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Abe Levy, a philosophy professor at the prominent liberal arts university Pomona College, represents what every man strives for—a search for his inner spirit. Through his character, Steinberg dives deep into profound topics centered around meditation and the constant tug of war between the material world's attachments and the pathway to a higher celestial plane. In a time of chaos and uncertainty, the author's debut novel delivers an enormously real portrayal of enlightenment, simultaneously conveying a calming lyrical quality to his prose a la Herman Hesse's Siddhartha while incorporating a dazzling array of philosophical, religious, and even scientific understanding to demystify complex subjects like meditation, liberation, and, inevitably, enlightenment.
The novel's structure is infinitely dynamic, featuring a dual arc that follows Levy within the classroom, teaching the Insider's Guide to the Self, and his personal meditation journey that takes shape after a dream at fifteen transports him into another world and another life altogether. Unsurprisingly, this creates a web of complexities with his wife, Sarah. While the narrative never strays from its ambitions, the audience seamlessly becomes a student, learning about ancient Vedic culture, the Bhagavad Gita, and The Art of Living alongside Tom and others in the lecture hall. Truly, Steinberg's ability to pull the reader into his lecture hall and the numerous intriguing discussions and universal quandaries debating consciousness, attachment, and good versus evil is exemplary.
From Plato and Aristotle to Max Planck and the Big Bang, Steinberg covers an unprecedented amount of ground. Each exploration imparts another layer of knowledge in the ultimate quest of understanding the self in God's image. More than a text, Steinberg's novel is an unforgettable experience that strips away the density that naturally accompanies these concepts and replaces it with energetic prose that never ceases to inform.
RECOMMENDED by the US Review