Fiction is another word for escape.
It can take the reader to another world, providing the imagination with the tools to paint a picture of exquisite beauty, nightmarish horror or anything in between.
It's almost magic, really. Within a few pages, a good author can make characters seem like people you've known for ages. In just a few chapters, decades of time can pass and yet you feel as though you've been with them through all of it.
Yes, I just mentioned pages and chapters. I did it because, to me, books are the ultimate "delivery system" for storytelling. Just like smoking is the delivery system for nicotine, books are the delivery system (and a much healthier one, at that) for the high that comes from finishing a satisfying story. It's why the book is always better than the movie.
Like many fans of the arts, be it dancing or singing, sketching or storytelling, sometimes I can be so inspired by what I see as to try my own hand at it. Watching the movie "Strictly Ballroom" inspired me to try ballroom dancing. I've been told that you are always supposed to find a least one positive from any experience you've had. In the case of ballroom dance, I learned that I could save a lot of time and frustration by not doing it.
Same with singing. My daughter has a beautiful voice. I guess it must skip a generation. My positive? Trying to sing with little success made me appreciate my daughter's gift that much more.
It's the same with trying to write The Great American Novel. When I read the works of some of the really great authors of our time I think, "I could never write like that."
But one thing I can do is draw cartoons. I also like to tell jokes, even write my own (with mixed results). And I love to tell stories. Not a novel or even a novella. Just light entertainment that can be enjoyed for what it is.
I decided to challenge myself to put my strengths together and create something. For me, drawing, jokes and storytelling added up to writing a comic. I wanted it to be light and funny, with likeable characters in outrageous circumstances; just like the old Looney Toons characters that inspired me to start drawing when I was a pre-schooler.
Then I set out to draw Fish Tank. It's the story of three aquarium fish (one of which is a super-genius) and their adventures. It taught me that it takes a lot of work to make a story flow. An effortless cartoon, one that tells a story and is funny in all the right places, is actually quite a chore to create. But I love to create them and the results made the work that much more rewarding.
For the first time in my artistic exploits, I finally feel like I've put together something that I can be proud of, something I can share with you.
If you'd like to learn more about Fish Tank, even look over some free samples of the eBooks, you can go to my website at http://fishtankcartoon.wordpress.com. There is even a complete story there that you can read. Give it a try. It's fun!
Maybe it's not a steak, but sometimes a little piece of chocolate can be satisfying, too!
My novel, Lifting The Wheel Of Karma, is a profound spiritual journey of extraordinary healing and redemption, but it is also a modern tale that harkens back to the myths of antiquity, which is what I think makes it distinctive. It is also why I believe it is relevant to readers, because it taps into the mythical dimension that resonates deep within the collective unconscious of us all.
Our lives are permeated and guided by forces that are beyond our control, forces more powerful than us, and very often with designs not of our choosing that will challenge and test us physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
My novel is the story of Joseph Connell, a gifted high school athlete from Montana, loved deeply by his family, yet tormented by nightmarish visions he can neither explain nor escape.
He believes the answer to what threatens to crush him can be found in the knowledge possessed by a mystical old wise man, who lives deep within the remote Himalayas of India.
If Joseph is ever to find the peace he so desperately seeks, he must get this wise old man to reveal what he truly knows, but that will not be easy...for this sage knows far more than he truly admits.
I started writing my debut novel, Lifting the Wheel of Karma, 25 years ago while still in high school. It took so long to complete because I tried repeatedly to abandon it, but the work refused to be forsaken. Eventually I realized that sharing this story with the world was, in fact, my Dharma –my duty in life.
Along the way I have worked as a Wall Street financial analyst, a waiter (not a very good one), a Hollywood Agent Trainee, a real estate developer, a summer day camp director, an award winning screenwriter, and independent filmmaker—including my autobiographical film, “A Life Unfinished,” which screened in The Hamptons International Film Festival.
Please visit my author’s website at: www.Paulhmagid.com
Lifting the Wheel of Karma is available at Amazon
Pilgrimage of Love
Author: Anaiya Aon Prakasha
Paperback: 502 pages
Publisher: lulu.com (August 4, 2011)
Amazon Link
Note: I received this book free from the author PR company, Mindbuck Media. The review posted below is based on my personal thoughts while reading the book.
Ratings:
★ ★ ★
My thoughts:
Pilgrimage of Love tells the story of Scarlett O'Shea, that at the age of 38, she is still searching for her true "Beloved". I liked the idea of "soul mates" or meeting "the one". However, I don't agree with some of the life lessons presented in this book and also some ideas on how to meet your "beloved" - like literally searching for "that one". I don't know, looking back at my past, maybe I was afraid to search for "him" because I simply don't want to be disappointed if things don't turn out right.
It was an interesting book to read, I actually enjoyed reading the first 200+ pages of the book but after that, I was already skimming because the story has long narrative paragraphs with very little dialogue. It makes the story hard to read and follow. Overall, I think this would be best enjoyed by those who are still "searching", a good book I can recommend to readers who are into reading reflections on love and life.
About the book:
A Tale of Romance, Heartbreak
and finding “The One”
by Anaiya Sophia
Does “The One” truly exist?
This is the question that Scarlett O’Shea attempts to answer in this passionate, inspiring, and life-changing story of finding her Beloved. As she travels around the world calling in “The One”, an orchestra of events is set in motion that brings about their destined meeting. Along the way, she discovers that her Beloved (who is an well-known International “spiritual” teacher) is far more demanding than her international celebrity yoga lifestyle could have ever imagined. With flames licking at her heels, he invites Scarlett to leave her old life behind so she can fulfill her desire to know what happens when you say“Yes!”tolove,no matter what the cost!
Ride the twists and turns of this rollercoaster in this hilarious, irresistibly romantic, and soulful journey. Pilgrimage of Love is a tale that will have you believing in love all over again.
Anaiya Sophia’s quest to truly know love started when she was twelve years old after she “met” her Guardian Angel on the steps of the Sacre Coeur in Paris. This destined meeting set her on a journey of love that included fifteen years of teaching Kundalini Yoga and writing books such as Open Your Heart with Kundalini Yoga and Womb Wisdom – Awakening the creative and forgotten powers of the feminine. Pilgrimage of Love is based on her own adventure into the spirit of love. Anaiya has been featured in magazine and newspapers such as Kindred Spirit, Spirit and Destiny, The Telegraph and The Guardian, as well as in numerous TV and radio shows. Her passion lies in re-awakening the power of love within others and working with the spirit of sexuality to heal, make whole, and rebirth women and men worldwide. She spends her love-filled life in London, England.
About the author:
“If you chose to be with me, you must risk finding yourself”….
Anaiya is the author of Pilgrimage to Love: A Tale of Romance, Heartbreak and Meeting The One and the creator of Sacred Reunion, Pathway of the Beloved, Awakening Soulful Sexuality, three 40-Day transformative processes based on her own experiences of stepping ever closer to the Beloved, retrieving Lost Will and healing sexuality. She is also a qualified Kundalini Yoga Teacher, public speaker and the co-author of Womb Wisdom: Awakening the Forgotten and Creative Powers of the Feminine and Open your Heart with Kundalini Yoga.
This website and all the work here is dedicated to the longing you feel within you to love without measure, and to experience that Divine yearning with your partner(s). To take this Sacred Mystery and to embody its rapture with your everyday lives. My desire is to experience and to know what Rumi and Shams lived, and to then share and support you all to do the same. I know that this Love is not the privilege of the Saints, Sufi’s and Mystical Beloveds bound by text and legend. This Love is waiting for us all to say “Yes” and to mean it with our every breath as we lay down our lives at its feet…
