The Rising Sign: Your Astrological Mask [Paperback]

Jeanne Avery (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 1991

By a well-known psychic and astrologer, a revealing psychological/astrological exploration of the masks we wear and the many ways our rising signs affect our personalities.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

By a well-known psychic and astrologer, a revealing psychological/astrological exploration of the masks we wear and the many ways our rising signs affect our personalities.

From the Inside Flap

By a well-known psychic and astrologer, a revealing psychological/astrological exploration of the masks we wear and the many ways our rising signs affect our personalities.

Product Details

• Paperback: 408 pages
• Publisher: Dolphin Books (December 1, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385132786
• ISBN-13: 978-0385132787
• Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.8 x 8.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #912,733 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Insightful!, December 19, 2002

By 

J. Thieme "quo-vadis" (Vista, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Rising Sign: Your Astrological Mask (Paperback)

I haven't seen another astrology book like this one. Ms. Avery breaks down the house wheel of each rising sign, describing each house as it falls on each sign.

For example, if you are Pisces rising, you have Pisces on the first house, Aries on the second, Taurus on the third, etc., all the way around the wheel. Ms. Avery relates what each of these mean for every sign.

The result is a more full understanding of each rising sign. For example, why might people who are Virgo rising feel constricted because of their own children? Because Capricorn (constriction) is on the fifth house (children).

The only drawback is that, understandably, the book does not deal with interceptions. I don't see how this would even be possible, with all the combinations for each sign. This minor drawback should not influence one's decision to buy the book.

Originally, I wrote a negative review of this book, but decided to change it since I found myself going back to the book again and again! So, you may have noticed the one star above; that is from the original review. Amazon won't let me change the stars now, but if I could, I'd give it four.

19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars This book should go out of print., August 12, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Rising Sign: Your Astrological Mask (Paperback)

There are several problems with this book. The introductory chapters, while very concise, compact, and well written, are too summarial for the novice and too elementary for astrologers. Although the author warns the reader that the provided table for your rising sign may not be exact, if I had not known my rising sign I would have been way off by the simplified chart. What is the point of reading the information if it has a 1/3 chance of being accurate? The book should focus either on an audience of professionals or of novices, and not try to hit both. Since the rising sign is one of the most complex elements of the chart, I doubt that a good book for novices is easy to accomplish.

Some of the information gives the impression that the author was a very young astrologer when she wrote it. For example, the 2nd house is "the money house," something that is rejected by more advanced astrologer, although the 2nd house certainly contains money issues. The biggest problem is that the actual descriptions of each house read more like a sun-sign analysis, and almost can be interchanged with this. There is little to show how the rising sign interacts with the sun sign, or how it is different from the planets, or how it is used as "the astrological mask" that the title suggests. There is some information on what the rising sign is in the introductory section, but it is not integrated into the actual examples.

Although the author uses the Placidus House System in her practice, she simplifies the book into a flat chart system (Equal House) and spends too much time analyzing all the houses in a way that does not work, has little to do with the rising sign at all, and thus makes the novice reader come to the conclusion that Astrology is bunk when they try to read "their section"!

The book uses the outdated "he" for everything as opposed to a style that is more gender inclusive, and talks about "the opposite sex" although this is a criticism that can be given to many heterosexist astrologers, even today. The filler celebrity examples are also out of date. Robert Redford, for example, is mentioned as just getting into film-making. He must have just done Ordinary People when the book was written, but now he has the entire Sundance Festival. This is offputting, especially since the celebrity examples provide the only real clues toward understanding the rising sign.

This book only serves the purpose of being returned by professionals and turning off novices in it's early 80's apologist style. The fact that the author was a former actress turned astrologer is not something to brag about, either. If you want to learn astrology, there are many better books today that you can get by searching Amazon.com.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Intrigue of a Mask, September 2, 2001

By 

Nancy R. Fenn "The IntrovertZCoach" (San Diego) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Rising Sign: Your Astrological Mask (Paperback)

Coming to grips with a good working knowledge of how to interpret the Rising Sign is one of the things my astrology students find the hardest to accomplish smoothly and professionally. I certainly don't mean the formula for interpreting each of the signs at the house cusp. That's child's play. I mean the pyschological function of the Rising Sign as a mask, its pivotal relationship to the 12th, 1st and 7th houses and its capacity to both attract and filter experiences from the outer world. I have always found Jeanne Avery to be a very entertaining writer, but I think the thing I like most about her "Rising Sign" book is that by the time a student finishes it, ifthey read it cover to cover or least sequentially through each chapter of the people they are interestedin, they will have had a good, thorough walkthrough on how to interpret and tie together an entire chart using the house by house by house method that Avery exemplifies. The glaring flaw in this book -- and I always wonder how it could have possibly been justified -- is that not only does it not take into account intercepted signs, it doesn't even mention that there is such a thing and that it could greatly affect a reading you give yourself or someone else using this book.