A collection of rare pagan poetry and purple prose from the heart of the 1920s counterculture. Victor Neuburg is most famous for two things: discovering Dylan Thomas, and being the man that Aleister Crowley once turned into a camel. Obsolete Spells offers another side of Neuburg, through his own poems and the strange books of Vine Press, the hand-operated imprint he ran from his West Sussex cottage between 1920 and 1930. Neuburg's youth involved terrifying-yet-farcical years as Crowley's lover, victim, and magickal sidekick. His later period, as editor of the influential "Poet's Corner" column for the Sunday Referee, found him a key figure in London's literary scene. But in between, Neuburg acted as a conduit for bohemian writers, arts luminaries, and the sexually adventurous: Peter Warlock set his words to music, singer Marian Anderson lived in his spare room, and he was a fixture at utopian community, the Sanctuary. Through it all, he turned the handle on the Vine Press: books of nature writing and anonymous song; poems and artwork worthy of The Wicker Man, side-by-side with a book on cricket. Obsolete Spells offers a selection of Neuburg's work and others from Vine Press books--over-the-top hymns to the Old Gods, tales from a utopian landscape, and more, most of which has been out of print for a century.

A collection of rare pagan poetry and purple prose from the heart of the 1920s counterculture. Victor Neuburg is most famous for two things: discovering Dylan Thomas, and being the man that Aleister Crowley once turned into a camel. Obsolete Spells offers another side of Neuburg, through his own poems and the strange books of Vine Press, the hand-operated imprint he ran from his West Sussex cottage between 1920 and 1930. Neuburg's youth involved terrifying-yet-farcical years as Crowley's lover, victim, and magickal sidekick. His later period, as editor of the influential "Poet's Corner" column for the Sunday Referee, found him a key figure in London's literary scene. But in between, Neuburg acted as a conduit for bohemian writers, arts luminaries, and the sexually adventurous: Peter Warlock set his words to music, singer Marian Anderson lived in his spare room, and he was a fixture at utopian community, the Sanctuary. Through it all, he turned the handle on the Vine Press: books of nature writing and anonymous song; poems and artwork worthy of The Wicker Man, side-by-side with a book on cricket. Obsolete Spells offers a selection of Neuburg's work and others from Vine Press books--over-the-top hymns to the Old Gods, tales from a utopian landscape, and more, most of which has been out of print for a century.

After a terrible mistake in his youth, Esavas Daruvias has found a home at the secluded Tower as a Master of weather magic, vowed to celibacy, self-mastery, and non-violence. Then, without warning, the troubles of the past resurface to disrupt his quiet life. The Mardavian Islands are threatened by a rebellion led by a mage with strange and terrible powers - his sister Rayaluna, the person hurt most by his long-ago mistake. Though Esavas has been hidden away at the Tower for more than twelve years and is sworn to a life of peace, the crown prince calls on him to help put a stop to the rebellion - and refusing isn't an option. Treated as a prisoner and traitor by the king, caught between the king's and the prince's conflicting goals, baffled by his sister's impossible powers, and bound by his oath to never raise a hand in violence, Esavas must risk everything he knows, everything he is, even his own soul, to stand against Rayaluna's terrifying magic and save the people of the Islands - and Rayaluna herself - from her destructive madness. From an austere scholars' tower to sun-soaked beaches, from desperate hillside battles to seas full of danger, come discover a new magic-filled adventure in Mage of Storm and Sea. Note: Mage of Storm and Sea is an epic fantasy series with a prominent romantic storyline in the later books. There will eventually be an HEA for the characters, but they have to work for it first! Mage of Storm and Sea is set in the world of the Wildings saga, in the Islands of Silas's mage ancestors, but stands alone and can be enjoyed if you haven't read the Wildings books. Contains strong language, violence, and mature subject matter, including sexual references and content.

A woman stands at the edge of a cliff, looking out to sea and the horizon. Dancers welcome the sun in a circle of stones. A dowsing road turns without warning. A church bell. Footsteps. Old Weird Albion is America writer Justin Hopper's dark love song to the English South; a poetic essay interrogating the high, haunted landscape of the South Downs Way; the memories, myths and forgotten histories from Winchester to Beachy Head. When someone disappears, when someone leaps from a cliff and is all-but-erased from memory, what traces might we find in the crumbling chalk of the cliff face; in the wind that buffets the edge of this Albion? A skewed alternative to Bill Bryson, Hopper casts himself as the outsider as he wanders the English countryside in pursuit of mystical encounters. His journey sees him joining New Age eccentrics and accidental visionaries on the hunt for crop circles and druidic stones, discussing the power of nature with ecotherapists and pagans, tracing the ruins of abandoned settlements and walking the streets of eerie suburbs. Through a startling revelation of his own family history, Hopper turns part detective, part memoirist, tracking the footsteps of his grandfather's first wife, Doris; piecing together her forgotten history.

Rebelling against Victorian religious and social strictures, occultist Aleister Crowley, soldier J. F. C. Fuller, and poet Victor Neuburg were active contributors and participants in the British secularist movement at the dawn of the twentieth century. Friendship in Doubt examines how the Agnostic movement inspired and introduced them to each other as foundational figures in the new religious movement of Thelema.