Book Review: "Witch in Darkness" by Kelly-Ann Maddox
A very recommendable nonfiction witchcraft book
„Witch in Darkness: Magick for Tough Times, Bad Days and Moments of Total Catastrophe“ by Kelly-Ann Maddox
The blurb:
The long-awaited follow-up to Kelly-Ann Maddox’s bestselling Rebel Witch is here … Witch in Darkness explores loss, fear, grief and pain through the magickal lens
Guiding the reader through the concept of the craft as a life-saving, soul-nurturing practice for dark times, this book overflows with inspiration and compassion for witches in difficulty. The raw and honest tone peels back the surface layers of witchcraft’s meaning and power, inviting the reader to use magick, ritual and readings to heal and grow. When disaster strikes, a magickal practitioner has endless tools to help them build strength and hope, and face the seemingly impossible. Witch is Darkness is packed with nourishing wisdom, including advice on:
Embracing an imperfect practice
Cleansing, grounding and shielding during tough times
Witching through extremes Identifying high-risk and low-risk practices
Energy management and low-maintenance magick
Dealing with loss, grief and despair using witchcraft
Magick and ritual for conflicts, dramas and relationship breakdowns
Addressing mental and physical issues from the witchcraft perspective
The book includes easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions to make magickal action easier to execute. Discover tarot spread designs, journal prompts, words of power and excellent suggestions for shifting your mindset, alongside a great Q&A segment to clear up confusions and help you get unstuck.
Spiritual counsellor and witchcraft mentor Kelly-Ann Maddox has a decade’s experience in the magickal space, offering workshops, one-to-one sessions and hundreds of informative videos on her popular YouTube channel. In this book, she draws on countless conversations with witches from all walks of life, as well as her own life journey through mental health breakdowns, struggles with self-harm and eating disorders, and heart-breaking bereavement.
Review
In my opinion, this is a much needed book for the witchcraft community. There are a few witchcraft books available about witching with chronic illnesses or disabilities, or how to deal with grief and loss from a pagan or witchcraft perspective. All of these have been published quite recently.
But this book is not limited to these topics, the author writes about several more, like dysfunctional or toxic relationships, addictions and how to support yourself and others when you do activism for social justice or other causes. In most of the chapters, there are ideas for ritual and spells, writing prompts, words of power and also several ideas for readings of Tarot or Oracle cards. The author encourages readers to tweak and adapt spells as they see fit. I have tried this with one of the spells and it went well. I also had ideas how to adapt another one and I surely will revisit this book from time to time.
Kelly-Ann Maddox writes, “You do not serve the craft; it is the craft that serves you” (p. 333). In my understanding, this opens up lots of new possibilities when thinking about doing witchcraft even if you are down in the dumps so to speak, or feel scared or helpless or are stressed-out. Kelly-Ann explains about what low-risk and high-risk witchcraft activities are and gives suggestions which to pursue in different situations and which better not.
She writes, „Witchcraft is a collection of tools for surviving and thriving. It is not a judgemental overseer that ascertains your worthiness to access it based on how much you seem to have your life together“ (p. 334) and „witchcraft is a resource, not a test“ (p. 334)
On a personal note, over the past years, I have quite often felt in a spiritual slump for weeks and felt like witchcraft was not longer easily available for me. I wish this book would already have been available back then.
The author has a unique and a bit eclectic witchcraft style, she doesn’t follow a specific tradition. If you want to learn about how to deal with your problem following a magickal tradition, this book is not a good choice I guess. For me, as a very eclectic witch, it’s really interesting.