When this book was first published back in 1973, it was practically alone in its field.

Sybil Leek was labelled as the world's Best Known Witch (next to Samantha on Bewitched) and this book surfaced and was absorbed at a time before the internet and before pagan and wiccans had established themselves firmly as a community in their own right.

Despite being 30 years old (the book was re-released in 1991) it can hardly be called dated. If anything, the information provided is less corrupted and closer to the original 'New Forest ideals'.

It was the first books to actually publish the Tenets of Wicca, and for that reason alone needs to be on your bookshelf.

Sybil Leek herself though fell closer to the Celtic cross than to the Wiccan pentagram, and even refers to some of the Gardnerian offspring covens as a 'cross between a nudist camp and a skin flick'

If you can get past some of the animosity towards the mainstream media and those that have 'corrupted' the craft (which seems at cross purposes with the central point of the book), you will find a very useful tool for learning about the history of witchcraft in the middle part of the 20th century, from one who witnessed its growth from the inside out.