Llewellyn had written to this website owner before, and had gotten no response. Now, scores of angry authors, publishers, and readers were suddenly sending her messages, including a Llewellyn author I know quite well, Deborah Blake, who was unaccountably sweet with her. Deborah forwarded me the website owner’s response – which was the first we had ever heard from her, in her own words! At that point I also responded to her, directed her to my blog post so she could understand our concerns, and our permissions manager followed up with yet another email explaining her legally precarious situation, and what was within the bounds of the law, and what was not. (Aside from the books which she had removed by then.)

And then, tonight this woman had the nerve to post a long-winded comment to my blog, trying to justify her actions. I did not approve it because I did not want it to pass by without commentary, nor did I want to drive any more traffic (positive or negative) to her website.

I will continue to refrain from publishing her name here, but here is her entire post (scout’s honor!), with my comments interspersed. If there is a lesson to be learned here, it is that if you don’t understand copyright law, it’s better to be safe than sorry. Don’t post it if you’re in doubt. If you don’t understand the law, ask somebody. And once it’s been explained to you, don’t cry about it. Just make the changes and move on. Anyway, here goes…and by the way, [sic] to all. I haven’t copy edited her at all.

Ever copied a spell or ritual into your BOS? You’re in violation of copyright. Ever copy and paste a spell or prayer to your computer for a ritual? Oops, you’re in violation of copyright. Did you print off that article to share with your coven? Copyright violation! Did you read and send a spell to a friend? Join a yahoo group that sends out spells? Copyright violations everywhere!

And here we have fundamental flaw number one. If you’re copying a spell into your own Book of Shadows for your own purposes, that’s fine. If you’re photocopying a couple pages of a book, that’s fine. (Although at FedEx Kinko’s, they won’t photocopy things for you anymore if you’re not the copyright owner. That’s how serious this is.) But I fail to see how copying a page or a spell for your own personal use is in ANY way synonymous or even comparable to the wholesale ripping off of entire books.

You know what, I agree, authors should be paid for their work and a copyright is a good thing. I apologize to all I may have harmed for all my copyright violations.

If you think that authors should be paid for their work and copyright is a good thing, then we’re done here. Yet apparently, we’re not done, because this woman does not truly believe the words she just wrote. Read on…

You see, just so everyone here is on the same page, I have a sneaking suspicion it’s my website currently being lamblasted here.

A sneaking suspicion? I emailed you the link myself! Apparently one can never be too obvious with this woman.

If you want to visit my website, do so quickly, since it’s coming down within the month. There are probably a 1000 or so pages, so act quickly if you’re looking for information.

I respect copyright – so quick! Download as much of my pirated stuff as possible before I’m yanked off the air!

The reason it’s coming down is simple. I screwed up with the copyrights. Not the modern books, that’s new. But Llewellyn asked me to remove something before. I thought I had done as they requested, but it turned out, I didn’t. I made the changes to the right page, but the wrong file and I didn’t check it. My site is huge and not database driven, each page something I have to manually go into and change. Me and me alone. Also, I was on two computers, using different files. I know better, it was bad website management. It was a mistake. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again. By taking the site down, I’m making sure of it. While we’re on the subject of Llewellyn, lets give them some credit for being reasonably flexible.

This is interesting. She thought she had done as we requested, which was to remove 32 copyrighted books from her website. Yet they were still there a month later. Oopsy? That doesn’t cut it. You have two computers? Who cares. You have a huge site that is fully manual? That’s your own fault for posting so many ripped off pieces of work from other authors, NONE of which are in your own words.

I also think its a sad loss of something that helped a whole lot of people. In my opinion, the idea of Wiccan education suffered a great loss.

This is where she starts acting like the Helen Keller or the Mother Teresa of Pagan education. Like her website is going to teach thousands of bright young Wiccans… because why? We’re underground? The knowledge is simply not available or accessible anywhere else? There aren’t intelligent, well-rounded, ethical teachers all over the internet who write lessons in their own words, without copying and pasting other people’s works?

I was willing to make the changes needed. I was willing to make the compromises.

Then why didn’t she?

But, I realized, I couldn’t make the promise it wouldn’t happen again. How could I? And, quite frankly, I have no intention of reliving the nightmare I’ve found myself in.

She couldn’t promise she wouldn’t accidentally upload entire, pirated books again. And by the way, I have no sympathy for this whole nightmare. She had been warned before.

You wouldn’t believe the names I’ve been called via email and on blogs. I don’t make a single dime off the website, so driving or not driving traffic makes no difference to me. I do pay a significant amount of money out of my own pocket for a site of that size. This firestorm is just not worth it to me to maintain the website.

You know who else pays money out of their own pockets for websites? Authors.

I wrote a letter, which I sent to a wide variety of folks, including the authors and publishers who felt they were harmed by my actions. Some accepted my heartfelt apology for my mistake. Some read the letter and offered genuinely useful suggestions and information, allowing me to understand copyright law and my options in something that approximated English.

If our previous communications with you were not in English, I do apologize. As far as I’m aware that’s the only language our permissions manager speaks, but I could be wrong. If you’d needed further explanation or clarification, let me refer you to the “reply” button of your email service.

Letter begins:

Thank you for your email. I always appreciate hearing the opinions of my readers and others. I certainly can see your point and I respect it. The webpage you are referring to has been removed.

Please allow me to explain my thoughts on the subject briefly.

First, I do hope you took the opportunity to review the remainder of the website as a whole. You will notice that there are many, many articles written over the span of several decades. All of them, wherever possible, provide author credit, link backs to where I got the information and copyright information when attached to an article. It has never been my intention to claim credit for that which I did not create.

The issue is not simply about giving credit. It’s more than obvious that you did not write all this material, and for that, I can honestly thank you. I can’t even begin to tell you how many websites a simple Scott Cunningham or Dorothy Morrison spell will show up on, with no attribution given whatsoever. However, just because you’re giving attribution does not make it legal. This is why there is a copyright disclaimer in the front of each and every book that says you must have permission from the publisher for further reproduction, internet included. That part is in plain English.

This is what a copyright notice looks like. It's in English.

Secondly, you might have also noticed that some of these links are no longer viable. I have lost a great deal of information simply by keeping a favorites link and going back to find important information gone because the site is no longer maintained. That’s why I always download and link.

Thirdly you may not be aware of the sincere difficulties those of us who are both solitary AND living in a deeply religious area, such as Lynchburg , VA for myself, function under. I didn’t buy books, or jewelry or magazines or anything else because I didn’t dare. I have been shot at, physically and verbally threatened and I live daily with the knowledge that were my family to find out my religion, I would be banned from seeing them and from contact with my cousins, who I love very much. It is quite difficult to learn about my religion under those circumstances.

We at Llewellyn, and our authors, are more than aware of the dangers and difficulties of living a closeted Pagan life in a small town, rural community, or part of the country that doesn’t care for our kind, and I am truly sorry for your trials and tribulations. That’s why we even published a book called The Small-Town Pagan’s Survival Guide. That book offers a wealth of ideas on how to practice your faith under the radar, or how to share it with others. The author of that book, may she rest in peace, even bought a complete altar set-up at a WalMart just to prove her point that one can practice Paganism anywhere. Even if you are in the sticks, you have internet in the privacy of your home. On the internet you can order books and your neighbors will be none the wiser when it shows up on your doorstep in a brown box. You can even download books – legally. Where and how you live is no excuse for pirating.

Fourth, when in college, I still look back in wincing pain as I remember days of ramen noodles and five solid weeks of KFC chicken because my friend next door was a manager and brought home all the chicken at the end of the day for us to eat. Ugh. Book purchases outside of textbooks were a ridiculous idea. Please note that I am not saying that copyright violations are an acceptable excuse, I am raising a point. How shall I educate the poor, the disenfranchised, without the books?

Please just stop. Just because you ate Ramen and KFC does not make you Mother Teresa. It does not confer a mantle of holiness upon your shoulders that frees you to distribute copyrighted materials to poor, disenfranchised people for the rest of your life. It doesn’t! How shall you educate them? In your own words, my dear! Please refer back to my original post and give a special reading to comment # 15 from Donald Michael Kraig. To wit, “Help set information free by writing the information in your own words. Show your originality and creativity.” If you’ve been a practicing Wiccan for all these years and still can’t manage to write your own ritual to share with your students, then I truly feel sorry for both you and them.

Fifth, when I finally moved to Northern VA and married an open minded man, I attended my first coven groups. We sang many wonderful songs. The HPS of the evening possessed only a few crude mimeograph copies of the lyrics, not even the musical copy. I kept those two pages for many years, but time killed my memory and I did not know how to sing them. I could not teach my coven to sing them. At long last, I learned that the lyrics came from Starhawk’s lovely albums, still available, and A Circle of Women, which was no longer published. This is among the many reasons I am so adamant about knowing and remembering who created it. There are so many things lost to us now because our American Wiccan founders, the early singers and writers, could not pass the information widely enough to survive.

Thank goodness we are now living in the information age and this kind of thing will become a rare occurrence. But you are not responsible for enshrining that information yourself. Just because you want to hold onto something does not mean you also have to post it freely on your website so everyone can download it.

My final point is this. My actions are based strictly on my own experiences as a Wiccan of 20 years. I firmly believe in the Wiccan Rede. I did not intend to harm anyone, I give you my word. Under NO circumstances did I intend to steal from anyone.

Which still doesn’t explain why all the files weren’t removed immediately upon first notification…

My intent was and remains the goal of education for Wiccans today and to teach Wiccans of the future their past as it revolves around us and those who preceded us. Today I own a library containing many of the books I posted, and many more I have not. My coven members have always had access to it; indeed, anyone interested is welcome to what is on my shelves. But unfortunately, that is only for those local to me.

Fortunately she is not the only Wiccan in America. There are others, all over the country and the world, that are willing to help teach newcomers, to lend them some books from their personal collections, to offer them a helping hand. And, fortunately, there are plenty of respectable websites offering free and legal content as well.

I am sure you understand the points I am making. So I will ask the question of you that I am asking of everyone this evening. It has no easy answer. If those like Starhawk, Gerald Gardner and many many others had not recognized the value of educating others BROADLY, around the world, about our religion, how would Wicca grow?

Wait… she did NOT just compare herself to Starhawk and Gardner, did she?!

How will it grow into the future? Uniquely lacking a gathering place, unsafe to announce our religion aloud even here in America , I ask you once again. How shall I educate without the books? Surely somewhere, there is compromise.

How shall she educate without the books? No one is asking her to. All we are asking is fair pay for our work – and I say that on behalf of authors, publishers, and booksellers as well. She might also like to talk with other Wiccan teachers around the country who are managing to do the Great Work just fine without distributing files without authorization.

Letter ends.

I’ll post my letter here in the hopes of generating some sort of useful discussion. After all, the problem is much larger than is being appreciated right at this moment.

What ARE you going to do with all the blogs and covens walking around with articles and spells written down, saved on hard drives etc.?

Good point. There is nothing we can do about people with our books, articles, annuals, spells, recipes, chants, etc. kept on their hard drive, or written in their Book of Shadows, lovingly copied from a well-used book. And I’m OK with that, and probably most authors would be, too. But what we can do is stop websites from the wholesale theft of our copyrighted materials. These are not books that are lost to the sands of time – these are books anyone can legally download through Kindle, Nook, Sony, Apple, etc…or ordered in the print form if it has not yet been digitized. It’s not the end of the world. This is not just a tidbit or two… it is serious business. I hope she can recognize that by now, but I think the point is lost on her.

How will you eliminate the thousands of bit torrents with these books in them? The many websites like mine?

The conflicting information, such as one producer saying POST NOTHING while another says its ok for me to keep a version for me personally, on my hard drive, just not to give it out? Llewellyn themselves says it’s ok to post up to 250 words before getting their permission. Is that per spell? Per page? Per website? How do you plan to shut individuals like me down when the many various people involved in the problem can’t even explain the copyright law to me in the same way?

Another good point. All publishers have different limits as to what they’ll permit. A conscientious web operator would find out what those limits are and try to stick to them. A halfway intelligent web operator who made a mistake would abide by those limits after having been reprimanded once or twice. And anyone who has any measure of sustained concentration would eventually be able to decipher Llewellyn’s 250-word rule, which was sent to her again today. This is what our permissions manager emailed to her and copied me on:

“You can use up to 250 words (except for spells) from any one of our books at any one time without further permission, with proper attribution of the work: title, author, publisher, and a link to purchase the book at Llewellyn.com. You may post 250 words from up to six books at a time, but total posted at any one time must not exceed six titles. You must remove material from a title already posted to keep the total at six”.

Why would she ever think that was “per spell?” Especially when the next line of this email was “Posting of spells is not allowed. Posting information from our annuals is not allowed without permission.”

How hard to do you think you’ll yell at Barnes and Noble for their Nook, which allows people to LEND out books for which one person paid, but the Lendee did not? Where’s the line here?

The line is that Barnes and Noble paid us money for that. And that we are perfectly aware of the lending functionality of their devices. It is not the same as posting it for a million people to download all at once. Again, please return to my previous post and see the myth “It’s the same as borrowing a book from a library, or from a friend.”

And don’t give me that “go to the library” crap. Most small town libraries don’t carry books like these. Most small bookstores are going out of buisness. My occult store did. Borders is out of buisness. Have you tried recently to review Barnes and Nobles selection of WICCAN books? Barely more than a shelf not even a bookshelf. In my small hometown, do I plan on reading Wiccan books in the BN Cafe out in the open while I take notes? Are you KIDDING? But their Christian stuff takes up five bookshelves. I counted.

I don’t care, because obviously you’re connected to the Internet. Bookstores live there too, you know.

Everything I had on my website I got online first.

So? As the saying goes, two wrongs don’t make a right.

I didn’t type or scan anything. Just copy, paste or download. That’s not intended as an excuse, it’s a fact. A symptom of the real problem. In the world of E everything, you no longer control your copyrights.

Actually, we do. And as long as people respected them, which you claim you do, we’d have no problem. Since you don’t, we send takedown notices and take legal action instead. We do control our copyrights, even though it is becoming increasingly difficult. Make no mistake of that.

I guess one of the reasons I have even bothered to post twice now about piracy (which is very old news) is that I have a sincere hope that at least our niche, spiritual community, unlike the masses of nameless Internet surfers downloading Nickelback, will see the value, ethics, and repercussions involved in this situation, and rise above others. I hope that Pagans, Wiccans and magicians of all stripes will fully support our small and fledgling community. I hope that Pagans, Wiccans, and magicians actually have superior ethics to others, guided by the Rede and the threefold law of karmic return. That is really the whole reason I am writing this post.

It’s not possible. Like sex, the kitty is out out of the burlap.

Ha ha hahahahahaha hahah haahahaha hahahah! Gasp. And meow.

You got me. You shut me down. I would have prefered you educated me, but only one of the many authors/publishers offered that. I’m grateful to them. But I’m one person.

You would have preferred we educated you? How about you take responsibility for your own actions and educate yourself? How about you ask questions the next time a publisher tells you to take down material and you somehow can’t get that request through your head? I’m sorry, but my patience is wearing thin now. It’s not our responsibility to educate you, although with my previous post I sincerely hope I’ve educated many, or at least made them pause to think about the consequences of their actions.

After all this, someday, you might meet me again. You might not. But rest assured, should you be suffering under the belief that I haven’t learned my lesson about posting copyrights, I HAVE.

WELL THANK GODS.

In fact, I know I made more mistakes than just the mistake of copyright infringement here. I’ll be sure to learn from them all. The insults from people who don’t know me and weren’t an author or publisher to whom my apologies were deserved felt breathtaking in their cruelty and crudeness. The kindness of strangers who supported me, or forgave me after I apologized for wronging them, will always be cherished.

I apologize for the criticisms and insults you’ve received from complete strangers. I’ve received quite a few myself today, just by standing up for authors’ rights. Some people truly feel we have no right to charge for this knowledge. Knowledge is free. But the end product of years of toil is not free. Learn from it, and pass on the knowledge in your own words if you’re brave enough to do so. If the best you can do is pass on the words of the masters, then give them due respect by expecting yourself and your students to pay them for their efforts.

Thank you.

First, the background: people loves to steal our books. Libraries and bookstores have claimed for years that some of their most frequently stolen stock are the religious books – anything from the Bible to those on witchcraft and magic. Whether this comes from a belief that all sacred knowledge should be free, a desire to hold onto a book containing so much wisdom (or so many exercises that can’t all be gotten through in the three-week lending period!), or, in the case of witchcraft books, concern that others in their small community might find out that the reader has an interest in these topics, and thus be “outed,” it’s always seemed a little strange anyway. If you’re specifically looking for a book on spirituality, doesn’t that imply that you’re trying to make yourself a better person? In that case, why start off on the wrong foot by stealing a book?

With this pattern having been in place for years, it should shock no one that in the digital age this would quickly translate over to stealing spirituality ebooks in any form. The music industry has wrestled with illegal downloads for years – we all know there are file sharing programs and sites that easily circumvent established means of distribution.

This is what a copyright notice looks like, stupid pirater.

The website I was sent multiple times today is a repeat offender. I won’t post a link here because I don’t want to drive traffic to her site. Let’s just say that she has a nifty little disclaimer about how she got all these PDFs of ebooks off the internet (presumably absolving herself of responsibility, having not scanned them in herself) and that as far as she knows they are not violating anyone’s copyright. And if she is in error, to please let her know. (I guess there was something about the COPYRIGHT PAGE of each of our books that she failed to understand.)

Llewellyn, Red Wheel/Weiser, and other publishers have notified this person, by writing to the email address listed on the website, several times. And yet that notice is still up, and our books are still there for illegal downloading. So today (after the very first email I received) we sent a DCMA takedown notice to her ISP, and hopefully those pages of her website will be removed soon. [Update: it looks like it's working. I'll check again from home, and again tomorrow.]

But since I kept hearing about it all day, regardless of our invisible-to-the-outside-world actions (which are things we deal with every day, incidentally), I wanted to post a few thoughts for you all to consider and hopefully discuss.

MYTHS ABOUT PIRATED BOOKS

“It doesn’t cost them anything to make an ebook, so why should I pay for it?”

This one I’ve also heard for legal, paid downloads, except in that case it goes “It doesn’t cost them anything to make an ebook, so why should I pay a normal book price for it? It should cost only $1.99/[insert your own price here]. I mean, I even had to buy a device to read it in the first place.”

Here’s the thing. First of all, an author wrote that book. They spent hundreds of hours researching, writing, editing, proofing, revising, communicating with their publisher, and in many cases, teaching, lecturing, writing a blog, marketing, etc. in order to have their good name in the field, in order for their manuscript to be desirable for publication. So that’s one person that should be paid for their effort.

Secondly, multiple people are involved in publishing a good book:

• the editor who carefully selects, acquires, contracts and develops it (that’s me, in this case),
• the editors who copy edit and proof it (the production editor, layout designer, and proofreader),
• the marketing team that writes the back cover copy, web copy, catalog copy, and so on,
• the cover designer who created a cover,
• the publicity team that sends out a press release, galley, or review copy to your favorite Pagan podcaster,
• the accounting staff who send out the royalty checks and pay our bills,
• the IT department that converts our book files to ePub formats and keeps our websites and servers running.

These are all fixed costs, whether the book comes out in print or digital (unless the author is self-published, in which case he or she can have more control over the pricing of the book and also gets to keep more of the profit). If you add a print release (not digital-only) then you can add the sales staff, customer service, and the warehouse crew. Basically the only thing you’re taking out of the entire equation by downloading an ebook is the cost of paper, printing, and distribution (trucking, shipping, etc.), and the people who make sure the physical copies get sent to the customers, whether those are bookstores or people. So are you still so convinced that your ebook should only cost a dollar? Or nothing?

“It’s the same as borrowing a book from a library, or from a friend.”

Um, except for the fact that the library bought a copy of the book, or your friend bought a copy of the book. (Even libraries that now do digital lending.) And that they have a finite number of copies (physical or digital) that they are able to lend out at any given time – not a file that can be downloaded over and over again in the blink of an eye by complete strangers all over the world.

Let me put it this way – surely you would lend $10 to a friend in need. But would you put up your PayPal account details on the internet for the world to see with a note that says “hey, feel free to borrow ten bucks”? If you did, I’m guessing you’d go broke immediately, unless you have some very deep pockets.

“But publishers have very deep pockets.”

Maybe some do – but I’ve never worked for a publisher that does. We’re talking about Pagan books here. It’s a niche. We hope to sell 5,000 copies if the book is to be successful. (And, not to shake your confidence in the system or anything, but some of our books only sell hundreds of copies and we don’t make a dime.) We are not selling Harry Potter here! We are not flying our authors around on world tours or taking them out for three-martini lunches! Being an independent, midsized publisher in a small field is not a license to print money.

Here is a great quote to illustrate the situation, written by Colin Robinson, who formerly worked for a large New York publisher:

Books have always been a low-profit item and in recent years margins have been shrinking even further. Publishers now regularly give bookshops a 50 per cent or even a 55 per cent discount on the retail price. The distributor that warehouses and delivers the book will typically take 10 per cent of what remains, or more if you are a small publisher; 15 per cent goes on production (printing, paper, typesetting). Add another 10 per cent for the author’s royalties and the publisher is left with 10 per cent to cover promotion costs, rent and office expenses, wages – and profit. No wonder it’s called the gentleman’s profession.

“But authors have deep pockets.”

While you wait for me to stop laughing, did you notice the author’s royalty in the quote above? It’s not much, and it can actually be even less depending on the genre, the format of publishing, and a variety of other factors. Authors don’t have deep pockets either – they cannot afford to give you their book for free. If they could, they would! (And some actually have, just as many musicians are now releasing their music and letting their fans decide what to pay for it.)

Most authors support themselves with full-time jobs in addition to writing and enriching their communities. The very few who don’t work a “day job” have to tour and teach constantly to make a salary to live off of. Some even sell potions, spells, or courses on the internet to add a little income. And yet they still provide plenty of free content on their websites, blogs, facebook pages and other media. They are more than willing to share – up to a point. If they approach a publisher to publish their book, it means, by default, that they want to get paid for it. It has value. So do them a favor and buy their book if you appreciate their work and want to make sure that they continue to write for, communicate with, and teach the community in the future.

“But it’s all over the internet anyway…”

Go ahead and read all the free blog posts you want. Learn about Wicca by putting together information from ten different websites. Go ahead and search for that certain spell you need on Google. Not sure what to do for next month’s full moon? Just type it into the search box. Go onto the Internet Sacred Text Archive or Patheos and learn about the world’s religions. These are all perfectly valid ways to get information. There are TONS of free resources on the internet – ones that are given freely by their creators. (Perhaps because they have ad revenue they can rely on. Perhaps they just do it out of the goodness of their heart.) So why do people even feel the need to download whole books in the first place? By wanting to download a book more than you want to read a website or blog (etc.), you are admitting that it has a certain value that is greater than what you can browse for free. The sum is greater than its parts. So please, pay for it.

“But I’m poor, I can’t afford to buy these books myself…”

See the above list of free resources. And visit your local library.

“But I wasn’t even sure I would like it, so why pay money on it?”

In today’s book-buying world, that is no longer an excuse. You can get previews of just about any books online, either at Amazon, GoogleBooks, or the publisher’s own website. You can browse reviews from other readers on GoodReads or other retailers’ websites. You can visit the author’s website or blog and see if you like their writing style or agree with their ideas. You can ask your facebook friends if they ever read the book and would recommend it.

“Information should be free!”

I totally agree, to a point. Information is what permeates the very fabric of the universe; information is as basic and integral to life itself as light, and so far no one is charging for light. Information is heady and exciting. Hermes/Mercury, the god of communication, is also the god of tricksters and thieves, so it’s not unreasonable to expect he’d be encouraging illegal downloads.

However, he is also god of merchants – trading, bartering, and yes, paying for goods and services. If you step back and look at the big picture, information is just a type of energy. And energy is never static, it must be exchanged. Money is also a form of energy – it’s how our minutes and hours of toiling away at something we might not always like get converted into poker chips we can trade in for things we like better. Therefore, it’s not only acceptable to use the energy of money in exchange for the energy of information – it’s divine. Like the universe itself, you are keeping energy in balance, in motion, in an unbroken chain, just as it likes.

Thanks for listening to my rant today. Please, feel free to discuss in the comments… I’m curious to hear your opinions and thoughts on this matter.

by John-Morgan on Flickr

Two weeks ago, I posted a Holiday gift guide for Pagans, Wiccans, and cool people, sharing some of the books I’ve acquired that were published within the past year or so that I figured would make nifty gifts for your favorite witches. (Only the ones who’ve been really good and bad this year!) But what if you don’t want to give the gift of books, but you still have Pagans in your life you’d like to shop for?

Cara Schultz at PNC Minnesota has very kindly done all kinds of research to round up the ultimate giving list. So much so that it had to be divided into two parts!

In part one, you’ll find foodie ideas, film reviewer Peg Aloi’s inspiring movie suggestions, music suggestions from überblogger extraordinaire Jason Pitz-Waters of The Wild Hunt, and few ideas for the eco-conscious Pagan by No Unsacred Place bloggers John Beckett and Eli Effinger-Weintraub.

In part two, Cara covers art and gifts for children, Patheos and PNC-Atlanta blogger Star Foster shares some art and botanical lotion picks, I share my book picks, web developer Dash provides some ideas for the techno-mage in your life, and PNC Warriors & Kin blogger Lori Dake, Bress Nicneven from the Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance (UMPA), and Selena Fox from Circle Sanctuary and Pagan Warrior Radio all chip in to provide ideas for any military Pagans you may know. (Or not know – UMPA and Circle are both holding drives to send Yule care packages to active duty Pagans stationed abroad.)

While a few of the recommendations are local in nature, most are not, as we are all gathered together by the loving strands of the Interwebs in a warm and fuzzy embrace. So have fun shopping! Feel free to add your suggestions in the comments as well!

The Yulish Tree by DairDair

It’s that time of year again…time for gift shopping! Whether you celebrate Yule, the Winter Solstice, Christmas or Hanukkah with your family and friends, the season has come to be synonymous with the giving of thoughtful gifts, trinkets or tokens of goodwill. This puts some degree of stress on all of us; though giving is joyous, often the expense and energy spent on tracking down “the perfect gift” is not.

I am a book lover, so I happen to think books always make good gifts. There’s no need to worry about whether it fits or is the right color; no need to buy batteries or complicated hook-ups to operate it; no need to stay up all night on Thanksgiving to get the best deal on it. It’s entertainment (or edutainment?) that can be used again and again, even if the power goes out for a week in a freak snowstorm.

Also, if you’re one of those people who happen to think that supporting local businesses is a smart idea, many of us are blessed with local independent booksellers who will bend over backwards to see their customers pleased, including specially ordering books for you. If you don’t have a local bookseller and don’t want to patronize the big boxes, you can always order directly from the publisher’s website – which, in turn, allows more of the proceeds to go to the author.

eBook Reader by goXunuReviews

Finally, we all know people who now read on gadgets – let’s not forget them either! You can buy gift cards for the Kindle, the Nook, the Kobo, and the Sony Reader, and they can pick what they like best.

If you’d like to buy a printed and bound media artifact, though, here are some suggestions. You can view my suggestions for 2010 here in case you had a certain type of person in mind, and remember that all Llewellyn books linked to below have a “browse inside” feature so you can check it out before checking out. Happy shopping!

Basket cases

The Witch's Heart

Why not put together a decorative gift basket including a book and some related extras? For example, Alaric Albertsson’s intelligent and thorough book on Anglo-Saxon magic, Wyrdworking, would be lovely paired with a set of runes or the author’s specially designed pictorial rune cards. Know someone who’s having a serious run of bad luck? Try giving them Ellen Dugan’s Practical Protection Magick along with a deep red or purple seven-day candle, cedar, lavender or vetivert essential oil, dragon’s blood incense, black tourmaline, hematite, lapis lazuli or malachite, and a sage smudge stick. And if you know someone who could use more love in their life (either with their current partner or with a potential new one), stuff the basket with The Witch’s Heart by Christopher Penczak, along with some rose water (available at many Middle Eastern delis), wheat pennies (coins that are actually made of copper, the metal sacred to Venus), yarrow, raspberry leaf tea, and a nice chunk of rose quartz, watermelon tourmaline, or peridot.

Something crafty

Magical Candle Crafting

We all know people who just can’t wait to get started on their next craft project. These are the people who usually give you some exquisite hand-made gift that makes you feel bad you bought their gift in a store! This year you can give them a book or two geared toward a new crafting hobby – but one that’s magical. Try out Wandlore by Alferian Gwydion MacLir, which includes everything you need to know about making and consecrating a wand, or Magical Candle Crafting by Ember Grant, which teaches you how to make your own magically infused candles for a wide variety of spells and special occasions. If you drop the right hints with your gift (and throw in a tree branch or a hunk of wax), you might receive a handmade wand or batch of candles next Yule!

Are you experienced?

Fairy Tale Rituals

Lots of witches who are fairly well established in their practices think that there is simply nothing new under the sun and haven’t bought a new book on witchcraft in years. Hopefully one of these titles will surprise them! For the (slightly twisted) child at heart, try Fairy Tale Rituals by Kenny Klein, which provides deep rituals and magic based on well-known fairy tales. If you know a witch suffering chronic burnout, whose magic hasn’t changed since the ‘90s, or who seems to have lost that magical spark – get them The Witch’s Bag of Tricks by Melanie Marquis as soon as possible to reverse the damage. I guarantee they will thank you later! Finally, for the feminist in all of us, give The Woman Magician by Brandy Williams – a thoughtful and wide-ranging discourse on women’s role in magic over the long centuries, and how we can take our Western magical traditions and craft something entirely new, entirely focused on the woman’s experience in her own body and her own right. This one is particularly hard to sum up neatly, so I do recommend using the Browse Inside function!

Off the beaten path

The Path of Druidry

Finally, there are those who are always looking for something different. The Path of Druidry by Penny Billington is a druidry book like no other, firmly based on the reader’s own observations of nature as well as the tales of the Mabinogion. Brain Magick by Philip Farber is a fun romp through how our brains make magic happen – occurring across all times and cultures, magic is definitely part of our biological/chemical makeup, and this book’s exercises will show you how to find it. And, if you know someone who lives literally off the beaten path, chances are they’ll appreciate the collective wisdom, shared stories and practical advice found in The Small Town Pagan’s Survival Guide by Bronwen Forbes.

And more stocking stuffers…

Did you know Llewellyn also sells tarot cloths, tarot bags, crystal runes and talismans, journals and more?

Check them out!

photo by Kashirin Nickolai

I saw a very interesting article this morning on what is purported to be the “most relaxing song ever created.” I highly recommend reading the whole article here, but to summarize with a quote from the article,

The band worked with sound therapists to get advice on how to make the most effective use of harmonies, rhythms and bass lines. The result on listeners is a slowing of the heart rate, reduced blood pressure and lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol.

This proves, once again, that our environments have profound effects on our brains, and thereby our entire bodies. If a song can slow your heartbeat by entrainment (the process whereby our hearts beat at the same pace as what we’re hearing) and if low tones put you in a trancelike state, then it’s no wonder witches rely on such techniques as drumming, chanting, or humming when performing magic or ritual. Once again, science has confirmed what magical practitioners already knew.

Researcher Dr David Lewis-Hodgson said, “Brain imaging studies have shown that music works at a very deep level within the brain, stimulating not only those regions responsible for processing sound but also ones associated with emotions.”

If the implications of this are as fascinating to you as they are to me, I highly recommend you check out a book I acquired for our magick line that just came out last month, Brain Magick by Philip Farber. This book can be used by anyone who practices magick, witches and Pagans included. Here’s a snippet from the intro:

Elements from a variety of theories and models, ranging from neuroscience to voodoo, are offered as clues to understand the phenomena we find in our magical experiments. There are many different styles and practices of magick, in every culture, on every continent. By identifying some of the common elements, we are better able to separate out the magick itself, the techniques and practices that really work, from the content of the rituals that relates to specific belief systems. In general, many techniques of magick are the same everywhere, with their intent aimed at different results and deities. This suggests that the rituals and practices derive from the commonality of human experience; this is how our brains work when we do magick.

Just some of the cool stuff included in this book are explorations of states of consciousness and state-dependent memory, and how you can use that in magick; how to create anchors to easily re-access those particular states, energies, or feelings (the way we often do in ritual by using the same cues to produce altered states); how to create and move through evocations, to better and more easily connect with gods or goddesses specifically aligned with your purposes; creating a timeline and moving through it; instant empowerment; and much more.

I seriously can’t say enough good things about this book, and any advanced witch should consider seriously working with the 56 exercises in the book. As the study mentioned above shows, there are simple and practical ways to change not only your brainwaves, but your brain chemistry, your state of consciousness, even your hormone levels. If you want to apply that to magick, this is the book that will show you exactly how to do that.

"Bound" -- Shelley Hennig as Diana in The Secret Circle on The CW. Photo: Sergei Bachlakov/CBS ©2011 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved

The CW is launching a new TV series, The Secret Circle, based on teenaged witches in Washington. The first episode will air tonight. From CW Publicity:

Cassie Blake’s world is turned upside down after her mother dies in a mysterious accident, forcing Cassie to move in with her loving grandmother Jane in the small town of Chance Harbor, Washington. While trying to adjust to her new life, Cassie is quickly befriended by Diana Meade, a sweet-natured classmate who offers to show her around and introduces her to mean-girl Faye, her sidekick Melissa and Cassie’s next door neighbor Nick. Things get complicated when she meets Adam, Diana’s boyfriend, with whom she feels an instant and powerful connection. Upon meeting one of her mother’s childhood friends, Dawn Chamberlain, the school principal and Faye’s mother, Cassie begins to wonder why her mother never spoke of her hometown. When strange and dangerous things begin to happen, Cassie’s new friends are forced to tell her their secret – they are all witches and her arrival will complete the Circle…

Sounds intriguing so far, right? Well, now I’ve read this article on Entertainment Weekly on five reasons to “love” about this new series and I’m having second thoughts about the whole thing. Once again, witches are being misrepresented as power-hungry, vicious and evil people (beings?) and not as followers of an earth-loving path that enriches so many of our lives. What tipped me off? Uh, how about this entire paragraph:

“We’re using the elements, but we’re trying to use them in a very dangerous way so you can see how the spell interacts with the elements around them and how they can create violent situations,” [producer Kevin] Williamson says. “These witches will pray [sic] on your weaknesses. They’ll find out what’s the easiest way to get at you, and they will do it. They’ll use your fears, your physical limitations. They’ll use anything they can to attack you and also cover their tracks. It’s really kind of eerie. We’re creating a very sort of devilish view of witchcraft. But we also have the aspirational [sic] wish-fulfillment aspect of it as well, which is what the kids ultimately want to do. They bind the circle, because who wouldn’t want to have superpowers, and then, of course, it gets dangerous.”

The writer of the show apparently doesn’t even know what it means to bind something. Egads! But how nice of the writers and producers to create a devilish view of witchcraft. Hate to tell them this, but I think that Kramer and Sprenger beat them to the punch on that one five hundred years ago!

Are you planning to watch anyway? Let me know how it goes and any reactions you have here in the comments! And if you just want to waste some time, try taking the CW’s quiz: which type of witch are you? Snicker.

First of all, the big news was that one of my favorite witchy authors here, Deborah Blake, won the COVR award (that’s Coalition of Visionary Resources – not the cover of the book!) in the Wicca / Paganism category for Witchcraft on a Shoestring. This is her fifth book with us, and in it Deborah gives advice on practicing the craft without breaking the bank.

Since it’s summer, here are a few suggestions from her book for ways to make your yard and garden less expensive and more satisfying.

Use seeds: Most flowers, herbs, and vegetables can be grown from seed. This is a much cheaper option than buying plants from a nursery or garden shop. In many cases (although not all, since most hybrid varieties don’t breed true from seeds), you can save the seeds a plant produces one year and use them the next. Heirloom seeds are particularly nice for this, and then you have the added benefit of growing a plant with roots in the past (you should excuse the pun). Many folks who use heirloom seeds are enthusiastic about increasing their use and will often provide them for free (or the cost of postage) to anyone who requests them. You can also trade seeds with friends who are gardeners, or take turns starting plants from seed by having one of you start all the tomato plants and one the broccoli, for instance. There are lots of plants (corn, carrots, spinach, lettuce, and radishes, for example) that require nothing more than tossing the seeds into a bit of clear ground, then keeping them relatively free of weeds.

Grow perennials and self-seeding plants: Perennials are plants that come back again year after year, and self-seeding plants are those that, while technically not necessarily perennials, tend to reseed themselves without help and show up the next year anyway. Many herbs and flowers fall into these categories. Perennials may cost more to begin with or take more effort to grow from seed, but once they are in your yard or garden, they will come back every year for free. (Be aware that some self-seeding plants are so effective at reproducing themselves that they can take over a yard or garden. Do your research before planting, and make sure that pretty flower isn’t considered to be an invasive weed in your area!)

There are five more tips on keeping your garden thrifty in the book, plus recipes, substitutions, spells, advice and much more on saving money! Check out the browse inside feature of this book for more.

Other COVR award runner-ups included Raven Digitalis’ Planetary Spells & Rituals and Michael Howard’s Modern Wicca. Congratulations to them all!

Next up in the big news department is my favorite vampire (yes, I just said that) Michelle Belanger. I’ve been lucky enough to work with Michelle on five books now (same as Deborah), the first of which was the anthology Vampires in Their Own Words, a book which offers a glimpse into the lives, thoughts and emotions of real life vampires. She has since been working with the cast and crew of the Paranormal State TV show for a few years now, and has in turn been writing some paranormal books for Llewellyn as well.

Michelle’s exciting news gets back to her core as a vampire expert – she will be commenting on season 4 of HBO’S hit show True Blood for MTV. If you’ve never heard of “real life vampires” before – they’re not the same as Dracula, Sookie and the other Hollywood vamps you might be familiar with – check out Michelle’s video introduction to the topic here. If you’re a fan of True Blood, check out all of Michelle’s ongoing commentary here and stay tuned as the season progresses. Here is a brief excerpt from her book explaining how she first began to discover she was a vampire.

My own exploration of vampirism started nearly twenty years ago. It was around that time that I began to suspect that there was something unusual about the way I interacted with other peoples’ energy. I would give massages to my school friends in band and choir and theater, always knowing just where to put my hands to relieve their tension and stress. It was not uncommon for people to fall asleep during one of my back massages, and everyone I massaged would comment on how I seemed to just pull the tension out of them with my fingers.

I had an instinctive understanding of where and how to use my hands, and I was always drawn right to the problem areas as if I could sense the knots and sore spots through the skin. The moment I put my hands on another person, I would often get images in my mind, as if I could somehow “see” inside them […] Knots and other problem areas manifested to me as dark or clogged-looking patches in the flow of energy. I would fix these by pulling the energy into myself, clearing out the gunk and leaving behind an unencumbered flow.

I always felt revitalized after giving someone a massage like this and, at first, I believed the rising, expansive sensation I felt was simply a part of the sense of satisfaction I experienced at having helped a friend. But I was sickly all through my youth and it began to be obvious that I felt physically better for a little while after I worked on someone else’s energy. Born with a life-threatening heart defect, I endured several major surgeries before the age of five; although the worst of the problem was repaired, my health was expected to be precarious. Yet somehow I improved my own vitality by touching the energy of another person and taking some of that energy in.

It took a little while for me to fully comprehend what this meant. The ability to connect with and draw upon vital energy came so easily, I never questioned it at first…

For more, check out the browse inside feature of this book.

In the last bit of author news, Katalin Koda was interviewed by the Wiccan / Pagan Times about her new book, Fire of the Goddess. It’s a long, juicy and detailed interview, focusing on everything from women opening to their inner masculine, to the connection between Reiki and shamanism in reclaiming the divine feminine. Here is a brief excerpt from her book on the archetypes she focuses on throughout:

The goddess is portrayed throughout various cultures and histories as a three-fold or triple-faced goddess. Contemporary Wicca practitioners, who practice crafting using the seasons, elements, and natural rhythms as guides, follow the cycles of the maiden or virgin, mother, and crone to guide their sacred ceremonies. This triple-fold view is connected to the three major times in a woman’s life: before menses, the years of menses, and the time of and after menopause. This is reflected in the phases of the moon: new or waxing as the white goddess of birth and growth; full as the red goddess of love and battle; and old or waning moon as the black goddess of death and divination.

After spending time working with these aspects of the goddess, I began to search further afield for varied expressions of the sacred feminine. These expressions are aspects of a wild, sacred feminine and resonate a very deep truth within our beings. This is not the feminine of gender, nor is it the feminine of biology, but the sacred feminine that connects us as human beings to life on this earth. I moved beyond the triple goddess into a nine-fold path that inspires us to access our own sacred feminine within.

When we focus our gifts and talents that are inherent to us as women, we are able to live from a place of authenticity, courage, and clarity. Using nine sacred archetypes, we unlock the rich natural resources within and develop our spiritual journey. The nine manifestations of the sacred feminine are Fire Bearer, Initiate, Warrioress, Consort, Healer, Bodhisattva, Priestess, Weaver, and Crone. Of course, there are many more aspects of the sacred feminine found both in cultures across time and space as well as within, but these are the nine I felt would be most accessible for women today. These nine archetypes are each associated with a specific goddess and one of her myths that will help to illuminate her role as the archetype. We can think of each of goddesses as an inspiration to activate our power, love, and wisdom as we develop on the path of the sacred feminine.

Well, that’s enough reading to keep you busy for the weekend. Have a good one! And Hail Lady Liberty!

As I’ve already warned everyone currently on the list, I’m not a small-town Pagan – I’ve never lived in a small town my entire life (if you don’t count weekends at my in-laws). So while I can definitely appreciate the challenges of living in a small town (where do you go to shop for candles and incense?! Does literally everyone go to church on Sunday?!), I don’t know as much about the very real joys of living so much closer to nature – seeing all the stars, owning a bee hive, hiking in the woods out my own back door, canning home-grown food for the winter. I don’t even have a yard to dig up, and must content myself with container plantings of tomatoes and herbs on the back deck of my apartment.

Still, I’m going to do my best to moderate the group in Bronwen’s absence by introducing new conversation topics every week. I look forward to seeing these small sparks catch flame through all of your interactions, responses and tales. I look forward to seeing mutual understanding and long-distance friendships take root. As Bronwen wrote on the Yahoo group page, “By joining this group, posting regularly and contributing our own experiences, we’re building a virtual kitchen table where small-town Pagans from all traditions and all parts of the world can “sit” and share, or just listen and lurk for a while.” So, if you haven’t joined already, please do! See you there.

There are myriad opinions on whether we should come out or not, and even as to whether we should appropriate the GLBT language of “coming out” for something that is fundamentally different… and yet, not so different. Some make the argument that coming out as a witch is more dangerous to parents than coming out as GLBT, because of custody issues. Others say that it is hard to live in a society where the mainstream automatically assumes you are like them – whether that means straight or Christian. And that if we speak up when we can, we can avoid more senseless bullying in the future. Furthermore, it appears the reason it is “easier” to be GLBT these days than 20 years ago (in terms of employment, child custody, etc.) is precisely because they took the issue head-on and brought it out into the light for people to discuss. And yet they still face great challenges for equality in the US and elsewhere.

To get a deeper look at both sides of the Pagan coming out issue, I can point you to two very different blog posts. In the first, T. Thorn Coyle reminds us of Tempest Smith’s needless death by her own hand; she was just 12 when she hung herself in the face of relentless bullying at school because she was Wiccan. But Thorn makes much broader and more important points as well, encouraging us to look forward to the day when saying you’re Pagan is “no big deal” and people can just get over it and get on with their lives.

In the next, Serenity Athenina argues that coming out gradually is almost always the best policy, allowing people to get to know you and your beliefs a little at a time rather than surprising them with an in-your-face statement on a proscribed day. She believes making coming out into a “holiday” cheapens the experience somehow.

What about you? What are your thoughts on Pagan Coming Out Day? Are you more or less likely to come out because of this drive? What are your concerns about coming out if you haven’t? And if you have, what were the rewards and the difficulties?

First things first – Walpurgis Night falls on April 30, or Beltane Eve. How is it different from Beltane? What is its significance?

The oversimplified answer would be that Beltane is the Celtic observance and Walpurgis Night the Germanic. When you look back into history and prehistory, the line between Celtic and Germanic and even Slavic are not at all clear, especially in Central Europe. It was a long time before the Roman designations caught on and the peoples concerned realized that they were supposed to be different ethnic groups. If you could go back to Roman times, I don’t think you would see so much difference between these peoples’ celebrations of May Eve. Since then, the so-called “Germanic” version has evolved into a night that’s first and foremost about witches. In the Middle Ages it was about driving them out. Now it celebrates them. Among the general public, kids dress up as witches and devils just as American kids do at Halloween, but it’s also about today’s German Witches celebrating their identity. Unlike many holidays, Walpurgisnacht has a geographic epicenter: a mountain called the Brocken in northern Germany. Nowadays, Witches gather there openly, but they were believed to gather there in secret since the time of Charlemagne and probably before.

Night of the Witches is a rather out of the ordinary book for Llewellyn to publish, as it does not deal with modern Wicca in the least! That said, do you think Wiccans will still enjoy it and find something of value in it? Can witches celebrate Walpurgis Night too?

One of my few friends who actually read the book asked me, “Wow, how do you know all that arcane stuff?” For Wiccans it’s not arcane stuff at all. Some of the content is for the general reader who has never heard of runes or besoms or valkyries. But then again, since Wicca is essentially an English religion, Wiccans might find something new in the book’s European slant. It’s possible that some Wiccan readers may not yet have run into an Alraune or a Bilwis or a Drude. And of course, the crafts and recipes are there for everyone. I’ve noticed that modern Witches always seem to be on the lookout for gifts for one another – is it all those Sabbats? You can use some of the craft ideas in the book to make gifts.

Chapter Nine is called “Getting the Coven Together.” As a non-Witch, I was thinking of other non-Witches forming a sort of “coven for the day” to celebrate Walpurgis Night. The activities are mostly party ideas, some less reverent than others. They’re certainly not meant to take the place of whatever full-time Witches are doing on this Sabbat. But I think absolutely that real Witches can celebrate Walpurgis Night too. After all, it’s their day!

There are a ton of fun craft projects in this book. Can you tell us a little bit about them? What is their difficulty level? Should we start on these crafts before April 30?

The Walpurgis wands are a kind of smudge stick, so you should make them a couple weeks ahead of time if you want them to be dry enough to burn on Walpurgis Night. But a lot of the crafts are designed to get you out and about on the night itself, gathering mullein leaves for the hag tapers or apple blossoms to arrange around your cauldron and greening candles. On the other hand, you can make a witch box whenever the mood takes you. This year, I indulged my inner “glitter witch” by making a Lunar New Year Leftover Box using bits and pieces of our Chinese New Year decorations. Lots of red and gold.

There’s a wide range of crafts in the book. The easiest is probably the origami kitchen witch. You don’t even really have to put bristles on the broom; just use a fringed party toothpick. Orange crinklies will make it look like your witch has flames shooting out of the end of her besom. Kids can make these no problem and hang them in the windows or wherever.

At the other end of the spectrum there’s the Witch’s Brew Pouch. This one is for the serious crafter who’s willing to go out on a limb and work with quality materials. I’ve been doing beadwork as a hobby for about twenty years. I really enjoy it, so I wanted to include a beading project in the book. I taught – or tried to teach – this craft to a group of women about a year and a half ago and they had a lot of trouble with it. It was a free workshop, and I think they equated “free” with “easy.” If you want to do nice beadwork, you’ve got to use tiny needles, tiny beads, and thread you can hardly see. That’s just the way it is. But with a little practice, the results can be beautiful.

How about the more than twenty yummy recipes in the book? What have you got in store for the reader, besides my personal favorite, “Crappy-weather Tea”? (Here in Minnesota, we can use that right up to the end of April!)

The recipes include traditional seasonal standards like the Sima, or Finnish mead, the Finnish May Day fritters and the cold May punch. Then I’ve adapted some German recipes specifically for Walpurgis Night. That’s how I came up with the April Hoppelpoppel and the Berry Porridge with Brocken Tops and Vanilla Sauce. The idea of a Walpurgis high tea is my own invention. I served the cucumber sandwiches and Red-cap Cake at a book signing earlier this month and they went over pretty well.

You have a whole chapter on different types of traditional witches from Germanic mythology, like the Ash Wife, Easter Witches, Weathermakers, Wolf Crones and much more. Are these relevant archetypes for modern Witches? Which one captured your interest the most?

I can’t really speak for modern Witches since I’m not one, but what I found personally relevant is the idea of the witch as a free spirit and force of nature. As I point out in the beginning of the chapter, the idea of the witch as Satanic only peaked in the sixteenth century and fizzled out a couple of centuries later. Unfortunately, it’s the one that’s really stuck in some people’s minds. The witches in my book are not anti-Christian but extra-Christian. They function outside Christianity and Christian social norms.

It was the valkyries who captured my interest the most. Many people, when they hear the word “valkyrie,” think of a fat opera singer. Not! If the original valkyries were real women who devoted themselves to Odin, then they were probably living rough in the wilderness. They could hardly have been fat. The Nordic valkyries appeared almost exclusively in dreams, while the Anglo-Saxon waelcyrge were conceived of as scavenging birds rather than actual women. Brunhilda is the most famous of the valkyries – I devoted several pages to her in the 2011 Witches’ Companion – but there were tons of others. And they were all scary!

I loved the herbal chapter of your book. How did you research the herbs? Do you grow some of them yourself?

I mention in the book that I’m more of a gatherer than a grower. I’m ashamed to say that I’ve had mint die on me. Mint! I mean, it’s invasive! I do best with plants that grow from large seeds, like sunflowers, nasturtiums, beans – the kinds of seeds they give preschoolers to grow! I did have to grow the chervil for the green soup myself because it’s so hard to find fresh in this country. It did pretty well, but it didn’t survive the hot New Jersey summer. Thank goodness you can freeze it!

My interest in herbs was originally an aesthetic one. I’ve been visiting the medieval gardens at the Cloisters in New York City since I was a teenager, and before that my grandmother took us to a lot of open air museums in Germany. Last summer, I got to visit the new Viking garden at Haithabu. (Yes, the Vikings were gardeners too!) The horse beans looked great growing behind the wattle fence but I sure wouldn’t want to eat them every day. There are no horse bean recipes in the book! I love old time herbs not just for their looks but for the names and the magical properties people ascribed to them.

Aside from the chervil, the bear’s garlic and possibly the angelica, all the herbs in Chapter 7 are easy to find either at the grocery store, the greenhouse, or growing by the side of the road, so I hope readers will seek some of them out in person, so to speak. Especially the sweet woodruff. If you want to know what Walpurgisnacht smells like, dry some sweet woodruff and stick your nose in it.

It’s also interesting that as a non-witch, you decided to write about this topic. What is it about witches that fascinated you in the first place? And now that you’ve gotten to know us better, any chance you will become a witch in the future?

In this book, I got to indulge my twin fascinations: witches and nuns. Chapter 4 is mostly about St. Walburga who was a real life English abbess. Why the fascination? Hmmm. . . In both cases I would have to say it started with the clothes. Especially the head gear. Shallow, I know! As a kid, I loved watching reruns of The Flying Nun. I even made myself a paper version of Sister Bertrille’s winged cap. Needless to say, I never wore it out of the house. In Chapter 5, you can find instructions on how to make a paper witch’s hat, so I guess I haven’t changed that much.

The witch thing too goes back to childhood. My dad took me for walks in the woods and read me fairy tales, mostly Hans Christian Andersen. If you think about it, the witches in fairy tales rarely kill people. A witch might turn you into a swan, put you to sleep for a while or kidnap you and raise you as her own. In fact, often the worst thing a witch can do is give you exactly what you asked for. I mean, the sea witch didn’t knock on the little mermaid’s door and offer to sell her a pair of legs, did she? The little mermaid came to the witch’s door.

I think witches and nuns both embody womanhood at its most mysterious.

As for becoming a witch in the future. . . Well, it’s a bit of a commitment, isn’t it? Kind of like becoming a nun, only different. I think I’m a little too flaky to be either. I certainly have more sympathy for Wiccans since I started writing this book. I went into the book with an awareness that Wiccans existed, they had a religion and that some of them were nice. Other members of the general public, and I mean educated people, seem to think they’re either Satanic or they’re a joke.

A while back, a fellow writer who knew I was looking for some cash told me about a job adapting bible stories for 5- to 6-year-olds. It sounded like exactly the sort of thing I would be good at. But when I listed my publication credits for the prospective editor, that was the end of it. The publisher couldn’t consider someone who had written about witches. They couldn’t even consider someone who had written about Halloween! By contrast, when I came to Llewellyn wanting to write about witches, no one asked me whether or not I was a witch, or whether or not I’d ever written anything about the bible. So I’m definitely feeling more at home with witches.

What will you be doing this weekend for Walpurgis Night?

Oooh, I was afraid you’d ask that! One thing my youngest daughter and I always do on Walpurgis Night is take a walk, just as it’s getting dark. In fact, that “stand of birches by the edge of the railroad tracks” that I mention in the book’s conclusion is a real place. We’ll be paying a visit to those trees, as well as whatever witches happen to live in them.

I have to take my crafts out of the display case at my local library the day before, so I’ll have all my witchy things at home again. Maybe I’ll arrange a private showing for my neighbors. I suppose I could work up to making some Walpurgis pancakes. You’ve got to have some kind of fire on Walpurgis Night, and I’ve got my greening candles all ready to go. I’ve already got some white ”fairy lights” (I like the British term!) strung up in the living room window along with my Pier One pentacle lanterns.  Oh, what the heck!  I think I’ll have a party!

Thank you, Linda, have a great one! To read more from Linda Raedisch, click here. If you’d like to browse inside her new book, click here.