Diana Bishop, Oxford scholar and reluctant witch, and Matthew Clairmont, handsome geneticist and vampire, are plunged into Elizabethan London, a world of spies, subterfuge, and a coterie of Matthew’s old friends. Here, Dianna must find a witch to mentor her and Matthew is forced to confront a past he thought he had put to rest.

Diana Bishop, a young scholar and the descendant of witches, discovers a long-lost alchemical manuscript deep in Oxford's Bodleian Library. Its reappearance summons a fantastical underworld, which she navigates with her leading man, vampire geneticist Matthew Clairmont.