Heaven on Earth: A Spiritual Novel
By Donna N. Murphy
Local to ?
iuniverse/Writer’s Club Press
2001, $20.95, paperback
0-595-15346-1, 427 pages
Heaven on Earth features the lives of two different groups of people an ocean apart–one located in America and the other on a small African island named Eluria. In Part I entitled Separate, a man from an upper class family in Washington, D.C. deals with his self-centered ex-wife and his rebellious teenage son as he tries to run a successful alarm company. With the help of his spiritually-minded mother, his new girlfriend, and a tolerant new-age group called Junto, the man learns to come to terms with his father’s murder by a black man and what is truly important in life.
In Eluria, two warring factions–the native Elu and the Figale–brutally kill each other in an attempt to gain control over the island and to receive retribution for the area’s slavery-ridden past. At the same time, a Figale politician and Elu-sympathizer struggles with protecting her own family and trying to bring tolerance to Eluria.
Part II (United) brings the American man to Eluria and he is soon followed by thousands of his fellow Junto supporters; who all take place in a “spiritual intervention” as an alternative to war. The American adopts a handi-capped, little Elurian boy (who grows up to testify what he experienced), and witnesses an amazing transformation in the behavior of the residents of the island; of course, not without some resistance from the terrorist-like guerillas.
After several months, many of the main characters go back to America or spread out across the world to pass on their divine messages; but the foreign spiritual teachers and residents remaining on Eluria experience tragedy in the form of a nuclear bomb. In their sorrow, the survivors realize there is a purpose for the disaster and vow to tell others of what they have witnessed.
This novel deals with several issues–most importantly, the futility of war and racism. Heaven on Earth is an excellent spiritual guide that teaches concepts such as reincarnation, the afterlife, forgiveness, positive manifestation, and the choice of life experiences we make before we are born. The author peppers her book with many real-life references and thought-provoking quotes from spiritual leaders. While I realize that this is a work of fiction, I would have appreciated if the author had included a foreword explaining if the island featured actually has a basis in reality and if so, are the conflicts described true to life. Regardless, I highly recommend this book to any soul seeking a spiritual path; and I find it to be a necessity for anyone who feels war, violence, and hate are the only way. Five Stars.
Charyl Miller Pingleton–August 8, 2008
