**THIS CONTAINS BOOK ONE AND BOOK TWO SPOILERS**
The December People
Series Overview
OVERALL
The December People series is a four book adult contemporary
fantasy series about a family of winter wizards living in Houston, Texas. In
this magical reality, wizards are classified by the seasons. You can be a
spring, winter, summer, or fall wizard, and each type has certain
characteristics. You can learn more about them here:
An overview of magical types and rules:
Each book in the series focuses on a different season:
- Destruction (winter)
- Watch Me Burn (summer)
- A Taste of Death and Honey (spring)
- Harvest (fall)
BOOK ONE – DESTRUCTION
David Vandergraff is a forty something husband and father to
three teenage children. But when he was first married, he had an affair with a
woman and had two children with her. Twelve years before the start of the book
his secret children and their mother mysteriously disappeared.
The story begins with David getting a call saying that his
children had been found. He discovers that their lives had been horrific. His
children’s mother re-married and they lived off the grid. His kids were
sexually abused by their stepfather for many years. Then he killed the mother
and the kids got away. The stepfather was shot down by police when he tried to
make a run for it.
David adopts his kids and his wife and other children are
furious, but Amanda (David’s wife) recognizes that the two new children need a
home, so they try to make it work together. Family and marriage drama ensues.
David’s two other kids claim to be dark wizards. Not
believing magic is real, David agrees with the social worker that it’s just a
magical narrative they use to make sense of their abuse. However, things start
happening that start to make David wonder.
Finally, after a dramatic scene with yelling and magic,
Amanda pulls David aside and admits the truth. David, Amanda, and all their
kids are wizards. However, they are
winter wizards, so their magic is inherently destructive and evil. Amanda
admitted that she used magic to wipe David’s memory so he would forget his own
traumatic childhood. She didn’t expect to make him forget he was a wizard, but
when it happened, she just went with it. They had chosen not to practice anyway
and not to tell their kids the truth because dark magic always ends up
destroying you.
However, more bizarre events lead the children to also
realize the truth, and the two new children, and Emmy’s (David’s daughter) friend
Samantha (who are all wizards) are happy to spill the beans to the kids who
don’t know about magic. Amanda urges them all to not use their magic, but they
do it anyway.
Then David learns that his oldest son, Jude, raped his
Emmy’s friend Samantha when she was staying over. Around the same time, he
learns that his other kid’s stepfather is actually still alive. Emmy blames
magic for the rape, and specifically the stepfather, for bringing all this evil
into her life. She overhears the news about the stepfather being alive and
decides to run away from home to go kill him.
David follows after her and they have a confrontation with
the stepfather in the desert of West Texas. Stepfather dies. Emmy is safe. They
all try to make it work as a family.
BOOK TWO – WATCH ME BURN
David is struggling trying to help his traumatized kids and
broken family. Then he starts seeing the image of a missing girl everywhere. He
sees her so frequently and becomes so obsessed with solving her mystery that it
seems like magic may be in play.
The missing girl is Julie Prescott, a teenage summer witch
from a seemingly perfect summer wizard family. David feels compelled to find
out what happened to her and starts investigating.
Then Emmy finds Julie’s bracelet in the family car and
worries that one of her family members was involved in her disappearance. She
doesn’t tell anyone about what she finds and starts her own investigation.
While searching the forest where Julie disappeared, she meets Julie’s brother
Nathan and they begin a secret romance. Nathan had been with Julie when she
disappeared.
Emmy finally decides to confide in her half sister,
Evangeline, and they go to search the forest together. Then Evangeline also
disappears in the forest. The whole family is devastated. They all try to find
her, but something seems dark and magical about the forest.
While all this is going on, Amanda is getting sick. She’s
been secretly trying to siphon dark magic out of her estranged son Jude and it
gave her cancer.
Nathan admits that he thinks he knows why Julie and
Evangeline were taken. They are solstice witches, meaning their magical date
falls on the summer and winter solstice respectively. They have incredible
power and some people might want to try to take their power using dark magic.
He says that if this person gets the magic from all four events, summer
solstice (Julie), winter solstice (Evangeline), fall equinox, and spring
equinox, they will have power too great for any one wizard and must be stopped.
He tells Patrick (David’s middle son) to stay away because he believes that he
is a fall equinox wizard.
Instead of staying away, Patrick realizes that if they are
looking for him, he might be the only one who can enter the forest and save the
girls. He goes into the forest and finds a house that had been invisible to
everyone else. A beautiful girl comes out to greet him. It’s the oldest
Prescott child, Caroline. Turns out she is evil and kidnapped her own sister to
steal her magic. She wants to collect magic from each of the four events. She
tortures Patrick. She is also dating the Vandergraff’s estranged son, Jude, who
was also in on the kidnapping.
Meanwhile, the forest where they went missing catches fire
and the Vandergraff and Prescott parents face off as they try to enter the
forest to save their children. John Prescott (the Prescott father) kills
David’s brother, James.
Patrick, Evangeline, and Julie eventually realize how
powerful they are if they work together. They are able to subdue Caroline and
escape. They worry that Caroline and Jude will continue looking for the missing
piece, a spring equinox wizard.
CHARACTERS
· David Vandergraff – Born 1970. Father to Jude, Patrick, Xavier, Emmy, and Evangeline. Husband to Amanda. Winter wizard.· Amanda Vandergraff – Born 1970. Mother to Jude, Patrick, and Emmy. Wife to David. Winter witch.
· Jude Vandergraff – Born 1996. Powerful dark wizard. Raped Samantha. Boyfriend of Caroline. Winter wizard.
· Patrick Vandergraff – Born 1998. Fall equinox wizard.
· Xavier Vandergraff – Born 1998. Son of David and Crystal. Winter wizard.
· Emmy Vandergraff – Born 2000. Winter witch.
· Evangeline Vandergraff – Born 2001. Son of David and Crystal. Winter solstice witch.
· Samantha Carthage – Born 1999. Orphaned. Best friend of Emmy. Occasional love interest of Patrick. Spring witch.
· Whitman Colter – Husband to Crystal. Stepfather to Xavier and Evangeline. Abusive and very evil. Winter wizard. Deceased.
· Crystal Carr-Colter – Wife to Whitman. Mother of Xavier and Evangeline. Lover of David. Winter witch. Deceased.
· Rachel Colter – Sister to Whitman. New York businesswoman. Winter witch.
· Carson Oppenheimer – Amanda’s brother. Father of five. Winter wizard (non-practicing).
· Jess Oppenheimer – Carson’s wife. Mother of five. Fall witch.
· Erastus Oppenheimer – Amanda’s father. Winter wizard (non-practicing).
· Eloise Oppenheimer – Amanda’s mother. Winter witch (non-practicing).
· James Vandergraff – David’s brother. Winter wizard (non-practicing).
· John Prescott – Father to Nathan, Julie, Lucas, and Leona. Husband of Thea. Summer wizard.
· Thea Prescott – Mother to Caroline, Nathan, Julie, Lucas, and Leona. Wife of John. Summer witch.
· Caroline Prescott – Born 1994. Daughter of Thea and an unknown winter wizard. Girlfriend of Jude. Fall witch.
· Nathan Prescott – Born 1996. Occasional love interest of Emmy. Summer wizard.
· Lucas Prescott – Born 1998. Summer wizard.
· Julie Prescott – Born 2000. Summer solstice witch.
· Leona Prescott - Born 2002. Mysteriously missing from family. All details unknown.
· Carlos Vega – Born 1992. Fall wizard sometimes called “The Oracle.” Shares prophecies with Thea Prescott. Told her that a Vandergraff would kill a Prescott.
Themes in Destruction
Worldbuilding in The December People Series
A Dose of Real Magic: Research in Fantasy Novels
Interview with Nikola Vukoja
A Tribute to Spring Wizards
Interview with David Vandergraff
Spotlight on Emmy Vandergraff
Tribute to Summer Wizards
Interview with Amy Bearce
Meet the Prescotts
Worldbuilding in The December People Series
A Dose of Real Magic: Research in Fantasy Novels
Interview with Nikola Vukoja
A Tribute to Spring Wizards
Interview with David Vandergraff
Spotlight on Emmy Vandergraff
Tribute to Summer Wizards
Interview with Amy Bearce
Meet the Prescotts
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