Teaching Romance Writers About “Real” Witchcraft

[icymist]

I am just home from the WRW (Washington Romance Writers) Retreat where I was one of the featured guest speakers this year, lecturing on the folklore and language of herbs and flowers, and on the topic of “An Intro to Witchcraft for Writers.” Just shy of 300 people came for the retreat (that must be why they call it the ‘Mega Event’) and it was a fabulous time. I also got the opportunity to sign my three latest Llewellyn books at Turn the Page Books in Maryland with Nora Roberts and Charlaine Harris and a dozen other romance authors on the day before my lectures.

My first class, the language of flowers, went very well. The language of flowers is a hot topic for Regency and historical romance novels, after all. But the main lecture on witchcraft was scheduled for the late afternoon, and I was pleased to see a nice amount of people and even a few romance writers whose names I recognized immediately. So there I stood with a smile, standing up at the podium and representing the “real life” modern Witch to the romance novelists. I was excited by this opportunity, and very determined to teach them the facts, so that they could pull from good information when they created their characters. Plus…I had an ace up my sleeve.

What was that ace? Well consider this. As Witches we all know that if we do not visualize, our spells will flop. You have to be able to see the spell’s outcome and envision in your mind the positive change that you wish to create. As a writer myself, I know that to be able to write a book or even an Almanac article, you also need to be able to visualize what it is you are trying to communicate to your reader. It may be to teach new information, or it may be to tell a story and to make your characters believable.
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