Author: Ileana Abrev
Trade Paperback, 144 pages
Publisher: Llewellyn
Publication date: October 2001
ISBN: 0738700819
Price & More Info: Click Here
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White Spells: Magic for Love, Money, & Happiness is one of those books that annoys a good-sized segment of the Neo-Pagan community whether the book itself is good or bad. It's a book of spells aimed at the beginner. Some Neo-Pagans seem to believe that magick is a dangerous force which should not be taught without a hefty dose of religion first. Others believe that all spell books are a waste of time because everyone should create their own spells from scratch.
As I've said in other reviews of books of spells, I don't fall into any of these camps. I got my start along the Neo-Pagan path from the magick end and believe that magick is completely independent of religion. Anyone, regardless of their religion (or lack of religion), can cast spells if they wish to learn how. While I agree that a personally created spell can be better, I don't think that spell books are a waste of paper. They are handy guides for the beginner and can be a useful source of ideas for the journeyman magician. They are probably useless for the master, but most people aren't masters. Therefore, I'm going to review this book solely on its merits as a book of spells aimed at the beginner.
This small (wide pocket-sized) book book is obviously aimed at the general public -- not just Neo-Pagans or Wiccans. Unlike many such books I've seen, this book does not start with a lot of background information about magick. There are no instructions for casting circles or other complex pre-casting operations. Instead of a complex circle, this book suggests a simple prayer to banish negativity before casting a spell in its short introductory section. This is nice because it makes the book much more religion-neutral.
The first chapter of the book is a short chapter on using color in magick. At eight pages, it's the longest section of "magickal theory" in the book. The author points out that the information in this chapter can be used to enhance any spell in the book. This gives beginners a way to personalize the spells in the book without having to study lots of magickal theory.
The remaining four chapters of White Magic are devoted to spells. The chapters are organized by spell form (crystal spells, bath spells, herb and plant spells, and candle spells). While this keeps similar to cast spells together, it means that spells for a particular function (e.g. protection or love) are scattered throughout the book. The book provides about 90 spells covering a wide range of needs. There are spells for love, protection, legal matters, money, healing, finding a job, fertility, enhancing sex drive, luck, and more. All the spells live up to the book's White Spells title as all but the most morally hung-up would probably consider every spell in the book "white" magic. Most importantly from the point of view of the beginner audience this book is aimed for, the spells provided are generally short, simple, and require only relatively common materials.
This small volume concludes with a short glossary, some sample spell record sheets for recording what spell one did and the results. There's also an index, although the easiest way to find spells is probably the lists of spells in each chapter in the table of contents.
While White Spells seems a bit pricy for its short length, it is one of the better spell books for the absolute beginner who just wants to use magick. It provides a good variety of simple but useful spells in a religion-neutral manner and without boring the reader with lots of theory. This lack of theory is also this book's major weak point. As it doesn't provide much theory and background, the reader really isn't learning magick, he's just learning to perform spells from recipes. Of course, that's all many people want and need.
Reviewed by Randall
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