The Portal

by Sharon Pape

The Portal by Sharon Pape released on Apr 22, 1994 is available now for purchase.

250 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published May 1, 1994

About the author

I started writing stories as soon as I learned how to put letters together to form words. From that day forward, writing has been a part of my life whether it was my first attempt at a novel in seventh grade or the little plays I wrote for my friends to perform for neighbors and family. After college, when I was busy teaching French and Spanish to high school students, I was also writing poetry -- often in French.

After several years, I left teaching to be a full time mom, and when my two children started school, I went back to writing. To my delight I found that the muse was still there, still waiting patiently for me to come around. My first novel, Ghostfire, was published at that time. It went on to be condensed in Redbook magazine (the first paperback original the magazine had ever condensed.) Then came The God Children and The Portal. Redbook also published my first short story, which was subsequently sold to several foreign magazines. With two great kids, a golden retriever and a loving, supportive husband (whom I'd met at the beach when I was fourteen -- but that's a story for another day), I felt like I was exactly where I was meant to be in my life. But fate had another plan for me, and it went by the name of "breast cancer."

Looking back, I realize how fortunate I was that the cancer was discovered at such an early stage, but at the time it was all very overwhelming. Once I was back on my feet, I wanted to help other women who were newly diagnosed, worried and afraid. I became a Reach to Recovery volunteer for the American Cancer Society and went on to run the program for Nassau and Suffolk Counties on Long Island. A number of years later, with the help of my surgical oncologist and two other volunteers, I started Lean On Me, a nonprofit organization that provides peer support and information to breast cancer patients. When Lean On Me celebrated its tenth anniversary it no longer required as much of my time, and I once again found myself free to pursue my first love -- writing.

Reviews

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it! It's an old book I got from my mother but it's staying on my bookshelf for future reading!

[Savannah · Rating 1 out of 5]

"The wind that rumbled through the canyon sounded angrier than usual; in the distance a coyote howled in counterpoint. No other noise intruded on the stillness of the cave. Even so, she was certain that the Indian* was back. She felt his presence."
*Note: this is from the first paragraph of the book. I'm not joking when I say that it hits the ground running with the outdated nomenclature.

Coming hot off the heels of DNFing my previous two Paranormal Romance picks - disheartened and rapidly losing steam in continuing on in this challenge, honestly - I really wanted to make sure I didn't just skim over my next read. So was it the best idea to pick up one of the examples that, from even the back cover material, I could already tell was going to be a bit of a racist dumpster fire? Well, as it turns out, yes.

It was a stereotyping, hodge-podge scrapbook attempt at cobbling together a bare minimum of compelling details about archeology, Native American history, and the sheerest veneer of romance. It frequently used language that is now considered offensive terminology within the Native American community, it took no pains to meaningfully develop any of the background characters beyond cardboard cutouts and preserved no sense of humanity beyond rote characteristics, and its plot hinged on a tired destined-soulmate premise that robbed the narrative of any deeper meaning and nuance.

But like driving past a car accident, I just couldn't look away. Both the questionable Native American shaman hero and fresh-out-of-her-doctorate-program heroine were deeply unlikeable from just a lack-of-personality sense, and routinely made what can only be summarized as a relentless and interminable volley of bad decisions, and yet it somehow found not just enough even ground to pass as what could not only be described as a "romantic story," but also as more compelling than a book about King Arthur the vampire mage and the werewolf race created to stop him (Master of Wolves, by Angela Knight, which I DNF'd right before attempting this).

The ending/ solution was bizarrely contrived, and never fully explained. Motivations for multiple characters were simply left up to general interpretation, rather than have personal connections noticeably develop at all. Almost all believability the reader had to buy into in order to allow the story to progress, relied on threadbare and severely stereotyped characters and antiquated views of Native American life and culture. Without the "stoic native" trope, this book would not exist, as that made up the personality for not just one, but several of its main characters.

And here's what also just drove me batty: they ruminated for hundreds of pages - HUNDREDS of pages - about whether it was possible for someone to exist on one plane, and then be transported to another. How can he possibly move so fast, seem as if he exists in multiple places at once, vanish without a trace, and then invade her dreams with images of a place that she's never seen before?

The title of the book is The Portal. It's a freaking portal. And yet, they do not come to grips with this idea until about 75 to 80% of the way through the novel.

[Shauna · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Silhouette Shadows are a hit or miss with me, usually a miss. I sludge through, drawn to the whatever-ness of the 90's. I think I have one more of these on my shelf from a library sale, after that I think I am done for awhile.