This is actually two books published by the Aquarian Press in a combined volume - "Magic, Its Ritual, Power & Purpose", and "The Magician, His Training And Work". Originally published in 1952 and 1959 respectively, Butler was not only an ordained priest in the Liberal Catholic Church, but worked closely with Dion Fortune and the Society of the Inner Light and founded the Servants of the Light School of Occult Science. Coming at the time when what might be termed 'modern Pagansim' was only just emerging, and still rooted firmly in the Christian mysteries, the books are nonetheless of enormous value to the modern student of Witchcraft.
The books cover such topics as breathing and relaxation exercises, visualisation and meditation techniques, the Quabbalah, tattvic waves, creation of talismans, building of a 'Magical Personality' - in short, a solid grounding in the theory, psychology and practice of magic, in whatever religious context the reader is working from. While some passages can be quite hard going, the books include invaluably concise explanations of the "why" and "how" of things work which many more recent books omit.
This is the first of Fforde's books not to feature the literary detective Thursday Next, and while functionling very respectably as a stand-alone book, those that have read the four Thursday books (particularly The Well Of Lost Plots) will, I think, get more out of this one in terms of in-jokes, references and general bizarreness.
This book revolves around the Nursery Crime division of the Reading police force, with DI Jack Spratt and DS Mary Mary investigating the death of one Humperdinck Dumpty, from injuries sustained from falling off a wall. Did he jump, was he pushed, and can Mrs Singh the pathologist succeed where all the King's Men failed, in putting the pieces back together again? Read it. Read the others first if you can. And then explore the huge suite of websites that accompany the books, giving book upgrades, 'making of' wordumentaries and all manner of silliness (quite a lot of which involves dodos).
This is the first book featuring Merrily Watkins, vicar of the village of Ledwardine and, in the rest of the series, diocese exorcist. As the seventh book in the series is due out this year and I've only read them through once, I felt it was time for a refresher. They blend the supernatural - both Pagan and Christian - with more down to earth mysteries, and are well worth a read.
The Wine Of Angels deals with her arrival as Priest-in-charge and build up to her installation as vicar, having to deal with the various tensions at work in the community - a heritage festival is planned and Merrily is caught in the middle of gay rights vs feudal rights, pagan/folkloric influences vs Christian, a missing girl and her own teenage daughter Jane (think "Cybil" set in Herefordshire. With ghosts. Ok, maybe not so much).
Rickman's written several other stand-alone books (all of which I'd recommend), but if you're going to read the Merrily Watkins ones, read this one first, or a lot of the plot won't be a surprise.
"There are any number of magical creatures, mostly female, whose singing can bring about horror and death. Sirens, undines, banshees, Bananarama tribute bands..."
This is the third book in the Nightside series, and bloody brilliant it is too. The Nightside is a kind of London flipside, where it's always 3am and all manner of nasties are real (if anyone's familiar with Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, it's a lot like that. In fact probably sue-ably so). John Taylor is a detective with a real private eye - his third eye - that allows him to find things. Unfortunately, if he uses it too much his enemies can track him through it, so there's lots of legwork and good old-fashioned threats and violence.
Simon Green is one of my favourite authors, and these books read a lot like his Hawk and Fisher series - in fact various characters/Gods/demons pop up in both, a lot of Green's work has very loose boundaries between its worlds.
In this book there's a nightclub singer whose sad songs have been making her audience commit suicide, and John has to find out why. It's funny, it's macabre, it's occasionally downright disgusting. Only complaint, no Suzie Shooter in this one (character from the first two. People that know me can probably guess what she's like). Hopefully this series will run and run, and she'll return soon.
