Wind

by Louise M. Hewett

'Wind' is the second instalment of the Pictish Spirit series, continuing an adventure in love and intimacy. 'Life for Roisin Clare will never be the same again. Having woken from a deep trance state spent for the most part in hospital, she returns home with her lovers, Adam and Ben, to embark on the challenging journey of service to her close-knit community of Pictish Spirit. It seems that the young and troubled seeker, Finn Eachann, is to be her first initiate. As she begins the mentoring process, Adam's past comes calling. His old friend and lover, Diarmuid Cruise, arrives as winter makes itself at home in the Adelaide Hills. Cursed by an Icelandic shaman whose tutelage he has now abandoned, Diarmuid seeks both repair and closure in his relationship with Adam but finds instead he has been drawn to experience a profound healing in the care of the shining woman and Pictish Spirit priestess, Roisin.' Wind picks up where Mist left us, poised on the threshold of a deepening experience of connection with those we love and the community context in which we live.

826 pages, Paperback

First published January 5, 2017

About the author

Louise M Hewett is a independent South Australian writer.

Reviews

[Therese · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weaving the ordinariness of cups of tea, café lunches and conversations with friends into a narrative that mingles radical feminist principles with Goddess spirituality, pagan ceremonies, shamanic journeys to the Otherworld and sexual liberation, Louise Hewett has taken her first book ‘Mist’ even further with ‘Wind’. Now that the characters at the heart of the story—Pictish Spirit priestess and healer, Róisín Clare, and her young lovers Adam Wrenshaw and Ben Archer—have become familiar, it was a pleasure to spend two whole months with them as their unconventional relationship continues to blossom. Though the arrival of new characters and fading of others provided challenges and intrigues, which I am sure will develop in the next book, there was a quiet, persistent effort to act with awareness, honesty and love to overcome uncertainties.

The destructive mentality of pornography is a core theme, arising in fascinating thoughts and conversations about not just porn, but prostitution, violence, abortion, (hetero)sexuality, the beauty industry, matriarchy, freedom from relational ownership, and above all about how dominator culture shapes us in distorting ways. As in the first book, myths (this time ‘Math Son of Mathonwy’) are deconstructed to cast a light on how dominator culture overrode the old, matrifocal ways.

Róisín’s role, alongside her partner Adam, is as initiator of men via a ‘bisexual activation’ that aims ‘to awaken the fully operational energetic being of a person to transcend learned behaviours’ (p. 83), so that they become truly free to experience love. I love how this aspect of the Pictish Spirit tradition is being developed, as in a sense, this is one of the intentions of radical feminism—to free us from patriarchal roles and behaviours so that we can be more wholly ourselves—and to experience this lived out in narrative makes me all the more devoted to it. To be liberated from the false roles/labels ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’, back into real embodiment as women and men is the core challenge we all face.

There is a sequence of meditations that Róisín speaks for a group of women that is so beautiful and incantatory, Susan Griffin’s ‘Women and Nature’ came to mind. And so much of Hewett’s writing is beautiful—there are, it seems, endless ways to experience love and pleasure, and she is not afraid to express that. (If you love magic realism, you will love this series.)

At the heart of the story is the refrain that everything is connected, there is no separation—a knowing grounded in material spirituality. It is such a privilege to read a book like this, rooted in a vision of possibility that might seem beyond us at this stage of our evolution, but we must imagine it before we can create it for real.

I can’t wait to begin book three, ‘Flowers’.

[T.L. Merrybard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, all I really need to say is, Flowers (Book 3) is on the way! I think Wind is even better than Mist. I'm very much enjoying the budding relationship between Róisin, Adam and Ben, and the other stories, such as those of Kate, Finn and Adam's old flame, Diarmuid, just add to my interest. I have learned a lot from this book as well, and it has opened my heart to being more loving in my own relationships. My fave sort of fiction: A book that entertains mightily, while growing me at the same time!