wrede, Garry Douglas Kilworth, Emma Bull, Michael Bishop, Gene Wolfe, Ramsey Campbell, Charles L. Grant, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, John Shirley, Elizabeth Bear, Peter Dickinson, Margo Lanagan, Ted Chiang, Delia Sherman, Ellen Kushner, Kim Newman, John M. Ford, Richard Matheson, Barry N. Malzberg, Scott Baker, S.P. Somtow, Steve Tem, Jonathan Carroll, Ian McDonald, Douglas Clegg, Douglas E. Winter, Christopher Fowler, David B. Silva, John Brunner, Bentley Little, Adam Roberts, Paul Di Filippo, Conrad Williams, Graham Joyce, Simon Clark, China Miéville, Geoff Ryman, Lucy Taylor, William Hope Hodgson, Tanya Huff, M. John Harrison, William Browning Spencer, Steven Brust, Craig Shaw Gardner, Thomas M. Disch, Luis Alberto Urrea, Lucy Sussex, Fred Chappell, Nancy Kress, Greg Egan, Scott Nicholson, Mark Samuels, Isabel Allende, Angela Carter, M. Rickert, Michael Chabon, Stuart Dybek, Ben Fountain, Steven Millhauser, Jeffrey Ford, James Lawrence Powell, Thomas Ligotti, Nisi Shawl, Anthony Doerr, Kevin Brockmeier, Jack Womack, Bruce Sterling, Michael Blumlein, Benjamin Rosenbaum, Greg van Eekhout, Lawrence Miles, Christopher Rowe, Eileen Gunn, John Crowley, Tim Pratt, Garth Nix, Andy Duncan, Laird Barron, Michael Shea, Joel Lane, James P. Blaylock, Ellen Klages, Kij Johnson, Caitlín R. Kiernan, Sarah Monette, Charles Vess, Nathan Ballingrud, Alan Moore, Elizabeth Massie, Terri Windling, Susanna Clarke, Gary McMahon, Susan Cooper, Ellen Datlow, Stepan Chapman, K.W. Jeter, Paula Guran, Ru Emerson, Ysabeau S. Wilce, Karen Russell, Veronica Schanoes, Stephen Volk, Adam Nevill, Adrian Cole, Tina Rath, Reggie Oliver, Simon Bestwick, Robert Coover, Éilís Ní Dhuibhne, Minsoo Kang, Ian Frazier, P Djèlí Clark, Frances Hardinge, Leif Enger, Natalie Babbitt, Gwen Strauss, Michael de Larrabeiti, Terry Blackhawk, Sandra J. Lindow, R.T. Smith, Karel ?apek, Rachel Simon
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Eighth Annual Collection | 1995 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Ninth Annual Collection | 1996 | Description / Buy | |
3 | Twelfth Annual Edition | 1999 | Description / Buy | |
4 | Thirteenth Annual Collection | 2000 | Description / Buy |
Alice Hoffman Anthologies
# | Read | Title | Published | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Ploughshares Fall 1989 | 1989 | Description / Buy | |
2 | Scribners Best of the Fiction Workshops 1997 | 1997 | Description / Buy | |
3 | Writers on Writing | 2001 | Description / Buy | |
4 | Ploughshares, Fiction Issue, Vol. 29, Nos. 2 & 3, Fall 2003 | 2003 | Description / Buy | |
5 | Eighteenth Annual Collection | 2005 | Description / Buy | |
6 | Shadow Show: All-New Stories in Celebration of Ray Bradbury | 2012 | Description / Buy | |
7 | Shadow Show: Stories In Celebration of Ray Bradbury | 2015 | Description / Buy |
Hoffman published her first short story (At The Drive-In) when she was 21. The achievement drew the attention of Ted Solotaroff, an editor, who asked her whether she had written any novels.
Hoffman responded by writing ‘Property Of,’ her first novel, which Farrar Straus and Girous (Macmillan Publishers) published. She wrote over two dozen novels in the years that followed, receiving awards recognition and a mention from Oprah’s Book Club.
The author writes books with strong elements of magical realism. She has an engaging style that encourages people to consume her work at a leisurely pace. The supernatural elements come naturally. As a child, she read myths and fairy tales.
These elements featured prominently in the literature she consumed. She was drawn to magic because the myths and fairy tales she read were told by great women with a strong storytelling background. As a writer and a woman, those women appealed to her. Though, Hoffman’s objective is to add a realistic spin to magic.
She does an incredible amount of research for her projects. She researches before she starts. Then she stops and writes the first draft. Then she takes a step back and does more research.
In a way, the research never ends. Some subjects are so compelling that, on occasion, she has felt like she could research them for the rest of her life. She has to make a concerted effort to step away from the research long enough to write.
The topic of her novels doesn’t have to be grounded for the author to lose herself in research. When she wrote ‘The Rules of Magic,’ she spent a lot of time reading about witchcraft.
But even though her research is extensive, Hoffman doesn’t put everything she learns into the books she writes. She believes that it is vital to know as much as you can about your characters. But the readers don’t need to know everything you know.
From what she has seen, accumulating copious amounts of background information gives an author the sort of clear understanding they need to bring a character to life. She experiments with various POVs before selecting a point of view that fits the story.
The characters take center stage in her creative process. She makes various notes about their history and attributes. Once she researches the setting, she outlines the story. Hoffman doesn’t expect to stick to the outline. In fact, she changes the outline all the time. But it gives her a place to start.
Alice Hoffman Awards
Hoffman’s accolades include the Massachusetts Book Award, Hemmett Prize, and the New Jersey Notable Book Award.
Alice Hoffman Books Into Movies
The Dovekeepers became a two-part TV movie in 2015. Practical Magic became a 1998 fantasy romantic comedy starring Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock.
Best Alice Hoffman Books
The author was treated for breast cancer at some point. The incident compelled her to volunteer her resources to establish Mount Auburn Hospital’s Hoffman Breast Center. Hoffman’s best books include:
Practical Magic: Gillian and Sally felt like outsiders. As children, the kids taunted them, and the adults shunned them. For their elderly aunts, the behavior was expected. The Massachusetts town had spent the last two centuries blaming everything that went wrong on the Owens women.
Gillian and Sally were determined to escape. And they did. But now, some unseen force is pulling them back.
The Rules of Magic: Susanna Owens expected her children to suffer. Their ancestor, Maria Owens, was charged with witchcraft back in the 1600s. Her only crime was loving the wrong person.
In Susanna’s time, the world is not quite as dangerous. But it is just as harsh. Her children are unfortunate because they are so clearly different. Susanna wants to keep them safe. She has given them a strict list of rules to follow, rules that can hopefully hide their gifts.
But the children are looking to visit their Aunt Isabelle in a small town in Massachusetts that holds the keys to their family’s secret.
When Does The Next Alice Hoffman book come out?
Alice Hoffman doesn't seem to have an upcoming book. Their newest book is The Invisible Hour and was released on August, 15th 2023.