Astrologers can expect questions about conception and pregnancy from time to time. I’ve always been fascinated by this topic as the outcomes so often highlight the fine line between fate and free will, though helping clients facing heartbreaking infertility issues can be a challenge.

Nicola Smuts-Allsop, an astrologer from South Africa, has focused her practice on this area and shares her work with us in Fertility Astrology: A Modern Medieval Textbook. The subtitle is apt, as Nicola utilizes her own combination of both ancient and contemporary techniques for predictive and electional matters, along with mythology and psychology, to work with western medical fertility interventions such as in vitro fertilization.

Smuts-Allsop is an earnest and thorough astrologer, and she has developed a wide and unusual array of techniques to help her clients conceive. These include identifying an Almutem of Pregnancy as well as its triplicity rulers, which she assigns to the three phases of a woman’s reproductive life. Fertility myths can help in counseling. Fixed star parans may actually indicate different places in the world that can be more fertile. Profections, Solar Arcs, Solar Returns and transits will identify a person’s most fertile times. Ebertin’s mid-points help determine both medical issues and timing.

With first-rate research, the book is densely packed with information, and Nicola shares her background and sources. She has chosen not to make this a “cookbook,” but rest assured that the final third of the book includes an overview of her techniques, fertility signatures and a glossary.

This is a sophisticated book for practicing astrologers with a particular interest in astrological fertility. I’ve read about and studied most of the methods presented, but even so, this engrossing work is one that demands much attention from the reader. Fertility Astrology includes in-depth analyses of five would-be parents’ horoscopes and four shorter ones, most of whom eventually conceived. You’re sure to pick up a new technique (or several) to help your clients.

Buy at Amazon.com: Fertility Astrology: A Modern Medieval Textbook