Friday, September 2, 2011

Visceral Magick

I'm very pleased - and somewhat relieved - to say that my latest book, "Visceral Magick", is finished, and will be released on september 15th. So keep an eye out for it on Amazon...

On September 17th, I will be at the Pagan Podkin Supermoot in Salem, MA, where about 16 Pagan podcasters, including me, will be doing a meet and greet in the morning at Omen. That afternoon, I'll be teaching a workshop on "Invocation and the Art of Ritual Possession" at the store. The following weekend, I'll be teaching "Visceral Magick" at the West Coast Eisteddfod in Los Angeles... both weekends I will have he new book available for sale, as well as my previous one, "A Grimoire for Modern Cunningfolk".

Last weekend I attended "Conjure on the Kern", a weekend intensive on Southern Conjure with Orion Foxwood. It was an incredible weekend that both my wife and I enjoyed immensely. If you ever see Orion Foxwood teaching anything in your area, goto it, because he is inspirational.

In November, my wife and I will be heading to North Carolina for Shadow Harvest, where I'll be teaching a number of new workshops. My friends in NC are all okay after the hurricane, though some of them are still waiting for the power to come back on!

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Update

Lots of stuff going on... first of all, there are several new podcast episodes, and the podcast is going live on Thursday nights, courtesy of Blog Talk Radio:

Peter's Crooked Path on Blog Talk Radio

Pendraig has some new books out, more novels by S. P. Hendrick, and "Scottish Herbs and Fairy Lore" by Ellen Hopman. Coming up is a great novel by Ben Reder called "The Demon's Apprentice", and another by Claudia Dillaire, called "Wrath of Amun". The first is a horror story that evokes the world of Harry Dresden ("The Dresden Files"), and the secomd is a murder mystery set in Ancient Egypt. We also have the first in a series of books on Enochian magick due out in August, written by Scott Stenwick.

... and somewhere in there my own "Visceral Magick" will finally see the light of day!

Wendy Rule is back in the US, and the final concert of her US tour is on July 29th, at the Lonny Chapman Theatre in North Hollywood - go to the link for info and tickets. Wendy will be performing with Silver Phial.

I will be in Salem on September 17th for the Pagan Podkin Super Moot, and will also be teaching my "Invocation and the Ancient Art of Ritual Possession" workshop at Omen on that afternoon. The following weekend I'm teaching "Visceral Magick" at the West Coast Eisteddfod in Los Angeles, and the first weekend in November I will be returning to ShadowHarvest in North Carolina. I hope to see you at one of these events!

Friday, April 1, 2011

Busy Busy Busy!

I'm pleased to say that my leg has healed nicely - thanks to everyone who sent healing energy and good wishes. It healed just in time, really, because things are starting to get busy!

This weekend is choc full of goodness, and there are some fun events I'll be attending further away in time and space...

First, this weekend's fun and frippery, which includes a Craft Fair tomorrow at Winnetka Tower in the San Fernando Valley, where I'll be selling books and doing Tarot readings. Then on Sunday, I'm teaching a class on Talismans at The Cauldron in Silverlake, CA, owned by the lovely Lorna and her cat, Mandrake. Then on Monday its back to Winnetka Tower to teach a class about initiation.

By the way, I'm teaching many classes at both locations.

Then in September, I'm off to the Pagan Podkin Super Moot, in Salem MA. This is a gathering of Pagan podcasters and those who enjoy listening to their podcasts, and it takes place over the weekend of September 17th.

Lastly, in November I will once again be attending ShadowHarvest in North Carolina. I had so much fun there last year, and they've beenmad enough to invite me back again this year.

Add to that the usual collection of Pagan Pride events (I'll be presenting at the Los Angeles one as well as Kern County and Antelope Valley this year), and the Wendy Rule concert I'll be hosting at the end of July in Los Angeles, and it is starting to look like a busy year.

... and don't forget to watch out for my latest book, "Visceral Magick", which should be coming out very soon now.

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

February and Mortality

So February turned out to be an interesting month for me. First of all, I've gotten back into archery. I last indulged in that sport at high school - aside from owning an English longbow that was used in the movie "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" that I only rarely made use of - and now I appear to have the bug... I have a recurve and a longbow (the one used in that Cadillac ad), and I recently qualified to compete in SCA archery events.

In fact, the same day I qualified, I managed to encounter the second half of this entry's title - my own mortality. No, I didn't have a William Rufus-esque adventure with the arrows, but I did receive a wound. At some point in the days prior to this I walked barefoot wher I shouldn't have, and an opportunistic infection found its way into my system, taking up residence in my right leg. As a result, on that sunday evening I found myself being admitted to hospital with my leg twice its normal size, blistered, angry and oozing. I'm told a few more hours and I might have been looking at a career as a pirate...

Luckily, the saws were not brought out, but I ended up spending three days in hospital with IV antibiotics. This is the best thing that has happened to me in years, though, because it brought to light a few things that needed to be taken care of, that could easily have killed me at any time.

The high blood pressure I sort of knew about... well, okay, I knew about it and deliberately avoided medical facilities for fear they'd put me on blood-pressure medication. Well, now I am on the stuff, but not having any side-effects, and my BP is more or less normal for what may be the first time in my life.

The diabetes, well, I was afraid they might find something like that, but my blood sugar isn't horribly high, and I'm told that if I lose the weight, I should be able to say goodbye to the DB and BP meds altogether. And I am losing the weight, too - six pounds in hospital, and another 14 since I came home, and I look and feel better than I have for several years.

So, just like initiation and immersion into the Mysteries, I have faced my fears and come away from the experience renewed and re-invigorated. I am firmly on a path to becoming healthy, which should ensure I'll be around to write, podcast and generally annoy the Pagan community for many years to come. I guess I wasn't paying attention to the messages from my Ancestors and Gods, as usual, so they literally knocked my feet out from under me to make me pay attention.

Now I just need to get Visceral Magick finished and on the bookshelves, before they whack me again...

Monday, January 10, 2011

A New Year, a New Journal, a New Podcast...

The holiday period has been busy, and not just for the usual reasons...

Pendraig Publishing has just released a new edition of Ray Buckland's classic Practical Color Magick, and is about to release issue 7 of the Crooked Path Journal. It has been over a year since issue 6, but it was worth the wait, as the Journal has a new format, layout, more pages, and a new, lower price of just $7.

If that isn't enough to get you interested, it includes articles by Orion Foxwood, Ann Finnin, and yours truly, and its release coincides with the return of another relic from my past, the Crooked Path Podcast.

My new book, Visceral Magick, will be coming out shortly, and I will have copies of that and my Grimoire to sell at PantheaCon on President's Day Weekend, where I will be presenting a workshop called Invocation and the Ancient Art of Ritual Possession.