The Elijah Tree

by Cynthea Masson

The Elijah Tree is the story of a young boy who is birthed in the fire of a mystical vision. Around him move Chava, Shira, Eli, and Jael—the adults who love him but who live in conflict with one another. Estranged from Chava, Shira struggles to find her place in the world while raising Elijah and mourning the death of her lover. One day at the beach outside her cottage retreat, Shira loses sight of Elijah and fears he has drowned. But then a stranger, Jael, finds him hidden within the rotting trunk of a tree. Jael’s act of returning son to mother brings her and Shira together through bonds of desire and faith.

The Elijah Tree can be read simply as the story of women dealing with loss and abandonment who find solace through the love of a young child. Or it can be read as a mystical allegory of the relationship between an absent or ineffable god and the prayer, scripture, or prophecies that, nonetheless, call the individual to faith.

211 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Cynthea Masson is a professor in the English department at Vancouver Island University. After completing a Ph.D. in English with a focus on medieval mysticism, she undertook a postdoctoral fellowship involving work with medieval alchemical manuscripts at the British Library. In addition to articles on mysticism and alchemy, many of her publications over the past decade have been in the area of television studies. She is a co-editor of the academic book Reading Joss Whedon (Syracuse University Press, 2014); her fiction includes The Elijah Tree (Rebel Satori, 2009). She lives in British Columbia.

Reviews

[Sharon Bidwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

There’s a poetic quality to this book that makes me want to love it, but I don’t. It’s too abstract, scenes flitting between the players in non-chronological order. The human stories at the depth of the book, the triangles within triangles of love and loss are as despairing as they are touching, yet the mystical beliefs of the various characters and which supposedly carry the plot didn’t gel for me. As much as I felt there’s something beautiful about the writing, the story is painfully abstract, so I found it a slog. I neither like it nor hate it.

[Carole · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a mystical allegory with a f/f subtext from a medieval literature professor who specializes in the subtexts in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Really.