Devoting her doctorate to the subject, her research led her to join Kabbalistic orders and two Wiccan covens, during which she emphasised that she was both an "insider" (a practising occultist) and an "outsider" (an anthropological observer).

First among these was the practicing Wiccan, journalist and political activist Margot Adler in her Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America Today, published by Viking Press in 1979.

[2] Sociologist Allen Scarboro, psychologist Nancy Campbell and Wiccan literary critic Shirley Stave undertook fieldwork in the Ravenwood coven of Atlanta, Georgia, over several months across 1990 and 1991 as the basis for Living Witchcraft: A Contemporary American Coven, published by Praeger in 1994,[3] while anthropologist and Wiccan Loretta Orion investigated the Pagan movement in the East Coast and Midwest of the U.S. for Never Again the Burning Times: Paganism Revisited, published by Waveland Press in 1995.

[6] Attracted to this new religious movement, she undertook an undergraduate degree in anthropology and sociology at Goldsmiths' College, where her final year research project focused on women's spirituality.

[6] Although initially planning to gather data through formal taped interviews with participants, she rejected this method, believing it solidified her "outsider" status among the subculture she was studying.

[9] The second chapter examines the community's conceptions of the otherworld, explaining how they approach it through acts of visualisation and altered states of consciousness and their understandings of it as a realm of spiritual energy connected to dreams and the imagination.

[10] In her third chapter, Greenwood examines her experiences among London's ceremonial magicians, focusing on her training in the Hermetic Qabalah, a "magical language" for exploring the otherworld.

[14] Chapter seven deals with conceptions of morality and ethics, arguing that whereas High Magic typically envisions a dualistic world view of good versus evil, Wicca adheres to a monistic worldview in which malevolence and benevolence are seen as intrinsic parts of the whole.

Labelling it an "enormously engaging, provocative, and rich book", he notes that readers may wish that Greenwood had more explicitly presented "the antipatriarchal assumptions and their shortcomings" of Feminist Witchcraft.

"[21] Sarah M. Pike of the California State University, Chico reviewed the book for Culture and Religion: An Interdisciplinary Journal, describing it as an "accessible and personal account".

[22] Anthropologist Galina Lindquist of the University of Stockholm published a review in The Australian Journal of Anthropology, referring to Magic, Witchcraft and the Otherworld as "a welcome contribution" containing "valuable" ethnographic material.

Noting that it joins the work of anthropologists like Jeanne Favret-Saada, Paul Stoller, and E. Turner, Lindquist praises the manner in which Greenwood put contemporary practices into historical perspective, and how she illuminates the "strains and contradictions" within the magical milieu.

The first reviewer, Daniel Cohen of Wood and Water magazine, praises Greenwood's theoretical approach, claiming that she had been "braver" than Luhrmann in maintaining a "creative tension" as both an insider and outsider.

[25] The Pomegranate's second review came from Pagan studies scholar Douglas Ezzy of the University of Tasmania, who praises Greenwood's research, theoretical approach and style of writing.

He notes that her "truly ground breaking" approach in taking spiritual experiences seriously had "fascinated and thrilled" him, asserting that her work builds on the pioneering edited collection Being Changed by Jean-Guy Goulet and David E. Young.

"[26] Reviewing it for his own website, prominent chaos magician Phil Hine described Greenwood's work as "fascinating", arguing that it should interest students of anthropology as well as practising occultists.

He praises the author's descriptions of her own experiences within esoteric groups, and the manner in which she highlighted the power struggles that take place within them, before recommending it as "an engaging and thought-provoking read".