9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Snake Oil, August 3, 2007
This review is from: Empowering Your Life with Runes (Alpha Books S.) (Paperback)
With this book, a futhark, and a blank tile, you will be able to cure all ills, caste out your demons, see your future, and get rich into the bargain.
Germanic Pagans will find this one frustrating, as their precious heritage is once again trampled by the New-Age enterprise.
The author is an expert on I Ching, Numerology, and Tarot, along with a few other New-Age subjects. She applies all of this experience in creating her own version of a runic panacea.
Unfortunately, her sources are almost exclusively the most superficial and speculative New-Age fantasy. Blum, who is best known for commercializing the runes, adding the "blank rune" and throwing away the traditional futhark order. Peschel, whose sources are in turn Blum, Fitch, & Conway, all of whom are among the more unreliable sources. Knight, who clearly copies whole sections from the works of better speculative authors without regard for their context or acknowledgment. Only Pennick stands out as a relatively reliable source, but too little too late.
The only thing missing is some factual information about runes. Examples: She includes "Celtic Nations" among rune users. She is very specific about Odin hanging upside-down from one leg (this is nowhere in the old sources, but an obvious borrowing from the Tarot). She includes a translation of the description of a shamaness from the Saga of Erik the Red doctored to include a "rune pouch" (the original mentions a charm pouch, but no runes). She implies that the blank rune is part of the older tradition. And many other basic inaccuracies.
If you are interested in runes, at least have enough respect for a real cultural heritage to look at the basic facts, then you can speculate for yourself, and cut out the middlemen. There are plenty of reliable sources:
Runes (Reading the Past, Vol 4)
Rudiments of Runelore
Runes: An Introduction
Runic Amulets and Magic Objects
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