We -- humans -- have been working candle magic pretty much since we first dipped a piece of string into wax. For moderns magick workers, its a hugely popular form of magick, probably because it uses such easily available tools. And who doesn't love candles?
No surprise then that there are a number of books on candle magick readily available. With Mastering Candle Magick, longtime author Patricia Telesco offers us a book aimed at those who are ready to do more than just the basics.
Telesco doesn't fool around when she calls this an advanced book. There isn't even a summary of basic knowledge to get the reader started, Nope, she jumps right into designing one's own spells, first with information on adapting and personalizing spells from others, then with a full step-by-step explanation of creating a candle magick spell from scratch. I don't think it's a stretch to say that the first part of the book (about a quarter of the entirety) is some of the best material on creating candle-based spells available.
The rest of the book is basically a grimoire of all things candle magick. Telesco offers ideas for spells addressing many aspects of life., describing the central part of each spell in a few paragraphs and then expecting the reader to build a full ritual from there. Telesco doesn't bother with long multi-page scripts we typically find in spell books which allows a huge number of spells to be packed into 150 pages. There are two appendixes with helpful hints and correspondences.
Long-time practitioners won't find much new, per se, but for the vast majority of people who are no longer beginners, but lack the practice, will find Mastering Candle Magick invaluable.
For those of us who have the 2003 edition of this book, this is indeed the same book. But it's been long out of print and I'm glad newcomers will enjoy this classic for the valuable edition to our library that it is.
~review by Lisa McSherry
Author: Patricia Telesco
Crossed Crow Books, 2024
pp. 220, $18.95
