February new releases on the Pagan shelf

Two exciting new February releases from Llewellyn are on their way to a bookstore near you, and what better way to celebrate (and show off) than to share a couple excerpts with you?

First of all, I have to say – I love this new function of our website. It allows you to look at the table of contents and an excerpt of the book – a longer one than you’ll see on Amazon. This means I don’t have to tell you quite so much about the book, because you can see it for yourself. But I still want to tell you a little bit about them! What can I say, the books I work on here are my babies.

The first book that hit our warehouse is the work of Los Angeles-based musician Kenny Klein. This fiddler, guitarist, singer, photographer and author regularly tours Pagan and Renaissance festivals, so you may have seen him performing before. He has six original CDs available on his website plus one more with his band Odd’s Bodkin. His new book is titled Through The Faerie Glass: A Look at the Realm of Unseen and Enchanted Beings. How to describe it? Poetic. Thoughtful. Dark. Full of folks songs and fairy tale snippets – and we’re not talking the friendly ones, either. Spine-chilling stories like that of Tam Lin or Reynardine shed light on the eroticism and dangers of the Good Folk. Klein also explores what journeys to the land of the fey are like – how they involve a time shift, a journey over water, and how you must never eat or drink anything they offer you – as well as he profiling changelings, the faeries’ relationships with various animals, lore about their enchanting music , and gripping tales about their sexuality. If you’re not sufficiently perturbed by the end of the book to resolve to stay away from them, there is a whole chapter on actually dealing with faeries – protecting your home from their mischief, finding objects that have gone missing, even gaining inspiration from them.

Kenny’s writing is thoroughly modern and enjoyable, helping to offset the sometimes archaic language of the folk tales. Here is a random sentence that exemplifies the tone and content of the book: “She is apparently a shape-shifter who can show herself to Henry as she wishes him to see her: as an ugly demon when it suits her; then as a total hottie when it’s time to get their groove thing on.” Yeah, you read that right: groove thing!

Check out the table of contents and full excerpt here.

The next book to arrive was the third book by talented author Michelle Skye. While she is not a roving musician, you may have heard of her nonetheless; she is a regular contributor to Llewellyn annuals, and has also written for Circle Magazine, SageWoman, and Renaissance Magazine. In her previous books, Goddess Alive! and Goddess Afoot!, she introduced readers to goddesses in the Celtic and Norse pantheons by providing deep guided meditations to meet them and magic or ritual workings to pull their influence into your life.

In her latest book, Goddess Aloud!: Transforming Your World Through Rituals and Mantras, she focuses instead on nine spiritual principles: Peace, Caring for the Environment, Love, Self-Love, Forgiveness, Healing, Growth, Hope and Spirituality. Each of these chapters then introduces you to three goddesses who can lend their support to that particular endeavor. For example, you can call on Pax, Roman Goddess of the Peaceful State, Our Lady of Fatima, Peaceful Mother of Christianity, or Branwen, Welsh Goddess of Compassionate Peace in the chapter on peace; or Tlazolteotl, Aztec Eater of Filth, Mary Magdalene, Christian Sacred Prostitute, or Arianrhod, Welsh Sovereign Lady when it comes to forgiveness. Each of these goddesses has a mantra to help you find your voice; these can be used in meditation, prayer, ritual or spellwork. For example, the Venus mantra is “Light my fire. Stoke my desire. Venus! Send my love to me.” Each chapter then ends with a ritual for the given attribute (peace, forgiveness, love, etc.).

As you can see, this means that the book covers 27 goddesses, rather than the 12 or 13 in her previous books, and calls upon goddesses from around the world, not just the Norse and Celtic ones. I would highly recommend it for anyone who wants to delve in and work on these issues in their life.

Check out the table of contents and full excerpt here.