Book Review: The Path of the Witch - Rituals and Practices for Discovering Which Witch you are.
Genre: Religion and Spirituality / Health, Mind and Body.
Publisher: Fair Winds Press - Quarto Publishing Group
Release Date: 27th April, 2021
About the Author
Let’s start with a little bit about the author. Lidia Pradas has written another book called The Complete Grimoire which came out last year. I did review that book as well, you can find the review here. From reading both of her books it’s obvious that Lidia knows her stuff, she has a great wealth of knowledge about Wicca and Witchcraft. You may also know her as @wiccantips on instagram where, again, she shares her knowledge of Wicca and Witchcraft practices. She comes from a family of Witches, so you could say it’s in her blood. It’s good to know that you’re in safe hands with her books.
The Book
Before I tell you about the book, it’s important to have a little context so you can see where my thoughts are coming from. When I first started exploring Witchcraft I felt like it was important to define what type of Witch I was. I consider myself to be a Wiccan, but I also practice Witchcraft. I read LOTS to see what kind of path I vibed with; Green Witch, Kitchen Witch, Hearth Witch etc. I feel like since I started there have been even more additions to this list, more sub-genres of Witchcraft: Crystal Witch, Lunar Witch, Sea Witch, Fae Witch, Astrology Witch, Divination Witch. The list goes on. I started to get a little fed-up with it. I use herbs in my craft, crystals, the lunar cycle. I’ve started exploring water magick and astrology. I work with my dreams and I love tarot. So I decided to go with I’m a Witch and that’s it! I didn’t feel like i needed to define it anymore than that.
Therefore, I was a little dubious about this book, especially when I saw the tag line, ‘rituals and practices for discovering which Witch you are’. I knew straight away I was going to be bits of all of them and I would be very stubborn about not being crammed into one path. However, I was still intrigued, and as I always do with witchy books, I wanted to see if there were things I could take from it and add to my own practice.
On to the book then. The blurb starts; "Witchcraft is not one defined path..." My first thoughts were to agree - this is exactly what I believe; there is no one path a Witch will follow. It continues; "...rather it is a diversity of practices you can curate and align with based on your lifestyle and unique gifts.
- Do you have an affinity for working with plants and herbs for magic and medicine? You may be a Green Witch.
- Are the kitchen and home space sacred to you? Are you able to tap into the sensory and healing properties of food for spellwork? Is cooking an intentional act for you? You may be a Kitchen Witch.
- Are you able to easily connect with the five basic elements of Air, Fire, Water, Earth adn Spirit? You may be an Elemental Witch.
- Can you do many practices with ease? You may be an Eclectic Witch.
The Path of the Witch describes the many different types of witches, their gifts and abilities, and their practices. Each path shows you activities and rituals you can use to discover and explore that type of witchcraft and discern if it is a fit for you."
When it began to define the paths and encouraged you to consider which you felt more of an affinity with, like I said before, I was dubious. Personally, I don’t like the idea of having to choose one of these paths. I'll discuss that more later when I come to my thoughts.
The book is beautifully illustrated throughout. The images are by Nata Vedanta and I would love to have some of them framed and on my altar. Look how beautiful they are!
I was slightly annoyed when I saw the contents page. I was thinking to myself, 'you can’t make me choose! I’m a Green Witch, a Wiccan, a Cosmic Witch. I work with the elements - but am I an eclectic witch? No i don’t think so.'
I did manage to calm myself down. I remembered I needed to be more objective because I was reviewing the book. Even though I don’t like the choosing a path aspect, the book does offer guidance for new witches as it allows them to explore the different areas of Witchcraft that they may not know anything about. If you are a new Witch and you are interested in this book then just remember: you don’t have to label your craft this way. You can take from the different areas and build a craft that is unique to you.
The book is really well organised. As well as the images, it is set out in sections with useful sub-headings making it easy to digest the information. You don’t feel like you’re having all of the information thrown at you and there’s no feeling of information overload. It also makes it easy to come back to sections you like or want to make notes on.
It begins with an ‘overall guide’ to Witchcraft. Covering things that are relevant to Witchcraft in general: the elements, altars, tools, cleansing; the things you would find in all beginner books. Then it moves on to the different paths, with a chapter for each ‘witch type’ and within each chapter there’s key information on what that path looks like, basic beliefs and values, some correspondences, spells, recipes and one of my favourite things is the guided meditation for each of the paths.
Throughout the whole book the information is clear, thoughtful and practical. As I said earlier, Lidia Pradas clearly has a wealth of knowledge to share on a range of Witchy topics.
My Thoughts
I did have a strong response to this book. In the opening it says that it is for, “anyone who wants to explore different paths” which is great! However, it then adds “before choosing one” This did make me twitch a bit. It bugged me. I don’t know if I was just being sensitive, but I felt like I was being forced to choose one. However, I did want to be more objective when reading the book and continued with the idea of just exploring the different paths for what they were, and for me that was definitely the best way to read it.
I did get a few things I could takeaway from the book and there was something in just about every chapter. I’ll go through each chapter and tell you what I thought and what resonated with me.
In the Green Witch section there were a few ideas about gardens. I already grow herbs and flowers etc. for cooking and spells, but I loved the idea of a moon garden and night blooming flowers. There were some really nice ideas shared in relation to that. This section also includes correspondences for trees, herbs, plants, essential oils - the usual stuff.
I also really enjoyed the Wiccan section because i felt like it had been a while since I had read anything about Wicca specifically and, for me, it was just nice to reaffirm those beliefs, values and ideals. I just felt myself agreeing and nodding along as I read.
You may notice that I enjoyed all the chapters that are aspects of my own path! The next being Cosmic Witch because astrology and the night sky is something I am currently studying. As this is a new aspect of my own craft I did find myself taking some notes and this section, like the others, offers enough detail to allow you to make good start in that particular area. The explanation of astrology was really clear and broken down. As it is just an introduction it was simplistic in some areas. If you really want to explore astrology, the cosmos and natal charts then a book dedicated to that specific area would be better. The information included in this chapter is something I already got from astrology specific books I’ve been reading. If you want to know the books I’ve been using for my Witchy studies then click here.
Predictably then, the chapter I didn’t really vibe with, and again this is a personal thing, was the Kitchen Witch chapter. I already know I am not, and never will be, a Kitchen Witch. I just don’t cook! Some aspects were interesting, for example the food correspondences for fruit and vegatables as I may use them in spells rather than actual food recipes. So those correspondences may still be useful for people, even if like me, you might not consider yourself a kitchen witch.
The chapter about ‘Elemental Witchcraft’ was a confusing one for me. I don’t really consider it to be a path of itself - if that makes sense? I think the same can be said for cosmic witch. I feel like these two things are definitely something that are part of other Witchcraft paths or things that compliment your craft rather than ‘paths’ in themselves. If I’m wrong and there are some elemental witches out there then please let me know in the comments. What do you think is different about an elemental witch than the elemental aspects all Witches use in their Craft?
I suppose really what I’m saying is that the information in this chapter, for me, was just things I would associate with being a witch. For example, linking the elements to the cardinal directions along with colour correspondences and items that we would use to represent each element, are just part of my general knowledge as a witch. I use the elements and their corresponding directions, colours, and the particular type of magick they are attuned with, regularly when creating and designing spells and rituals.
On the other hand, if you are not familiar with this aspect of Witchcraft, maybe because you’re a beginner or it’s just something you are not aware of, then I think it is something that can benefit everyone’s practice. This book could help you with understanding how to use the elements in your craft, but I have come across it in other books for beginners as well.
Lastly the Sea Witch chapter, Again this is an area of interest to me so I did like reading about the use of Water in spells and rituals. I do prefer to refer to it as 'water magick' or 'water witchcraft' just because for me, I don’t live near the sea, therefore it can be lakes, rivers or streams that inspire my magick. My sun sign is Pisces so that’s one of the main reasons I’m exploring this area and this chapter did offer a wealth of information around using the sea and other related aspects.
Lastly, one thing I really loved was the guided meditation at the end of each chapter. They feel really personal and I’m definitely going to make a note of my favourite ones in my book of shadows so I can come back to them.
Final Thoughts
Time for some final thoughts then, because I think some people may think I’ve been quite contradictory in my review. It does have positives and negatives. The main negative for me is the way the book is put across or the purpose of the book. This idea that you will read the information and know what type of Witch you want to be doesn't work for me and I really don’t think it will work like that for a lot of people. If I read this book when I was just starting out I would be even more confused about my 'supposed' path because, as you can probably tell, I love so many different aspects of Witchcraft.
However, once I got passed that then the information imparted throughout the book is great. If you are a beginner then I would look at it as more of a guide to just how varied and diverse Witchcraft can be. People who have literally no idea where to start or what to do will find it really helpful and I would recommend picking and choosing from the different areas what really speaks to you. Like I said at the beginning you know the information is coming from a good source! Lidia Pradas obviously has a lot of knowledge and has researched the various areas she talks about.
Towards the end of the book she does add a very small paragraph about labelling and changing your path which did appease me slightly. Lidia acknowledges that our paths change and that we may incorporate more than one ‘path’, that she has mentioned, into our Craft. Honestly, I did start to feel a bit weird at this point. Maybe I’m the only one that has a variety of areas in my Craft? Please let me know if there are other Witches out there who use astrology and green witchery and also consider themselves Wiccan, or some variation of that, and I’m not just excessive in my practice!
Some sub-genres can be really complimentary. For example, water and lunar witchcraft work well together because the moon is closely linked to the tides and is a controlling force over the seas. Furthermore, both are linked to feminine energies and emotions. I could talk about this forever and I think I’m slightly going off topic so I’ll leave it there for now.
Overall, I did enjoy reading the book as it offered some reminders as to why I love each aspect of my craft. The illustrations are beautiful throughout. Just don’t go in to the book expecting to find the one path you are meant to follow.
I hope you enjoyed this review and found some of it useful. Please share any thoughts you had about anything I’ve mentioned I’d love to know if there are people like me or even if you disagree with me then I’m interested in lots of different perspectives!
Ophelia x
Thank you to NetGalley and Fair Winds Press for allowing me to read and review an advanced e-copy of this book.