The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels

Female empowerment and the subversion of traditional gender roles is a crucial theme throughout The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels. In India Holton’s fantasy version of Victorian England, women have more agency and power, enabling them to have various adventures and to even occasionally dominate men.

The Wisteria Society is a woman-led group of pirates that use magical incantations to fly their houses. This flight allows them to practice piracy and pull off bank robberies and heists of all kinds. The Wisteria Society was founded by Black Beryl, the wife of a doomed explorer. She and her husband crashed their ship on an island, and Black Beryl found the flying incantation written on a piece of parchment inside a bottle. When she realized that reciting it could make things fly, she flew a beach hut back to England and shared the incantation with her ladies’ book club, which then turned to piracy and became the Wisteria Society. This was a marked shift for the ladies, who instead of being relegated to sewing circles and literary discussion were then permitted to take up piracy “with remarkable ease” (25), showcasing the innate desire for adventure and aptitude for cleverness and cunning within the women.