My top 4 spiritual/occult books of 2025 (tough competition)

Entrance to the underworld

Seen on my walk today…

Bookshops are temples and sanctuaries in a world of bland corporate chains and online digital slop

Hello, #Portfolioday! Illustrator in love with books here. Soon to be illustrating the work of Lord Dunsany. I have the best publishers and authors, would love to work with you in 2026. thomassbrown.com

‘The vertuous student’…‘ Satan tempteth him from his Study to evil company’. Student days, good times

There has always been lamentation of how things are not like they were in the old days…. ("Woe To Drunkards" Samuel Ward, London, 1622)

Goodnight from The Bottled Imp tavern, where a pale ale fuelled punch-up has broken out on whether white horse of summer or grey mare of winter is the best Bone Horse. Goodnight from Rex Hill, wondering why his shadow has grown wings on the walk home. Goodnight from Hookland.

"How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world." WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE The Merchant of Venice, Act 5, Scene 1 Art: Nurture - Oil on Canvas 2020-2024 by Miles Johnston @miles_art

When Hooklanders talk about the county being haunted by an ‘Iron Witch’, you have a moment of confusion. Do they mean Margaret Thatcher or do they mean some other malevolent entity that is withering the land and stealing hope? – Dr. Michael Benn, 1981

Getting spellbound by the surreal subway scene of Matthew Grabelsky’s 'Witchy Woman'. Oil on Canvas #beautifulbizarre #grabelsky #contemporaryart #surrealism #oilpainting #nycsubway #hyperrealism #blackcat #witchywoman #artcollectors #art

#WyrdWednesday One of my favourite weird Christmas tales, the classic account by Jean Hingley of Rowley Regis, Birmingham, of being visited on the 4th of January 1979 by three fairy-like UFOnauts who discussed Jesus, the Queen and Tommy Steele with her before she offered them some mince pies.

Seen on my walk today…

Once you've seen tombs described as 'dream incubation chambers for the dead', it's hard not to think of what those dead dreams might be. Are they remembrance of sunlight or an enfolding of shadows, rage against brick thwarted access to the corpse paths? – #MattAdams

Seeing How to See ~~~~~~~ “As Kathleen Raine put it: ‘the imagination does not see different things, it sees things differently.’ This is why the meaning content of many mystical experiences is a kind of ‘oh yes’ or ‘of course’ and seems to be something you *already know* ...” ~ Gary Lachman.

In this season of self indulgence please remember to give a little kindness to the birds

Water, Air, Earth, Fire. By Marco Toso Borella, ‘Elementi’, Painted gilt glass and sgraffito on 24 carat gold leaf, Murano, 2022

Happy winter solstice from the Green Man

Christ with the four elements. In the hermetic tradition Christ represents the quintessence or the philosophers’ stone of alchemy By Marco Toso Borella, ‘Elementi’, Painted gilt glass and sgraffito on 24 carat gold leaf, Murano, 2022

A good reason to read books is that it really annoys some people, exactly the type of people you want to annoy

“Wine is sunlight held together by water” GALILEO GALILEI Art: Blue and white cup engraved with scenes from a Dionysian thiasos. Compagnia Venezia Murano by Attilio Spaccarelli, 1886

Seen on my walk today…

GLUTTONY The figure is raising a cup of Prosecco and eating gelato in a cone. An allegory of one of the seven deadly sins, Italian, 1340-55, external facade of the Doge’s palace, Venice. My photo

Victor Brauner (1903-1966) The Surrealist, January 1947. Design is clearly based on the Magician card from the Tarot. My photo

I'm suspicious of those who don't aim to haunt a bookshop or a library. If the afterlife isn't the point you tackle the eternal 'to be read' pile I'm not sure we can ever call ourselves friends. If I am not allowed to read as a ghost there will be much trouble. – #DAKilroy #Books

Seen on my walk today…

You do not become a world builder by reading everything everyone else has to say about world building. You do it by the actual act of creating, the continuous and dedicated practice of the skill. You fail, you learn, you create again. This is what makes you a world builder.

Some will tell you the soul of a ship lives in its anchor. Others say its resident spirit clearly has home in the figurehead. At Ashcourt Port Authority, they've a whole wall of figureheads renowned for being wave oracles. Even on land, they whisper prophecy. – Tim Coss #VOH

Seen on my walk today…

Apocalypse detail,Greek icon by George Klontzas, 16th century, detail. My photos

Seen on my walk today…a gull looking after the fish stall

Prancing PAN Pan, Early 2nd century AD

Horned satyr or PAN with breasts on a bronze well head in the Doge's Palace in Venice (c.1559). My photo

Seen on my walk today…weird door knockers

I've said it before but remember when conspiracy theories were fun? Now I can't even enjoy a "celebs who sold their soul" or "reptilians are amongst us" or "the earth is flat" video, cause too many people believe that shit. Fucking idiots. You've ruined the fun, and also the entire world for us all.

Current reading. Brooke Palmieri's wonderful and moving "Bargain Witch: Essays in Self-Initiation". A review will happen at some point.

Seen on my walk today…

Seen on my walk today…

My bronze statue of PAN c.1750

Seen on my walk today…

What d’you fancy for Christmas?

Seen on my walk today… Treadwells books

Hookland is a deliberate re-wilding of folklore, but it is also an act of reminding people that you only have to scratch in the right places to reveal yourself as an animist, a knower of scarelore and someone whose immunity to the strange is a lot less complete than imagined.

Seen on my walk today…

Jacob Boehme

How about the clang of doom I captured this morning in St. Peter's cemetery...

From the latest Midian Books mailer: The Avalon Hill Witchcraft Ritual Kit (1974). "A boxed set of materials and guide books for performing witchcraft rituals....seems to be a hybrid of role-play and 'genuine' Wicca. Needless to say extremely scarce." www.midianbooks.com/product-page...

Frontispiece of the Mystery of the Cathedrals by Fulcanelli (1926). Illustration by Julien Champagne.

Linguists start compiling first ever complete dictionary of ancient Celtic More than 1,000 words used as far back as 325BC to be collected for insight into past linguistic landscape apple.news/AfvyTc6opREe...

Seen on my walk today…