I live in Boston, and am thus just an hour away from the hallowed Witch City. When you go to a place that heavily markets its supposed magic, what otherworldliness do you actually expect to find in the landscape of kitschy souvenirs? In The Electric Life of Lavender Lewis, the titular protagonist is at a crossroads concerning how much of the occult she believes in. Lavender “Ven” is a 17-year-old with epilepsy, whose mother has made her aware of the beliefs held by some cultures that seizures grant access to a supernatural plane. Ven’s coming-of-age story depicts her wading through grief and fear amid a convergence of her family’s love for the arcane, the realities of her disease, and the essence of Salem, Massachusetts.

Salem-based author Kara Storti has epilepsy and published her award-winning debut Tripping Back Blue in 2016, only now bringing us her sophomore novel. The Electric Life of Lavender Lewis introduces Ven, struggling with epilepsy that has resisted all treatment, but vehemently opposed to surgery that would remove part of her brain. Furthermore, Ven’s mother passes away from multiple sclerosis just after the book begins. But something remarkable starts happening during Ven’s seizures: She finds herself in a cozy bedroom stocked with books, inhabited by a boy who can’t remember his life, and is convinced by certain clues that her late mother has given her a mission to save him.

Ven’s most obvious ally is her aunt Tammy, who lives a vagabond lifestyle while pursuing a career as a tarot card reader. Tammy withdrew from their lives as Ven’s mother grew sicker, before reappearing at the funeral, only angering Ven more. But Tammy absolutely believes Ven’s story and proposes they embark on a road trip to Salem (from Vermont) to contact her mother in the beyond for answers. Tammy is her own nest of contradictions, whose actions you can’t quite excuse but whom you can’t help but love, when she is, in a way, the mascot of this story.

Storti’s wistful, cleverly constructed metaphors mixed with the witty and sarcastic voice she gives Ven are fitting of this small-scale but extraordinary narrative. Consider the very first sentence: “My seizure is a train tearing around the bend, its demon conductor out for blood.” Such is the language that Storti uses to describe Ven’s epilepsy (presumably describing how she herself experiences it), making it a formidable character in and of itself. But the text also explicitly confirms that this is a story about, among other things, Ven learning to better manage the seizure demon because she is more than her disease.

And the prose is just as vivid and funny when representing Ven’s teenage personality, interests, and emotions, making her life feel very full. During her first abnormal seizure, she reacts: “He takes a step toward me. Stay back, you skinny wraith, man of incomprehensible wattage. The horror! The madness! His face is pale and startled and I think he might be glowing a strange amber color.” Hilarious, while still fleshing out the details of the boy’s presence, and making me believe that this is a girl who often rereads Edgar Allen Poe. Storti also compellingly illustrates Ven’s internality by contrasting her passions with the logistics of epilepsy: “I should focus on my love of concert tees rather than the hatred of my disease. I should take pride in my book collection and how it represents my personality more than the collection of pills in my medicine cabinet.”

I wish this book could have spent more time in Salem, though it makes stops at other lovely New England locations. The text experiences a subtle cosmic pivot as Ven approaches the locale, launching into a lively description of what you see as you drive into the city. “At a young age, I know how to burn sage to cleanse a house. I’d power a crystal under the moon and stow it away in my pocket, hoping it would bring me the luck it promised. All thanks to Tammy, Mom and—I realize—Salem,” Ven says. Ven still isn’t ready to completely forgive Tammy, but becomes more comfortable around and impressed by her fearless aunt; Storti arguably leaves this plot point partially unresolved, as such painful relationships can only get better with time.

Ven still instinctively turns to a treasured crystal or asks her mom for help from the beyond. She also consciously questions her mother’s epileptic trivia and scoffs at her aunt’s seemingly shallow and capitalistic spirituality. There are some points where Ven rejects the idea of epilepsy being magical, in a predictable darkest hour manner, which doesn’t make complete sense when she has seen enough to fully believe that something supernatural is going on here. But other than that, Storti’s storytelling is seamless when it comes to exploring these dilemmas. This book has a leisurely pace through its surprising twists and turns, cruising down highways with some romantic interludes in seizure world, relaxing into contemplation before crescendoing, respectively, through the motifs of lavender and lightning. Though the ultimate lesson is somewhat familiar, Storti reaches it in a very effective way through Ven’s personal experience, entwined with the more universal ones of late teendom.

The Electric Life of Lavender Lewis is fundamentally melancholy because of where the protagonist is in her life, yet it has a joyful core. It paints a complex portrait of having an extremely disruptive condition and writes a beautiful love letter to the author’s hometown. Adding to my personal experience of the book is Storti’s appearance in conversation with Elizabeth Searle at the ever-whimsical location of Brookline Booksmith this month. “We always wanted to create a space of wonder and a space to wander,” store co-owner Lisa Gozashti told The Boston Globe in 2022. Though this space has been a forum for many great books filled with critical commentary, the fairy-light-adorned shop seems like the perfect magical setting to discuss this book in particular. But in the end, Lavender learns what we all have to eventually: magic or no, all you can do is face the music and take control of your own life.

The Electric Life of Lavender Lewis is available now, you can order your copy on Bookshop.org