New Book Finished - Hurrah!

People of the Great Journey, the book I was born to write, is finished. It's an adult fairy tale, a work of "spiritual fiction," the book I have most enjoyed writing in my life to date. I also think it is the kind of book that you curl up with in an armchair by the fire, for a delicious read. The final scene is set by moonlight at the Callanish Stones, as shown here in this beautiful image. (Found it on the web, but haven't been able to find it again since so can't credit photographer. Apologies! If it's yours, let me know and I'll add your name here.)

Voyage Of The Dawn Treader

Can't wait to see this! This was one of my favourite books, even as CS Lewis was and is my most favourite author since childhood. Here's a hilarious hing. The author meant his books to introduce or reinforce Christianity in children, but I entirely missed the point, probably because I was being brought up Roman Catholic! (Loud laugh.)

Orm the Barmaid

I wrote two pieces for the magical GreenMan Review a few years back and they've been reprinted in its companion blogspot called Sleeping Headhog. You can read the first piece here: http://sleepinghedgehog.com/edibles/orm-as-gmr-barkeep-part-1/ and the second piece here: http://sleepinghedgehog.com/edibles/orm-as-gmr-barkeep-part-2. It's not easy serving non-alcoholic drinks to bad fairies, cluricauns and headless horsemen. Worst of all though, are one's fellow fantasy writers ... very demanding!

The Celtic Warrior Princess

Well, it was a no brainer - the title change. Only a short way into the edit of the first book in my new series I realised that the word"princess" is loaded with all kinds of implicit notions like sophistication, manners, restrained emotion and good behaviour which couldn't be further from the character of my tempermental barbarian wild child, Fenora. Just add one word to "princess" - i.e. "warrior" - and all those notions go right out the casement window. Language is a virus, as William Burroughs once commented. Words are signifiers - was that Foucault? Derrida? well, all those semiotic/semiology types - and they come loaded with cultural layers of what is being signified. This gal is not a prissy princess. Far from it. Oh and go visit my new Facebook page for The Celtic Warrior Princess - www.facebook.com and search "Celtic" and click if you like. She's just up new. (Image: (c) James Brady, Ireland)

To be Shee or Sidhe? That is the Question

Here's a delightful all-woman Celtic folk and trad band called "The Shee." I found them on youtube when I was googling "Shee" as the antiquarian spelling for the "Sidhe" or fairy folk. I'm thinking of using this spelling in The Celtic Princess because, let's face it, the average non-Irish-language-speaking person would not in a million years know that you pronounce "Sidhe" as "Shee." And don't be annoyin' me, ye purists. J.M. Synge himself used that spelling.

Eckhart Tolle's Ego

Someone gave me A New Earth to read when I was walking in darkness earlier this year. Parts of the book spoke to me and I began to realise it was because those parts were bowdlerised Buddhism. His own theories such as the'pain body' struck me as nothing short of absurd. My biggest objection would be his presentation of the ego as something akin to demonic, a tormented flaw of the mind. In my experience, the ego is a child - an easily frightened one - and yes, if let run rampant can certainly behave demonically even as a child can; but, like a child, it needs a firm and gentle hand, compassion and understanding, reassurance and guidance. It is not the enemy. It is that part of consciousness which allows us to navigate material existence and it needs to be both strong and flexible to face the 'slings and arrows' of life. The other thing that strikes me about Tolle (aside from the fact that I find him creepy) is the amount of money he is making while supposedly awakening the world. Of course one has a right to earn a living but he has already made millions, why does he need to keep making more? For example, why charge for his online television? If he really wants to help people awaken, why not allow them to view the television free? And when he is speaking, why does he not insist that his promoters provide a certain amount of cheap seats for people on low incomes? Do they not need to awaken also? Mother Amma does not charge at all for her hugs and darshan, yet she raises huge amounts of money for hospitals, schools, charities and so on. I have a name for certain New Age gurus like Tolle and all those shark-teethed smooth-talkers of The Secret. Remember the commercial salesmen who used to cross America in wagons selling magical elixirs that cured everything? Snake oil merchants.

Eat, Pray, Love - the Movie

Read this book last year. My sister Pat gave it to me. There was no point passing it on to my women friends as they had all already read it! So now I'm just back from seeing the film to which I brought my friend Sherron for her birthday present. I've put the book cover here instead of either of the trailers as, quite frankly, both of them nearly put me off the movie! It's as if they went out of their way to find the few times Julia Roberts was not convincing as Liz Gilbert, the author. I'm also glad I ignored the critics and the general word on the street which claimed the film was rubbish and didn't have the depth of the book. (I've sworn off all film criticism after I was convinced not to go to Avatar and then bought the DVD and discovered what I had missed.) Anyhoo, contrary to the lousy trailers and the word on the street, the film is FANTASTIC and I would highly recommend it. As far as I'm concerned, it is very true to the book and has the same emotional and spiritual depth as well as the same gorgeous feast for the senses in terms of food, fun, frolic and luscious scenery.