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Spells for a Magical Year: 100 Rituals and Enchantments for Prosperity, Power, and Fortune
The ideal reference for any modern witch, Spells for a Magical Year gives a month-by-month guide to spells, rituals, and enchantments.
Using planetary, solar, and other natural influences, as well as the ancient power of pagan holidays, goddess energy, and traditional festive dates—draw upon beneficial universal energy at any time in the year to maximize your spell success.
This comprehensive almanac by the best-selling author Sarah Bartlett includes all the important celebrations. Discover which spells work best on Sabbats, Halloween, and All Soul's Day; as well as days devoted to deities from world spiritual traditions such as Greek Demeter, Hindu Durga, or Persian god, Baal.
Spells for a Magical Year reveals specially designed spells and rituals for all major dates to benefit you and your loved ones. Follow step-by-step instructions for performing the rituals, using talismans or amulets, and casting spells around New and Full Moons, solstices, and equinoxes. There is also a unique guide to bewitchments according to the apparent path of the sun through the sky to boost fertility, love, creativity, prosperity, and well-being.
This eclectic spell book also uses invocations, blessings, talismans, and amulets drawn from a wide range of traditional magic practices from around the world, including medieval grimoires, ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian magical tablets, Greco-Roman Magic texts, all completely updated for the modern-day witch. By working with the cycles of nature, you can stay in tune with the rhythms of the universe to help manifest your dreams.
Using planetary, solar, and other natural influences, as well as the ancient power of pagan holidays, goddess energy, and traditional festive dates—draw upon beneficial universal energy at any time in the year to maximize your spell success.
This comprehensive almanac by the best-selling author Sarah Bartlett includes all the important celebrations. Discover which spells work best on Sabbats, Halloween, and All Soul's Day; as well as days devoted to deities from world spiritual traditions such as Greek Demeter, Hindu Durga, or Persian god, Baal.
Spells for a Magical Year reveals specially designed spells and rituals for all major dates to benefit you and your loved ones. Follow step-by-step instructions for performing the rituals, using talismans or amulets, and casting spells around New and Full Moons, solstices, and equinoxes. There is also a unique guide to bewitchments according to the apparent path of the sun through the sky to boost fertility, love, creativity, prosperity, and well-being.
This eclectic spell book also uses invocations, blessings, talismans, and amulets drawn from a wide range of traditional magic practices from around the world, including medieval grimoires, ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian magical tablets, Greco-Roman Magic texts, all completely updated for the modern-day witch. By working with the cycles of nature, you can stay in tune with the rhythms of the universe to help manifest your dreams.
224 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2019
About the author
Sarah Bartlett
145 books105 followersSarah Bartlett (D.Psych Astrol) is the author of international best-selling books including The Tarot Bible, The Little Book of Practical Magic, The Witch's Spellbook and National Geographic's Guide to Supernatural Places. As contributing astrologer to media such as Cosmopolitan, She, Spirit & Destiny, the London Evening Standard and BBC Radio 2, Sarah now practices and teaches tarot, natural magic, astrology and other esoteric arts. She lives in the countryside.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
August 29, 2022
I need to buy this book for daily reference. It's so beautifully well done. I would recommend it to all lovers of magic and other witchy things.
September 28, 2021
Unfortunately, this book writes from a Wiccan perspective. So it is rife with cultural appropriation, soft polytheism, mixed with henotheism and monoism. That being extremely offensive to Pagans/Polytheists of said ethnic religions to see their Gods conflated with entirely different ones and mashed together senselessly based on the slightest, vaguest similarity.
The Amaterasu spell where she promotes referring to oneself as a Goddess, I highly discourage. That seems more egotistical and hubris than empowering in my opinion. You can be the best version of yourself without elevating yourself to the level of the divine.
I liked her use of bibliomancy on page 95. However, I do wish she would have clarified that it was bibliomancy and that bibliomancy. This is a spellbook, a lot of beginners think everything is a spell, divination is not a spell. So I feel the context would have been useful. That said, I do like that she at least mentioned it can be any meaningful book to you that you use for it.
A lot of her spells have Selene in them...even if they maybe don't make the most since? Like she seems to think Selene is just another name for, "The Goddess" even better because of Wiccans obsession with Moon Goddesses specifically.
On a prosperity spell, she calls upon Arianrhod as a Celtic Goddess. Which though technically correct, I think it would have been really cool if she had specified Welsh. There are meaningful cultural and spiritual differences among different Celtic paths. Ireland is not the same as Scotland, etc.
On page 132, she blatantly says the Kharites are aspects of the Triple Goddess...I find it extremely offensive and distasteful to rip things from Hellenic Polytheism and rewrite them into being whatever you want them to. The Theoi and all Gods deserve respect. Hellenic Polytheism may be an open religion, but that doesn't give license to take things from it like that, then twist and contort them to suit your narrative.
Most of her love spells are written from a cishet female perspective. That's not a terrible thing it's just...disappointing. There are men and queer people who practice magic as well. So being inclusive isn't a must but I definitely appreciate it when I see it and it is certainly noticeable when absent.
So when looking into Chongyang, it looks to be an ancestral/death holiday for Chinese people to clean the graves of their ancestors and offer incense. She...made a love spell for it? That seems highly inappropriate and disrespectful. That's in such poor taste...words do not adequately describe it.
So when she finally does write a more inclusive love spell, it's on Samhain, which she seems to think is a good time for seducing? What is it with her and death/ancestral holidays being a time for love and lust? I guess death is a very steamy concept to her. Kinda uncomfortable to read to be honest.
So...she seems to think Frigg turns mortal women into Nymphs. Frigg, a Norse Goddess...turns mortal women into Greek Nymphs? These are two entirely different religions. Heathenism vs Hellenism, learn the difference. Neither one are Wicca. Why use the Triple Goddess symbol to call upon Frigg's power? Frigg is not The Goddess, Frigg is not a part of Wicca.
She also has a lot of spells involving rings, burying or dumping things into a river. The repetitiveness get stale really quickly for me.
I...don't really have much nice to say about the book to be entirely honest. I purchased it because it's a pretty hardback and I like seasonal/monthly formats. So doing things monthly and incorporating new and full moons as well as astrology are all great ideas...in theory. Just poor execution, I'd say.
The Amaterasu spell where she promotes referring to oneself as a Goddess, I highly discourage. That seems more egotistical and hubris than empowering in my opinion. You can be the best version of yourself without elevating yourself to the level of the divine.
I liked her use of bibliomancy on page 95. However, I do wish she would have clarified that it was bibliomancy and that bibliomancy. This is a spellbook, a lot of beginners think everything is a spell, divination is not a spell. So I feel the context would have been useful. That said, I do like that she at least mentioned it can be any meaningful book to you that you use for it.
A lot of her spells have Selene in them...even if they maybe don't make the most since? Like she seems to think Selene is just another name for, "The Goddess" even better because of Wiccans obsession with Moon Goddesses specifically.
On a prosperity spell, she calls upon Arianrhod as a Celtic Goddess. Which though technically correct, I think it would have been really cool if she had specified Welsh. There are meaningful cultural and spiritual differences among different Celtic paths. Ireland is not the same as Scotland, etc.
On page 132, she blatantly says the Kharites are aspects of the Triple Goddess...I find it extremely offensive and distasteful to rip things from Hellenic Polytheism and rewrite them into being whatever you want them to. The Theoi and all Gods deserve respect. Hellenic Polytheism may be an open religion, but that doesn't give license to take things from it like that, then twist and contort them to suit your narrative.
Most of her love spells are written from a cishet female perspective. That's not a terrible thing it's just...disappointing. There are men and queer people who practice magic as well. So being inclusive isn't a must but I definitely appreciate it when I see it and it is certainly noticeable when absent.
So when looking into Chongyang, it looks to be an ancestral/death holiday for Chinese people to clean the graves of their ancestors and offer incense. She...made a love spell for it? That seems highly inappropriate and disrespectful. That's in such poor taste...words do not adequately describe it.
So when she finally does write a more inclusive love spell, it's on Samhain, which she seems to think is a good time for seducing? What is it with her and death/ancestral holidays being a time for love and lust? I guess death is a very steamy concept to her. Kinda uncomfortable to read to be honest.
So...she seems to think Frigg turns mortal women into Nymphs. Frigg, a Norse Goddess...turns mortal women into Greek Nymphs? These are two entirely different religions. Heathenism vs Hellenism, learn the difference. Neither one are Wicca. Why use the Triple Goddess symbol to call upon Frigg's power? Frigg is not The Goddess, Frigg is not a part of Wicca.
She also has a lot of spells involving rings, burying or dumping things into a river. The repetitiveness get stale really quickly for me.
I...don't really have much nice to say about the book to be entirely honest. I purchased it because it's a pretty hardback and I like seasonal/monthly formats. So doing things monthly and incorporating new and full moons as well as astrology are all great ideas...in theory. Just poor execution, I'd say.
January 6, 2023
Admittedly, I picked this book up from a local discount retailer and I was a bit skeptical about its content...but overall, while paging through it quickly in the store, it looked rather interesting.
I was not wrong. The book is brimming with interesting information about magic (from all around the world). In fact, I was surprised at the amount of information provided within its pages. Unfortunately, like many books with spells or magic in their titles, Spells for a Magical Year, felt like something I should have been reading in high school.
I think that is actually what bothers me...if, in fact, it's directed toward those who are dipping their toes in witchy waters, it may make new-to-witchcraft readers feel they are required to purchase a number of very specific supplies. I may be assuming too much but the "What You Will Need" section of nearly every spell usually requires rocks, minerals and/or crystals, metallic coins, rings and chains, varying colored candles, etc. -- the majority of these things are rarely in my possession. Sure, you might own a lapis lazuli, a red candle and a gold chain...but unless you're planning to work only a spell requiring any or all of those items, you may feel discouraged (or, simply inadequately supplied). It sounds a bit silly, but some naive readers may feel the efficacy of their spell work is going to suffer if they do not procure the supplies seemingly required. The author kindly provided substitutions for the items she calls, "Magic Tools," but she provides novices with no guidance regarding the substitution of magical properties associated with her prescribed minerals, metals or plant allies.
I was not wrong. The book is brimming with interesting information about magic (from all around the world). In fact, I was surprised at the amount of information provided within its pages. Unfortunately, like many books with spells or magic in their titles, Spells for a Magical Year, felt like something I should have been reading in high school.
I think that is actually what bothers me...if, in fact, it's directed toward those who are dipping their toes in witchy waters, it may make new-to-witchcraft readers feel they are required to purchase a number of very specific supplies. I may be assuming too much but the "What You Will Need" section of nearly every spell usually requires rocks, minerals and/or crystals, metallic coins, rings and chains, varying colored candles, etc. -- the majority of these things are rarely in my possession. Sure, you might own a lapis lazuli, a red candle and a gold chain...but unless you're planning to work only a spell requiring any or all of those items, you may feel discouraged (or, simply inadequately supplied). It sounds a bit silly, but some naive readers may feel the efficacy of their spell work is going to suffer if they do not procure the supplies seemingly required. The author kindly provided substitutions for the items she calls, "Magic Tools," but she provides novices with no guidance regarding the substitution of magical properties associated with her prescribed minerals, metals or plant allies.
December 3, 2021
This seemed a little all over the place and generalized/glossed over a lot of cultural relevance. It is trying to do too much, maybe. It did give me a few ideas, though, and was beautiful.
December 17, 2019
5.0 out of 5 stars
Can’t wait to cast some of these spells
Can’t wait to cast some of these spells
July 20, 2024
Useful information
August 25, 2022
I bought this book years ago and I still use it!!
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews