Mystical Paths

Third Reading Summary: Nicholas Darrow is coming of age, attempting to prepare to become a priest and live a normal life. But his life is anything but typical as the child of an elderly former monk. And he has never really learned to control his psychic powers. And with the death of his mother when he was 14, there is no longer anyone that can solve the problems between him and his father.

Magical Paths is the fifth book in the Starbridge series. As is standard for Susan Howatch's books, she writes about multiple generations with interlocking storylines and perspectives. Nicholas Darrow is the son of Jon Darrow, the narrator from Glamourous Powers. Mystical Paths has the shortest time period of the series, with most of the story playing out over just over a week.

It is 1968, and Nicholas Darrow has quietly become engaged to a young woman he has known his whole life. He has graduated from seminary and will be ordained soon. In the previous book, set in 1963, we know that Nicholas is on the periphery of Venetia's coturie, as she calls her set of friends. Christian Aysgarth, the oldest son of Stephen Aysgarth and his first wife, Grace. Christian is forty and married with two young children. He had a successful academic career with a professorship at Oxford and a beautiful wife, Katie, the daughter of a Duke. But in 1965, he died mysteriously in a boating accident.

Nicholas, like his father Jon, has psychic powers, and Venetia comes to him to see if he will perform a seance so that Katie can contact Christian to deal with her guilt over his death. Nicholas knows the danger of trying to contact the dead but thinks he can avoid an actual seance and solve Katie's problems on his own. But, of course, it goes badly because, as a young man in the 1960s, he thinks he is more capable than he is. And he thinks that those older that could help him are all stuck in the past. Both Venetia in Scandalous Risks and Nicholas in Mystical Paths are 23, and that sense of naivete and confidence leads to problems.

I appreciate that Howatch changes up the format in Mystical Paths, and it is much more of a mystery or thriller. Nicholas visits all of Christian's old friends to determine if they thought that Christian's death was an accident or suicide, or something else. And because it deals with Nicholas, it is much more oriented toward the paranormal and discusses demon possession and hauntings and the Christian ministry of healing and exorcism.

There is more on-screen sex (not graphic or titillating, but present) than in the rest of the series. I understand that Howatch is making a distinction in the books between extramarital sex and affairs when at least one person is married and between ordained and unordained. But I still am uncomfortable with some of the ways that the series tends toward grace for men without as much attention to the women.

The final book in the series brings many of the threads of the earlier books together. One of the strenghts of the series is that Howatch is showing a variety of perspectives and emphasizes how hard it is to really know another person, even those that are close to us relationally. The way that Howatch uses a variety of narrators to explore the life and understand motivations and then revisits those scenes later from other's perspectives is a signficant strenghts of the series. The last book, Absolute Truths, is the only book that returns to a narrator. But it also gives Lyle a voice through Charles reading her journal. That along with some joint spriritual direction sessions with Charles, Jon and Stephen/Neville, allows a greater than normal range of voices in a single book. But it is also longer at 672 pages compared to the rest of the series that ranges from 480 to 520 pages.

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Short Review: Nicholas Darrow, 25 and soon to be ordained seems to be blundering around reeking havoc instead of bringing healing to those he is trying to help. This is a very different feel to the previous four books. It is more of a paranormal mystery than anything else. And I think that is a good way to break the cycle of the books. Still this book is very good at looking at a Christian that has grown up in the church and has to find his own way of faith instead of his father's means of faith.

As I write this I have finished the sixth book, and I want to enthusiastically encourage people to read this series. It is the best series I have read in a long time. Not traditional Christian fiction by any means, but I have spent a lot of time thinking about my faith because of the questions broached in these books.

My full review is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/mystical-paths/

Again, on a second reading, this is even better than the first. One of the things I like about this series is its focus on the weakness of Christians, both that they are (and continue to be) sinners and that God uses weakness in ways that we could not imagine.