The fluffy side of Wicca, 17 Aug 2001

I'm afraid reading this book gave me the distinct impression that it was being marketed at the "love spells" audience - that category who wish to get involved in witchcraft because it's "cool", rather than from any real spiritual aim. There is more to Wicca than magic (sorry - I refuse to add that daft extra "k") and casting spells - and yet this book - like so many others - seems to approach magic as though it is the be-all and end-all of Wiccan practice. The first two parts of this book deal, respectively, with Wiccan practice and beliefs. And those parts comprise 68 pages - including blank pages between chapters. After that, there are 271 pages dedicated to magic and magical practice. I see this as being disproportionate in the extreme. Magic is a Wiccan tool just as is a ritual knife or a candle - but if all you want is magic, well, you don't have to be Wiccan to practice it. Why not forget all the intricacies of Wicca and just go and learn about magic? It strikes me as similar to becoming a Catholic solely because you want to take Holy Communion.

Wicca is a religion of which magic is a part, and not all Wiccans use magic in any case. I see little value in a book that claims to present an introduction to a subject and yet focuses on one small part of that subject to the virtual exclusion of everything else. I cheerfully admit my dislike of this book comes from my own view of magic as something that, like nuclear power, is very potent and needs to be treated with respect. I don't like to see books offering magic out as the solution to all of life's little problems.

Having said all that, though, this book IS well written for what it does, and it IS informative where magical tradition is concerned. It is dotted with little snippets of useful and/or interesting information and, to give credit where it's due, does often include warnings and cautions about the misuse of magic. So if you're interesting in a basic guide to magic, then this may well be the book for you. I just think it would have been simpler to have left out the first 68 pages and just called it "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Magic" - since as far as this book is concerned the entire Wiccan religion, its short history and complex philosophy, seems to be little more than an inconvenient complication to the simple business of casting spells.

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