Stewart Farrar (1916–2000)

I’d been after this books for years, although I forget why, when a copy popped up on eBay. The book was only ever published in hardback, and the hardback was published by Robert Hale, which no doubt explains why it had proven so hard to find. Unfortunately, I lost the auction on eBay for the book… but found a copy for less on abebooks.co.uk from a seller in Australia. (I see there’s now a copy on Amazon going for £590. I paid nowhere near that.) And, after all that, was it worth it? I show more understand most of Farrar’s fiction revolves around witchcraft and Wicca – I believe he practiced it himself – and certainly a coven of witches makes an appearance in Forcible Entry. But the story is mostly about parapsychology research, particularly telepathy and astral projection. Matthew is a professional photographer and dying of cancer. He also volunteers as a test subject at a parapsychology study run by the university. Which is where Sheila, an attractive young woman, works as an office manager. The two prove to be gifted at astral projection. On one such trip Matthew, knowing he is dying, steals Sheila’s body. So while his real body dies of cancer in hospital, Matthew takes over Sheila’s body and feigns amnesia to cover any mistakes he might make in his impersonation (he had been studying her for weeks beforehand). However, Sheila had been an unwitting agent of the CIA investigating an organisation that wants to use people with parapsychological abilities for nefarious reasons. But not everyone is convinced by Matthew’s impersonation of Sheila – especially her American boyfriend, who involves a coven of witches to undo the possession – and when Matthew is forced to kill to defend his secret… It’a an interesting premise, and Farrar’s prose is readable and unremarkable. I’m surprised the book is not better-known – or rather, surprised it never made it to paperback, because there’s certainly a market for it. But then, I don’t think many of Farrar’s novels made it to paperback, so it seems his chief readership was library borrowings. There were a couple of other Farrar novels offered by the seller on eBay who was selling Forcible Entry, and one or two of them looked interesting. But I’m not going to go out of my way to track down his books, although if I see one going cheap I might give it a go. show less

Reasonable resource on rituals, spellwork, Sabbats, and related topics from well-known Alexandrian initiates. Incomplete, as these kinds of books tend to be, but useful. It's geared toward coven work, though solitary practitioners may find it useful too. Better than most comparable titles on the market, though admittedly that's not saying much.

As a person who does not know much about specific Gods and Wiccan rituals, this book was a very good introduction. Being uneducated in Wiccan lore and Gods, I cannot say anthing about the accuracy, but having an interest in these areas, the books works great. The book is well organized and easily understood, with enough info about specific Gods with associated rituals given for all covered Gods.

One drawback is that it only covers Gods, and you have to buy the book "The Witches Goddess" to show more find out more about corresponding Goddesses, since most worship ritual and many other wiccan rituals usually call both a God and Goddess, not just one. However, the book only covers rituals involving a single God, so knowledge of Goddesses are not needed for the rituals in the book.

All and all, this books is great as an intro to Gods, Paganism, Wicca, and ritual, but not for advanced practice. It is a very useful guide to those new to practicing with or relating to Pagan Gods. It feels very Wiccan. Witches or pagans who are not Wiccan may find the book interesting, but would need to ignore the wiccan slant in how it's written. show less

This is pretty much the most complete published work on Alexandrian Wicca around (or at least of which I am aware). Unfortunately, that doesn't make it good, considering the fact that the information is extremely incomplete, and the lore is extremely flawed.