I am the book club's hostess for January as well as the author of the month. We will be reading my novel, Numenon: A Tale of Mysticism & Money. I'm going to set out some introductory material and outline some of the questions/issues I'd like to see us discuss in the coming weeks.
Before I talk about my book, I'd like to tell you my goals for the month. First, I'd like to develop a feeling of community and warmth that will flow into the Book Club's coming months. I'd like us to get to know each other and have a good time together. I'd like us to learn from each other. I'd like to get a different understanding of my book from you.
My primary intention is that we should have fun reading Numenon. If you don't want to follow the schedule I set out below, forget it. Same with the questions. Don't answer them unless you want to. If you think of other issues or questions, bring them up. This is a time to hang out and examine a very unusual story.
I want to hear from you, too. Would you please tell us a bit about yourself as we begin? What's your background? What attracted you to the book club? Add anything that you care to share.
WHERE DO YOU BUY NUMENON? A number of places. I've got a surprise in point one below: How to get Numenon free.
⁃ I've arranged for you to get an eBook of Numenon free through Smashwords. Go to the book's Smashwords page. Use the coupon code LV94U when you check out and the book will be free. The coupon is good through January 19th, and I can extended the date if people want me to. I believe Smashwords makes books available in almost every eBook format.
⁃ If you'd like a print version, you can buy Numenon here: http://numenon.com This is the gorgeous hardback book that won all the awards. It was originally $24.95. We're selling it for $9.50 plus shipping. I will inscribe the book any way you like, just note what you'd like me to say in the message at checkout.
⁃ Numenon is also available as an Amazon Kindle for 99 cents. And it's available as a hardback on Amazon at a bit more than we charge. (We make almost nothing on the hardback when its purchased through Amazon, by the way.)
Also––I am not a Jungian analyst or professor; I won't be leading this discussion as an academic or psychotherapist. I am an an author. I've got a fairly deep understanding of myself and the writing craft. Both halves of my brain have been educated: I hold Master's degrees in economics and counseling.
ABOUT ME:
If you've got a few minutes, the interview that Bonnie Bright and I did and which is linked here is the best introduction to me and my work. If you don't have time to listen to it, I'll give you a (relatively) short run-through here:
I was born in San Francisco. at the end of WWII. My father, a first generation immigrant, founded and owned what was the 10th largest residential construction company in the USA in its heyday. I grew up on San Francisco's Peninsula, in the heart of what came to be known as Silicon Valley.
Those were intoxicating years. Not only was I surrounded by the cutting edge of corporate culture, I had my father sitting in the family room. That was like having Secretariat parked on the front lawn. I learned about extremely successful people from my father and his friends. They moved at light speed and were more directed and effective than any people I've met since. Mine was a heady and thrilling existence, quite addictive. When I write about the upper end of Silicon Valley society, I do it partially from my own experience.
When I was eighteen, a drunk driver killed my father and my charmed life vanished overnight. I set about defining myself. How I could define myself was limited. Business was the only life-path my father approved. Even though he had passed on, his influence on my psyche was enormous. I majored in economics. I earned two degrees in the subject and worked as an economist for years. I was a doctoral student at Stanford's Graduate School of Business.
I left that program, but ended up working for the professor who taught Negotiation and Intervention at the Graduate School of Business. I coached negotiation and active listening with his students a few days a year for twenty years. That was a blast. As a result, I have an abiding love for MBA (Master's in Business Administration) students and MBAs. And negotiation. This shows in Numenon.
I left Stanford and started moving in a direction that better fed my soul. While working as an economist, I earned an MA in MFCC from Santa Clara University. There I learned about Jungian psychology and the transpersonal psychologies. Roberto Assagioli's Psychosynthesis fit my personal experience better than any other theory. Assagioli's egg diagram was almost a snapshot of my inner life. I've had unitive and other spiritual experiences since I was a young child. My first transcendent experiences occurred when I was a young teenager riding my horse through the redwoods of the Coast Range. I began a meditation practice in 1975 which accelerated and strengthened my spiritual development.
Years passed; jobs and professions along with them. In 1993, had a personal crisis which shattered what I thought about myself and my world. I was devastated. I spent from 1993 to 1995 putting myself back together.
Two major events happened in 1995. I went to a meditation retreat. After that retreat, I had a mystical experience which lead to Numenon and my other work. This is described in the Author's Note in Numenon and in my interview with Bonnie Bright. I also I started writing with a writing group led by a local poet. Those events changed my life.
When I wrote Numenon, I was dealing with PTSD and trauma-related issues. The book has a darkness that reflects my interior state. I was also trying to get my arms around what had happened to me and explain the nature of evil. Be aware of this as you read.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
You can learn pretty much everything about Numenon through this link to my web site. The linked page offers a synopsis, information about the book's awards, reviews, an excerpt, a physical description of the book and more.
The book's "personal history" may be of interest to you. Numenon was released in 2008; it's been around for a while. Being the book's author has been thrilling. Numenon is my first novel; my second book. We entered it in a couple of book contests as an ARC (advance reading copy). It won the visionary fiction and religious fiction categories in those contests. I entered it in more contests after it was released. It ended up winning four more national awards.
I'm particularly pleased with the Silver Nautilus Award for Indigenous/Multicultural Fiction. The Nautilus Award was established to recognize books that promote spiritual growth, positive social change, and conscious living. Previous Nautilus winners include Thich Nnat Hanh and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Winning the Silver Medal in the IPPYs (Independent Press) Awards was also exciting. The IPPYs are the oldest and largest contest for independent presses. About 4,000 books were entered that year.
As a Kindle book on Amazon, Numenon jumped to the front of books about mysticism, ranking #1 in three categories of mysticism and hovering about the 1,000th level in Kindle sales ranking (out of, say, 900,000 books). It's an Amazon Bestselling book. Numenon also garnered five star reviews for years.
I'm not telling you this to brag: it's a cautionary tale. I didn't realize how extraordinary Numenon's performance was. It kept it's #1 position in mysticism for about a year with absolutely no promotion on my part. I became complacent, expecting the wave to continue forever. This was a mistake. I wish I'd taken a screen shot of its Amazon page when it was at it's peak.
Numenon has dropped in the rankings, but it's the same book with the same heart that was ranked #1.
TIMING:
The book has 448 pages. If we divide the reading evenly over the month, that would mean reading 112 pages per week. If we do that, we should be on page 112 on January 7th, 224 on the 14th, 336 by the 21st and finish by the 28th.
Don't feel bound by this, if you want to read ahead, please do. But, if you read ahead, please don't ask questions in the reading group that reveal content that other group members haven't reached. You can message me privately if you want to talk about something.
QUESTIONS/DISCUSSION POINTS:
Don't wreck your experience of reading the book by trying to answer these questions while you read. Let the answers and your viewpoints rise to the surface as you absorb the text. Numenon is a piece of art and a gestalt, not material for a quiz.
SOME QUESTIONS:
Compare & contrast Will Duane and Grandfather's psychological development. These are two very successful men in radically different fields. How did they end up so different?
Will Duane's psychic structure. What Jungian concepts do you see manifesting themselves in the book's first chapter? Subsequent chapters?
How would you diagnose Will?
Grandfather has had horribly traumatic things happen to him. How did he come out so well?
How would you diagnose him?
Two shamans exist in Numenon: Grandfather and Great-grandfather. How do they strike you?
ADDITIONAL MATERIALS:
Numenon brings up a wealth of issues highly relevant to our contemporary society. The following add greatly to our understanding of the book and what's going on around us.
Recommended reading/viewing:
"Inside Job", the Academy Award Winning documentary film produced, written and directed by Charles Ferguson. I believe that this film, which documents the causes of the 2008 financial crises, generated the "Occupy Wallstreet (and everywhere else)" movement.
The film clearly illustrates how our financial markets caused their own collapse because of greed and lack of discipline and morality. It makes complicated economic concepts easy to understand by use of graphics. It also illustrates the culture of the upper financial echelon, which is of interest to us as we study Numenon corporation.
My character Will Duane isn't based on a real person. He's a composite, partially my dad, partially people in the news. And partially my neighbors. I lived in the Town of Woodside, bedroom to Silicon Valley's finest, for fourteen years. People like Will Duane were all around me.
When I wrote Will and his lifestyle, I thought I was absolutely over-the-top in describing his behavior in every direction. "Inside Job" shows that I under-wrote the character. In all likelihood, Will would have been more flamboyant, ruthless, and immoral than I show him.
The Hypomanic Edge: The Link Between (A Little) Craziness and (A Lot of) Success in America by John D. Gartner PhD. This illuminating book explains a lot about Silicon Valley and its "movers and shakers". I'll bring it up in subsequent weeks.
Well, that should be enough to get us going. Let me know what you think/feel about the book and what I've written above.
And enjoy Numenon. One of the reviewers called it ". . . an amazing trip into two worlds."
Have a good trip! I'll be checking in often––feel welcome to come and hang out. I've got more material for the coming weeks . . .
Sandy Nathan
Replies
Hi, Ed! Great to hear from you! You offer deep insights into the characters. I'm going to let everyone finish this week's session and then start really pitching in myself tomorrow afternoon–-Saturday the 7th.
So, now's the time to read, folks. Or––if you don't feel like reading, just know I'll be discussing whatever questions people send me in depth starting tomorrow.
Ed––re: Will. The guy's a mess. He's been severely physically and emotionally abused, and who knows what else? He's not only functioned with these handicaps, but he's triumphed. Or at least triumphed within the system that his dad set up, and he bought into. But he's cracking. He's becoming agoraphobic, as is clear as he drives away from his house in the first chapters.He's falling apart.
More to come . . .
I did know someone like Grandfather. He died in 1982. An Indian meditation master. Changed my life completely. He's the model for Grandfather, though my teacher wouldn't sound like GF or do the things he does.
OK...So: question. Why the heck did Grandfather have to spend his entire evening-before-the-Meeting reviewing computer-generated surveys? I gotta say, I was really annoyed. But he "had to," right? I'm sure Sandy can answer this---but instead, how about everybody else who is new to this and just read that part. What on earth is the point? Why do you think things unfolded this way instead of allowing him to eat his dinner, prepare his medicine, and spend time with the People? Seems so WRONG....
[Hint: The answer starts on page 92, Bonnie and all. And keeps unfolding in subsequent chapters. Remember that Grandfather does only what the Great One and his Ancestors tell him, no matter how much he may dislike it personally.]
Page 92... there is synchronicity for me! I am also reading a book called the Templar Revelation. On page 92 it talks about how the Crusaders are being pulled to the other side - to the Cathars - even though they know they will suffer a horrific death. I was reminded of this while reading Numenon when various staff members began crying, drinking, acting out because something wasn't right with them. They knew what they were told was wrong and that Will was someone they had to no longer follow. "Just one more time and then I am out" was the theme that stuck with me for a few pages in Numenon... Oh our precious Psyches.
We know, don't we? The issue is following what we know. (Hi, Leigh!)
Yes --- I enjoyed his reaction to being told by the ancestors to put on a "seminar"!!!
Yes, I had the same sort of reaction :)
Hi everyone. I'm wondering how everyone is doing on the reading. I had thought it would be a little hard to get to, but I have to say I'm still so compelled. I usually pick up the book last thing at night thinking I'll just read a page or two and I have, so far, ended up completing a chapter each time I do that.
On some level, I'm just enjoying it and don't really have "questions" per se--just curiosities here and there. I love how it's unfolding. But--it would be great to start digging in a little more and hearing from people so we can feel more connected. Maybe if you're reading this, you could just chime in (either respond to this or to Sandy's initial post) and say where you are in the process or how you feel about it--even if you're still on page 1.
Remember, there's no right and no wrong--and no obligation to even like it, though it's hard for me at least not to find certain things I like, of course. If you have a comment, no doubt someone else will appreciate reading it because it will resonate with them--or else they will appreciate it because it gives them something new to think about because it offers a new angle.
So--what's up everyone? Where are you in the process? How are you? Have you met Grandfather yet, and what do you think? I have a whole perspective on that--but will offer it up in a separate post....
I'm beginning to really get my teeth into these characters and their dualities. Will is a fascinating character, and in for more than he realises. Grandfather is even more fascinating and I am really loving the way he is such a spiritual "giant" but still struggles with anger issues. That gives me hope :)
(Or at least that's how it appears to me. Of course, Grandfather's anger in response to what has happened is entirely appropriate. I guess it's just interesting to me to see it because so often anger is not dealt with in spirituality, or people are expected to not have any at all. It is edifying that he has it, and on thinking further while I'm writing this I'd say that it's not at ALL that he struggles with anger issues, as I wrote in that first paragraph, but that his anger is referred to at all, that has captivated me. I guess that's my own stuff coming out - dealing with just how much anger and fury I've been carrying around all my life and learning to let it go :)
And Grandfather couldn't live with his wife. It was his anger that drove her away. He's very highly developed spiritually, but not perfect. His love of and allegiance to the Great One is what carries him to the heights and gives him his power. That and surrender. At each turning point in his life, he turns toward the light and gets the reward. I love Grandfather.
When I was writing the bit about Grandfather and Paul Running Bird and his performance evaluations, I cracked up. I have no idea where that came from, but it fits the situation perfectly: the Numenon folks on the way, Paul's ambitions, and exactly what would drive Grandfather nuts. He has other faults, too, which show up more at the end of Numenon's sequel. (Which I'm rewriting as fast as I can.)
Will is such a bundle of contradictions. I love him, too, because I can see what he's fighting against and what happened to him. What would he be like if he had a more normal upbringing?Would he have flown so high?
Will is a fixture in my inner life and will be for quite a while. The sequel to my set far in the future, pre-nuclear holocaust, sci-fi/fantasy, The Angel & the Brown-eyed Boy, is just about to go to the printers. The sequel, Lady Grace, follows The Angel, beginning "when the radiation clears." Lady Grace features a bunch of characters from Numenon––Will, Bud Creeman, and Wesley Silverhorse––who morph there from 2015. Eighteen years after Numenon.
I've got Will rattling around in my head for all those years. I'm working on a fourth book in the series, set in 2023. Will's a big player in that. He's battered and transformed and still the same.
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