Archive: Around Town

The Karber WitchesIt's not easy being a witch.  People want your help, but they gossip about you behind your back.  You are accosted by the living and the dead.  You are kidnapped and it turns out your boyfriend is a serial killer.  And you are subject to religious persecution.  Even though Author Tanya Robbins set her novel in Lansing, she doesn't really think that would happen here.  "Maybe in Dryden," she jokes.

Her novel, 'The Karber Witches: Demons Among Us' is to be released on October 7th, but is available now on the publisher's Web site.  The book tells the story the Karber Witches, especially that of Kyleigh Karber, who goes through a series of life-altering experiences to fulfill her destiny.  Each Karber is born with a different psychic ability.  Kyleigh's is that she can see and speak to the dead.  That makes her already chaotic life more complicated.

"The witchcraft thing has always fascinated me," says author Robbins.  "Religion has always fascinated me.  It is fascinating how people adhere to something that they can't see or hear or taste or touch.  Witchcraft has always had a bad connotation, but it's actually quite interesting.  It's not evil."  Making people understand that is one of the challenges Kyleigh has in the novel, pompously but humorously putting people straight.  "She is very in-your-face," Robbins says.

Robbins used Lansing as the background for her story, using local landmarks including Cayuga Lake and Ludlowville Falls.  "I love Lansing, and think it's a great place," she says.  "I wanted the rest of the world to know that these townships are actually quite nice, away from all the rigorous hustle and bustle of the world.  The simplicity of small town life is fantastic."

The novel came about from a kind of challenge.  A long time friend said, "I've always wanted to write a book."   Robbins replied, "I'm going to jump on that bandwagon."  She started writing the book in November of last year, and finished it in March, then sent it out to publishers.  She was thrilled when Publish America accepted it for publication.


She mixes fact with fiction, and had some difficulty researching  because she says the practitioners of 'traditional witchcraft' are closed-mouthed about their tradition.  She got lucky one day while on-line when she found a 'witchmaster' who was willing to help her.  "We corresponded back and forth about it, and he gave me things to look up," she says.  "He let me in on a lot of stuff, which is not standard procedure.  There was also a lady in New York who practices a different kind of traditional witchcraft, fairy magic.  She got me some information regarding that."

Robbins didn't plot the novel before she started.  "That stifles the creativity for me," she says.  "I tried, but the more I tried working with a structure, the more I got frustrated.  So I ended up just letting it flow."  She ended up using most of what she wrote.  

She wrote on her computer, but the editing started out rocky as she printed out chapters for her cousin to edit.  By chapter eight they realized they could save a lot of time and effort by emailing the chapters back and forth.  She also started carrying around a recorder to save ideas as they occurred to her.  Robbins designed the cover, which includes symbols like the tree of life, the circle and pentagram, night and day, life and death, astrological signs, and the eye of Horus.

While it was hard work, Robbins says she enjoyed the process so much that she is already working on a new novel about Druids.  I love doing it.  I put in the dedication to my husband, 'Thanks for standing by me while I figured out what I wanted to do when I grow up.'"  

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