The Red Magic 8, a highly anticipated gaming phone from the company Nubia, is set to be introduced on a yet-to-be-announced date. With the previous versions of the Red Magic lineup gaining popularity among gamers, the Red Magic 8 is expected to bring even more advanced features and enhanced gaming experience. As the release date approaches, gamers and tech enthusiasts are eagerly waiting for the official announcement to see what the Red Magic 8 has to offer..
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ITW Spotlight: Chris Bohjalian Pens His Timeliest Novel Yet in “The Hour of the Witch”
In Hour of the Witch ( Doubleday ), bestselling author Chris Bohjalian takes readers on a treacherous journey through 17th-century Puritan New England, when a woman proclaiming her rights could end up hanging from a noose.
INSPIRATION FOUND IN A REAL LEGAL CASE
Loosely based on a factual case, Bohjalian “came across a reference in the records of Boston’s Court of Assistants from 1672: a woman named Nanny Naylor successfully sued her husband for divorce on the grounds of cruelty.” He explains that he “was looking for a way into a novel of suspense set in the 17th century, but one that I hoped would chart new ground.
“My best work is powered by dread. My books are slow burns. It’s not ‘action’ in a conventional sense that keeps readers turning the pages, but rather a simmering anxiety. And many of the Puritans lived with anxiety and dread: Satan was as real as your neighbor, and they fretted constantly over whether they were saved or damned.
“When we think of New England’s history of hanging people for witchcraft, we beeline straight to Salem in 1692. But in 1656, the governor of Massachusetts had his own sister-in-law hanged as a witch. The first real witch hunt was in Hartford in 1662 — three full decades before Salem. One thing many of the women executed as witches had in common was that they were smart, opinionated, and viewed as outsiders: sometimes they saw through the patriarchal hypocrisy that marked a lot of New England Puritanism.”
PURITANICAL MARRIAGE NIGHTMARE
In the novel, 24-year-old Mary Deerfield has endured her older husband’s cruelty for the entire five years of their marriage. She’d become adept at hiding the bruises that Thomas is careful to leave close to her hairline. Mary knows that when he comes home from the pub “drink drunk,” she must be on high alert for an outburst that might cause him to abuse her.
Thomas had hit her more than a dozen times, hurled her into the hearth, and thrown steaming-hot stew on her. “Mary was a prisoner of a man who had within him a monster.”
After Mary’s father, an importer of goods from England, gives her the newest thing from Europe — forks with three tines that are used for eating things hard to pick up with a spoon — Mary finds the forks buried in her yard. She doesn’t know who buried them but believes someone is trying to put a spell on her. When her 18-year-old servant Catherine sees Mary putting the tines back into the ground where she found them, Catherine believes that Mary is the one who buried them and that she’s cursed by the Devil.
When Thomas stabs Mary’s hand with a fork even though he’s sober, she realizes that she loathes her husband. She knows she must get away from him, and the only way is to petition for divorce because of cruelty. There begins Mary’s journey to divorce her husband. She must convince the Court of Assistants who will hear her petition that Thomas has been cruel to her. But Thomas insists his “discipline” of Mary was always educational, a husband trying to teach his wife.
FACTUAL DIVORCE AND WITCHCRAFT FICTION
According to Bohjalian, the story of Mary Deerfield is fictional. “The man Nanny Naylor divorced, Edward Naylor, was a beast. He was thoroughly despicable, and I imagine you had to be a horrible human being for Boston’s all-male Court of Assistants to grant a woman a divorce on the grounds of her husband’s cruelty in the 17th century. It happened exactly one time.
“But Thomas Deerfield, the abusive husband in my novel, is not Edward Naylor. Thomas is a monster, but monsters and beasts (and nightmares) come in all shapes and sizes. Witchcraft did not figure into the actual divorce trial in 1672, and it was allegations of witchcraft that interested me.
“Likewise, my heroine, Mary Deerfield, is not Nanny Naylor. The idea of the divorce was a way for me to create a courageous and strong heroine who’s willing to risk everything to regain control of her one rare and beautiful life.”
Mary’s infatuation with Henry Simmons, a young entrepreneur in the community, along with her practice of sexually satisfying herself alone at night, causes her to consider that maybe the Devil has in fact tainted her heart. But she must still escape Thomas’s brutality.
The trial becomes an assassination of Mary’s character and the beginning of the town’s belief that Mary might indeed be an agent of the Devil. Soon, she’s fighting for her life.
A TIMELY STORY SET MORE THAN 300 YEAR AGO
Bohjalian says that although “Hour of the Witch is set in 1662, it is, by design, among the timeliest novels I’ve ever written.”
And although the novel is fictional, Bohjalian hopes that his recreation of a Puritan trial reflects accurate elements. “While the Puritans were solid record keepers, they didn’t have court stenographers. We don’t have verbatim transcripts of most 17th-century trials.
“I hope the way I’ve described the trial proceeding is fundamentally accurate. I had the good fortune of becoming friends with L. Kinvin Wroth, professor emeritus of law at Vermont Law School. We first had lunch 20 years ago, when I reached out to him to discuss the novel I was contemplating about a Puritan woman’s attempt to divorce her husband. He pointed out the articles it was critical I read about 17th-century law and the first New England courts. He read a draft of the novel and patiently corrected my most egregious mistakes.”
A MESSAGE FOR READERS IN HOUR OF THE WITCH
“Although set in 1662, I doubt my readers will miss the irony when one of the men on Boston’s Court of Assistants calls Mary Deerfield ‘a nasty woman.’ I want my readers to see the similarities between our world then and now,” Bohjalian says. “I’ve loved it when early readers have said things like, ‘Wow: it’s The Crucible meets The Handmaid’s Tale.’”
Even though women have gained rights and freedom since 1662, Bohjalian acknowledges there are still parallels in today’s world with the prejudice Mary faced in her Puritan community. “Men still abuse women and take them for granted. And, yes, men often vilify strong, smart women. Whenever a woman is a corporate CEO, or a successful politician or legislator, we see the double standard and the ways women are maligned.
“The Puritans came here with what they thought was a noble goal: to build a city upon a hill that the world would smile upon and make their God proud. Instead, they started the genocide of the indigenous people who lived here and showed that good intentions are no match for the robust hypocrisies and contradictions that live within the human heart.
“Human relationships are always going to be fraught, and the human soul is always going to be fragile. We are always going to make mistakes. We are at our best when we understand that and can say either, ‘I was wrong, forgive me’ or ‘I forgive you.’ There’s a reasonable process, and we’ll get past this.
“When the Puritans were at their best, they did those things. When they were at their worst? It wasn’t pretty. They used the stocks the way we use Twitter: for public shaming.”
SNEAK PEEK AT BOHJALIAN’S NEXT NOVEL
“I wrote The Lions of Hollywood during the pandemic. It arrives in October 2022.
“And because I didn’t know what the ‘present’ would look like in 2022, my next book is also historical fiction but is set in 1964 (a year I don’t recall, but I was alive). It’s definitely a thriller.
“I loved Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and decided I wanted to write a Hollywood novel, but with a twist. The world’s biggest movie star finally gets married and brings her entourage with her on her honeymoon safari. But it all goes to hell fast, and it’s quite clear early on that an awful lot of Hollywood royalty is going to get eaten or otherwise killed.”
What advice does Bohjalian have for other writers?
“Write as often as you can, every day if possible. Write in the genre you love. If you love science fiction, write that. If you love thrillers, write thrillers. Skim a dictionary and pick out interesting words you’ve never or rarely used. Do your homework: research always makes my books better. And read voraciously. I love it when I’m reading a novel so good I’m left with an inferiority complex.”
YOUNG BOJALIAN’S RESPECT FOR HITCHCOCK
And finally, Bohjalian shares something about himself his fans might not already know.
“As a boy, I lived for the Alfred Hitchcock fiction anthologies, the small paperbacks filled with short stories that were awash with things that go bump in the night. I had dozens of them and kept them on a special shelf in my bedroom, treating these inexpensive little books with totemic reverence. I think it was perhaps inevitable that the first short story I ever wrote that still exists — I believe it is from the third or fourth grade — ends, ‘The dripping stopped, and the vultures had their meal.’”
This story appears through BookTrib’s partnership with the International Thriller Writers. It first appeared in The Big Thrill.
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Chris Bohjalian is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 22 books, including The Red Lotus, Midwives, and The Flight Attendant, which is an HBO Max limited series starring Kaley Cuoco. His other books include The Guest Room; Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands; The Sandcastle Girls; Skeletons at the Feast; and The Double Bind. His novels Secrets of Eden, Midwives, and Past the Bleachers were made into movies, and his work has been translated into more than thirty-five languages. He is also a playwright (Wingspan and Midwives). He lives in Vermont.
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K.L. Romo
K. L. Romo writes about life on the fringe: teetering dangerously on the edge is more interesting than standing safely in the middle. She is passionate about women’s issues, loves noisy clocks and fuzzy blankets, but HATES the word normal. She blogs about books at Romo's Reading Room. For more, visit klromo.com, @klromo on Twitter and @k.l.romo on Instagram.
“When we think of New England’s history of hanging people for witchcraft, we beeline straight to Salem in 1692. But in 1656, the governor of Massachusetts had his own sister-in-law hanged as a witch. The first real witch hunt was in Hartford in 1662 — three full decades before Salem. One thing many of the women executed as witches had in common was that they were smart, opinionated, and viewed as outsiders: sometimes they saw through the patriarchal hypocrisy that marked a lot of New England Puritanism.”
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Reviews for "Get Ready to Level Up: Red Magic 8 Introduction Date Revealed"
1. Sarah - 2/5 - I was really excited to get the Red Magic 8 on its introduction date, but I have been left disappointed. The phone's performance is not up to par with other flagship devices and I experienced lag and sluggishness even during basic tasks. The battery life is also quite poor, forcing me to constantly search for a charger. Overall, I expected more from the Red Magic 8 and would not recommend it.
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3. Emily - 2/5 - I was really eager to try out the Red Magic 8 on its introduction date, but it turned out to be a disappointing experience. The phone's user interface is cluttered and confusing, making it difficult to navigate through the various settings and features. The battery life is also disappointing, requiring frequent recharging throughout the day. Considering the price point, I expected a much better overall performance and user experience from the Red Magic 8.