Title: Hawk Divine
Author: J M Duke
Published by: When Illuminated Press
Publication date: 3rd Nov 2018
Genre: Art Book/Short Story Anthology/Philosophy
Pages: 47
Format: eBook
Source: Kindle Unlimited
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Blurb/Synopsis
Stepping from dusty temple walls, crumbling papyrus and long forgotten stories in ancient tongues, eight Egyptian gods come forth into our modern world. Through liminal spaces and altered states of consciousness pour the tales of their ingress and adoration. Hawk Divine asks us to wonder: Do spirits and monsters walk among us? Does the magic of imagination, word and image evoke gods into existence? Can the wisdom of a meaning-rich, poetic and life-affirming past save us from a meaningless, robotic and desolate future? Featuring Janice Duke’s eight Egyptian Gods portrait series as full page illustrations, as well as eight new illustrations – including two double page images of Horus and Set – the text comes to life in full colour. Step into an enchanted world: this world.
Review
When I signed up for Kindle Unlimited there were a few books on my ‘hit list,’ Hawk Divine was one of them!
Hawk Divine is a collection of short stories and accompanying illustrations. Each story shares the flavour of one of the infamous Egyptian Gods or Goddesses.
This might be a bit of a brief review compared to some of my others, but that’s no reflection on the quality of the book or the stories within. They are all outstanding and each one of them imparts a vast sense of wisdom to the reader. With each of the stories, it feels like J M Duke is channelling the vast knowledge of the Gods themselves and passing it on to the reader.
Within the passages of this book are the philosophical topics of existence, femininity, placement, death and other such topics that the great philosophers of our times have discussed at length. For example, while reading these stories I began to reflect on how they apply to my own experiences. There is a wisdom in these pages that flows throughout each of the stories and into the reader. Applying heavy topics in a light manner, making the reader question their own existence and how they can improve their thoughts and lives for the better. The potential for self-reflection is enormous with this book and for that reason alone I highly recommend it.
Additional to the stories are J M Duke’s beautiful illustrations. In my previous post, I mentioned that I only have an older model Kindle – as such I’d love to have a physical copy of this book to see the printed version of these illustrations in colour. As a treat you can see some of the Illustrations on J M Dukes website. There are more images in Hawk Divine. Seeing them in their black and white offerings is enough of a treat when reading their accompanying stories; yet I yearn for more! This is a book that I will be adding to my shelves to revisit time and again; mostly when I need that spiritual pick-me-up the pages bestow on the reader.
Summary
An exploration into spiritual matters inspired by Egyptian Gods and Goddesses. Beautifully illustrated that works well on a basic kindle as much as they do in colour.
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