It seems that every time I go to a bookstore there is a new crystal healing book out. Here are some of my tried & tested favourites.

Illustrated Elements of Crystal Healing by Simon Lilly is an excellent book for someone starting to work with crystals. Many effective methods of using the crystals are outlined and illustrated, along with sound and practical advice for managing your energy field. If you read this book & follow the advice given you will be able to experiment safely with your crystals. This is the book I supply to my students as the core text for their Crystal Therapy Diploma studies. The Gemstone Directory at the back covers many of the most popular crystals, although the serious crystal addict will want more information.


Simon & Sue Lilly have just brought out The Essential Crystal Handbook,. This makes an excellent companion to Illustrated Elements of Crystal Healing. The photographs are clear, attractive & helpful. Crystals are organised by colour, which is handy when you have a crystal in front of you & don’t know what it is. Similar stones are listed to help you identify a crystal that may look quite like another- a very handy feature. Each crystal is discussed in terms of identification & care, magic, healing functions and practical ideas. Students and practitioners of crystal healing will find some of the technical information helpful too- including chemical composition, hardness, lustre & crystal system. This is a very neat pocket sized book, easily transported with you on crystal buying expeditions.


Better known is the best-selling Crystal Bible by Judy Hall. This is another practical guide to crystals & again its smaller than average size enables you to carry it around. Most of the information in this book can be gleaned from other guides, however having it all pulled together is useful. Stones are organised alphabetically. Often several different forms of a crystal are pictured & listed, giving for example the rough and the tumbled appearance, which is helpful. The attributes of stones are discussed, followed by their healing properties. Until Sue and Simon’s book came out this was my quick reference guide & I still use it at times.


Crystal Power, Crystal Healing by Michael Gienger is a recommended read for my students. Gienger has an interesting slant on crystal healing, grouping people by personality traits into the seven categories of crystal structure. He also includes more information on geology and chemical composition than the other books I’ve mentioned. The lovely thing about this book is the excellent photography. Each crystal is beautifully captured on black photographic plates. Gienger gives information under headings of Minerology, Mythology, Healing- which is split into the effects crystals have spiritually, emotionally, mentally & physically, and Application. He also includes chemical composition, crystal system, formation, mineral class and colours. My only bugbear is that being translated from German seems to have mixed up the alphabetical order, so that some stones are out of place, for example Emerald turns up in the middle of stones beginning with S! This isn’t really a beginner’s book, but it is great for someone wanting to extend their knowledge.


For those that tap into the most esoteric end of Crystal Healing there is the trilogy by Katrina Raphaell. These are certainly not beginner’s books and some of the information is so ‘out there’ that you need to be very open-minded to accept it. However these books contain the more mystical use and application of stones that many find fascinating. She is a particular authority on the quartz ‘Master Crystals’ which are special formations of clear quartz, believed to have specific esoteric properties.


No discussion of Crystal Healing books would be complete without reference to Melody. Her Love is in the Earth series documents an impressive number of crystals. I do look things up in here and she does cover stones that are out of the ordinary and not found in other guides. For beginners this is part of the problem- many of the stones are very rare or specific to a certain area & you are unlikely to come across them. A friend who runs a crystal shop dreads people coming in clutching a Melody book & saying, “I’ve found the perfect crystal for me,” as it is often something he has never even seen! Added to this there are no pictures in the first & most comprehensive book of the series, so you’ll have to get the pictorial supplements too, or look them up elsewhere. That said there can’t be many professional healers who don’t have Melody on their bookshelf and mine has been so well used over the years that the back cover has fallen off!