Book Review: The Celestine Prophecy
Title: The Celestine Prophecy
Author: James Redfield
Reviewer: Sabrina Gould
E-mail: [email protected]
Publisher: Warner Books
ISBN: 0-446-51862-X
Book Subject: New Age, Fiction
Where it can be found: Pretty much anywhere. This book was on the bestseller list for quite a long time.
Rating: 6.5
Recommendation: Recommend to read or buy secondhand, but not to buy at full price
Reason for Recommendation/General Review: The author presents a lot of spiritual and philosophical ideas in a fictional setting. The ideas that Redfield puts forth are profound and important ideas. But I feel that it was unnecessary to use fiction as a means of presenting them.
The central themes in this book are 9 spiritual insights, and once learned, these insights will propel humanity to a new age of spiritual awareness and will create a utopian society. The insights themselves are quite brilliant and worth knowing. The essence of these insights is that all conflicts between humans are wars over energy; whether you call it chi, prana, ki, or etheric energy. The author states that humans need this energy to live, but that most people do not receive the energy that they need. Consequently, we fight with one another and play control games in order to manipulate energy, and to boost our own energy fields. People achieve this through different means, and at the expense of depleting other's energy fields.
Redfield detailed explanations of
the control dramas people use to boost their energy rings true for me. He
details four of these control dramas; the 'poor me', the Interrogator, the Aloof
Person, and the Intimidator. Poor me types use sympathy to absorb energy from
others, Interrogators ask questions and tear apart the answers to prove
themselves correct. Aloof people act mysterious and vague in order to receive
more attention, and Intimidator uses bully tactics. However, I personally
believe there are many more control tactics than just these four. He left out
the Chameleon; people who take on the traits of their friends and family to be
accepted and loved!
The main reason I recommend not buying this book is because the writing is flat,
the plot is thin, and the characters are one-dimensional. The book is hard to
get into because, frankly, the author is not the greatest writer. As well, his
ideas are stretched too thin, and the plot drags on in a predictable fashion. If
this book were shorter, or contained better characters and plot, I'd recommend
it, but it seems to me the author might have done better to make this book
non-fiction. However, it is a huge bestseller, so perhaps other people might
disagree with me, and actually want to buy it. Hey, I got my copy secondhand for
$7....but I would never have paid full US dollars. So, I recommend buying this
book secondhand or borrowing it from a friend. Or, you can run a search on the
Internet and read about the central ideas; they are not hard to find. I have
been to many sites and newsgroups where these ideas were discussed, and the book
did not really go into much more detail about them. Read the book, but don't buy
it at retail cost!
Last Updated: June 3, 2004
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