The Hungry Sea: A Novel

I’ve always loved stories within stories, and The Hungry Sea is a container of many stories, stories both old and new, of this world and of other worlds, stories that shatter, and ones that repair.

In this novel, you will meet Tess, a shaman unable to transcend her own human nightmare, Miles, an autistic child grappling with a world he finds uncomfortable, and Olivia, a woman lost in her own longing. You will meet Declan, a boy observing what happens in the wake of his own death, Lionel, an aging man with dementia and countless regrets, Owen, a father who is raising a child he knows is not his own, and Martin, another father grieving for a child he will never be able to claim.  There are stories of fateful compromise and of unreconcilable shame.  But there are also stories of unexpected triumph and ones of long-awaited forgiveness.

I have been a lover and a teller of the ancient Celtic tales for many years.  They hold for me such truth and insight into the human condition—a subject that has always fascinated me.  In this book, the tales appear at orchestrated moments, almost like characters unto themselves, settling into the larger story in gentle counterpoint, as if reaching out with compassion and understanding to the troubled humans, roaming the novel, so beleaguered and puzzled by their lives.

In my work as a practitioner, I have found that the shamanic journey can often provide with its healing story that same counterpoint, that new way of seeing and being.  And that’s why the shamanic journey is also a character in The Hungry Sea, giving us its own point of view, its own wisdom.

Stories are alchemical.  They are meant to change us, in both subtle and dramatic ways.  I hope you will find solace, understanding, and even challenge in this book.  As you learn more about the lives of others—whether real or fictitious—you will no doubt come to understand yourself so much better.