Maya del Mar's Daykeeper Journal: Astrology, Consciousness and Transformation
In Association with Amazon.com


by Maya del Mar
I will briefly review three new astrology books. They are all written by good astrologers, and for the most part are simply different ways of repeating basic astrological principles. They are all published by Llewellyn Worldwide, St. Paul, MN. They all have a paperback format, and are published in 2003 or 2004. Llewellyn uses very readable type, and composes books in a user-friendly format. I do appreciate this.

Mapping Your Birthchart by Stephanie Jean Clement. $19.95. Stephanie’s book teaches the reader basic astrology in a clear and understandable fashion. It has the special feature of including a CD-ROM which calculates and interprets your birth chart. Stephanie includes advice on how to use the energy of the planets to improve your love life, meet goals, overcome challenges, and create happiness. We plan to publish more about this book later.

Mythic Astrology by Ariel Guttman and Kenneth Johnson. $24.95. Those of you who enjoyed Jean Bolen’s books on the gods and goddesses within will love this one. The authors ask us to identify with the mythic characters in our psyches, as shown by astrology. It is a practical guide to using myths and ancient archetypes for astrological chart interpretation. I was pleased to see inclusion of the asteroids. The authors also offer healing techniques for problem planets. This book is for those interested in Jungian psychology, mythology, and dreamwork.

 The Love Relationship Formula by Christine Rakela. $19.95. This book also includes a CD-ROM which is for the purpose of evaluating relationships. The subtitle is "predicting romantic success with astrology." The idea of the formula is overly simplistic (the editors’ idea?), but otherwise this book is a helpful guide to relationships. It includes the negative and the positive expressions of connections, and this is a big plus. Christine touches on many aspects of relationships, including karmic relationships, but mostly it is a cookbook for specific planetary connections between charts. The general reader who is interested in astrology, as well as the astrologer, can appreciate Christine’s book.