Customer Reviews

Simple Spells for Hearth and Home: Ancient Practices for Creating Harmony, Peace, and Abundance

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It seems to me that the majority of spell books on the market focus on love and prosperity, almost to the exclusion of anything else. With that in mind it's refreshing to see a spell book promoting harmony and happiness, especially in the home, where unfortunately it is oftentimes lacking. This book covers practical advice, correspondence tables and spells for moving in, safety, nurturing and love, health and joy for grandparents, coziness, healing, and finding buyers. I especially like the section on mood shifting for fire, earth, air and water signs. The last portion of the book covers spells for holidays - traditional and "nature" (read: pagan). I thought the spells for the Sabbats were very lacking and that's why I took off one star... However, if you are looking to bring harmony to your living space, this is a book you should seriously consider, along with the Magical Household by Scott Cunningham and David Harrington.

In this time when most spell books are only about love and money it nice to find one dealing with home and family. With spells for Physic Housecleaning and Health and Joy for Grandparents to Nurturing and Love for the Kids Room this book is wonderful for makeing your home more of the kind of home we all want. Loving, cheerful and happy, the kind of home we all want to come home to.

I enjoyed this book very much and expect to use it quite often in the future. It's like Feng Shui but easier to understand and incorporate. I only wish there were more general spells (like how to create coziness, etc.) in the book.

The title and subtitle sum up what this book is pretty well. A little bit spell book, a little bit decorating book, she talks about making a house a home through some effort on your part.

It's a nice little book with some nice ideas, but she seems to try a little too hard to take Pagan ideas to non-Pagan readers. Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, for instance, presented in a Pagan way might appeal to many Pagans, but not to many Christian or Jewish readers. It has a feel of effort to it, like she's trying to sell the book to a group that never visits the "New Age" section of the bookstore.

Still, things are presented in a very clear way, suggesting materials and moon phases for the most appropriate times for the spells. None of the materials are very exotic, so the spells are indeed accessible to anyone who is of a mind to try their hand at a little magic.

The index is quite good, but unfortunately no bibliography. Not a bad book if Hestia/Vesta-type rituals are important to you.

"Simple Spells for Hearth and Home: Ancient Practices for Creating Harmony, Peace, and Abundance" delivers exactly what the title promises--something not many books do. I enjoy the inclusion of various goddesses who can assist with magickal house work--especially the Roman goddess Vesta. The spirit of "Simple Spells for Hearth and Home" is light and inspirational--the spells are easy to accomplish. My only quibble with the book is shared with another reviewer--she constantly tries to "hard sell" the concept of using spells to people faithful to Judeo-Christianity. There isn't a problem with this, since magickal books need not and indeed should not be exclusive. I do however suspect that her core audience come from Earth-based paths (Wicca, Witchcraft, Hoodoo, Shamanism, etc) Dolnick's hard-sell routine comes off as a book selling tactic; her otherwise gentle voice becomes brassy. In the future, if Dolnick let her gentle voice lead the way rather than allowing it to be overpowered by the pursuit of personal abundance, her books would be even stronger.

This brilliant book focusing on spells and rituels for your home and holidays, is a must see for all wiccans! Plus, it is a series book!