Christine Grace - The Witch at the Forests Edge: Thirteen Keys to Modern Traditional Witchcraft

To work as a witch means to embrace liminality, always moving between various states and layers of reality. Touching on thirteen different areas of a witchs practice, Christine Graces exploration of what it means to occupy a place in the natural world challenges readers to think about specific aspects of their practice in a focused way. The Witch at the Forest's Edge is a welcome and thought-provoking addition to a modern library, enabling a practitioner to re-examine their spiritual connection to the natural world at any point in their journey.

Arin Murphy-Hiscock, author of The Green Witch

One of my many hats is as a forest farmer, so The Witch at the Forest's Edge by Christine Grace has a special meaning for me. I grew up as a forest dweller and live now with the woods at my back porch. This powerful and intensely liminal place holds the keys to a deepening of our spirituality as well as a broadening of it. This book will be read, marked, pondered upon, and read again.

H. Byron Ballard, author of Seasons of a Magical Life

Weve never truly existed beyond the reach of enchantment, says Christine Grace early in this captivating book. A genuine exploration of enchantment through the experience of modern traditional witchcraft is the gift that she offers us. The Witch at the Forest's Edge is accessible but deep work, and Grace does not shy away from encouraging us to be open to more demanding practices and fields of study. We are ushered from known to unknown, stepping into liminal spaces and weaving rituals that strengthen our spiritual work and relationships. Ample opportunity for reflection exists within these pages, as well, with insightful questions attributed to each key, making this an excellent book for seasoned witches, alongside those just starting down the path. I am so impressed by the guidance offered herewe are escorted along the hedge by the authors lamplight of wisdom and offered myriad ways to discover the treasures of magic for ourselves. What a journey!

Jen Rue Holmes, of Rue and Hyssop

A thoughtful examination of witchcraft, The Witch at the Forest's Edge by Christine Grace explores a wide range of topics from sourcing our tools ethically to examining the origins of what we think we know to discovering the spirits of place. Graces gentle voice evokes a texture of dappled shade, as though these truths were shared on the border between this world and the next. The Witch at the Forest's Edge restores the animalia missing from pop culture witchcraft, linking natures richness with modern understandings of community, respect for culture, and stewardship.

Amy Blackthorn, author of Blackthorns Botanical Magic

The Witch at the Forest's Edge by Christine Grace presents a thorough one-on-one introduction to the Forests Edge Traditions approach to modern witchcraft, while wonderfully adding to the conversation surrounding the execution and usefulness of a regional, animist-based practice.

Christopher Orapello, coauthor of Besom, Stang, and Sword and cohost of the Down at the Crossroads podcast

The witch is a curious figure, existing in a uniquely liminal space of both fact and fiction, this world and the next. Many practitioners of magic walk a path that carefully stays in that middle ground, but a few heed the call to peek beyond the hedge, to walk amongst ancestors and spirits and gods and beings for which we dont yet have names. It can be daunting to leave that comfortable middle path, but Christine Graces book The Witch at the Forest's Edge provides a gentle, encouraging hand to hold as you take your first steps past the hedge into the world beyond. The advice is practical, grounded in a practice that begins with what you have on hand and in your surroundings, includes discussion of ancestry and the many ways that family is made and found, and includes a deeply appreciated section on magical ethics. This book is practical, fresh, and will help guide a whole new generation off the well-trod path to embrace the old, wild magic found beyond the hedge.

Fire Lyte, author of The Dabbler's Guide to Witchcraft and host of Inciting A Riot

This edition first published in 2021 by Weiser Books, an imprint of

Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

With offices at:

65 Parker Street, Suite 7

Newburyport, MA 01950

www.redwheelweiser.com

www.redwheelweiser.com/newsletter

Copyright 2021 by Christine Grace

Foreword copyright 2021 by Cory Thomas Hutcheson

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording,
or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing
from Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC. Reviewers may quote brief passages.

ISBN: 978-1-57863-758-4

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available upon request.

Cover design by Kathryn Sky-Peck

Interior by Deborah Dutton

Typeset in Adobe Garamond Pro, Apercu Pro, and Nexa Rust Sans

Printed in the United States of America

IBI

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

To my magical, beloved family

This book contains advice and information for using herbs, spell-craft, ritual observances, shamanism, and ritual possession and is not meant to diagnose, treat, or prescribe. It should be used to supplement, not replace, the advice of your physician or other trained healthcare practitioner. If you know or suspect you have a medical condition, are experiencing physical symptoms, or if you feel unwell, seek your physicians advice before embarking on any medical program or treatment. Readers are cautioned to follow instructions carefully and accurately for the best effect. Readers using the information in this book do so entirely at their own risk, and the author and publisher accept no liability if adverse effects are caused.

This book would not exist without Marijean Rue. Her spirit and wisdom suffuse the work. We wrote teaching material together for years prior to the writing of the book, and the ideas and practices herein have been shaped within our nourishing friendship and co-leadership. Cory Hutchesons support and assistance helped me see the broader potential of this work, and Gabriel Whalen insisted on the validity of my voice even when I doubted.

I am grateful to the members of the Forests Edge Tradition, to its spirit, and to the Voices, its guiding council. I am grateful to my apprentices for teaching me and to the ancestors for guiding me. I am grateful to the forest for enfolding me, and to my family for loving me.

Coming to the forest is a powerful experience for me. The trees rise high above my head, spreading out their branches to form a natural cathedral. All around me I feel the woods breathing, life spilling out from between roots and under rocks, the soft sigh of fungi and bacteria reclaiming fallen logs or creatures and bringing them back home into the soil. The forest is a place of wonder. Once, when heading to a crossroads for a nighttime magical working, I stopped suddenly, deeply aware that something was watching me from the edge of the forest. My breath hitched in my chest as I saw a deera stagemerge from between the trees with tall, wide antlers like a crown on his head. He stood and watched me for a moment, and thenalmost like a dreamhe stepped backwards into the forest and disappeared, evaporating into the dark spaces between the bark and leaves. In another instance, my magical partner and I were doing some work in a small forest near our homes, and we had gotten a bit turned around. We turned off our flashlights and paused, asking for guidance or help. When we turned the lights on again, a juvenile deer stood there a few feet in front of us, then turned and led us in the direction we needed to go. The forest is a place of deep magic. That magic can be powerful, and also frightening. It is always good to have a guide.