BOOK OF MOONS

You'd think occultists would be able to keep track of their gear, but as Changing coven member Bast (known to the uninitiate as graphic artist Karen Hightower) circulates from coven to coven preparatory to the Ecumenpicnic celebrated on May Day, she keeps hearing that witch after witch—her friend Glitter, statuesque Xharina, the sleazy bookstore Snake's all-purpose priestess Lorelli Lee—has each lost her copy of the Book of Shadows. Could the multiple vanishings be coincidental? Not a chance—especially when Changing wannabe Ned Skelton, a part-time clerk at grande dame Ilona Saunders's occult bookstore, interrupts the Ecumenpicnic to announce that he's found a copy of the Book of Moons that proves Mary Stuart, no less, was a practitioner of Wicca. Ned's announcement is shouted and laughed down by skeptical witches who assume his Book of Moons is only the latest in a series of frauds and forgeries. But Bast stops laughing when Ilona is found murdered, and Ned, after just enough time to leave a suspicious parcel with Bast and swear her to secrecy, follows apace. Bast (Speak Daggers to Her, 1994) makes an attractively hardheaded guide to the community of New York's estimated 10,000 witches. But if you're reading to find out whodunit, you can knock off 50 pages early.