Whispers Before the Fire: The Mercy Lovejoy Prequel - Chronicles of the Whispering Falls Keepers: A Historical Saga of Witches, Magic, and Cats, #1

Andover, Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1691.

Mercy Lovejoy has already learned how quickly fear can turn an ordinary woman into something dangerous in the eyes of her neighbors.

Now the unease is spreading.

As women begin coming to Mercy for help, strange disturbances around Abigail raise questions no one can answer easily. A physical failure at a threshold echoes a deeper danger Mercy can feel but cannot yet name. And the bond she formed with Rufus, Sable, and Thimble is still new enough that none of them knows exactly what it will demand.

Mercy has begun recording what she learns in the pages she calls Things to Keep. What works. What fails. What must never be forced. And what should be remembered if another woman one day carries the same gift.

But in Essex County, whispers about witchcraft are growing louder.

Helping someone may expose Mercy. Refusing may leave another woman alone with something she cannot face.

And the closer 1692 comes, the more dangerous it becomes to know the difference between the supernatural and the merely unexplained.

Whispers Before the Fire is a cozy historical fantasy filled with witchcraft, talking cats, women's household knowledge, found family, quiet mystery, and the rising fear that would soon engulf colonial Massachusetts.