Dreaming of the Nile is a novel about a woman’s spiritual quest to find meaning in her life. Leila Martin, a thirtysomething journalist living in Los Angeles, is suffering from a chronic case of fatigue and depression. Having exhausted medical possibilities, she embarks on a spiritual search in an attempt to cure her malaise. After attending a powerful sweat lodge she has a dream about a woman in Ancient Egypt called Hathor. Over the next few months, Leila learns about the life of women in Ancient Egypt and how spiritual beliefs were woven into the fabric of everyday life, and gradually this strengthens her. But all is not rosy, and difficulties in Hathor’s world have a powerful effect on Leila’s life as she observes from another time and place. Leila’s concerns for Hathor deepen her need to understand what is going on, and she is drawn into a romantic entanglement that may or may not turn out to be good for her.

Author’s Note: I wrote Dreaming of the Nile in the mid 1990′s, following a series of dreams that had begun in 1989 as I was recovering from an illness contracted in Nepal. I made a few attempts to interest publishers at the time without success, and then gave up on it to focus on my non-fiction writing. The book languished in a drawer for fifteen years until my connection to the work mysteriously woke up and I realized I should publish it myself. There are still too few books that map the inner journey of transformation and how it connects to spiritual experience. There is also precious little out there on the relationship between physical energy and spiritual life.

In publishing the novel now, I faced the usual temptation to mess with one’s older work from the vantage point of what one knows now. But I resisted this and barely revised it. I value the work as it emerged at that time, and the integrity of who I was when I was writing it.

Buying the Book: You can buy Dreaming of the Nile at most of the online retailers; you can ask your local bookstore to order it; you can buy it directly from Lulu; or you can order a signed copy from me. The price is £9.99 or $15.68. The e-book is available for immediate download from Lulu.com for £4.99.