She had three sons with her former husband, Phillipe de Clermont. Ysabeau de Clermont is a French vampire who sired Matthew de Clermont. And without really telling her all that much about the covenant, he takes her to a castle in France to meet his mother Ysabeau. Lisa Berry Drago: Matthew tries to protect Diana from the covenant. So the two, along with a cast of side characters, spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to harness Diana's magic and get it back. Now Matthew tells her the book is really important to the survival of the three species and the congregation wants it. After Diana calls up a mysterious book in the Oxford Library, she sends it back without truly understanding its magic. But within that container is a whole lot of other stuff. So if you haven't seen them, you've been warned.Īlexis Pedrick: I wanna quickly break down the plot of Discovery of Witches before we jump into other conversations.

The conversation will mostly focus on books one and two, and season one and two of the show. Lisa Berry Drago: Just as a note, this podcast is definitely going to contain some spoilers. The story starts in modern day Oxford England and quickly takes us all over the world, and all over time. Her main love interest is a vampire, Matthew Clermont. Harkness is a historian of science, but also a witch. And no one is quite sure why.Īlexis Pedrick: The main character is Diana Bishop, who like Deborah At what point, it's established that the creatures might've made up to 50% of the population in the past, but they've been dying out. The creatures know about each other but the humans don't know about them, and they wanna keep it that way. They live among regular folks but they do so in secret. Lisa Berry Drago: Like all good fantasy stories, there's witches, vampires and demons in the world of All Souls. And a yearly conference that we occasionally host at the Science History Institute. A Discovery of Witches, Shadow of Night, and Book of Life have now been adapted into a TV series on Sundance channel. Which are a series of fantasy books by Deborah Harkness. And this is Distillations.Īlexis Pedrick: Today we're gonna talk about The All Souls Trilogy. Lisa Berry Drago: And I'm Lisa Barry Drago. Hosts: Alexis Pedrick and Elisabeth Berry Drago The TV show and annual All Souls Con-which the Science History Institute occasionally hosts-is based on the trilogy of books about witches, vampires, and demons by author Deborah Harkness.ĭistillations sat down with Jen Daine and Cait Parnell, the hosts of the All Souls podcast, Chamomile and Clove art historian Stephenie McGucken and medievalist actor, journalist, and author Sarah Durn to talk about the series’ alchemical roots, the material culture in the TV show, and how the book’s found-family theme mirrors the fandom.

Ever since the book A Discovery of Witches debuted in 2011, the All Souls franchise has taken on a life of its own with devoted fans all over the world.

A discovery of witches trilogy