PURE MAGIC: A COMPLETE COURSE IN SPELLCASTING offers a primer for any apprentice wizard who wants the foundations of spellcasting. Both theory and practice blend in chapters that cover everything from minerals and metals to understanding realistic expectations of magic, the use of herbs and incense, tinctures for psychic enhancement, and the origins of common spells. An excellent primer for any new witch and collections catering to them.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

This is an excellent book! After reading through the preview version on Amazon I was so excited that I actually went out and bought it immediately. I love the writers style and how thoroughly she addresses each of the topics. Some of the topics I've never even seen discussed in other wiccan flavored books about magic. I would have given the book 5 stars except for a few minor issues related to the editing and the research.

After reading the background on the book I found out that it is a new edition of one of the author's earlier books on earth magic. As the author says, she added some new material but left the old material in as well. This is both one of the strengths and one of the weaknesses of the book.

In some parts it seems the author replaced terms like "earth magic" or "natural magic" with the term "pure magic" to be in keeping with the new title. Although I can understand why this was done, it ruins the flow of the message she is trying to convey. To me this is just a minor issue.

However, my one big concern is her discussion in regard to ethics. It looks like her research was lacking in this area or she simply overgeneralized. She mentions a "few basic tenets shared by all schools" and then quotes a version of the Wiccan rule "Do what you will, but harm none." At best, it was a typo and should have read "most schools," at worst, she deliberately ignored that not all schools have the same ethic. Even a quick look at the non-Wiccan magical traditions would have shown that many schools are not adverse to spiritual justice spells even if they would harm another person ie. bringing a criminal to justice. This section could have used some updating to either present a more accurate picture of the ethics found in other schools of magic or to simply state that she is presenting Wiccan ethics, including the rule of three boomerang effect (which is also a common Wiccan idea). As a side note, although the author claims that this book doesn't have "those" kinds of spells in it, her 5000 Spells book does.

Also, her deities associated with magic section was a little disappointing. It appears that she did very little research into the original mythology and folklore associated with the deities she describes. She gives her own versions of of them, which may work for her, but its not completely accurate from an academic point of view. I couldn't help but laugh at her modernized novela version of the story of Isis and Osirus (Asar and Aset actually). Although it was memorable, it was also misleading and in my opinion somewhat disrespectful to the Egyptian Gods and Goddesses. For a better description of the mythology and functions of the Egyptian deities check out "The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt" by the Egyptologist Richard H. Wilkinson.

In addition, for some reason the author seemed focued on the female deities associated with magic and basically ignores or minimizes the male ones. The major male one's such as the God/Magician Odin or the Master Egyptian magician/God Thoth were only mentioned in passing in relation to the female deities Freya and Isis and even then the depiction wasn't accurate (BTW Odin only learned Vanic magic from Freya not the magic of the runes or galdr). It would have been much better, and more honest, to present them as they appear in the actual mythology and folklore and leave it at that rather than distort or water down their significance and power. I don't see how it helps any aspiring magician to ignore the male energies in magic. At the very least she should have included references in the text to "scholarly" works regarding the deities so people could research it and make up their own minds about the nature of these beings.

However, that being said, I think the book is aimed more at people who are more interested in doing love or prosperity spells than in pursuing detailed academic research into mythology and folklore. If you are the academic sort you'd probably recognize the issues immediately or at least do further research anyway so it doesn't matter that much for you, if you aren't the academic sort and aren't interested in folklore you probably wouldn't care anyway so either way it isn't a huge issue.

Overall I think this is a very good beginners book for people wanting to pursue natural magic. In fact I think it's the best one out there and I've read a lot of them. My only recommendation to people buying this book is to make sure that you follow up with your own research on the topics covered in it and don't take anyone's word as truth until you've tried it and checked it out for yourself.