Author: Kerr Cuhulain
Trade Paperback, 312 pages
Publisher: Llewellyn
Publication date: September 2002
ISBN: 0738702544
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Kerr Cuhulain's new work, Full Contact Magic: A Book of Shadows for the Wiccan Warrior, has me quite torn -- in many areas it is much better than a great number of recent "101"-type books... but there are also a great number of contradictions, a rather dismissive attitude toward those who view a Warrior's path differently from the author, and personal views touted as Wiccan bedrock. I am quite conflicted whether to recommend it, or recommend against it!
Kerr's writing is very conversational, and many points are illustrated with real-world examples that make it much easier to grasp Kerr's viewpoints. The material is well-organized, and well-footnoted for further reading. The Rede is discussed much more rationally than I have seen a majority of books, care is taken to distinguish Wicca from the many other Pagan religions, and he defers to Ronald Hutton on many matters of documentable history. There is a great deal of information about energy work that can be useful -- particularly to folks who may not perceive energy in the visual ways commonly referred to.
On the other hand, Kerr also exaggerates situations and paraphrases portions of his source material to make them fit his personal ideals (something he criticizes in both of his books), a number of elements are not identified as opinions of the author but are instead inaccurately presented as general views of Wicca, and several elements that do derive from Traditional Wicca are changed, but the changed form is presented as the Traditional form without any note of how or why they have been changed.
There is much here that may make this well worth purchasing... but brush up on your critical reading skills beforehand, and follow up with some of the source works noted in the footnotes and bibliography.
Reviewed by Sana
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