Written 10 Aug 2008.

From the darkness of Chelsea Cain to the light of Conscious Evolution

Sweetheart by Chelsea Cain

Conscious Evolution by Barbara Marx Hubbard

I read a lot of detective/mystery/crime fiction. I like the aspect of the puzzle to be solved. Really good ones have something to say about the society we live in and the characters are made plausible; the reader can really get into the story and the characters become almost like friends whose lives the reader follows with interest.

Lately I have come to think that perhaps some crime writers are competing with each other to produce the most gruesome crimes and characters and situations. I have just finished a book by Chelsea Cain titled Sweetheart. I struggled to the end trying to find something redeeming in it all. Perhaps the writer's background as a creative director in PR and marketing campaigns has something to do with the "creativity" in the novel. (Lets face it, many of the ads nowadays are based on the worst possible qualities in us: all the seven - is it 7 - "sins" are encouraged for us to give into and revel in.)

The murderer in the novel is a beautiful female serial killer, who got to be one all by perself without any help from men, "a feminist homicidal psychopath" as the detective in the book says. The detective who ever having had sexual relations only with pers wife becomes sexually involved and obsessed with this killer. The killer so beautiful, cunning and manipulative that per can get men and even women to do anything per wants. And the killings - well, I keep wondering if the things done are even possible in real life. I have no idea what kind of research the writer has done to find out if the ways and means of killing are possible the way they are in the novel. I feel kind of numb inside after reading this novel. The subtitle on the cover says "True love never dies." The killer escapes and lives to "thrill" in another novel with pers obsessive pursuer, I assume. I can live without such thrills.

There are other murders being investigated while this drama with the psychopath is played to the final escape. These murders are committed to protect a "good" politician's reputation. There are no surprises there as to how and why and who. All quite predictably brought to conclusion. Which brings me to something else I have been reading.

I have just started reading a book by Barbara Marx Hubbard. The book is Conscious Evolution with a subtitle Awakening the Power of Our Social Potential. The introduction states that the book is "an early effort to respond to the immense challenge and opportunity of our age. It sets forth a vision of the vast transformational enterprise of the next millennium ...... Conscious Evolution carries us beyond the human potential movement toward the social potential movement and describes a new social architecture to enhance and connect social innovations now evolving around the world. .... Conscious Evolution presents a plan that can bring humanity across the dangerous threshold of possible self-destruction to the point of the shift - when we realize we are going to make it, that we have the capacity to survive and grow. This plan is composed of initiatives that are already occurring, but have not yet been connected, communicated, and understood to be vital elements of a whole system transition."

Well, dare I hope? I have not got very far in reading this book yet. So far an interesting and a positive fact revealed is that a big study in US found out that "there are 44 million 'cultural creatives' in the United States alone - almost one-fourth the American population. Cultural creatives are defined by a set of values, a new lifestyle, and worldview. Feeling that we are all members of one planet, they are concerned about the environment and social-economic justice. They have a different notion of relationship - one that is less hierarchical. They are interested in holistic health and are extending women's concerns into the public domain. Their emphasis is on consciousness raising in all aspects of our lives - personal, social, and planetary." The study was published in 1996. Lets hope there are even more now, 12 years on.

We seem to be living in a very dark time right now. The book by Chelsea Cain is one indication of it. So are all the ads that draw on our worst possible characteristics and seem to say it is ok to be greedy, manipulative, vindictive etc. Many people feel apathetic, depressed, social outcasts. There is a very wide cap between those who have and those who don't. Just the other day in the morning news there was an item about really expensive yachts and the billionaires who owned them having trouble finding people to work in them. I remember another item some time ago about a restaurant in a plane hovering over London I think it was. Juxtapose these images with the millions without shelter or food. Dark times indeed.

Perhaps this darkness will be followed by light. The book Conscious Evolution gives me hope. So do all the cultural creatives around the world. Another wonderful thing I heard about is the world march for the world without wars. Check this website about it http://www.mundosinguerras.org/ Perhaps, we'll survive. Toivossa on hyvä elää, sanoi kirppu toiselle.