THE GODDESS WHEEL: A Meditation Guide on Woman's Sacred Cycles and Sexual Mysteries By Karin E. Weiss, Ph.D.

Although this book is full of colorful pictures, the written text is its main feature. The paintings in this picture book are rendered in a distinctly dilettante style, and the subject matter intrigueingly portrayed. The text is well written and thought-provoking. Weiss writes in a mix of fantasy, philosophy, and poetic prose to express profound wisdom in plain words. Her ideas are deceptively simple, for every sentence reveals deeper meanings about women's experiences of life, love, and longing. In the introduction, she writes:

"Feminine spirituality is about becoming Whole. It is about containing, connecting, uniting, and bonding. It is about affirming and celebrating all living things. It is about harmonizing and balancing the masculine and feminine principles in all our lives. The Mother-god's most important lesson is that Divinity exists in everything; that all life is sacred and erotic. . . . The feminine spiritual message is perpetually revealed by the turning of the seasons, and, above all, we see our own experience of transitions and changes mimed by the moon's monthly orbit. Like the "faces" of the moon, women's own cycles, moods, and roles pantomime the ever-changing Essence of female sexual and spiritual power."

The book derives from the author's extensive life-travels as a sex therapist, astrologer, gardener and breeder of pedigreed cats. Her love of animals shows through the paintings. Her empathy for human foibles and her sympathy for Nature's caprice lends a sometimes shocking humor, combined with honest revelation, to her concept of Woman's erotic spirit. Weiss offers a broad view of sexual-spiritual merging that encompasses shadow and light, serious and playful, foolish and wise. She is less sympathetic to the prevailing male-dominated culture, however, and a strong feminist bias shows through all of her work.

Here are the names of the eight Archetypes and their corresponding masks or faces or roles, as Weiss has defined and arranged them: Mother Archetype: Mother Earth, Divine Mother, Grandmother. (New Moon) Maiden Archetype: Good Girl, Naughty Girl, Orphan. (Waxing Crescent Moon) Wild-woman Archetype: Dame Nature, Maenad-Madwoman, Whore. (First Half Moon) Muse Archetype: Clown, Star, Siren. (Gibbous Moon) Lover Archetype: Beauty Queen, Sweetheart, Vamp. (Full Moon.) Companion Archetype: Handmaiden, Mate-Wife, Sister-Friend. (Disseminating Moon.) Warrior Archetype: Heroine, Huntress, Rebel. (Second Half Moon.) Wise Woman Archetype: Mystic, Priestess, Witch-Shaman. (Balsamic Moon.)

This book is a gold mine of affirmation, self-knowledge, compassion, and pure chutzpah for women and teenage girls today. Read it and learn to like yourself better-- even those parts of you that you have denied and tried to hide. Following are a few selected passages:

"Earth remains ever the prototypical Female, recreated in the fertility cycles and bodies of all women. The bond we inherit through our physical bodies to the earth connects us to all her creatures forever. Deep in our bones, we remember our sacred earthy origins. (Mother Archetype, first face: Mother Earth, p. 16)

"The Maiden is core to all others, for she embodies the soul's dream. In her world, the magic of make-believe prevails. The freedom to explore our fantasies as children, gives us self-confidence to pursue our dreams as women. ( Maiden Archetype, p. 22)

"The Wild-woman is the animal part of us who roars, howls, snarls, screeches, with untamed primitive passion. She is the keeper of an inner bestiary, the choreographer of a psychic circus of ba