Jessica is a lonely girl of about thirteen years old. She has few friends, and her mother leaves her home alone most nights. One day Jessica finds a very ugly baby kitten and takes him home despite not really liking cats. She and her mother name him Worm, because in his scrawny, almost-hairless, newborn state, that’s exactly what he looks like.

But Worm isn’t a normal cat. He doesn’t play or cry like other cats, and his stare feels hypnotic to Jessica. And one day, she hears him speak. He tells her to do terrible things to the people around her, and she can’t control her actions. Jessica has read all about witches, and knows Worm must be a witch’s cat, but she has no idea how to escape the spell he’s put on her. As she looks for a solution, she has to come to face the truth about herself.

Zilpha Keatley Snyder is one of my favorite children’s authors. I believe this is the fourth book I’ve read by her. She always manages to create a spooky story that borders on the supernatural, without ever really crossing the line. In this book, she’s created a parallel for the Salem Witch trials and Ann Putnam. She explores the psychology of a child always left alone, and the greed of power and attention. The Witches of Worm is one of those books that shows up frequently on banned books lists, and once again, I don’t see why. It teaches a good lesson, and there’s nothing immoral about it. I think this is a great book for kids to read. Maybe those trying to ban it don’t read it all the way through…they hear “witches” and cry foul.

One of the things I’ve noticed about Snyder’s books is that she spends a lot of time talking about children of single parents – single either by divorce, death, abandonment, or having never married in the first place. Some of these single parents are good, and try as hard as they can, and some are neglectful, like Jessica’s mother. Either way, the children in these families often feel different and alone. Snyder wrote a lot in the 60s and 70s, when nontraditional families were different and strange, but were also becoming more common. I think she captures the children’s worries about not fitting in perfectly. While the same rules might not apply today – no one really looks at kids funny for only having one parent anymore – I think the feelings Snyder brings up are still valid. Kids are looked at funny for other reasons. There is always discrimination, teasing, and bullying in school. There are always kids that struggle with fitting in.