New on my bookshelf

I must have received about half a dozen excellent new titles for review:

Diabolical
edited by Peter Grey & Alkistis Dimech,
Scarlet Imprint Publishing,
Hardback /338pp/ full colour illustrations/£35
no isbn

Scarlet Imprint's Diabolical is collection of essays on Grimoires, ie ancient &

not so ancient books on magick regarded by magicians as the recepticals of the
core secrets of the Art. As co-editor Peter Gray comments in his foreword,
grimoires are very popular at the moment. I'd also say that collections of essays
are popular and have maybe taken the place of the "fanzine". Seems to me that the
essays in Diabolical are as good as many trade and academic paperbacks and that
there is an potential audience for a slightly cheaper edition. Interesting also
that not one of the dozen contributors, apart from the co-editor, is female, which
makes me think that the grimoire still very much a male preserve?

I wasn't sure if I was going to be that interested in this volume, although I

suspect many will be. My own magical work doesn't often impact with the largely
medieval grimoire traditions although I am vaguely aware that it is some sort of
continuation of the late classical Egyptian magical-religion. But there again one
of the first essays is by Paul Hughes-Barlow and concerns the so-called Testament
of Solomon - a compilation apparently made and incorporating many manuscripts from
Roman Egypt. In other words this is a very early grimoire that still shows its
debt to the Kemetic tradition. Paul's Hughes Barlow essays is interesting but
maybe a bit short, I hope he will extend his research in a longer work.

Aaron Leitch's has contributed an informative essay and study guide to The Book of
Sacred Magick of Abramelin the Mage, a book made famous by the Hermetic Order of
the Golden Dawn. I'd forgotten that Abramelin is said to be an ancient Egyptian
adept, a details that would once have been dismissed without much thought. These
days the academic consensus is that Egyptian authorship should be taken on face
value at least until proved false. If you go with this idea, it becomes clear that
the Grimoire are not about the medieval Christian "hell" but really the Egyptian
"underworld".

Like other grimoires, Abramelin "blurs" the distinction between "high" and "folk"
magick. Its techniques require a flexible approach, even in the prelimary setting
up and invocations of the daemona. When the work is done, the owner can dispense
with the formal ritual, deploying appropriate talisman either secreting them on
his or her body, often under one's hat or bonnet. I'm told that grimores have
always been popular with folk practitioners, such as "cunning men & women etc, now
I understand why. So that's two out of a dozen essays in this collection, so you
get the drift, substantial stuff. I'm still contemplating Jake Stratton Kent's
very personal take on "Nebiros" which also has a neo-Egyptian theme. . .

Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon

edited by Dave Evans & Dave Green,
isbn 9780955523755
Hidden Publishing
Paperback /227pp

Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon is a collection of essays, perhaps even a jubilee
or festshrift for Ronald Hutton and his seminal study of Wicca and Witchcraft. The
contributors are an impressive band of occultural scholars from around the globe
and present topics such as Geoffrey Samuel's essay From Tantrik Chakra to Wiccan
Circle; Sabina Magliocco's Aradia in Sardinia: The Archeology of a Folk Hero and
Henry Bogdan, author of the standard bibliography of Kenneth Grant, on The Occult
Underground: Strategies for Power & Antinomianism. So its an interesting
collection. I might also claim some credit for the title which was one I used for
a review article in this very newsletter, generously quoted in co-editor's Dave
Evans' foreword.

The Qliphoth
by Paul A Green,
Libros Liberted Publishing
isbn 9780978186500
Paperback/ 321pp/£10.99

The Qliphoth by Paul A Green, is his first venture into occult fiction although
his science fiction has been well received and his radio play about the rocket
scientist/occultist Jack Parsons was great. Qliphoth is a Hebrew/Kabbalistic
concept, literal meaning "shells", a kind of anti-universe. Whenever I think of
them I see the world of Jean Cocteau's film Orphee in which the departed live in a
faded replica of their former existence, disintergrating though a process of slow
inertia.

The narration opens at a new age centre somewhere in Devon. Young Lucas is viewing
snippets of a TV documentary about his estranged father Nick, who is a 1960s acid
casaulty currently incarcerated in a care home at his former wife Pauline's
insistance. Lucas wants to see his father.

Meanwhile at the care home, we learn of a chain of events that lead to Nick's
current predicament, the finding of a collection of magical artefacts belonging to
a defunct magical order with strong Crowlesque overtones called the Order of the
Brazen Head (perhaps a reference to Francis Bacons wondrous contraption) -
personally I prefer the Dennis Wheatley school of writing, that uses real
characters rather than "joke" names. As the story unfolds Nick is desperate to see
his teenage son and give his side of the story before it is too late.

I guess the author was aiming for something like the work of Gustav Meyrinck's
Golem or even Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf. So Paul Green has set himself a very
high bar and now and again reaches it. The bits I enjoyed the most were the less
occult passages of Pauline's attempts to live a normal life despite the dark stain
of a feckless former husband and missing son. Paul Green doesn't quite deliver for
me but nevertheless if you like an occult story with a continuous dreamy occultual
flow, this might work for you.

Underworld
by Katherine Sutherland
(illustrated by Alex Singleton)
isbn 9780955685828
Web of Wyrd Press
Paperback/53pp/

All aspects of occult publishing seem to be on the ascendent just now - and the
many novelists and poets deserve your support. One rising star is the poet
Katherine Sutherland, whose new collection Underworld is a spirited re-imagining
of the Inanna mythos accompanied by excellent illustrations from Alex Singleton,
rather misleadingly credited as co-author of the book. A fine addition to any
aesthete's book shelf.

Also received and reviewed next time Magic, Witchcraft & Ghosts in the Greek and
Roman World a sourcebook prepared by Professor Daniel Ogden, Oxford University
Press (The author teaches history of Greek & Roman "necromancy" at Exeter). Billed
as an alternative to Georg Luck's earlier collection "Arcana Mundi". The books
looks to be mainly as titled, ie material from Greek & Latin Classics, with a
smattering of real magick from Egypt. [Mogg]