Hello all!

I woke up today to find that I had had a new book delivered. It's called Backwoods Witchcraft by Jake Richards. I got my copy from Blackwells, but Amazon has it as well. Blackwells of Oxford is a curiosity in it which is almost next door to the Bodleian Museum and seems like a curiosity in itself and I'm impressed by its service and website. I even got a bookmark with my order, which is nice. But I was mainly going to talk briefly about Backwoods Witchcraft.

Backwoods Witchcraft mainly talks about the folk magic from the Appalachian Mountains, which seems to have preserved many old European practises as well as practises from Voodoo and Hoodoo because of its secluded settlements. The author, Jake Richards is very knowledgeable on the subject as he comes from one of those communities and has grown up with these practises. I'm still to delve into it properly, but there is a curious section about the use of the bible and the role of Christianity in the area - which the book is quite complimentary about so would accommodate any Christian Witches or any wanting to incorporate Christian entities into their craft.

Backwoods Witchcraft by Jake Richards

I picked this volume up for two main reasons. The first is that I wanted to look into some of the practises that had arrived in the Americas from Europe. As the communities were secluded, they seem to have been bypassed by some of the witch hunts that plagued Europe and much of New England or The South, so many practises and a mentality that was present at the time of the colonisation of America, before even the English Civil War could very well be present. It would be curious to explore some clues into it at least.

The second reason to get this book was because a friend of mine had received a copy as a gift and had recommended it. She is covering it chapter by chapter on her YouTube Channel called Jenn The Taxidermy Witch ifer. She has covered the introduction, and has, as of today, completed reading the second chapter of eleven.

Apart from this, today sort of feels like its been a bit of a none starter. I helped a bit with moderating a new tarot Youtuber page on facebook and also, a Viking Folklore channel I'm involved with called Northworthy Sagas and Stories uploaded an unboxing video and I had something to do with its promotion. Here it is:

The host of Northworthy Sagas and Stories also wanted to restart a gamer channel on a site called Mixer. He has a good concept - a Viking plays Viking games - which is curious and he would be able to tell historical anecdotes while playing and answer questions, as he is planning of playing the games while in period dress. I think its a cool concept. Unfortunately, I'm still a little unsure what I'm doing with the main site.

Other than that, I'm behind on writing up the article on the first Aicme of the Ogham Runes (batch of five). And that's somewhat irritated me, even though other things have been happening. I have also been planning a short story that I'm eager to start, but I have a feeling that it's going to be a little while before I start. I'd much prefer to have a fair stretch of time to devote to it and I think it could be roughly a week before that happens. I also think it could take a bit of time to organise the information about the Aicme of the Ogham Runes into something I would like to put up on here. I'm probably going to need to spread out properly as my Book of Shadows is quite large and I'm probably going to need other note taking things about me.

That also reminds me, could some pictures of my Book of Shadows be of interest? I made it by hand.

Anyway, let me know and until next time, may your sleep soothe your soul and may you wake refreshed.

Hello everyone,

Phew, that's the Christmas period over, and sorry that it's been such a while since I last was in touch.

A few things have been in the pipeline over Christmas. I have a short story coming out soon that will be incorporated inside a heavy metal album. There will be more about that later on, nearer the album's release date, then I can give you lots more details.

I will be adding a few more pages and a bit more content on here. I would like to re-upload parts of Thomas of Newburgh's History of English Affairs from my old blog. These will be the juice parts that involve curious phenomena and the supernatural, which include zombie revenant sightings, twin suns in the sky and the Green Children of Woolpit. I hope you will enjoy those.

The other thing that will be seen on my blog will be a sporadic series of curious folkloric, supernatural and historical things that tickle my imagination. I would like to upload them when I can in the hope that they will put some fire in the imagination of others as well.

Also, I have been working with Northworthy Sagas and Stories. I was impressed by their ethos of wanting to record and archive tellings of Dark Age folklore. Alongside that, they aim to share as much as they can about Dark Age history, myth, legend and culture. So I will soon be on YouTube as either a Viking or an Anglo Saxon. I am also working on their blog, which I hope will be ready soon, so watch their space, I applaud their effort.

One thing that's related is that I am planning a fictionalised short story that will be part of a saga for a persona that I'm developing for Northworthy Sagas and Stories. It will be based at Repton, and old capital of Mercia and involve Vikings, Saxons and a Lovecraftian god. It is based on a short story that I wrote many a year ago that I was unhappy with and didn't do anything with.

One thing that I will be doing with this story is that I will be using tarot readings to help me better develop the story. After a bit of interest, I will be converting some of my methods and planning involving the tarot readings into blog articles that I shall put up on here! So watch out for those.

Well, that is all that I've been up to recently and I hope the New Year is treating you all well. I wish you all good health and a good bye.

Hello all,

This is being put up a little later than I thought it would be, but better late than never, as they say.

This last week or so has been very good to me. I've completed a short story and its to be published! Which I'm immensely pleased about. Hopefully, by the end of the month, it'll be in print, if not, it should be out before Christmas at least. I'll Keep everyone updated on what happens there. I'll also provide links to where you guys can get your hands on it. It'll be part of a multi-media package that I'm excited to be included in.

Something else that I've been working on is for the Northworthy Sagas and Stories YouTube channel. The blog is coming along and soon there will be some new banners made for the blog as well as the YouTube channel itself. After that, once I've built up some content, the blog will go live.

I am now an admin on their channel and you'll be able to come and chat with us when a video goes up via YouTube's canny premiere facility.

With Northworthy, I have been invited along to perform in some of their videos. So I have a Saxon persona that I am currently working on, replete with my own Saga that will hopefully will be performed as a milestone and also be published as a book that is accompanied by a series of short stories and some Skaldic poetry that I am learning the formula for. So watch out for that.

Alongside all of that, Northworthy Sagas and Stories may also be introducing a series of black-smithing videos and videos on how to tailor Dark Age period clothing. Hopefully, I'll have a hand in that. I await with baited breath.

As always, I'll keep you lovely people updated on my exploits and progress.

Farewell!

Hello all!

Well, that was a bit of a trial. I had a lot of my social media sites potentially get affected by a virus, but everything seems safe. Its been a while since that happened and nothing bad has happened. So there's nothing to worry about there.

So, welcome to my new blog! Take a look around. There's a little bit about me on  the pages listed down the side. Something that Steven King once said about me which was lovely and there are two short stories as well. Both were done quite a while ago and had been published in the Derby Evening Telegraph to accompany an art exhibition I took part in in 2013. I hope you enjoy them. I went through them once again while uploading them to this blog. Though they aren't my best pieces, I found myself being pleasantly surprised by their content. Can you spot all the references?

Well, what have I been up to otherwise. Well, I now have a new Instagram account and a new Twitter account and you can easily find links to them at the top of the blog or in the About. I recently finished a first draft for a story inspired by a series that I'd long given up on. I think I might take that series up again. Its based on Derby history and folklore. Once I've had it edited, I'll see what's to be done with it.

I am also working on another short story at the moment and I don't want to say too much about it just yet without permission as its for someone. I don't want to put my foot in my mouth about it and say the wrong thing, but more news about it should be let out about it as this month progresses. So watch out for that.

Other things that I've been up to are my involvement with Northworthy Sagas and Stories. It's a YouTube channel specialising in the telling of Dark Age folktales, so that's primarily Vikings and Anglo-Saxons. But they also talk about Dark Age culture and fighting styles as well, so that's all very fun. I've been helping them sort out a blog - more on that to come - and also helping them out with a couple of twitter accounts. They have a YouTube twitter account and a Blog twitter account to check out. They also have an Instagram account as well.

But other than that, I have been exploring a lot of magically processes. There's a lot of meditation involved as well as fiddling around with crystals, pendulums, tarot cards and oracle cards. I even made my own Black Mirror for scrying - just like John Dee hey? though I bet a lot of you will think it's all airy and fairy (lovely beings). I've really got into the concepts of Alchemy and Gnosticism. I may even start up my own blog about it. But I've not properly decided. You'll here about that here first.

But back to more writing based things. I have been mulling over taking up a proper Steampunk persona and have been mulling starting up my own YouTube channel. How I go about doing that and what exactly my content will be, I have made no firm decision whatsoever. But any decision with be updated here.

One last thing. My old blog had a couple of extra pages. Would people like to see their return? One was about curious sections of Thomas of Newburgh's History of English Affairs - a very good history by all accounts, very accurate for its day that also had some acknowledged weirdness included. There was also a section about Derbyshire folklore, history and ghost tales as well that I'd found. And lastly, there was a potted history of my favourite detective book series, Sexton Blake - he is mostly forgotten about but more prolific than Sherlock Holmes ever was. What do people think?

Anyway, that's it for now. I hope to be updating this at least semi-regularly. I'll keep in touch.

Farewell