I am completely astounded that this novel was written in 1930. It is a deep exploration into a woman's spiritual awakening, which includes her early years (with fascinating detail) of life as an actress/dancer in Depression-era Hollywood. It is written in the style of an ancient spiritual text, reminding me a lot of the style and rhythm of the Mahabharata. I also love that it all takes place in Big Sur and Carmel, California, focusing in on the spiritual communities there. I am disappointed by the ending - it seems that men continuously see women's spiritual path as one of dismemberment and suffering, but I was totally pulled in to the story and I loved the musical rhythm of the writing.
This book is top 10. First of all the main character is a woman. Second, the story explains all of the difficult things she’s had to endure and how they have led her to her spiritual journey. A lot of people usually talk ab how the spiritual journey is all nice and wonderful but most people don’t mention what experience caused for that spiritual door to open in your life. I feel sometimes for some people a really bad rock bottom moment can make some people to force themselves to get out of that dark hole and end up having some sort of epiphany, making them become more mindful and aware of their life. In other words become “spiritual”. Besides the story alone the author is really really good. Like the words they put together i can read all the passion and see how beautiful this book is. Its like i read a big beautifully written poem that almost made me cry. It’s also really nice to read a good book that talks about women and how they can be objectified and treated a certain way by men. Then becoming free from that, awesome book!