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White Bird
Story:
Thomas lands bewildered in Kathmandu, to find a place to scatter the ashes of his older brother Paul, who was a Peace Corps volunteer decades before in Nepal.
He meets an American cohort of Paul’s and her parents who work with Tibetan refugees. Helen stayed and became a Buddhist nun. His visit prompts the surprising revelation that Paul is the father of her daughter. The girl, Eike, grew up in Kathmandu and became an unlikely Buddhist shaman, or healer.
His encounter with them is awkward but his mother in Seattle is thrilled. She is a Lithuanian refugee of World War II and lost her heritage. He finds echoes of his family’s history in the plight of Tibetan refugees.
While spending time to get to know Paul’s daughter, Thomas dabbles in meditation and Tantric sex, flirts with Helen, and loses the ashes. They almost lose Eike when she goes into ritual trance to guide her father out of bardo, the state between death and rebirth.
He and the other characters are connected by the death and transmigration of Paul’s soul, the “white bird” that ties them together. Without knowing it, Thomas has followed a practice for grieving suggested in the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
Thomas lands bewildered in Kathmandu, to find a place to scatter the ashes of his older brother Paul, who was a Peace Corps volunteer decades before in Nepal.
He meets an American cohort of Paul’s and her parents who work with Tibetan refugees. Helen stayed and became a Buddhist nun. His visit prompts the surprising revelation that Paul is the father of her daughter. The girl, Eike, grew up in Kathmandu and became an unlikely Buddhist shaman, or healer.
His encounter with them is awkward but his mother in Seattle is thrilled. She is a Lithuanian refugee of World War II and lost her heritage. He finds echoes of his family’s history in the plight of Tibetan refugees.
While spending time to get to know Paul’s daughter, Thomas dabbles in meditation and Tantric sex, flirts with Helen, and loses the ashes. They almost lose Eike when she goes into ritual trance to guide her father out of bardo, the state between death and rebirth.
He and the other characters are connected by the death and transmigration of Paul’s soul, the “white bird” that ties them together. Without knowing it, Thomas has followed a practice for grieving suggested in the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
- GenresFiction
271 pages, Paperback
First published August 11, 2014
2 people are currently reading
386 people want to read
About the author
Ruta Sevo
12 books34 followersSee my website for all my books, available as ebooks and paperbacks.
We read to enter the realities of other people. We want to feel their emotions and hear their secrets. We want to know what really happened; what was under the surface. My fiction will probably involve foreign travel, spirituality, and finding yourself.
A couple of principles guide my writing. First, we all want to break out of conventional and routine life. The proper surfaces of life are often hiding truths and secrets. Most of us wish we were more free and did things that we couldn’t because they were not permitted, or we didn’t have the money, or we didn’t have the chance.
Second, Sanskrit poetics say that works of art are designed to evoke one or two key emotions: love, humor, anger, sorrow, disgust, fear, energy, and wonder. (These are called “rasa” which means “essence.”) The pleasure of art is the pleasure of having the experience of one of these feelings. In literature, the story and characters are designed to bring the reader into the predominant emotion.
Writing has to work for the author and for the reader. We find compatible authors to take us to places that are interesting, happy, enlightening. A story is like a friend: you like something there and you want to spend some time there.
Some of my favorites: Salinger, Hemingway, John Barth, Karen Blixen, Annie Proulx, Paulo Coelho, Jorge Luis Borges, George Orwell, Thomas Mann. Recently I was gripped reading Alexandra David-Neel, a Victorian woman who walked out of China into forbidden Tibet in the 1920s. I love being taken places by Paul Theroux.
We read to enter the realities of other people. We want to feel their emotions and hear their secrets. We want to know what really happened; what was under the surface. My fiction will probably involve foreign travel, spirituality, and finding yourself.
A couple of principles guide my writing. First, we all want to break out of conventional and routine life. The proper surfaces of life are often hiding truths and secrets. Most of us wish we were more free and did things that we couldn’t because they were not permitted, or we didn’t have the money, or we didn’t have the chance.
Second, Sanskrit poetics say that works of art are designed to evoke one or two key emotions: love, humor, anger, sorrow, disgust, fear, energy, and wonder. (These are called “rasa” which means “essence.”) The pleasure of art is the pleasure of having the experience of one of these feelings. In literature, the story and characters are designed to bring the reader into the predominant emotion.
Writing has to work for the author and for the reader. We find compatible authors to take us to places that are interesting, happy, enlightening. A story is like a friend: you like something there and you want to spend some time there.
Some of my favorites: Salinger, Hemingway, John Barth, Karen Blixen, Annie Proulx, Paulo Coelho, Jorge Luis Borges, George Orwell, Thomas Mann. Recently I was gripped reading Alexandra David-Neel, a Victorian woman who walked out of China into forbidden Tibet in the 1920s. I love being taken places by Paul Theroux.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
November 22, 2014
This was a crazy wonderful read! Along with beautifully described landscape, I especially enjoyed the characters in this book. I was constantly surprised by the road the story took, and then delighted to see where I was.
I read this over a weekend - I was not able to put it down and was sad, yet satisfied, when it ended. Read it! You will be very glad you did.
I read this over a weekend - I was not able to put it down and was sad, yet satisfied, when it ended. Read it! You will be very glad you did.
November 8, 2014
I loved this book! This was an interesting story about Thomas, a man in his fifties, who went to Nepal to spread the ashes of his recently deceased older brother Paul. He did not have a close relationship with his brother and was reluctant about going, but decided to go after some encouragement from their elderly mother. In Thomas's search to find a final resting place for Paul, he encounters a person from his brother's past ends up spending an extended amount of time in Nepal. I thoroughly enjoyed reading about his adventure in another land and the culture shock he went through. Thomas's eyes were opened up not only to Tibetan culture but an extended family that he could have only met by honoring his brother's final wishes. I received a free copy from the author. Thank You!
February 17, 2016
I was expecting something different from this book. A kind of Peace Corps experience in Nepal and it was, a little. Mainly, it was a man exploring Tibetan Buddhism. Having said that. I enjoyed the book.
July 22, 2018
“It’s an adventure you haven’t had yet, Thomas. Sit.”
Thomas smiled. He was thinking of his dog Sally.
For a long time I’ve had a fascination with westerners who expatriate themselves to remote places in the Asian Subcontinent. The way they make full and rich lives for themselves, steeped in eastern tradition, and yet often accomplish great things for the welfare of the local inhabitants, somehow intrigues me. I’ve heard some pretty amazing stories. Well, here’s a pretty amazing book:
In her novel White Bird, writer-scholar-translator Ruta Sevo skillfully explores the unusual demographics of present-day Nepal and the clash of cultures that confronts an American visitor and raises some very fundamental questions about what life is, or ought to be, all about. Thomas Rusak, the American, has come to Nepal with his brother’s ashes in search of the most meaningful spot for scattering them to the wind and rain. This mission turns, necessarily, into a search for his brother’s mysterious past in Nepal, a past that Thomas feels he must unearth in order to finally understand his brother and the lifelong complexities of their relationship. And Thomas cannot open up that past without intruding intimately into the lives of two extraordinary women.
As it turns out, Sevo tells this story with such pungent detail, such a “sensory onslaught” of Nepali life and landscapes, that it becomes more than just a story about individuals. It becomes a story about cultures. It becomes the equally mysterious search for the essence of that great magnetic pull that eastern philosophies have over westerners, who sometimes chuck it all for the rustic spiritual life in places like Nepal. Thus, White Bird is a dazzling, swooping mystery that lifts itself to different altitudes. Like all good mysteries, there may be answers for every question on one level, but ten questions for every answer on another.
Thomas smiled. He was thinking of his dog Sally.
For a long time I’ve had a fascination with westerners who expatriate themselves to remote places in the Asian Subcontinent. The way they make full and rich lives for themselves, steeped in eastern tradition, and yet often accomplish great things for the welfare of the local inhabitants, somehow intrigues me. I’ve heard some pretty amazing stories. Well, here’s a pretty amazing book:
In her novel White Bird, writer-scholar-translator Ruta Sevo skillfully explores the unusual demographics of present-day Nepal and the clash of cultures that confronts an American visitor and raises some very fundamental questions about what life is, or ought to be, all about. Thomas Rusak, the American, has come to Nepal with his brother’s ashes in search of the most meaningful spot for scattering them to the wind and rain. This mission turns, necessarily, into a search for his brother’s mysterious past in Nepal, a past that Thomas feels he must unearth in order to finally understand his brother and the lifelong complexities of their relationship. And Thomas cannot open up that past without intruding intimately into the lives of two extraordinary women.
As it turns out, Sevo tells this story with such pungent detail, such a “sensory onslaught” of Nepali life and landscapes, that it becomes more than just a story about individuals. It becomes a story about cultures. It becomes the equally mysterious search for the essence of that great magnetic pull that eastern philosophies have over westerners, who sometimes chuck it all for the rustic spiritual life in places like Nepal. Thus, White Bird is a dazzling, swooping mystery that lifts itself to different altitudes. Like all good mysteries, there may be answers for every question on one level, but ten questions for every answer on another.
February 23, 2018
In my reading experience, I am able to separate the line of fiction from reality. Whatever is occurring to a person or in an environment is not "real". It serves a descriptive function that carries the story along.
The characters and places in White Bird blurred that line, almost obliterating it. The characters seemed so real and I had to go back to some reviews to give me some assurances that the characters were fictional.
Kathmandu and the surrounding communities took on a life of its own. It is an energetic setting with a diverse population. Tourists and those seeking further enlightenment seemed drawn to the energies and wisdom held within its boundaries.
Wonderful reading experience which provided insights into the Buddhist mindset.
The characters and places in White Bird blurred that line, almost obliterating it. The characters seemed so real and I had to go back to some reviews to give me some assurances that the characters were fictional.
Kathmandu and the surrounding communities took on a life of its own. It is an energetic setting with a diverse population. Tourists and those seeking further enlightenment seemed drawn to the energies and wisdom held within its boundaries.
Wonderful reading experience which provided insights into the Buddhist mindset.
February 3, 2020
So awful! Is it science fiction? The author is credentialed but the woo woo version of Bon and Buddhism is off putting and casts doubt on everything in the setting. The main character is not particularly likable or even comprehensible as a fully fleshed out person. Don't waste your time. There is nothing here worth your time.
October 13, 2019
Thomas is tiresome. I'll stick with Rinzai Zen.
September 3, 2022
I wanted to like this story...I really do. I mean, you can tell that the author has certainly done her research on the topic. And I was curious to see how a western person would interpret Buddhism and weave it into a story. Of course, I wasn't expecting a totally true account...this is fiction after all. Maybe something like 'Memoirs of a Geisha', where a believable and intriguing tale can be told despite the wholly fallacious depictions of the culture.
Unfortunately, that is not the case here...maybe I had too high an expectation but the story is really not...there. Conversations between the characters is dry, awkward and doesn't flow well at all. Some characters just pop out of nowhere and just seems to like act like they belong in the story the whole time just grates at me.
Thomas as the main character is...plain. There are multiple times while reading the book that I couldn't image Thomas as being a 40-ish something adult who is supposed to have an 'weary' outlook on things. Instead, he seems almost like an immature 20-something instead with how the author portrays him. I'm guessing the author wanted to portray an ignorant person, but he didn't come across as that.
The entire feel of the book did not mesh well together and that is a such a shame for the potential to truly dive into another religion while also enjoying the ride.
[Disclaimer: Copy received from Giveaway.]
Unfortunately, that is not the case here...maybe I had too high an expectation but the story is really not...there. Conversations between the characters is dry, awkward and doesn't flow well at all. Some characters just pop out of nowhere and just seems to like act like they belong in the story the whole time just grates at me.
Thomas as the main character is...plain. There are multiple times while reading the book that I couldn't image Thomas as being a 40-ish something adult who is supposed to have an 'weary' outlook on things. Instead, he seems almost like an immature 20-something instead with how the author portrays him. I'm guessing the author wanted to portray an ignorant person, but he didn't come across as that.
The entire feel of the book did not mesh well together and that is a such a shame for the potential to truly dive into another religion while also enjoying the ride.
[Disclaimer: Copy received from Giveaway.]
January 4, 2015
I won this book through First Reads. Thank you!
Want to read
September 26, 2017Okay, I'm putting this on my to-read list despite (because of?) my misgivings that it is going to be a severe mangulation of Tibetan Buddhism. There were already enough word uses, turns of phrase, and definitions in the description and the preview to give me pause, but the moment I see a character who is a rank beginner at meditating being given "Tantric sex" practices right off the bat (and in this case, to "dabble" in!), I know I am looking at a total fiction. I just want readers to please keep that in mind too. If anyone is interested in reading about the real beliefs and practices of Tibetan Buddhists, I can give you the names of some authoritative, respected books.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews