It’s deep, and it’s light, and simply a lot of fun to read.
Eve’s Eden is collection of stories from Soéva Sophia’s life, from growing up in 1960s Berkeley California, with all the energy of that time, through living in the mystical Mexican village of Amatlán de Quetzalcóatl, to finding, and losing, love in the community built around Salmon Falls, a bountiful fishing site once shared peacefully by the tribes of the area which is now Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts.
The stories are told with a lightness, whether her at five communicating and liberating a manta ray trapped on a pier, or seeing a magical wind become part of, and destroy an opera in Mexico, or being in love with someone who endured, with good humor, trials like Job’s.
The stories are organized and introduced by five goddesses from different traditions, from Eve, of Garden fame, looking over the young Soéva fending for herself, to Aphrodite making sense of love. The goddess’ myths shape the stories as the stories illustrate the myths.
What was most enjoyable about the book, for me, and difficult to explain, is the style in which the stories, all true, are told. There is a lightness to them and a wandering back and forth between reality and an almost dream like view as they appeared to Eve. She talks of her dyslexia and how it shapes her view of the world, how things don’t quite look to her like they might to others. This, then, invites us to see things a bit differently as well, to see reality, and, then, glimpse at the same time, the mystical threads holding it and us all together.
Start with Part I, Eve & Joyous Beingness and the story You Cannot Tame a Zebra and end with Part V, Her Fountain of Love and the story Dancing as Aphrodite. In between, well, it’s deep, and it’s light, and simply a lot of fun to read.