Labyrinth A Mythic Journey

Two brothers travel through stories that define their lives - from a fairy tale to a future world. One is tying to evade his past while the other is trying to confront it. Emotional and historical memories merge as they journey through a labyrinth of different times, places and characters...

Although The Tin Drum has often been called one of the great novels of the 20th century, most critics have been baffled in attempting to draw its apparent chaos into a single literary framework. Here is the full-length study to penetrate the brilliance of Gunter Grass's style and uncover the novel's mythopoetic core. In A Mythic Journey: Gunter Grass's Tin Drum, author Edward Diller convincingly demonstrates the still valid relationship between modern and classical literary criticism. By reading The Tin Drum as both modern myth and historical epic, he provides a profound and sensitive interpretation of one of the masterpieces of 20th century literature.

Energy Psychology presents a comprehensive approach to healing that combines leading-edge Western bodymind psychological methods with a broad system of ancient, sacred traditions. Incorporating Dr. Mayer's integral approach called Bodymind Healing Psychotherapy, Energy Psychology draws on Chinese medicine approaches, including Qigong and acupressure self-touch; kabalistic processes; methods drawn from ancient traditions of meditation and postural initiation; and psycho-mythological storytelling techniques.Drawing on thirty years of training in Tai Chi and Qigong, Dr. Michael Mayer shows how integrating the essences of these traditions and methods can restore vitality and give the average person self-healing tools for physical and mental health. Unlike the quick-fix books on energy restoration, this book uses timetested, age-old practices from sacred traditions in combination with well-established clinical approaches. Dr. Mayer teaches readers bodymind healing methods to treat anxiety, chronic pain, addictions, hypertension, insomnia, trauma, and other prevalent conditions. Written in a clear, intelligible style, Energy Psychology includes real-life case studies that highlight the effectiveness of his techniques.

Award-winning editor Paula Guran presents a diverse reprint anthology collecting classic myths and legends, retold by today’s top fantasy writers. The Native American trickster Coyote . . . the snake-haired Greek Gorgon Medusa, whose gaze turned men to stone . . . Kaggen, creator of the San peoples of Africa . . . the Holy Grail of Arthurian legend . . . Freyja, the Norse goddess of love and beauty . . . Ys, the mythical sunken city once built on the coast of France . . . Ragnarok, the myth of a world destroyed and reborn . . . Jason and the Argonauts, sailing in search of the Golden Fleece . . . Myths and legends are the oldest of stories, part of our collective consciousness, and the source from which all fiction flows. Full of magic, supernatural powers, monsters, heroes, epic journeys, strange worlds, and vast imagination, they are fantasies so compelling we want to believe them true. This new anthology compiles some of the best modern short mythic retellings and reinvention of legend from award-winning and bestselling authors, acclaimed storytellers, and exciting new talent, offering readers new ways to interpret and understand the world. Adventure with us on these Mythic Journeys . . . TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction: A Map or Maybe Not “Lost Lake” – Emma Straub and Peter Straub “White Lines on a Green Field” – Catherynne M. Valente “Trickster” – Steven Barnes and Tananarive Due “Our Talons Can Crush Galaxies” – Brooke Bolander “A Memory of Wind” – Rachel Swirsky “Leda” – M. Rickert “Chivalry” – Neil Gaiman “The God of Au” – Ann Leckie “Faint Voices, Increasingly Desperate” – Anya Johanna DeNiro “Ogres of East Africa” – Sofia Samatar “Ys” – Aliette de Bodard “The Gorgon” – Tanith Lee “Merlin Dreams in the Mondream Wood” – Charles de Lint “Calypso in Berlin” – Elizabeth Hand “Seeds” – Lisa L. Hannett and Angela Slatter “Wonder-Worker-of-the-World” – Nisi Shawl “Thesea and Astaurius” – Priya Sharma “Foxfire, Foxfire” – Yoon Ha Lee “Owl vs. the Neighborhood Watch” – Darcie Little Badger “How to Survive an Epic Journey” – Tansy Rayner Roberts “Simargl and the Rowan Tree” – Ekaterina Sedia “The Ten Suns” – Ken Liu “Armless Maidens of the American West” – Genevieve Valentine “Give Her Honey When You Hear Her Scream” – Maria Dahvana Headley “Zhyuin” – John Shirley “Immortal Snake” – Rachel Pollack “A Wolf in Iceland Is the Child of a Lie” – Sonya Taaffe About the Authors About the Editor Acknowledgements

In Crete during World War II, Alenka, a young woman who fights with the resistance against the brutal Nazi occupation, finds herself caught between her traitor of a brother and the man she loves, an undercover agent working for the Allies. May 1941. German paratroopers launch a blitzkrieg from the air against Crete. They are met with fierce defiance, the Greeks fighting back with daggers, pitchforks, and kitchen knives. During the bloody eleven-day battle, Alenka, a young Greek woman, saves the lives of two Australian soldiers. Jack and Teddy are childhood friends who joined up together to see the world. Both men fall in love with Alenka. They are forced to retreat with the tattered remains of the Allied forces over the towering White Mountains. Both are among the seven thousand Allied soldiers left behind in the desperate evacuation from Crete’s storm-lashed southern coast. Alenka hides Jack and Teddy at great risk to herself. Her brother Axel is a Nazi sympathizer and collaborator and spies on her movements. As Crete suffers under the Nazi jackboot, Alenka is drawn into an intense triangle of conflicting emotions with Jack and Teddy. Their friendship suffers under the strain of months of hiding and their rivalry for her love. Together, they join the resistance and fight to free the island, but all three will find themselves tested to their limits. Alenka must choose whom to trust and whom to love and, in the end, whom to save.

Scott Russell Sanders reveals how the pressure of the sacred breaks through the surfaces of ordinary life-a life devoted to grown-up children and aging parents, the craft of writing, and the natural world. Whether writing to his daughter and his son as each prepares to get married, or describing an encounter with a red-tailed hawk in whose form he glimpses his dead father, or praising the disciplines of writing and carpentry and teaching, Sanders registers, in finely tuned prose, the force of spirit.

Myth and Meaning in Early Daoism examines some of the earliest texts associated with the Daoist tradition (primarily the Daode jing, Zhuangzi, and Huainanzi) from the outlook of the comparative history of religions and finds a kind of thematic and soteriological unity rooted in the mythological symbolism of hundun, the primal chaos being and principle that is foundational for the philosophy and practice of the Dao as creatio continua in cosmic, social, and individual life. Dedicated to the proposition that ancient Chinese texts and traditions are often best understood from a broad interdisciplinary and interpretive perspective, this work when it was written challenged many prevailing conceptions of the Daode jing and Zhuangzi as primarily philosophical texts without any religious significance or affinity with the later sectarian traditions. While controversial and at times playfully provocative, the methodology and findings of this book are still important for the ongoing scholarship about Daoism in China and the world.

Her journey of recovery from bipolar disorder and her insights are described in this book, an autobiography of Carol Noyes. When Carol went through mid-life crisis in the spring of 2006 her world was turned upside-down. Carol was able to wean herself off drugs, after over four years on psychiatric medications. She found natural alternatives that effectively helped her to recover and to lead a productive life. Carol believes that the current medical paradigm is inadequate and often unable to help individuals to heal and to bounce back. Carol nearly died from a combination of the swine flu and lithium poisoning. Her descent to the bottom of the metaphorical well provided the impetus for her to research non-drug therapies. These therapies, along with faith, hope, and courage, brought Carol back to a peaceful life. Carol recounts her life and investigates the factors that precipitated imbalance. She writes about her extraordinary experiences during expanded states of consciousness. She also delves into the world of symbols and mythologies, describing how they became poignant for her. Carol calls her experience a time of spiritual awakening; a time of developing self-esteem, learning to love herself, and finding her true purpose. She hopes that her insights will help others going through spiritual crisis. Those interested in humanistic psychology, personal growth, and spirituality may find this book fascinating.