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The Compass

1 rating: 5.0

A book by Tammy Kling

ARE YOU LIVING THE LIFE YOU WERE DESTINED FOR? The Compass is a life transformation novel that will guide you on a journey of self-discovery. At the core of The Compass are specific life lessons about belief systems, authenticity, and understanding … see full wiki

Tags: Books, Spirituality, Religious Fiction

Author: Tammy Kling

Genre: Religion & Spirituality

Publisher: Vanguard Press

1 review about The Compass

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The Compass: A FirstLook Review From Basil & Spice

May 21, 2009

by KellyF
posted in Cafe Libri: Reviewing Books & More

Rating:

By Kelly Jad'on

From: www.BasilAndSpice.com
Author & Book Views On A Healthy Life!

Book Review: The Compass: From Where You Are...To Where You Want To Be (Vanguard Press/ Jun 2009) by Tammy Kling and John Spencer Ellis

A work of fiction, The Compass begins with the main character Jonathan Taylor alone in the desolation of the Nevada desert, unprepared for the elements--without drinking water. He is adrift in his own sea of emotional pain. His wife and child, we assume, recently killed in a car accident, had left him bereft of his own identity and unable to cope with his personal tragedy.

Feeling hollow, Jonathan hopes--in Job-like fashion, for "a whole new wife, a new kid, and justify it all by saying there are no accidents...." Self-absorbed with his own internal struggle, Jonathan travels, at the request of new found friends, from point-to-point, in search of the difficult resolution he must finally face when he turns toward home.

During the journey, the protagonist encounters pivotal, ethnically diverse persons, not by "accident," but placed purposefully in his path by circumstances greater than himself to lead him forward toward a state of awareness and atonement. Jonathan recalls one saying, "We're not guaranteed anything...Yet we come into this world feeling entitled as if we are. We arrive acting as if we've been handed a manual for life with a certificate that guarantees us a hundred years." Jonathan's travel is not just literally a trip from location to location, but a journey of self-discovery.

What pushes each of us to reexamine our lives? Is the unexamined life truly not worth living? Jonathan was pushed to the brink by the car accident, taking his family from him. Through the story we learn from him that life is short and precious. We really are not guaranteed a hundred years.

The Compass illustrates the fact that though we all will encounter times of deep sad darkness, there is still hope, a light, which points us in the right direction. Life itself, once we awake from a lack of consciousness, brings about an awareness of a power greater than ourselves. We humans are truly connected to each other. Though we each feel that life is experienced individually, as Jonathan did, we all undergo the joys and storms of life. "The philosophy that we are all connected is a major thread within the story of The Compass." Which way does your compass point?

5 Stars

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