Discover a book 20,000 years in the making!Travel with author Karen
Tate as she examines the varied Divine Feminine traditions as old as
the
Neolithic temples of Malta or as new as the
Goddess Temple of
Orange County, in locations as inaccessible as
Sedna's Watery Domain
near the Arctic Circle or as crowded as
Ueno Park in downtown Tokyo.
Meticulously researched, clearly written and comprehensively
documented, this book explores the rich tapestry of Goddess worship
from prehistoric cultures to modern academic theories. Consider the
amazing similarities between age-old pagan rituals and those
associated with contemporary religions.
On the heels of finding out that the J.
Paul Getty Villa Museum bookstore was planning to carry Sacred
Places of Goddess: 108 Destinations, Karen received news that the
Joseph Campbell Foundation bookstore was also planning to carry her
book. Below is Stephen Gerringer's exuberant recommendation:
"I congratulate you on the concept,
Karen, and on its execution. Pilgrimage is a neglected aspect of
most contemporary Western religions; not only are you restoring that
concept, but you've taken the Goddess out of the hallowed halls of
academia, out of the abstract realms of the psyche, to locate Her in
the physical world. Your book is well written, well-researched, and
is a resource I'll be consulting on a regular basis. What's
more, your work is a marvelous manifestation of what Joseph Campbell
intends when he advises us to "Follow your bliss." Thank you for
catching that spark and spreading the vision."
Metaphorically Yours,
Stephen Gerringer
Joseph Campbell Foundation
"Author Karen Tate has amassed an
extraordinary amount of colorful and practical information on 108
Sacred Places that have as their focus, the Divine Feminine, the
Goddess in her many forms. With Karen as your guide, you will not
only understand how to get to your destination, but you will be
armed with extensive historical, archaeological and religious facts
that will enrich your traveling experience. The more commonly known
sites such as those in England, France, Greece, Malta and Turkey are
covered but many lesser known sites such as "the ancient cities of
Leptis Magna," in Libya that has intact temples dedicated to Cybele
and Artemis are also covered. Europe, Asia, the Middle East,
Oceania, South America, the West Indies, Mexico, and North America
are all included in this ground breaking new work from Karen Tate.
Highly Recommended!"
- Jennifer Reif, Author of
"Mysteries of Demeter; Rebirth of the Pagan Way," "The Magical
Crone; Celebrating the Wisdom of Later Life," Morgan LeFay's Book of
Spells and Wiccan Rites," and "Aphrodite's Riddle."
"A revealing, useful, and enthusiastically
recommended (series) for the vacationer seeking to fulfill their
spiritual as well as their recreational yearnings." -
Midwest Book
Review
" 108 Places that stir the
soul." - Chicago Tribune
"It's enough to amplify the spiritual
wanderlust of even the most ardent sojourner." - Yoga Journal
Karen's book is wonderfully written,
lucid, easy to understand, with incredible photos. I have the good
fortune to be one of her friends as well. We have known each other
about 9 years and I have attended her Isis Navigatums and some of
her rituals. We are connected through several Egyptian goddesses --
Isis, Hathor and Sekhmet. Karen has literally lived her 2 books
WALKING AN ANCIENT PATH and her first one, SACRED PLACES OF GODDESS,
transformed her life through sacred rituals, immersed herself in
sacred sites, created personal relationships with goddesses, lives
in her own Temple, etc. She walks her talk!! Through her books one
can begin (or continue) a path of Right Action, healing oneself, and
the planet, and learning about the Goddess. I cannot recommend her
books more highly!!
Lauren O. Thyme, Author of
The Lemurian Way
This book is not the usual popular
archaeology offering on the subject. It is a combination of that and
a travel guide as well---so you not only learn the historic and
mythological background on the various ancient sites, but are
supplied with current information on how to get there. The coverage
is impressive. Karen even briefly mentions the ruined shrine of
Astarte at Aphaca in Lebanon which is the ancient source of the
pre-Christian (Canaanite) Holy Grail legend according to
anthropologist Jesse Weston (From Ritual to Romance). This beautiful
natural site, where hundreds of Goddess worshipers were massacred by
emperor Constantine's soldiers in the 4th century, is still
venerated by local Pagans but has been almost completely forgotten
by the Neo-Pagans of America and Europe. Hopefully Karen's book
will go through several updates as time goes by and thus it will
continue to be carried along on sacred grad tours for years to come.
Reviewed by Poke Runyon
Producer: The Rites of Magick
Karen Tate weaves wonderful stories of
how present day women and men experience sacred sites of the divine
Mother. She encourages our imaginations to actually be in those
locations. She gives us information and images about how these
Goddesses were venerated in another era and how their power still
affects worshippers and travelers today.
In her guidebook, she takes the reader to sacred places everywhere
around the globe, introducing contemporary and past theories,
connecting the dots about how the Goddess went from one area of the
world to another. Within each site discussion of sacred locations
she brings activism or ecofeminist issues into the mix in her
sections entitled Gaia Alert! She also discusses sexual practices,
economies, artifacts, etc. Of course, given my own interests, I was
lost in her interpretation of the Goddesses of Israel, their
location of artifacts and the interconnection to the Christian
Madonna. Reading this material leaves me aching to visit soon. But
before taking off to these exotic locations she reminds us that some
of these sites are in our own backyard!
This is much more than a travel book, this should be a reference
book in anyone's home library with an interest in history,
archeology, mythology, philosophy, spirituality and travel. Through
clear and concise academic references and her recorded experiences,
she adds further spice to the recipe by including how to guide
oneself to remote or difficult to find sites. I encourage this book
for oneself or to purchase as a gift.
Reviewed by Jayne DeMente, MA
Founder and Director, Women's Heritage Project
This is an amazing book!! The author has
done a wonderful job, the book is extremely well organized,
structured and laid out. Her writing style is straight forward and I
felt as if she was there talking just to me. I especially liked the
infomation in the indroduction on safety tips. This is more than a
guide book that puts the foucus on the spirtuality of each site, but
one that provides scholarly infomation and history of the sites as
well. Included as well are Gaia Alerts, which put the focus on the
environment and Goddess Foucus side panels, which provide even more
information about certain sites. Her vivid description and
information on the birthplace of Aphrodite was fascinating and
totally new to me even though I have been studying and practising
Goddess spirituality for 16 yrs. I am ready to begin a jouney to
visit Goddess with this book as my guide.
Juliette Ashmoon, Elder Priestess
Writer for The Beltane Papers
After reading this book, I understand
why people hole up in living room recliners with travel books. You
feel like you have a friend named Karen leading you by the hand
around the world to the Goddess. You actually feel you're inside
Hina's Cave in Hawaii, or inside the Temple of Hera on the Island of
Samos, or gazing at the Labyrinth in Britain's Glastonbury Tor. This
book is dense with fascinating female-deity facts and blocks of
solid info backed up by a 12-page bibliography. It's also packed
with photos, drawings and maps, too - at least one to every page
spread. I'm keeping this book handy as a reference source as well as
a source of travel ideas.
Jeri L Studebaker, Author of Switching to Goddess
Sacred
Places of Goddess: 108 Destinations is more than a travel book; it is an encyclopedia of Goddess allowing one to visit her sacred
sites and discover Goddess culture around the world from the comfort
of your armchair.
