Jonas and the Mountain

Book excerpt: More than an unusual love story, Jonas and the Mountain offers startling insights into the nature of reality. An enlightened eastern mystic. A western psychic who knows everything. And a broken man who falls in love with them both at a holy, magnetic mountain in India. This is a journey into the heart of it all.Jonas has been living a half-life since he lost his marriage, his college English teaching position, and his best friend all at once. Then he hears a voice in his head, and strange poems start to just come to him. These events lead him away from his home in Vancouver, Canada, to the holy mountain of Arunachala in India, where Jonas meets the American guru D whose master was the sage of nondualism, Ramana Maharshi. From D he learns about silence and waking up from the dream. After Jonas's retreat with D ends, he meets an oddly familiar woman and discovers a connection with her that explains the voice and poems and opens up yet another reality. Anamika's unique metaphysical teachings differ from D's-multiple dimensions, partner selves, creativity-and she offers simple expressive arts exercises to bring them home to the characters in the novel and to you, the reader. Jonas seeks to reconcile D's and Anamika's knowledge to find what is true with a capital "T," as he struggles to resolve the pain in his past and the surprising ways it appears in his present.You are invited to journey with Jonas and find your own answers.