The Valkyries

This is soon becoming a traveling tradition for me; I pick a new book either before I leave or when I get to my destination by Paulo Coelho. My selection for my next trip is The Valkyries, let me tell you that it wasn’t easy to select just one book because I also wanted to read The Witch of Portobello. But I guess the theme of this one is what I’m looking for right now. Here is the review from Amazon.com:

From Booklist
There is enough interest in angels to ensure this peculiar little book a significant audience. It traces a spiritual journey of sorts, stereotypically cast as a journey into the desert, that embodies a New Age conception of liberation as liberation from the past in confrontation with oneself. The “ritual that demolishes rituals,” which is the climax of the book, is all done with mirrors. As Simone de Beauvoir would note, the “mirrors” are women–and that calls into question both the “newness” of the story and the “age” it heralds. But it is a strange tale many will find compelling. Steve Schroeder –

Excerpt from the backcover:
A powerful exploration of one man’s battle with self-doubt and fear.
“this true-life odyssey is at once a modern-day adventure story and a poignant message about letting go of the past and believing in the future.”

If you have read this book please share with me your thoughts on it, but don’t tell me the ending though.

Paulo, you are traveling with me one more time. I hope you don’t mind.

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Clary Lopez, author of Simplicity, Richness of Life

Traveling with Books

One of the things I dislike the most from traveling is the task to choose the books I’m taking with me. I have a huge collection of permanent books in my library and a selection of books I want to read. It’s too hard to part from them.

When I travel I take in consideration the time and place I’m going and how much time I think I’ll have to read. Of course I can’t forget that I have also need to be writing this blog, an e-zine and my next book. Unlike my last trip when I took a bunch of books with me,this time I will choose only 4-5 books. I will try to keep the size compact and the themes varied; non-fiction, fiction and mystery. I’m also bringing the latest magazines I received. I guess you can call me a read-a-holic.

If you travel with books I want to know about it.

What are you taking with you and how do you select your books?

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Clary Lopez, author of Simplicity, Richness of Life

BookHomestead.com, my Book Review Store

One of my dreams is to have my own bookstore but as you can imagine the cost to have a storefront is staggering, something I’m not looking forward to have to pay for. I love to be around writers and book lovers in general. Off and online interaction is very important to me.

I’ve been helping authors for a while and it has been a very good experience. I enjoy looking for ways to get the word out about their works and mine. We are not competing but building up strength as we work together towards the same goal; to reach our audience.

I created my own bookstore online, BookHomestead.com, and as I promote it and find more authors and readers to visit on a daily basis I feel alive. My goal is that this site becomes the bridge between readers and writers. Most of our services are free so I’m needing not only the authors but my friends to help me promote the site.

Yesterday I received a box full of bookmarks for the site. I’m willing to mail some to anyone who would like to help me promote the site in their own town. You can give the bookmarks away, place them at the library, bookstores, small shops, anywhere where people stop by a counter top and can take one. If you are interested please e-mail me your mailing address and I’ll be glad to send you some.

You can send your address to services@bookhomestead.com

If you haven’t already, please visit the site. We have a new Featured Author. Don’t miss it!

http://bookhomestead.com

Comments: (From another blog)

DOC (… it would be my pleasure! I’ll send you my address… and I hope to someday have MY book in your store! (if you’ll sell photo books) I have one I’m starting for my family for a x-mas present, but I’m liking how it’s coming out. I may just send you one to get your opinion… because coming from you, well, I would really love hearing what you have to say…good or bad, I would! HUGS!

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 09:00am (EDT)

GG - … It’ll be my pleasure DOC

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 09:19am (EDT)

i’m on my way… Flavi told you of my book project?

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 10:52am (EDT)

GG - … Tell me about your book project Kayak.

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 12:32pm (EDT)

[dele… Oh Wow, I'll do a write up on this for you for sure and post it this week Clary, I would love to help you promote it.

Also, I know you sent a msg about a “group” and I will get to it as soon as I can, I haven’t forgotten.

Also, have you check out Yahoo! Mash yet? It requires by email invitation, so if you would like to check it out let me know by sending me a msg with your email address. I won’t give your email address away, it is confidential between you and I so no worries.

I look forward to checking out your new site here too but it’ll have to be tomorrow. Tonight I am going to bed super early, I’m already tired.

Congratulations! I am thrilled for you, it’s another exciting journey ahead for you, love it!

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 03:42pm (PDT)

♥Ana’… visited BookHomestead.com and it’s nice. I pray that all your heart’s desire will come true soon.
Keep on inspiring others as others inspire you… God bless you richly!

Wednesday September 26, 2007 - 11:21am (CST)

Sherr… Would love to pass out your bookmarks, always willing to help out a fellow business.
I also always dreamed of a bookstore but have settled so far with a household and decor on-line store with a friend. One day…

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 11:33pm (EDT)

Doc I am an avid reader and will be very happy to assist you. Walter Mosley is my favorite writer by the way. I will be in touch.

Tuesday September 25, 2007 - 11:44pm (PDT)

Deant… This is a wonderful idea. Your passion for the written word is inspiring.

Wednesday September 26, 2007 - 11:14am (EDT)

Photo… Clary, I have many poems to go through and clean up and decide which one to compile. There are two-hundred plus that are just sitting here on my hard drive. Everyone wants me to compile them into a book. I know nothing about this and what to do, so if I ever get one compiled, I’m thinking along the line of calling it “Beautiful Woman”. It would be very much a pleasure to hand it over to you for your new site Again I know nothing About compiling one to send to you!

Good luck with this…I know you will do well.

Love Ya!

20th Anniversary of The Alchemist

Congratulations Paulo on this important anniversary. The Alchemist continues to be the book everyone should read. I can’t thank you enough for having written this book.

Here is a repost I did on the book some time ago.

Paulo Coelho Blog

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

Click the picture to buy the book

This is one of my all time favorite books; I’ve read it three times and bought copies to give away to my family and friends. I bought the Spanish version while I was visiting my parents in Puerto Rico. It truly is a great book to get you to think about what your dreams really mean in your life and how far they can take you on your earthly journey. It also helps you to listen to your heart and follow your dreams. I was surprised at the end of this fable story. Hope you take the time to read it.

You can read The Alchemist for free here, while you wait for your print copy.

In here Paulo answer questions from his readers about the book.

What Book Am I?

You’re Mrs. Dalloway!
by Virginia Woolf
Your life seems utterly bland and normal to the casual observer, but
inside you are churning with a million tensions and worries. The company you surround
yourself with may be shallow, but their effects upon your reality are tremendously deep.
To stay above water, you must try to act like nothing’s wrong, but you know that the
truth is catching up with you. You’re not crazy, you’re just a little unwell. But no
doctor can help you now.

Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

This was fun, what do you think? Am I that book?

A New Earth’s Christian Option

There is a hunger for enlightment and spirituality today, it’s a growing trend helping people to finally find time for themselves and their soul in order to find balance and peace within.

I volunteer at my local library once a week and I found Lift Up Your Heart among the books that needed to be put back on the shelf. I’m always on the lookout for a few good books to take home with me. Since the sections I worked are the non-fiction I get plenty of time to -while working- see what’s new and available.

This book was first published in 1950 and Fulton Sheen was way ahead in his way of thinking. He speaks of the ego and the I, the ego being that which we think or pretend we are and the I as our true self. The ego is a conformist, it is adjusted to its times; the I has attained inner freedom, through transcendence of the wordly. In order to reveal the I we need to shed our ego.

The popularity that A New Earth gained thanks to Oprah’s promotion has been impressive. Not only did she promoted the book but she sponsored a whole new online study on this book which many around the world are taking part of, Christians included. Many are calling it Oprah’s church, but I don’t believe that’s her intention. She always like to share what she believes is good according to “her understanding.” Unfortunately the impact this class will have will be one of people believing they depend on themselves and not God.

If you know of any other good Christian books that could interest those who are reading A New Earth please share them here.

The Quest for an Authentic Life

I found a little gem of a book called Beachcombing at Miramar; The Quest for an Authentic Life, it didn’t take me long to read it and soon after I found myself re-reading again. Today I took it from the bookshelf, this time is completely highlighted and I just thumbed through some key passages. “Once we possess another creature, we alter forever the inherent nature of that creature.” The only person we truly possess is ourself, it is our duty to know, develop and share our nature with others.

In my life trajectory so far I have been a daughter, a friend, a girlfriend, a wife, and a mother. Some of these relationships put me on a rite of passage; a life transition. Transitions are never easy, it involves recreating and shedding parts of our former life in order to make room for the new and that can be painful at times. It’s a renewal of the mind, an awakening of the soul. I would say that among all the different transitions one of the most important is the one we go through to live an authentic life. Life is not worth living if we are not living our truth, we become truly lifeless.

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Clary Lopez, author of Simplicity, Richness of Life

Oprah’s Church? What Do You Believe?

Oprah has been for me a person who demonstrated that we can accomplish a lot in life, even against the odds. I watch her show every week and I’m a subscriber of her monthly magazine, but one thing I’ve learned in life is to KNOW WHAT I BELIEVE. I won’t judge her because she is acting according to what she knows about her faith at this point, only God has the right to judge on this matter. There is a lot of different teachings, faiths, beliefs out there and we can’t blame this or the other for the loss of our faith. When life doesn’t go exactly as we thought it should we can’t blame the media, books, people, music etc. Yes, the media have a tremendous influence in our way of thinking but it is ultimately US who by our ignorance are driven into situations of this magnitude.

When I heard the announcement for this class something told me it wasn’t right. I tried to listen to the first class but technical difficulties didn’t let me finish it. I thought about listening to it later after it was posted on her site. Then I went to the store and saw the book displayed and stop to look through it, I could tell right away it didn’t go with my Christian belief. By reading a blog review of the book I found out it had Budhist ideas integrated into it, called it Budhism 101 written into a more easy to understand terms.

I’m not trying to condone the bad influence some communication mediums are doing to believers in general but what I would like to do is put responsability back on the shoulders of those who know about Jesus and what he is about. He came personally to teach us how to live and how to gain eternal life, if we choose to believe something else or listen to others than the witnesses of his teachings we are entitled to do so, but we are also entitled to the consequences.

As Christians what we are called to do is to continue to grow in the knowledge of our faith and share it with others. Each individual in turn will respond to the message or not. It is our responsability to share it to the best of our ability and move on, but we are also called to defend it. We can’t force anyone to believe on what we believe but we have the right to hold fast to our faith.

I believe that many people are driving to all of this kind of thinking because their spirit is hungry. We have starved our spiritual life to such a degree that we don’t even know what it is anymore. My belief is that we were created by God and that is who our soul yearns for. If we only take care of our body and not the soul sooner or later we feel that something is missing and it is.

Faith is a personal choice and we are ultimately responsible for our own life and what we do with it. All we can do is live it to best of our knowledge and ability, expose our belief along the way and guide those who are willing to listen.

We need to pick our battles and this one is one we need to trust God to conquer with the life of Christians as testimony. What’s your opinion?

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Clary Lopez, author of Simplicity, Richness of Life

Die Living, Not Dead

“And death is possibly the most important thing. We are all walking towards death, but we never know when death will touch us and it is our duty, therefore, to look around us, to be grateful for each minute. But we should also be grateful to death, because it makes us think about the importance of each decision we take, or fail to take; it makes us stop doing anything that keeps us stuck in the category of the “living dead” and, instead, urges us to risk everything, to bet everything on those things we always dreamed of doing, because, whether we like it or not, the angel of death is waiting for us.”– Paulo Coelho

What is life supposed to be? Mere existence or a sum of experiences fully lived? I wonder as we somehow get from living each and every moment to navigating on autopilot through life. When did all of this happen and why? Life is not static, it evolves and changes and sometimes those changes are not welcomed or accepted. Familiarity and comfort is regarded with stability but there comes a time when we may not feel that way anymore. I guess our outlook changes the moment we face death. Dying is such a final state even to those of us who believe in resurrection that it makes us dig deep within ourself. In order to rise to eternal life we must experience death, the same goes when we are to experience a necessary transformation in our life, something has to die inside of us in order to be re-born. We know a transformation is necessary because there is a nagging sense of pain and sorrow within we can’t shake off from our soul. The more we resist it the more it hurts.

These periods of our life have been called many things but my favorite so far is Dark Nights of the Soul, Thomas Moore wrote a book with that title and as I read it I identify to all that I’m feeling at this moment. I don’t agree with everything he writes but the core of the matter is there and I can relate. I was studying St. John of the Cross writings months before I came to this stage in my life and in a way I see it as the prelude to a great transformation of mind and spirit in order to connect fully to what God had in mind for my life.

This is a short passage from Dark Nights of the Soul:

Your dark night is preparing you to be yourself. It is reenacting your birth as a person. It is offering you an alternative to absorption in your manipulative culture.

Your dark night is forcing you to consider alternatives. It is taking you out of the active life of submission to alien goals and purposes. It is offering you your own approach to life. You can sit with it and consider who you are and who you want to be. you can be fortified by it to stand strong in your very existence. You can be born again, not into and ideology that needs your surrender, but into yourself, your uniqueness, your God-given reality, the life destined for you.

The question now is if we are going to let our life to evolve and be transformed or if we are going to continue to hide behind our fears and begin to die inside? It takes courage to move on to an unknown path but it is ultimately a matter of life or death of our own spirit.

Brida

I was reading Paulo Coelho’s Blog and found out about his new book, Brida. The theme was interesting and in tune to what many women go through at different stages in their life. It has to do with finding out who she (Brida) is among other things, something I am questioning in my own life and I’m sure many other women are as well.

Here is the sypnosis from Amazon:

The spellbinding new novel from one of the world’s best-loved authors, Paulo Coelho, recounting the story of Brida, and her pursuit of wisdom. This is the story of Brida, a young Irish girl, and her quest for knowledge. She has long been interested in various aspects of magic, but is searching for something more. Her search leads her to people of great wisdom, who begin to teach her about the world. Her teachers sense that Brida has a gift, but cannot tell what that is. Meanwhile, Brida pursues her course ever deeper into the mysteries of life, seeking to answer questions about who she is. She meets a wise man who dwells in a forest, and teaches her about overcoming her fears and trusting in the goodness of the world, and a woman who teaches her how to dance to the music of the world, and how to pray to the moon. She seeks her destiny, as she struggles to find a balance between her relationships and her desire to become a witch. This enthralling novel incorporates themes fans of Paulo will love. It is a tale of love, passion, mystery and spirituality.

I went ahead and pre-order the Spanish version due in April, I can’t wait. I just finished reading The Zahir and I really enjoyed it. It is about love and obsession. Right now I’m reading Veronika Decides to Die. Paulo always write about what is so common to all of us as human beings, there is a new important universal theme in each one of his books. He says he writes to understand himself but in the process he reveals human nature to the core and the great need to keep it linked to the spiritual. I always find nuggets of wisdom sprinkled in all of his books and some of them are deeper than others.

If you get a chance go ahead and check his books, I am sure you won’t be disappointed.

Thank you Paulo for writing the way you do.