Hosts: A Dance With Books, The Book Nook, Jorie Loves A Story, Dear Geek Place, There’s Always Room For One More
Wyrd & Wonder has super interesting prompt(s) on the art of reading past, present and future by magical means. So, let me pick your brain on how to make some predictions. I could come up with 7 ways, none too dire, I hope!
Seers & Soothsayers
Too many examples out there, but really they are just born to get visions. Remember the Little Girl from Once Upon a Time? And specifically for premonitions, The Vespertine.
Tarot Cards
Hey, you could use Tarot cards to hone into that inner intuition. Tarot Cafe Manga and The Castle of Crossed Destinies both come to mind.
Time Travel
Hear me out – if you are travelling back to the past, you are the witch from the future! You can be scarily accurate – like Claire from Outlander series.
Runecasting
Everyone knows about runes. Right? Somehow I couldn’t think of examples beyond The Girl the Sea Gave Back or Eragon (where the herb-witch uses the same trick with some bones).
Scrying Pool
I find it very difficult to define this. I think… it’s something you do by peering deeply into the waters, preferably crossed by the hero. Example: Heir to Sevenwaters.
Seance
Seances can hit or miss, you never know who is a true psychic and who is just a quack. A Dreadful Splendor is a good example.
Magical Forensic Analysis
There are certain rituals that the investigating officer performs to retrace the last steps of the dead one. Strong examples are the October Daye series and The Witness for the Dead.
So, which methods or tools for predictions seemed most interesting to you? Which books made the predictive arts most believable? Let’s discuss!
3 replies on “Predicted by the Stars (or what have you)”
Awesome post! I love the idea of Witness of the Dead. But I’ve always found scrying really interesting as well.
Very clever! Of these, I have only read Outlander – loved the first three books but slowly have lost interest in the series. Too much rape or threatened rape and she has become so repetitive. I think her editors are too afraid of losing her to say she meanders.
I’ve always been partial to runes. They were also used in Stardust (Neil Gaiman). I didn’t care for that book much, but I loved the movie adaptation, and the way the runes are used in the film really hit the spot for me.