Heartlight

This story was a pleasantly long, absorbing, and highly entertaining look into the life's work of lightworker Colin McLaren who serves his cause via the occult tools available to him. MZB has a thorough understanding of ceremonial magic and her occult background is well represented in this book. Colin battles against evil, searches for his mystical heir and struggles against his failing strength as he becomes an old man in service of the light. As a character study, it's wonderful - depicting the orbit and work of one man and the effects that he has on all those whom he meets. Read it as a fictional occult autobiography and it won't disappoint.

It's good to have read the other reviews before writing this one, because a couple of them confirmed what I had suspected -- that some references were to books that I haven't read yet. Although much of the action in HEARTLIGHT takes place before GHOSTLIGHT, WITCHLIGHT, and GRAVELIGHT, part takes place after these, so it should be read last. (Alternatively, you could start with HEARTLIGHT and save chapter 24 through the end of until after you've read the other three.) This book didn't seem overlong to me. I started late yesterday morning and continued reading even though I didn't finish until after midnight and I had to fight off the effects of three nights of too-little sleep. I wanted to learn more about the mysterious Colin MacLauren who was alluded to in the other volumes. I liked seeing younger versions of characters I'd met already, even though I felt a bit as I did when I saw "The Phantom Menace" after having seeing the three "Star Wars" movies that were made first although they take place later -- sorry because I knew the sad outcomes for some of those characters. MacLauren's various battles with Evil didn't make me feel that they were too repetitious. I would expect someone in his line of work to have to go through more than one such battle in his lifetime. I think there's enough variation in the details. In a way, it's a shame that this book came out before the shambles that is the final USA Presidential election of the 20th century -- it's fun to speculate how that might have been worked in with the other historical events and overall plot. Random comments: (Chapter one) 1956 was the 6th decade of the 20th century, not the 5th. This is a common mistake that I shared until reading about various decades of life in my library's medical journals forced me to work it out. Your first decade of life is from zero [birth] through age 10. Your second is from ages 11 through 20, and so on. It's the same with each century. By the same reasoning, the first century AD was from zero through 100, the second from 101 through 200, and so on. The 20th century is called that because it began in 1901 and will end on 31 December 2000. That is why this book is correct in stating that the real turn of the millennium is 2,000, not 1999. (Chapter 4) I'm not sure if it's true, but I read somewhere that President Kennedy screwed up his German and actually told the people of Berlin that he was a [jelly?] doughnut. Given Toller's secret, I don't feel at all bad about what Colin does to him. In fact, I thought our hero's guilty feelings were excessive. Simon's dreadful accident didn't seem so horrifying after finding out what he had done earlier. (Chapter 16) If MacLauren's birthday is February 2nd, then he was born on Candlemas, the old celebration of the purification of the Virgin Mary -- any symbolic significance? I thought that "elide" into all the other late-night emergency calls of Colin's life bit was a typo for "slide",

As many have pointed out, this book tours several of MZB's previous series...the Dark Satanic, Inheritor, etc., and the Light series...but the part I truly found best about (both Heartlight and Ghostlight) is that you find out more of the Fate of all the major characters of the Fall of Atlantis (2 books, which I read in a compendium). It was very touching for me to find out what finally became of Riveda....and to know that he became friends with Domaris, if not Deoris.

Never have I read a work of fiction that actually made me think of a period of our recent history in a new light. Marion works magic by weaving an already compelling storyline of believable rituals and magick into a convincing explanation for and which ties many of the key moments of turmoil of the twentieth century.Her characters are people anyone can identify with; their lives aren't sickingly happy, nor are they perfect. They have their good times, their sorrows, their hurts, anger, and the guilt of their mistakes. Nor are her antagonists completely bad--there is always room for redemption.I also enjoyed the way Marion weaved Colin's story to cross those of characters from the three previous novels in the series. It gave us a chance to see these characters from a totally new perspective, and in the cases of Thorne Blackburn and Hunter Greyson, we were given a glimpse into their youth and personalities that we were not shown in _Ghostlight_ and _Witchlight_.I recommend this book to anyone who has ever asked the question, "Why?"

HEARTLIGHT is the fourth occult/gothic novel in Bradley's LIGHT sequence (following GHOSTLIGHT, 1995; WITCHLIGHT, 1996 and last year's GRAVELIGHT. This latest (and obviously) final installment not only picks up characters from these three books, but it also picks up characters and storylines from Bradley's previous gothics DARK SATANIC (1972), THE INHERITOR (1984) and WITCH HILL (1990) and adds new details and new perspectives to the old stories. In HEARTLIGHT Colin McLaren must battle against Toller Hasloch, who tries to destroy the American spirit by means of Black (Nazi) magick in order to establish a Fourth Reich. The book spans four decades from the 1960s to the 1990s and chronicles not only Colin's battle against Hasloch, but also his attempts to rescue people who got in trouble with supernatural and evil powers. I can really recommend this book to every reader who has enjoyed one of Mrs. Bradley's previous gothics. HEARTLIGHT combines strong characterization wit! ! h a moving and involving story (being German Bradley's description of the fall of the Berlin Wall REALLY touched me). And although some stories will be familiar to readers, be sure not to miss this great novel of the eternal fight between LIGHT and DARKNESS. And by the way don't believe everything that you've read in the review from KIRKUS REVIEW. You better find out for yourself.