These books are hard really, I like them but at the same time… I enjoy the ideas in these books, the philosophical and spiritual implications are rather wonderful, but therein lies the problem. It truly does get a little preachy at times, far-fetched even to an Eclectic Pagan such as myself. I love the reincarnation aspects, I love the fairies and deities who are not actually gods, the immortality I am uncaring about either way, the mind over matter concept is great, the merging of every mythology into a single truth is interesting.
And truth to tell, a lot of the concepts in these books are ones that I believe in, many are ones that I have studied and am interested in, but still, it is all too much. I suppose that is the ultimate problem with this series, there are TOO many interesting philosophical and spiritual concepts. A lot of the ideas in these books are big enough that many people would take a while to grasp the basic premises of just a single one of them. Put every major concept into 6 books, one continuing story, and you have a mass of people completely missing the points within each individual philosophy. Personally if I were trying to enlighten people to such mysteries, I would use one or two of the major concepts in a single story line, and then use different concepts in an entirely new story line.
Beyond that problem, I had a few difficulties with the language used in ancient Gwynnedd and certain elements of the characters are just awful really. I had a couple other little dislikes as well, but in truth it was all minor compared to the big one I have already mentioned.
Overall, I like these books a lot, but, I will never be able bring myself to read them more than once every five plus years (and I can read favourites more than once a year). I give a massive amount of respect to Traci Harding, having a low grasp on written English, and being dyslexic, she really is impressive.
Hearth Witch Down Under
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