Hi friends! I have a few Halloween-ish writing posts lined up for you, and this is the first one! I gathered up this list of magic spells because if you’re writing fantasy or paranormal stories, you might want to work some wizard or witch magic (or “magick”) into the story, whether they are fun, cute spells or deadly serious.

You may have ordinary characters working with spells, charms, and incantations, or the magic may only work for a natural witch, magician, or other person with magical powers. A character may be casting spells for good, for neutral purposes, or for evil—which means you may need to know how to hex someone. In some traditions, a spell intended to cause harm will bounce back on the witch (sometimes by a factor of three!)

To create this list of spells for witchcraft, I drew extensively from ancient magic (including Latin spells, African spells, Celtic magic, Jewish magic, and more), but also from literature, modern Wiccan spells, and popular culture. Before I get into it, though, let’s talk about how to write a spell in a story.