The Witch of Willow Sound

A spooky, atmospheric, and fast-paced feminist tale about women called witches and the parts of our history we'd rather forget

Madeline is missing. Ordered to find her, Madeline's estranged niece, Fade, must return to the lonely forest of Willow Sound, Nova Scotia. There, Fade discovers her aunt's once-cozy cottage empty and rotting. The ominous smell of something burnt hangs in the air.

In her search for answers, Fade clashes with the people of Grand Tea, a nearby village struggling under the shadow of a massive, looming rock that could tip and crush them all at any time. For generations, they've invented bizarre lore about Madeline, calling her a witch and blaming her for their misfortunes. They've had more misfortunes than ever lately. And a hurricane is coming.

Inspired by real East Coast traditions and witch lore, The Witch of Willow Sound is a modern gothic tale that explores family lost and found and throws firelight on dark truths about what societies do with the people, and the past, they don't want.

A modern, fast-paced, feminist, and sometimes even funny East Coast gothic with fresh regional folklore about a woman searching for her missing elderly aunt, long suspected to be a witch by the local villagers.


Vanessa F. Penney was born in northern Newfoundland and raised in rural Nova Scotia. The coal-black ocean depths and bone-buried shorelines of the East Coast inspire her writing. Vanessa lives in Dartmouth, NS. This is her first novel.


Sales and Market Bullets






• A FEMINIST TAKE ON THE GOTHIC GENRE: With a tough-as-nails female protagonist and an aunt deemed a witch by the local townsfolk, Penney turns the gothic genre on its head. Instead of victimizing female characters, Penney tells a story of strong, powerful women who aren't afraid of what anyone thinks of them.



• SUPERNATURAL SUSPENSE - OR IS IT?: The story plays with the characters' - and the readers' - minds, keeping readers guessing whether the sinister happenings are supernatural or grounded in reality.



• SET IN RURAL NOVA SCOTIA: An eerie twist on small-town horror, this story is a haunting love letter to Canada's East Coast. Born in Saint Anthony, Newfoundland, and now based in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Penney's lifelong ties to the region bring an authentic touch.



• SCREENWRITER TO DEBUT AUTHOR: Vanessa Penney's full-length feature action screenplay Raising the Dead was a semi-finalist in the 2021 Toronto Metropolitan International Screenplay Competition, judged well for "superb plot revelations" that are "heartbreaking" and "a twisted mystery that brings a great plot and delivers well on it."



• PERFECT FOR READERS OF: T. Kingfisher, Shirley Jackson, Mexican Gothic (Silvia Moreno-Garcia), Bunny (Mona Awad), Weyward (Emilia Hart), The God of the Woods (Liz Moore).



• NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: "It's fast-paced, feminist, and creepy, a fun read that still has something to say about the people we fear and how humans look for blame. I loved that you can't tell if it's actually supernatural for a good chunk of the book, which encourages us to question our own assumptions. It has a tough female protagonist, great atmosphere, misfit friendship, and the rural Nova Scotia setting provides some fresh folklore and haunting regional history." - Jen Knoch, senior editor