Here are 82 books that Jambalaya fans have personally recommended if you like
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At age 49, I traveled to Cuba to find a version of woman- and motherhood large enough to hold all I wanted to be. And it was there, among the island’s mother saints and goddesses, that I found the mirror I was looking for. In this list, I share five books that reconnect us with the spiritual mothers who might show us the way back to ourselves. From Luisah Teish’s New Orleans household magic to Gloria Naylor’s mystical Willow Bay, we meet the goddesses, conjure women, and “women who know” who shine a light on the power and multidimensionality of the feminine through the lens of spirit, faith, and identity.
In these seventeen essays we meet the Yoruba river goddess Òsun, the mighty shapeshifter whose name means source, as in “the source of a river, a people, or of children...that which runs, seeps, flows, moves as water does.”
Here is the role model I’ve been hungering for! Not only a river and fertility goddess, Òsun is a holder and conveyor of political, economic, divinatory, maternal, natural, and therapeutic power; a larger-than-life Mother who is both spiritual and material, sweet and strong; a multi-faceted role model who shifts shape with every turn of her river. Immersed in her stories, I find myself leaning into those places where I, too, am fluid, my identity too vast to fit into any one shape or box.
Osun is a brilliant deity whose imagery and worldwide devotion demand broad and deep scholarly reflection. Contributors to the ground-breaking Africa's Ogun, edited by Sandra Barnes (Indiana University Press, 1997), explored the complex nature of Ogun, the orisa who transforms life through iron and technology. Osun across the Waters continues this exploration of Yoruba religion by documenting Osun religion. Osun presents a dynamic example of the resilience and renewed importance of traditional Yoruba images in negotiating spiritual experience, social identity, and political power in contemporary Africa and the African diaspora. The 17 contributors to Osun across the Waters delineate the…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
At age 49, I traveled to Cuba to find a version of woman- and motherhood large enough to hold all I wanted to be. And it was there, among the island’s mother saints and goddesses, that I found the mirror I was looking for. In this list, I share five books that reconnect us with the spiritual mothers who might show us the way back to ourselves. From Luisah Teish’s New Orleans household magic to Gloria Naylor’s mystical Willow Bay, we meet the goddesses, conjure women, and “women who know” who shine a light on the power and multidimensionality of the feminine through the lens of spirit, faith, and identity.
What a delight to cozy up with the fictional island of this novel, an imagined liminal space on the border of Georgia and South Carolina, we are told “got spit out from the mouth of God, and when it fell to the earth it brought along an army of stars.” Even more delightful, we are told that when He tried to reach down and scoop them back up, He found Himself shaking hands with “the greatest conjure woman on earth.”
Thus we meet the “great, great, grand Mother” of Willow Springs, the archetypal first mother who could “grab a bolt of lightning in the palm of her hand; use the heat of the lightning to start the kindling going under her medicine pot,” and heal “the wounds of every creature.” I love how deeply feminist, mystical, and immersive this novel is: a page-turner I return to whenever I want to…
With a new introduction by Robert Jones, Jr, author of The New York Times bestselling novel, The Prophets
'Gloria Naylor is a brilliant word-worker and a breathtaking story-teller. Mama Day is her masterpiece' Tayari Jones
'A sweeping, ambitious, gorgeous novel - takes you by the throat and refuses to let go. Mama Day is a stone-cold masterpiece' Carmen Maria Machado
Between Georgia and South Carolina is an island you won't find on any map. Only a single wooden bridge connects it to the world. In Willow Springs people still honour their ancestors, who arrived as slaves back in the time…
At age 49, I traveled to Cuba to find a version of woman- and motherhood large enough to hold all I wanted to be. And it was there, among the island’s mother saints and goddesses, that I found the mirror I was looking for. In this list, I share five books that reconnect us with the spiritual mothers who might show us the way back to ourselves. From Luisah Teish’s New Orleans household magic to Gloria Naylor’s mystical Willow Bay, we meet the goddesses, conjure women, and “women who know” who shine a light on the power and multidimensionality of the feminine through the lens of spirit, faith, and identity.
I love a biography that is as well-researched as it is immersive, and this book does not disappoint! Marie Laveau―a free woman of color who all but ruled New Orleans in the mid-1800s—may be the most legendary American practitioner of the magical arts, and in this book, Denise Alvarado—a New Orleans born, native Creole who studies African and Indigenous-based healing traditions from a personal and academic perspective—separates the myth from the fact.
Moving seamlessly between historical archives and her personal experience as a practitioner, Alvarado introduces us to the New Orleans Voodoo queen, her reign and legacy, and the spells, charms, prayers, rituals, and recipes that bring her magic to life.
The life and work of the legendary “Pope of Voodoo,” Marie Laveau―a free woman of color who practically ruled New Orleans in the mid-1800s
Marie Laveau may be the most influential American practitioner of the magical arts; certainly, she is among the most famous. She is the subject of songs, films, and legends and the star of New Orleans ghost tours. Her grave in New Orleans ranks among the most popular spiritual pilgrimages in the US. Devotees venerate votive images of Laveau, who proclaimed herself the “Pope of Voodoo.” She is the subject of respected historical biographies and the inspiration…
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…
At age 49, I traveled to Cuba to find a version of woman- and motherhood large enough to hold all I wanted to be. And it was there, among the island’s mother saints and goddesses, that I found the mirror I was looking for. In this list, I share five books that reconnect us with the spiritual mothers who might show us the way back to ourselves. From Luisah Teish’s New Orleans household magic to Gloria Naylor’s mystical Willow Bay, we meet the goddesses, conjure women, and “women who know” who shine a light on the power and multidimensionality of the feminine through the lens of spirit, faith, and identity.
As someone who writes about discovering Santería as an adult, I was enchanted to read how Hernández stumbles upon its rituals through the eyes of a child. In her father’s workroom, a gray rock with cowrie shells for eyes and a mouth that sits on a clay plate filled with candies becomes the author’s enticing introduction to Santería’s gatekeeper deity, Eleggua. In the kitchen, women read cups of water that ferry messages between the living and the santos and the dead.
“There’s nothing odd about any of this, because it has always been this way,” Hernández tells us, illuminating the ways her young self navigates her identity among the wisdom and complexities of the aunties and mother who raise her, and the “women who know” they call upon to help them find their way.
The PEN Literary Award–winning author “writes with honesty, intelligence, tenderness, and love” about her Colombian-Cuban heritage and queer identity in this poignant coming-of-age memoir (Sandra Cisneros, author of The House on Mango Street).
In this lyrical, coming-of-age memoir, Daisy Hernández chronicles what the women in her Cuban-Colombian family taught her about love, money, and race. Her mother warns her about envidia and men who seduce you with pastries, while one tía bemoans that her niece is turning out to be “una india” instead of an American. Another auntie instructs that when two people are close, they are bound to become…
I came to discover the healing power of art, nature, and ritual while I was grieving the loss of my father a decade ago. I would go to the park and make impermanent and symmetrical art from found twigs, flowers, pine cones, berries, and leaves as a way to ground, heal my broken heart, and make sense of a chaotic time. Since then, I‘ve made over a thousand nature altars, written a book about it (Morning Altars), and have taught tens of thousands of people around the world to make meaning in their lives through a creative collaboration with the natural world. It still amazes me that something so simple and impermanent can bring such wonder and resilience.
A wise man once said to me, “if you can say it, you can see it." This magical book of art, poetry, and nature is a response to the removal of nature words such as “acorn,” “wren,” and “dandelion,” from a children’s dictionary. His gorgeous writing encourages us to wonder at the forgotten and to behold the ordinary by uttering nature words as a conjuring thing. During a time of environmental loss, grief, and forgetting, McFarlane lets us fall in love again with the greater-than-human world through language and therefore, to renew our capacity to marvel at the living landscape and our own inner landscape.
Beautiful books make unforgettable gifts. This pocket-sized treasure is the perfect gift for fans of nature, language and rich artwork, adult and child alike!
Kindred in spirit to The Lost Words but fresh in its form, The Lost Spells introduces a beautiful new set of natural spell-poems and artwork by beloved creative duo Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris.
Each "spell" conjures an animal, bird, tree or flower -- from Barn Owl to Red Fox, Grey Seal to Silver Birch, Jay to Jackdaw -- with which we share our lives and landscapes. Moving, joyful and funny, The Lost Spells above all…
From the time I was very young, Witchcraft and the supernatural have always fascinated me. I can remember staying up late to watch horror movies or reading an Edgar Allen Poe book under the sheets with a flashlight when I was supposed to be asleep. I knew this was never a phase or something I would “outgrow”; the spell had been cast and I was forever in its power. I’ve tried to read everything I could on Witchcraft, its history and practice and anything regarding the occult. It was all of this reading and research that really helped me to write Widdershins and everything that came after. Enjoy the list!
This was the first occult book I ever bought, so it holds a special place in my heart. The title alone, drew me to it and I was not disappointed. The book is full of all kinds of spells and information on herbs, amulets and talismans, ceremonial magic, Satanism & Witchcraft, potions, and many other wicked goodies. I love old occult books and this one, first published in 1970, started my occult library which has continued to grow.
The Complete Book of Black Magic and Witchcraft is a mainstay for both beginners and advanced seekers into genuine occult methods because it is the first instruction manual to systematise the techniques and aims of Ritual Magic. Including how to prepare for rituals of exorcism and purging, and the rites and mysteries of sorcery, and Infernal Necromancy. This was achieved this by years of research pooling information from rare manuscripts on these subjects and comparing the various sub-sections of each to find the central methods of Ceremonial Magic. While crucially informing the readers of the differences so they can experiment…
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…
I'm a historian of slavery and the Atlantic slave trade who was trained with a PhD in History and a PhD in Art History, and who's interested in how slavery is memorialized in the public space as well as in the visual and material culture of slavery. I was born and raised in Brazil, the country where the largest number of enslaved Africans were introduced in the era of the Atlantic slave trade and that still today is the country with the largest Black population after Nigeria, the most populous African country. I believe that studying the history of the Atlantic slave trade and slavery helps us to remedy the legacies of anti-Black racism today.
Objects intended to protect African men and women and their descendants were also part of the rich material culture of the Atlantic slave trade.
In this book, art historian Matthew Rarey explores the history of mandinga pouches, small amulets containing a variety of items such as Islamic prayers, herbs, shells, and hair. The book shows that these items were not at all insignificant things, but rather tangible traces of the histories of men, women, and children who were forcibly transported to the Americas and whose trajectories linked European, African, and American spiritual and material worlds.
In Insignificant Things Matthew Francis Rarey traces the history of the African-associated amulets that enslaved and other marginalized people carried as tools of survival in the Black Atlantic world from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. Often considered visually benign by white Europeans, these amulet pouches, commonly known as "mandingas," were used across Africa, Brazil, and Portugal and contained myriad objects, from herbs and Islamic prayers to shells and coins. Drawing on Arabic-language narratives from the West African Sahel, the archives of the Portuguese Inquisition, sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European travel and merchant accounts of the West African Coast, and early…
I loved graphic novels even before I became an author/illustrator. But because I create for young readers, I also read a lot of graphic novels aimed at them. I am also a big believer that books with female protagonists are important for all readers: male, female, and non-binary. All of the books I’ve recommended are books I plucked off my own bookshelf, and that I’ve read several times and I think are exceptional in some way.
Amulet is a masterwork of story, imagination, and art.
Tragic circumstances lead to Emily, her younger brother, and her mother having to move into the run-down home of a relative. While cleaning, Emily uncovers an amulet, which almost seems to be meant for her.
That night, her mother is kidnapped by a monster and in order to rescue her, Emily and her brother rush through a portal into another world. And that’s just the beginning!
Emily is a strong young woman who makes bold choices and fiercely defends her family. This adventure story is epic!
Graphic novel star Kazu Kibuishi creates a world of terrible, man-eating demons, a mechanical rabbit, a giant robot---and two ordinary children on a life-or-death mission. After the tragic death of their father, Emily and Navin move with their mother to the home of her deceased great-grandfather, but the strange house proves to be dangerous. Before long, a sinister creature lures the kids' mom through a door in the basement. Em and Navin, desperate not to lose her, follow her into an underground world inhabited by demons, robots, and talking animals. Eventually, they enlist the help of a small mechanical rabbit…
I struggled a lot with reading as a kid, I would not call myself a natural reader at all. When I was young, fantasy and magic stories were one of the few genres that could grip me enough to make me actually focus and attempt to read but I always hated the ones that took themselves too seriously (they always felt impossibly long to get through). Now, as a children’s author, myself, it’s my hope and passion to serve fellow young-readers-who-don’t-consider-themselves-readers with fun accessible stories. I hope you enjoy!
A school drama with a dash of Greek Mythology when Helen of Troy’s amulet gets into a young girl's hands.
Juliet is suddenly doused with attention and does her best to navigate it. The story is very funny and lighthearted, this was another one of my favorite school reads.
Juliet Dove is a girl who doesn't like to be noticed. But though she may be shy, she has a wickedly sharp wit. Whenever someone does take notice of her, she tears into the person with a savagery that's earned her the nickname Killer. Juliet ends up leaving Mr. Elives' magic shop with Helen of Troy's amulet--that is, a virtual man magnet. Juliet doesn't know what she's got, but the boys in her class do--they start to notice her. Soon every boy in town is swoony for her. Yet, much as she'd like to lose all the unwanted attention, she…
This book follows the journey of a writer in search of wisdom as he narrates encounters with 12 distinguished American men over 80, including Paul Volcker, the former head of the Federal Reserve, and Denton Cooley, the world’s most famous heart surgeon.
In these and other intimate conversations, the book…
Ever since I traveled to Ethiopia as a child and saw its forms of Christianity, I’ve been fascinated with the ways that a religion that seems to be “pure” and ethereal actually gets mixed with folk traditions. I came to specialize in the ways that Egyptian Christianity became Egyptian. But I have also noted this phenomenon throughout religions: Buddhism, Judaism, and Islam all assimilated themselves to particular regions and village expressions. This dynamic exchange between the “great tradition” and resilient local traditions is fascinating to trace even today when many leaders claim that nothing exists except for pure religious teaching. But historians of religions know that every religion is constantly “syncretizing.”
A vast amount of amulets come from the early Christian period in which the potent deeds and names of Christ, angels, apostles, and even Scripture passages were inscribed on papyri to be rolled up and worn or slipped in some part of the house.
These materials essentially made the stories and the scripture of Christianity into components of healing or protective magic (and some scholars have indeed suggested that such magical services constituted the actual context for the spread of Christianity). But who was responsible for these materials—for repurposing scripture and names as materials with concrete efficacy?
In this book, De Bruyn develops a picture of scribes dedicated not so much to the spread of the Gospel as the mediation of Christian scripture for material needs like health and fear.
Making Amulets Christian: Artefacts, Scribes, and Contexts examines Greek amulets with Christian elements from late antique Egypt in order to discern the processes whereby a customary practice--the writing of incantations on amulets--changed in an increasingly Christian context. It considers how the formulation of incantations and amulets changed as the Christian church became the prevailing religious institution in Egypt in the last centuries of the Roman empire. Theodore de Bruyn investigates what we can learn from incantations and amulets containing Christian elements about the cultural and social location of the people who wrote them. He shows how incantations and amulets were…
