View source for Religion:Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch

{{Short description|2021 novel by Rivka Galchen}}
{{Infobox book
| italic title      = <!--(see above)-->
| name              = Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch 
| image             = File:Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch by Rivka Galchen 3456.jpg
| image_size        = 150px
| border            = yes
| alt               = An image of the 2021 book cover
| caption           = 2021 book cover image
| author            = Rivka Galchen
| audio_read_by     = Natasha Soudek 
| title_orig        = 
| orig_lang_code    = 
| title_working     = 
| translator        = 
| illustrator       = 
| cover_artist      = 
| country           = United States
| language          = 
| series            = 
| release_number    = 
| genre             = Fiction, Historical novel 
| set_in            = 17th-century Germany
| publisher         = Farrar, Straus and Giroux 
| publisher2        = 
| pub_date          = June 8, 2021
| english_pub_date  = 
| published         = 
| media_type        = Hardcover, E-book, Audio book
| pages             = 288
| awards            = 
| isbn              = 9780374280468
| isbn_note         = 
| oclc              = 1269024553
| dewey             = 
| congress          = PS3607.A4116 E94 2021
| preceded_by       = 'Atmospheric Disturbances'
| followed_by       = 
| native_wikisource = 
| wikisource        = 
| notes             = 
| exclude_cover     = 
| website           = [https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374280468/everyoneknowsyourmotherisawitch Macmillan]
}}

'''''Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch''''' is a historical fiction novel written by Rivka Galchen and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux on June 8, 2021.<ref name=charles>
{{cite news
 | last = Charles 
 | first = Ron
 | title = The story of Europe’s infamous witch trials gets the Monty Python treatment
 | newspaper = Washington Post 
 | date = June 1, 2021
 | url = https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/rivka-galchen-everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch/2021/05/24/155fcfea-bca9-11eb-b26e-53663e6be6ff_story.html
 | access-date = }}</ref><ref name=kirkus>
{{cite news
 | last =Staff
 | first =
 | title = A 17th-century German witch hunt—really
 | newspaper = Kirkus Reviews
 | date = March 17, 2021
 | url = https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/rivka-galchen/everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch/
 | access-date =October 21, 2021}}</ref> The book is a fictionalized version of true events.<ref name=wolf-ocher/> Part of the historical background of this story is that "between 1625 and 1631, under the Catholic Prince-Bishopric of Würzburg, the [[Religion:Holy Roman Empire|Holy Roman Empire]] saw one of the biggest mass trials in European history, with an estimated 900 people executed in the Würzburg witch trials."<ref name=Hagi>
{{cite news
 | last =  Hagi
 | first = Sarah
 | title = Rivka Galchen's Historical Novel Satirizes Moral Panic
 | newspaper = {{wipe|New York Times}}
 | date = June 8, 2021
 | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/08/books/review/rivka-galchen-everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch.html
 | access-date =October 21, 2021}}</ref>

==Plot==
This story is set in the 17th century in the [[Religion:Holy Roman Empire|Holy Roman Empire]] during the beginnings of the Thirty Years War and the plague. In this fictionalized version of the illiterate Katharina Kepler's later life, she is accused of [[Social:Witchcraft|witchcraft]]. Part of the reason for the accusation is because she lives into old age when most people die around the age of 30. Other reasons are related to her personal quirks. Also, the label of "witch" comes at first from Ursula Reinbold and then snowballs into many in her community accusing her of the same. Her son [[Biography:Johannes Kepler|Johannes Kepler]] was compelled to absent himself from the royal court to defend his mother. She is also aided by two of her other children as well as her sympathetic legal guardian, scribe, and neighbor, Simon.<ref name=Hagi/><ref name=wolf-ocher>
{{cite news
 | last = Kate Wolf and Medaya Ocher 
 | first =
 | title = Rivka Galchen’s "Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch"
 | newspaper = [[Los Angeles Review of Books]]
 | date =July 23, 2021
 | url = https://lareviewofbooks.org/av/rivka-galchens-everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch/
 | access-date = }}</ref><ref name=kellog>
{{cite news
 | last = Kellog
 | first = Carolyn
 | title = Review: Spellbinding novelist Rivka Galchen’s new book is a hysterical witch hunt
 | newspaper = {{wipe|Los Angeles Times}} (the newspaper). 
 | date = June 3, 2021
 | url = https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2021-06-03/acclaimed-for-spellbinding-fiction-rivka-galchen-goes-on-a-witch-hunt
 | access-date = }}</ref><ref name=clegg>
{{cite news
 | last = Clegg
 | first = Bill
 | title = Review: Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch
 | newspaper = Publishers Weekly
 | date = July 8, 2021
 | url = https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-374-28046-8
 | access-date = }}</ref>

==Reception==
According to the online review aggregator website Book Marks, the book received mostly positive reviews.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Book Marks reviews of Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch by Rivka Galchen|url=https://bookmarks.reviews/reviews/everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch//|access-date=2022-02-05|website=Book Marks|language=en-US}}</ref>

''Kirkus Reviews'' says, "There is so much in this novel to consider—the degree to which we make monsters of one another, the way that old age can make of femininity an apparently terrifying, otherworldly thing—but it is also, at every step along the way, an entirely delicious book."<ref name=kirkus/> ''Publishers Weekly'' says, "Galchen portrays her characters as complicated and full of wit as they face down the cruelties dealt to them...[t]his is a resounding delight.<ref name=clegg/> According to Rhianna Walton of Powell's Books, "It's relatable, in a way I didn't think possible...[a]nd it's poignant and philosophical, an examination of motherhood, neighborhood, science, magic, and culpability that I knew possible only because I've read Galchen before and was prepared for her singular ability to breathe life, logic, and beauty into the absurd.<ref name=walton>
{{cite web
 | url = https://www.powells.com/post/interviews/powells-interview-rivka-galchen-author-of-everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch
 | title = Powell's Interview: Rivka Galchen, author of 'Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch'
 | last = Walton
 | first = Rhianna 
 | date = June 23, 202
 | website = 
 | publisher = Powell's Books
 | access-date =}}</ref> Writing for ''{{wipe|The Washington Post}}'', Ron Charles describes how "the comedy that runs through 'Everyone Knows' is a magical brew of absurdity and brutality. Galchen has a Kafkaesque sense of the way the exercise of authority inflates egos and twists logic."<ref>{{Cite news|last=Charles|first=Ron|date=June 1, 2021|title=The story of Europe’s infamous witch trials gets the Monty Python treatment|work=The Washington Post|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/rivka-galchen-everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch/2021/05/24/155fcfea-bca9-11eb-b26e-53663e6be6ff_story.html|access-date=February 5, 2022}}</ref>

The novel was long listed for the 2022 Canada Reads contest.<ref>{{Cite news|date=January 12, 2022|title=Here is the Canada Reads 2022 longlist|work=CBC|url=https://www.cbc.ca/books/canadareads/here-is-the-canada-reads-2022-longlist-1.6310422|access-date=February 5, 2022}}</ref> 

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* {{Official|https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374280468/everyoneknowsyourmotherisawitch}}
*{{isbn|9780374280468}}
* [https://www.powells.com/post/interviews/powells-interview-rivka-galchen-author-of-everyone-knows-your-mother-is-a-witch Rhianna Walton interview]. Powell's Books.Blog. 
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-6JqSWFslw The Center for Fiction]. Christine Smallwood interview. YouTube.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS9jf84rM78 Green Apple Books] interview. YouTube.
* [https://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-ca-jc-rivka-galchen-20140504-story.html Rivka Galchen talks about putting a female twist on iconic stories]. LA Times.
* [https://www.latimes.com/lifestyle/story/2019-09-11/reading-nook-rivka-galchen-subways-are-for-reading Reading Nook: For Rivka Galchen, subways are for reading]. LA Times.
*{{lccn|2020058349}}

[[Category:Religion and society]]

{{Sourceattribution|Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch|1}}