Those interested in attending a sesshin will find Landrum’s book useful, though the tight focus on the author’s individual...
Landrum, a woman well-practiced in helping others overcome difficulty and achieve success, offers her insights into the Japanese practice of sesshin through her personal journal.
To one unfamiliar with the practice of sesshin, this book at first appears to contain a misspelling. But Landrum, a behavioral health therapist, quickly clears that up, explaining the type of extended meditation involved in and encompassed by a sesshin. She then explains her purpose with this book—to demonstrate, through giving an account of her experience, what a sesshin is, specifically for those who may be interested in attending one. She then details her experience with a weeklong sesshin among California’s redwoods, during which she spent most of her time in meditation with a group. While Landrum’s details are fascinating and very specifically re-create her experience, it’s occasionally hard to tell if the book is targeted at outside readers with a general interest in the practice of sesshin or whether the details of Landrum’s experience are overly personal. Some of the information she gives, while important to her experience, would not necessarily be applicable to the majority of sesshin attendees. For instance, near the end of the week, Landrum struggles with the way one of the group leaders tries to control her and she ends up not attending most of the remaining group times. This is certainly key to her personal journey through the sesshin, but would probably not happen to most attendees. Some readers might wish Landrum’s journal had undergone another edit, so that she could share information relevant to a sesshin without airing personal issues. However, the details Landrum gives are not embarrassing and do not qualify as over-sharing, just potentially uninteresting to those in search of facts about attending a sesshin. But as the documentation of one individual’s experience within the practice of a sesshin, Landrum’s story nicely demonstrates the journey a soul can make through such a unique undertaking.
Those interested in attending a sesshin will find Landrum’s book useful, though the tight focus on the author’s individual experience may be too specific for general application.Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2011
ISBN: 978-1456846664
Page Count: 54
Publisher: Xlibris
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Afraid of the dark? Don't worry, this anemic collection of vampiriana is more likely to put you to sleep than to add to your wakefulness. Novelist, veteran chronicler of the macabre, and consultant to Francis Ford Coppola's film version of Dracula, Wolf (The Glass Mountain, 1993, etc.) returns to some very familiar haunts. In fact, he seems to be fast running out of new things to say, citing his prior work at least 40 times. For the rest, it's a lot of bloodless flapdoodle and flapping about, an if-it's-Tuesday-it- must-be-Nosferatu quickie tour of all the obvious highlights of vampire lore and legend: first off, a discourse on blood, then on to Dracula's historical ``inspiration,'' the psychopathic Vlad the Impaler. Next, we hurry through a history of the gothic novel, a pocket bio of Bram Stoker, and a bite-size synopsis of his Dracula. Finally, we review modern films and fiction (Anne Rice ad nauseam) with vampire themes. Yet Wolf is an intelligent observer and competent writer, and he does occasionally tap into an interesting vein. For instance, he shrewdly analyzes how radically vampirism's mythopoeic import has changed with the times. In Stoker's era, it was all about sexual anxiety. In the '60s, America became the great vampire, sucking up helpless Vietnam's lifeblood. Then, in the '90s, the vampire as eros and thanatos is symbolically entwined with AIDS. More along these lines, more diversion, deeper thought, would have been welcome. This is not a book for connoisseurs, experts, or even dilettantes. Only, perhaps, as a Dracula 101 introduction for the uninitiated does it really work. (30 b&w photos, 4 line drawings, not seen)
Pub Date: April 18, 1997
ISBN: 0-553-06907-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Broadway
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The ethnobotanist co-author of Psilocybin: The Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide (not reviewed) puts forth the theory that magic mushrooms are the original ``tree of knowledge'' and that the general lack of psychedelic exploration is leading Western society toward eventual collapse or destruction—controversial statements, to say the least, though the argument's details often prove fascinating. In the beginning, McKenna tells us, there were protohumans with small brains and plenty of genetic competition, and what eventually separated the men from the apes was an enthusiasm for the hallucinogenic mushrooms that grew on the feces of local cattle. Claiming that psilocybin in the hominid diet would have enhanced eyesight, sexual enjoyment, and language ability and would have thereby placed the mushroom-eaters in the front lines of genetic evolution—eventually leading to hallucinogen-ingesting shamanistic societies, the ancient Minoan culture, and some Amazonian tribes today—McKenna also asserts that the same drugs are now outlawed in the US because of their corrosive effect on our male-dominated, antispiritual society. Unconsciously craving the vehicles by which our ancestors expanded their imaginations and found meaning in their lives, he says, we feast on feeble substitutes: coffee, sugar, and chocolate, which reinforce competition and aggressiveness; tobacco, which destroys our bodies; alcohol, whose abuse leads to male violence and female degradation; TV, which deadens our senses; and the synthetics—heroin, cocaine and their variations—which leave us victimized by our own addiction. On the other hand, argues McKenna, magic mushrooms, used in a spiritually enlightened, ritual manner, can open the door to greater consciousness and further the course of human evolution- -legalization of all drugs therefore is, he says, an urgent necessity. Provocative words—often captivating, but not often convincing.
Pub Date: Feb. 17, 1992
ISBN: 0-553-07868-2
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1991
BOOK REVIEW
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