Sandra Kynes

This book focuses on how to blend essential oils for use in magic and ritual, and yes, that's pretty much what the title promises. But while I'm guessing many books on essential oils include a lot of recipes, or are only recipes, there are hardly any in this book. Kynes has included maybe four recipes in the entire book, mainly as examples. Instead, the strength of this book is Kynes's detailed explanation of how to blend essential oils effectively. She has chapters on blending by botanical show more family, scent group, and perfume note, as well as by magical purpose ("As Above, So Below"). There is also a chapter on the magical uses of the carrier oils. The last half of the book is an encyclopedia of essential and carrier oils, listing the botanical and blending information for each, as well as the magical correspondences. This is a fine book for learning how to blend essential oils, but may be less than satisfying if what you want is a quick reference of recipes. show less

Love it! Almost exactly what I had wanted. Unlike other books I have found on oils and magic, this actually explained why the oils have certain beliefs attached to them and their history and cultural significance, which I find to be the most interesting and useful part of magic and perfume. Not just like, IDK, Love is blahblahblah oil, end of story, no explanation, which I see all the time in these books. Not as in depth as I would have liked, but this is a practical book for mixing your own show more oil blends instead of a history book so I understand. Clearly written and divided the information well, which I very, very much appreciate. I got this book via netgalley and liked it so much I bought a hard copy to put on my shelf. show less

Consider me completely blown away by this book. I adore the sea, love to learn about it, find it quite magical and this book was an explosion of all those things. There was so much in this book that made me intruiged and amazing.

There's great quotes I never knew of. A new form of divination I'm definitely looking into trying out.

I was so amazed by the amount of historical (quotes, sea logs, etc) and physical science work done (like the tides and tidal bulges of the moon, how it worked and show more why), and how every chapter was full of expansive lists of what they were cover (the best being the extensive lists of Sea deities and creatures throughout recorded time).







(I have to tell you the fact this book has twelve pages of bibliography [out classing the index by a good six] at the end, because each of its references is cited, also may have made my heart pitter-patter quickly.) show less

Pretty good. The book is in full color throughout, and there are photographs of all the crystals discussed. Most entries includes a pronunciation guide for the name (just in case "chrysoprase" isn't in your everyday vocabulary). Kynes includes scientific facts about each crystal in addition to its magical uses: its internal structure and its luster. After all, maybe knowing that quartz has a trigonal inner structure will give you ideas on how to use it magically. There are appendices at the show more end for magical correspondences—all the crystals that are commonly used in prosperity spells, for instance—and a list of deities with their corresponding crystals.

The book is quite thorough, and all the photos make it lovely to look through. I thought the descriptions of the stones were interesting to read. The only drawback is that it's hard to glance through an entry to quickly see the pertinent information about that stone. A short chart for each crystal, listing things like astrological associations, main magical uses, etc., might have been useful. show less