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Is it recommended as "what not to do"?

I remember reading it when I was 15 and thinking it was great, but admittedly the only other book I'd read was a short introduction to "witchcraft" by Theresa Moorey which, if anything, was filled with even MORE lies than Broomstick.

Still LIES, DAMN LIES. I particularly remember her "Only Wiccans are witches and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying or deluded" and "This ritual is called Drawing Down the Moon, it is about sucking energy from the moon and thus bonding with the Gawdess".

It's much more grown up than "Teen Witch", which I have read more recently. It's the best of Ravenfluff's books, I'd say. But it's still a load of crap. There's so much "You are a witch, aren't you AWESOME?! Those once-borns are just so blind and stupid in comparison to you, you wonderful Wiccan you!" Puke. Blah blah, Burning Tiems, blah blah, damn those Xians, blah blah, yay Angels! (lolwut?), blah blah, spells are just prayers raelly so don't be scared, blah blah, my personal morality is the same as every other witch in existance ever and if you disagree with me you are a BAD PERSON omg TEH THREEFOLD LAW!!!1! See, take all of that out and it might actually be worth a read, so long as you had a salt shaker handy. Trouble is, take all of that out and there's not all that much book left.

I suppose it's telling that it's those parts that have stayed with me and not any of the information she provided. I'm sure she went into rituals, which might be of help if you're into that sort of thing, although IIRC she gives them wholecloth and doesn't actually give you much instruction as to why you do something. You do it because that's what it says to do, essentially. I think there was a fair bit on Sabbats too which would probably be better information, but it's been too long since I last read it properly.

EL OH EL!!!

+1

I have alot of her book as refrence.... i find that some of it is accurate and a great majority is wishy washy...wicca (espcially for the solitary witch) is highly...personalized to each witch everyone has diffrent traditions and ways to do things but most of the time they are variations on traditional beliefs....but her stuff is good for..her

Yes, I've read it. Twice. The first time was several years ago when I decided to evaluate her works for myself, rather than jump in the Silver bashing bandwagon blindly. This was after I'd already been reading things by more respected authors and academic works on Paganism in general, so I already had a foundation in place from which to come at the work. I read through it and found very little wrong with it. Not if you're a reader with half of a brain and knows better than to accept anything anyone says as absolute truth, at any rate.

A second time, again, to attempt to find what was apparently so wrong with it. Still didn't see it unless I read the book with the explicit goal of finding dirt and wrongness. I haven't had to deliberately seek out wrongness in all of her works that I've read, though... "Teen Witch" had some things in it that I immediately went "WTF" at. Overall, though, I've read enough of Silver's works to come to the conclusion that she isn't anywhere near bad enough to warrant the sort of venom I often see spat in her face.

Teen Witch I would probably rate at most 1.5 stars (aka, please don't give this book to your teen if it's their first book on the Craft; it's rather bad), Broomstick 2 stars (aka, it's not a bad starter book, but there are better ones out there now, so better to look elsewhere), but Cauldron I'd probably give 3.5 stars (aka, there are some real gems in here that are definitely worth a look). Keep in mind I start with 2.5 stars as an baseline; something has to be truly extraordinary for me to even consider giving it five stars and truly abysmal to warrant none. Her works - like most authors I've read - range from being good to bad. Exactly how good or bad, useful or useless they will be to your own path... no rater can tell you that, really. I learn something from everything I read, even if what I learned was "I disagree with this and this is why."

I think at the stage you're at, Charity, you'll find it a boring read and I personally wouldn't waste time with it. Some of her anecdotes and tales can be pretty amusing though, if you enjoy her style of writing. It would be more worth the time to read Cauldron or Sacred Flame, which have grains of useful "advanced" stuff in there. I'm pretty sure Christopher recommends reading Silver so students get an idea of the variety of writers out there on the Craft, but I'd ask him directly to be sure.

Are there? I don't recall there being any particularly noteworthy exercises. But I could have missed a few gems. The book was mostly just "meh" to me. xd

I have always agree with this link:
http://wicca.timerift.net/ravenwolf.shtml

Out of all her works I think Broomstick is the best...which isn't really saying much haha!
I own 3 of her books, I can't throw them away because I feel like its a waste but I don't want to pass them onto others because I don't feel they inform a new pagan properly.
So I keep them for reference and as a reminder that not all books contain the truth.

I've compared her works a couple of times with themselves and found inconsistencies in basic knowledge. Her Teen Witch books seems to dumb a lot of stuff down. Her big brown solitary wicca book (for the new generation? I can't recall the title right now) is apparently for a more mature wiccan...naaaaar! With spells about bullying, acne and passing exams I definately beg to differ.
Broomstick is neither dumbed down or complex (like some of the info in solitary wicca). I guess you could say it was a happy medium.

I would only recommend it in terms of "This is what many people follow and adhere to in their practice. That's fine for them but if you want to really discover your pagan self read Ronald Hutton, Vivienne Crowley and etc"