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Post by helrunar on Jan 5, 2023 5:07:59 GMT
Doreen Dominy Valiente (1922-1999) was born on January 4. Without planning to do so, the night before her 101st birthday, I finished my second reading of this volume, a cycle of short stories that falls at least somewhat into the "occult investigator" (more of an investigator than a detective) sub-genre. Although the style of the tales is more in the vein of young adult-oriented supernatural horror fiction, the book is an interesting example of a small press publication of the present era, and thus I wish to write some account of it here. The chapter titles: The Witch Ball Vampire Love The Cottage in Thorny Lane The Talisman of the Moon The Legend of the Grove A Night in Wookey Hole The Corn Dolly The Black Dog The Old Oak Chest The Quest of the Book The Witch Ball Reappears The manuscript of these stories was discovered amongst Doreen's papers some years after her death. Doreen is often hailed as "the Grandmother of Modern Witchcraft." She was an Initiate and High Priestess to one of the founders of Modern Wicca, Gerald Gardner, but left Gardner's coven in 1957 because the old man was a publicity hound and had begun to be featured in some of the lurid tabloids of the day, and Doreen got fed up. Doreen's books include such titles as Where Witchcraft Lives (which collects various accounts of Witchcraft happenings in the Sussex of olden times; the final chapter provides a glimpse into the Craft revival as it was unfolding in that county in the early 1960s), Natural Magic, and The ABCs of Witchcraft (which again collects a lot of very interesting material, recounted in a lively, engagingly robust style). I suspect that the stories of The Witch Ball were written in the early 1970s, but that's just a speculative presumption; we read of a cottage in the present day of the tales that has no telephone, and I don't know until how late in the century such cottages continued to be "off the lines" in rural areas. The stories begin with a chance meeting between elderly antiques dealer Charles Ashton and young businessman Jeremy Blake in a Brighton seafront hotel (Doreen Valiente lived in Brighton, and loved visiting antique shops). Many of the stories involve a tale of an odd happening to do with the occult that one of the characters shares with another. Ghosts, vampirism, the old legends around Black Shuck, folk Witchcraft practices and other curious incidents unfold through the tales. A couple of the stories include instances of old family magical lore and traditions that may have been inspired from things shared with the author in her many years in this field. In a folow-up post, I will write a bit more about the stories. This little book, co-published by the Centre for Pagan Studies and the Doreen Valiente Foundation, is widely available through online retail sites. It is most likely a bit too "cozy" for many Vault readers, but it is a book I enjoyed very much back in 2020 when it first came out. If anything, I enjoyed my second visit with the stories even more this past month. cheers, Hel. |
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Post by Swampirella on Jan 5, 2023 12:49:59 GMT
That sounds very interesting, Hel, thanks for the detailed post!
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Post by helrunar on Jan 5, 2023 16:15:49 GMT
My blackhearted thanks to Demonik who I'm sure upgraded the original post with those lovely scans of the front and back covers. The front cover is from a drawing the author did (and seems to be based on a photo of her with a crystal ball). The book featured excellent interior drawings by a well known fantasy artist--I'll update with her name shortly.
cheers, Hel
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Post by helrunar on Jan 6, 2023 4:35:37 GMT
The interior drawings for this book are by Debbie Lewis, and are really quite good. Ms. Lewis was working as a tattoo artist when she did the pictures for this book. The drawing of the infamous spectral hound, Black Shuck, is particularly unnerving in its realism.
It's hard to write much about the individual stories without giving too much away. The first chapter describes the initial meeting of the two lead characters and how Charles Ashton, retired antiques dealer, once came into possession of a haunted Witch Ball. The crystal was somehow linked to the vengeful spirit of a malevolent woman of the early 1800s who had poisoned her husband. The final chapter of the book reveals the eventual fate of this object and the spirit that maintained a persistent existence within it.
"Vampire Love" concerns an episode in the life of Charles Ashton as a young man. "The Cottage in Thorny Lane" is an interesting tale in which the cottage described in the title is only occasionally visible to certain people or at certain times of day or evening; a cottage that is itself a ghost, and ultimately, a portal to a hidden realm.
"The Talisman of the Moon" is one of the stories most reminiscent of the "James gang" type of tale; an unwary archaeologist finds the talisman in one of his digs, and learns the hard way that such objects can evoke spirits from the remote past. "A Night in Wookey Hole" tells of a Hellfire Club type of gentlemen's gathering within the famous caverns--it could have been titled "The Devil is not Mocked" (but that title was already used by Manly Wade Wellman).
"The Corn Dolly" gives us a woman trapped in an abusive marriage and what happens when her Mum turns to the "older ways" of magic handed down in the family to bring about a solution. Both "The Black Dog" and "The Old Oak Chest" offer gruesome relics of the past for your consideration.
As I wrote in my earlier comments, the stories are atmospheric and unquestionably "cozy." A nice book to read by the fireside on a winter's night, if one actually had a fireside (I sometimes pull the chair up next to the radiator).
cheers, Hel.
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Post by Swampirella on Jan 6, 2023 11:54:17 GMT
Great review, Hel. I just might buy this one!
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Post by helrunar on Jan 10, 2023 14:33:55 GMT
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