Netta Fornario always held a special fascination for me and it bothers me that people only remember her for how she died, and not for the Mysteries she served, and sadly her life's work has now faded to a few surviving pieces under the name of Mac Tyler. Knowing that she loved a fairy opera called The Immortal Hour, I wanted to create for her, her own story to star in. Even as this book encompasses two separate stories, one about Netta in the past and another about a writer in the future trying to unravel this enigma, it is a tale about what happens when worlds gently touch or violently collide together, such as cultural and/or religious oppositions, emotion and reason, real and unreal, fact and fiction, love and hate, life and death, and ultimately how we seek to reconcile or transcend them. As what happens any time I ever try to write about an Initiate, and she was a Co-Mason as well as a member of Alpha et Omega, the story is never what I set out to write and it becomes something more. This book is unusual because it seeks to hide fact in fiction and fiction in fact, and only in the interplay from one world to the other do we sometimes find what we are seeking.

A mysterious death on Iona in 1929, and a century-long search for the truth. The true story and mystery of Netta Fornario, a writer and occultist who died on the Scottish island of Iona in the early Winter of 1929. A proponent of the early 20th Century occult renaissance, half-English, half-Italian Netta found herself consumed with the search for God and the answers of what lay beyond the so-called thin place. Consumed with grief, having lost her mother and grandparents before the age of twelve, Netta associated herself with some of the most infamous occultists and groups of the time. Her belief in the faerie kingdom that lay beyond our world, led her to Iona, an island she believed was one of the world's thin places, where the Green Ray Kingdom was closest to our reality. It was there, under cover of night and a biting frost where she would meet her demise. Two days after disappearing from her lodgings, Netta's nude body was discovered among the hills by two crofters. What followed was a century of rumours, embellishments, and bizarre tales of how exactly Netta had come to meet her fate. Some wild theories stretch from a wicker-man-style island where the residents covered up a murder of an unusual outsider, psychic attack from beyond the grave, murder by the very faerie creatures she was seeking, to tales that Aleister Crowley himself had travelled to Iona to kill a fellow occultist. Despite the fantastical tales of occult rituals and demons in the night, Netta's death was perhaps not so extravagant. Maybe she was an emotionally damaged woman, who escaped a childhood of grief, to find solace in the occult, and it was those beliefs that exacerbated her mental collapse, resulting in her death. In The Immortal Hour, we look at all the evidence - and lack of it - relating to Netta's life and death, the theories, the wild accusations, tales of the occult, falsehoods, and one woman's search for something greater than herself. The book dissects newspaper articles, archives, written theories, and lost papers that give us insight into the story of Netta Fornario. Ultimately, this work has been produced to honour the memory of a young woman who lost herself between the thin place and the vast landscape of her own ghostly heart. From the bestselling author of the Bizarre True Crime Series, Monstrous book of Serial Killers, the Harrison Lake Mysteries, and the Suicide Prevention Handbook.

For a thirteen-year period, the reclusive Scottish writer Fiona Macleod enthralled the Victorian reading public with a deluge of stories, novels, poems and essays drawn from the wildly romantic Highland and Island landscape. Although it was later revealed that these works had issued from the pen of William Sharp, it was clear that Fiona Macleod was more than a pseudonym; to Sharp she was very much an autonomous entity. What's more, the wealth of previously unknown and unheard of myths, names, traditions and beliefs in her writings, while shone through a Celtic prism, show every sign of having emanated from the Realm of Faery. Steve Blamires presents a ground-breaking assessment of the Faery lore within Fiona Macleod's literary output as part of his ongoing study of this enigmatic writer. Building on the established groundwork of his biography of Sharp, The Little Book of the Great Enchantment, he explores the mythology and traditions of Faery, their symbolic and magical significance, and the devices employed by Fiona in the transmission of Faery teachings and inspirations. Using examples from Fiona's rich and resonant body of work, his detailed interpretation will enable the reader to tease out the Faery gems that are still to be found woven into the lines and verse of her writings.

William Sharp (1855-1905) was a prolific writer; friend and confidant to the literati of the day; an active member of the occult world of the late Victorian period; and a man who spent his life cloaked in layers of secrets - the most important being that he was the pen behind the writings of the mysterious Fiona Macleod. He kept her true identity a closely guarded secret. Many famous people - W.B. Yeats, "AE", MacGregor Mathers, Dante Gabriel Rossetti - were involved in Sharp's short life; he was a member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and Yeats' secret Celtic Mystical Order; and he and Fiona Macleod were involved with the mysterious Dr. Goodchild whose ancient bowl was proclaimed by many to be the Holy Grail. But the enduring legacy of these two fascinating writers is the wealth of Faery magical lore contained in the writings of Fiona Macleod. For the first time this book reveals previously unknown secrets from the life of William Sharp and shows clearly how to recover the Faery lore contained in Fiona Macleod's literary output. These writings are not only about the Realm of Faery, they are the first authentic first-hand accounts from the Realm of Faery, revealing previously unknown Faery gods and goddesses, Faery belief, lore and magic. The Little Book of the Great Enchantment adds significantly to the corpus of serious writings on this greatly misunderstood subject.

Chilling stories of unexplained events, perfect for true crime fans! In every corner of this earth there are secrets. They are hidden in the dark edge of the woods, nestled in the cold stars, and staring out from a stranger's eyes. And whether they be demonic possession or an unsolved murder, the unknown has always haunted our dreams. From the hit podcast Unexplained comes a volume perfectly crafted for the curious, the cynical, and the not-easily-frightened. Richard Maclean Smith is the expert in the unknown, and humbly offers up ten tales of real-life events that continue to evade explanation. With these chilling stories comes the missing key: a connection to our own beliefs in science, superstition, and perception. From cryptic accounts of spectral sightings to peculiar tales of time anomalies, Smith delves into each case with meticulous research, thoughtful insights, and a respectful approach. Unexplained encourages readers to question the boundaries of our understanding, proving that reality can be more extraordinary than we ever imagined. Embark on this gripping journey into the unknown with Unexplained: Supernatural Stories for Uncertain Times. Key Features: Thought-Provoking: Challenges readers to question their understanding of reality and embrace the inexplicable. Well-Researched: Offers meticulously researched accounts of paranormal phenomena and unexplained events. Engaging Storytelling: Features a narrative style that is both engaging and respectful, based on the popular Unexplained podcast. Wide Range of Topics: Explores a diverse range of phenomena from spectral sightings to time anomalies. Cultural Perspective: Includes historical, cultural, and scientific context for each story, adding depth to the mystery.

The Cosmic Doctrine is a condensed blueprint outline of God's manifestation in this creation. Complex indeed! But what has tended to bother some about the Cosmic Doctrine teaching has been the almost total emphasis in explaining evolution simply as being the psychic nuts and bolts of God. Leaving one with the impression that God may be reduced from a Great and Infinite Being to a kind of mechanical Newtonian clockwork. However there is much more to it than that. The higher up the planes you go, although esoteric theory tends to describe it as all more abstract, in actual fact things become so much more complex, vibrant, vivid, bursting, and brimming with life in incredible profusion. It is another form of experience however. The broadest, though simple, analogy would be to liken the existence on the higher levels as something after the order of a Bach fugue - which could indeed seem to some a rather dry abstraction, but which to the attuned and educated ear is a revelation of divinity, harmony and celestial order. The reality is not easy to describe in concepts, let alone in words. How best to describe a rainbow to a blind man? Contens Introduction Section I. THE EVOLUTION OF THE COSMOS. - 1. The First Manifestation. - 2. The First Trinity. - 3. The Building of the Atom. - 4. The Evolution of the Atom. - 5. The Genesis of a Solar System. - 6. Cosmic Influences on a Solar System. Section II. THE EVOLUTION OF THE LOGOS AND HIS REGENTS. - 7. The Evolution of a Great Entity. - 8. The Relation of a Great Entity to the Cosmos. - 9. The Projection of the Concept of the Universe. - 10. The Relation between the Projected Image and the Logoidal Consciousness. - 11. Auto-reactions and Cosmic Memory. - 12. The Birth of consciousness in the Universe. - 13. The Beginnings of Mind and Group Consciousness. - 14. The Seed-atom Building a Seventh Plane Body. - 15. Evolution of the First Planetary Form. - 16. Evolution of the Lords of Flame, Form and Mind. - 17. The Influence of the Regents upon the Globes. - 18. The Goal of Evolution of a Life Swarm. Section. Section III. INFLUENCES UNDER WHICH THE EVOLUTION OF HUMANITY IS CONDUCTED. - 19. Tabulated Summary of Influences. - 20. Cosmic Influences. - 21. The Logoidal Relation to the Manifested Universe. - 22. Influences of the Manifested Universe. - 23. Teaching Concerning Other Evolutions inhabiting a Planet Simultaneously. - 24. Influences which Humanity exerts upon Itself. - 25. The Law of Action and Reaction. - 26. The Law of Limitation. - 27. The Law of Seven Deaths. - 28. The Law of Impactation, or the Transmission of Action from one Plane to another. - 29. The Law of the Aspects of Force, or Polarity. - 30. The Law of the Attraction of Outer Space. - 31. The Law of the Attraction of the Centre