Witches and witchcraft have always held a huge fascination in popular fiction (just look at Harry Potter). But with the rise of TikTok, witchcraft is gaining ever more fans – with ‘witchtok’ amassing 57 billion views and ‘witchlit’ becoming hugely popular in the book lists.
However, 49-year-old Carolyn Turmaine was a fan even before the internet explosion. From the age of three, she knew she wanted to be a witch.
Carolyn, from Northumberland, explains: ‘My dad was in the RAF and we were living in Cyprus and we had no access to any witchy cartoons on TV. But my mum said that I started dressing with a hat and broomstick ever since I was little.’
When she became a teenager, Carolyn devoured books about Merlin and Morgan Le Fay, a witch from the Arthurian legends.
She recalls: ‘I was actually brought up a Roman Catholic and I went to Sunday school, so I …