It’s been a wild year for Sideways Pike….
We’re excited to share the cover for Hannah Abigail Clarke’s The Scratch Daughters—arriving in September 2021 from Erewhon Books. In the second book of the bestselling Scapegracers trilogy, Sideways Pike struggles to keep her coven together, track down her evil ex, and hex dudebros, as the loss of her magical soul drives her to desperation.
It’s been a wild year for Sideways Pike. She formed a coven with the three most popular girls in school, fell for a mysterious stranger, and threw a massive Halloween party with said coven to impress said stranger, only for her to literally rip Sideways’ specter out—a soul-like organ that gives witches the ability to perform magic. For Madeline, stealing Sideways’ specter was a necessary evil: after her witchfinder ex-boyfriend robbed her of her own, Madeline’s been hellbent on getting it back and exacting vengeance on the whole Chantry family, even if that means hurting another witch in the process. Sideways can have her specter back when Madeline’s done with it. She’ll be fine until then, right?
Except Winter break is looming and specter-less Sideways is feeling rotten. She can’t do magic on her own, parts of her mind are tangled with Madeline’s, and if it weren’t for Mr. Scratch, the inky book devil consensually possessing her, she’d probably be dead. Sideways and her fellow (much merrier) Scapegracers have set up shop as curse crafters for girls in their school who’ve been done wrong by guys, following dead-end trails in pursuit of Madeline where they can. But when Sideways comes up with a reckless plan to get her specter back, she finds the other Scapegracers think it’s too dangerous to proceed.
Well, Sideways is used to going it alone, and she’s desperate. She’s not going to let an ex-crush and six unhinged witchfinders stand between herself and her magic. But she, Mr. Scratch, and her trusty stolen bike are in for a bumpy ride…
Buy the Book
The Scratch Daughters
Hannah Abigail Clarke is here and queer, etc. They have been published in PRISM international, Portland Review, and Eidolon. They were a 2019 Lambda Literary Fellow in Young Adult Fiction and a Pushcart nominee. They researched queerness, labor, and monstrosity at the University of Chicago. The Scratch Daughters is the second book in their indie-bestselling series, The Scapegracers.
