Women Mystics

With Wild Mercy, Mirabai Starr shares the subversive wisdom and fierce compassion of the feminine mystic across cultural boundaries and throughout history. From saints and sages, to goddesses and archetypal energies, to contemporary teachers and seekers - you'll meet women who blazed a path that will illuminate your own.

Journey into the lives of extraordinary women who redefined spirituality, reshaped philosophical thought, and left an indelible mark on the world of mysticism. Mystic Women offers an inspiring exploration of female visionaries whose insights and legacies continue to influence philosophy, faith, and mystical traditions around the globe.

What was life really like for women in the medieval period? How did they think about sex, death and God? Could they live independent lives? And how can we hear the stories of women from this period?

No one ever told me what to do if I ended up 40-something, divorced, and jobless. When my ex knocks at my door with his new girlfriend, I somehow manage to turn them into toads. But that's not possible, right? Still, my ex-husband's car is in the driveway, and he's nowhere to be found. Which doesn't look great for me. So I do the only rational thing I can think of...I run for it, straight back to the small town I grew up in. Mystic Hollow is exactly the way I remember it, except now it seems that everything I thought was normal and boring is supernatural.

Bethany Parker finally feels at home. With a found family of fellow supernatural outcasts, the fifty-year-old divorcée starts to believe she can make peace with her past. But when the vampire she freed receives a visit from his former partner-in-crime, she discovers she's not the only one running from trouble. Threatened with death by the new arrival unless she retrieves a magical artifact, Bethany plots to thwart the bloodsucker's trap. But even with the help of her level-headed medium friend and loyal talking cat, the recently awakened mystic fears she won't master her powers in time.

Is there a Christian spirituality that embraces the entire reality of womanhood? The answer, Shannon K. Evans suggests, is an emphatic yes. There is a spirituality that meets us in every part of our lives, developed by the women who came before us. Six mystics—Teresa of Ávila, Margery Kempe, Hildegard of Bingen, Julian of Norwich, Catherine of Siena, and Thérèse of Lisieux—revealed a faith big enough to hold the female experiences of sex and desire, the yearning for bodily autonomy, the challenges of motherhood and identity, as well as life with male authority and—sometimes—violence.

After years of living in fear, Amanda Banning has left her husband and moved for a fresh start with her six-year-old daughter. Jeb Sterling has no idea why he feels so compelled to help Amanda and her daughter when a cold snap leaves them temporarily homeless. Amanda seems to have given up on her dreams, but Jeb refuses to quit until he makes her every wish come true....

The Swedish painter Hilma af Klint (1862-1944) was forty-four years old when she broke with the academic tradition in which she had been trained to produce a body of radical, abstract works the likes of which had never been seen before. Today, it is widely accepted that af Klint was one of the earliest abstract academic painters in Europe. But this is only part of her story. Not only was she a working female artist, she was also an avowed clairvoyant and mystic.

While in Bath preparing for her upcoming marriage to Lord Darkefell, Lady Anne learns of a profoundly accurate mystic working in town whose uncanny predictions have stunned the gullible and the skeptical alike. Certain there's a harmless rational explanation for the medium's supposed otherworldly abilities, Anne's tolerance turns to defiance when the seer's dark pronouncements begin having a decidedly harmful affect on her friends - and a troubled local vicar takes his own life.

A community of quirky, mismatched, and endearing women struggle to find meaning and purpose on a ramshackle monastery in upstate New York. Having spent their lives in service to a church that seems to no longer serve them, they are confused about their own futures and the future of the entire monastery.

Aly’s got enough on her plate, with finishing her degree and taking care of her nephew and starting her new job at the antique store while drooling over the owner's gorgeous son. No time for visions. Alas, the universe doesn't care what Aly believes. When she turns 21, she starts to feel psychic impressions left on objects. A disorienting power for someone surrounded by antiques.

People’s timeless captivation with those supposedly endowed with supernatural powers - these gifted individuals oftentimes regarded as gods walking among everyone else - is a fascinating phenomenon in itself. Soothsayers and clairvoyants were particularly revered in past centuries, even by royals, nobles, and other influential figures, who placed oracles, mediums, and mystics in their retinues and sought counsel from them on a regular basis.

From the beautiful apsaras of Hindu myth to the swan maidens of European fairy tales, stories of flying women - some carried by wings, others by clouds, rainbows, floating scarves, and flying horses - reveal the perennial fascination with and ambivalence about female power and sexuality. In Women Who Fly, Serinity Young examines the motif of the flying woman as it appears in a wide variety of cultures and historical periods, in legends, myths, rituals, sacred narratives, and artistic productions.

With her ghostly client unable to remember who did him in, April is forced into the role of supernatural detective. Assisted by her spectral ex, a magical secret agent, and an overcaffeinated talking cat, she finds herself in hot water when the clue trail reveals an escaped demon. And if she can’t get control of her own recently awakened power, the next murder she has to solve may be her own.

There's nothing practical about magic—which is why I ditched my wand years ago. Thirteen years, to be exact. The day I left Silverlake. Except now, a family emergency has called me back home, and quite frankly, I'd rather be anywhere but here. But when my aunt raises her wand to cure a friend and he ends up dead, it becomes abundantly clear I'm not leaving anytime soon.

Witchy barista April Storm is fighting to get her new coffee roaster up to snuff while keeping her quaint Welsh community’s magic under wraps. So when two hikers stumble upon a corpse, she races in with her supernatural abilities to bring things to a swift close. But she’s certain trouble is percolating in her precious pixie town when the body and its spirit suddenly go up in steam.

When retired postmaster Albert Schumer is found dead on the steps of the post office, the whole town of Mystic Notch is disappointed he won’t be able to play in the annual checkers tournament. But when his ghost informs middle-aged bookstore owner Willa Chance that he died trying to deliver an old letter, which has mysteriously gone missing, Willa realizes Albert didn’t just slip and fall. Someone killed him. Even worse, it turns out the letter contains a list of ingredients for a spell that could wreak havoc on Mystic Notch if it falls into the wrong hands.

Middle-aged bookstore owner Willa Chance is looking forward to the opportunity of appraising a valuable private library that hasn't seen the light of day for 50 years...until she finds a dead body in the backyard and the ghost of the home's previous owner anxiously waiting for her inside.

When a string of robberies escalates to murder, Willa is baffled by the behavior of her sister, the county sheriff. Normally the gung-ho lawwoman would be all over the case, but she seems more interested in doing her nails and picking out jazz music instead. Willa has no choice but to take it upon herself to investigate. After all, her sister’s reputation is at stake, and a killer is running loose around town. Plus she has a secret weapon - she can see ghosts. Talking to the spirit of a murder victim usually helps solve the case, but not this time.

Barista April Storm longs for more than making a mean macchiato and talking to her ex-boyfriend’s ghost. So when her quirky Aunt Rose asks her to help open a hip café in the rural area near the Welsh and English border, she jumps at the chance to start fresh. Little does she know what lies in store for her when spirits begin to arrive, asking for help in solving their murders. Assisted by her spectral ex, a magical secret agent, and a talking cat named Punkin, she finds herself in hot water time after time. Can April serve up justice before a brewing disaster boils over?