A Discovery of Witches
core novel 2011 All Souls Universe
Record
| First published | 2011 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 4.02 (569,928 ratings, collected 2026-09-04) |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780143119685 |
| Internal chronology | 1 |
Synopsis
A Discovery of Witches (2011) is the debut novel of Deborah Harkness and the first book in the All Souls Trilogy. Diana Bishop is a historian at Oxford and a descendant of a powerful line of witches, though she has spent her adult life avoiding magic and suppressing her own abilities. While researching alchemical manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, she unknowingly calls up an enchanted, long-lost text known as Ashmole 782, an event that ripples through the hidden world of witches, daemons, and vampires living alongside humans. The recall draws the attention of Matthew Clairmont, a centuries-old vampire and geneticist studying the biological origins of these creatures. As the two grow closer despite an old taboo against relationships between different species, they must contend with a secretive governing body, the Congregation, and other parties eager to possess the manuscript and the secrets it may hold.
Where it sits
- Universe: All Souls Universe
- Series: All Souls Trilogy core; position 1 of 3 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Deborah Harkness
Notes
- From the series record (All Souls Trilogy): Original trilogy; all three volumes were New York Times bestsellers.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings and are never conflated: a book's place in one says nothing about its place in the other.
- Publication order, within the series All Souls Trilogy: position 1 of 3: next Shadow of Night (2012)
- Internal chronology, within All Souls Universe: position 1 of 5: next Shadow of Night (2012)
Sources
← All Souls Universe dossier · All universes
Part of the Library. Fields without an identified source are omitted, never guessed.