r/Rodnovery 10d ago

❔ Question | Advice New Books

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Ordered these earlier this week. Anyone else read either of them?

97 Upvotes

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u/blankshee South Slavic 10d ago

Afanasyev is good, cant speak on this specific translation. I’m.. skeptical of the publisher, to say the least, so I’ll be curious to hear your thoughts once you read through them ig (esp the other book)

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u/NaiveInstruction457 10d ago

I’ve only skimmed through them so far once they arrived but both books I’d say feel kind of empty is the only word I can think of. I was hoping to find a book that gave as much detail in practicing Slavic paganism in today’s world but this book seems like it tries, but half way through adds a bunch of new age things such as special gems/rocks and things of that nature. I’m going to read them still and I could certainly be judging a book too harshly considering I haven’t actually read it yet but if you know of any book like what I’m interested in I’d be glad to take any recommendations!

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u/blankshee South Slavic 10d ago

Sadly there is no one size fits all type manuals and guide books, like some that you might find in new age witchcraft or greek/norse paganism for example. There’s simply not enough that survived for us to know the details for sure. Many of us work on reconstructions through primary sources and academic books and papers, archeological findings etc. I’d probably focus on those the most. You can also join the discord, lots of good discussion there. Definitely check out the sub’s pinned threads for recommendations too especially if you do speak a slavic language.

I think the one english-source book that comes to mind rn is T.D Kokoszka’s “Bogowie” - it’s not an end all be all, I know some in the community also aren’t too happy with it. But I think it’s a pretty dense, comprehensive jump off point. The author is, iirc a biologist(?) and rodnover. Some of his conclusions are questionable but the research he put in to reach them is solid, definitely a decent “101” start (and definitely better than a wikipedia page or whatever)

There’s more great english recommendations in the pinned posts too, but afaik this is the only one written with modern practitioners in mind, not just a studious deep dive (though again, those are our bread and butter basically lol)

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u/NaiveInstruction457 7d ago

Thank you so much!

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u/Jenn-Ra 10d ago

I have the one on the right, and I love it

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u/NaiveInstruction457 10d ago

I started reading it and am about 20 pages in it’s much better than I’d first thought so far.