Running from Safety: An Adventure of the Spirit - Hardcover

Bach, Richard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0688127169 ISBN 13: 9780688127169

Publisher: William Morrow & Co, 1994

Synopsis

Fifty years after promising--and forgetting--to come back through time and teach himself what he has learned about life, Richard meets nine-year-old Dickie Bach, who reminds him of the promise

About this title

Reviews

An extended dialogue between Bach and his inner child comprises the latest book from the author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull. While hang-gliding one afternoon, Bach is reminded of a promise he made to himself when he was a child: to write a book containing the sum of all he has learned and deliver it to his nine-year-old self, Dickie. But Bach finds that Dickie is angry and hurt at having been locked away for the last 50 years. Slowly a dialogue emerges, as Bach tries to pass on his years of experience and in return relives some buried memories, particularly the events surrounding the death of his brother Bobby. What results is a kind of Richard Bach primer, summing up the author's thoughts on time, love, death and God and laying out a belief system not unlike George Bernard Shaw's idea of the Life Force. Participating in this shared voyage of discovery is Bach's wife, who contributes her own insights and acts as a kind of reality check on her husband. Though the concept here may strike some as Philosophy Lite, the book-thanks in large part to Bach's sincerity-deftly skirts sentimentality and becomes, ultimately, a real and affecting creation.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

New Age jargon bobs along amiably on stream-of-consciousness froth in this quasi-nonfiction indulgence by the author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull (not reviewed). While paragliding, Bach meets a ``teaching angel'' named Shepherd (get it?), who reminds the pushing-60 writer of a promise he made 50 years ago to Dickie, his nine-year-old inner child: to ``write a book to take back, just for the boy you were, everything you know.'' That book presumably is this one, a cross between a Socratic dialogue and the transcript of a schizophrenic's rant. Richard's discussions with Dickie about free will, fate, risk, and coincidence consist mainly of other people's warmed-over tenets presented as revelations. (Dickie speaks for weary readers when he shouts, ``THAT'S TOO MANY, RICHARD!...IF YOU SAY ONE MORE MAXIM I'M GOING TO POP!'') Much of the book is devoted to perusing Richard's messy mental scrapbook: Childhood was a desert, but at least Dad taught him to play chess. Why did brother Bobby have to die? (Leukemia.) Why did Richard succumb to peer pressure and drink beer as an adolescent? First marriage goes sour; thank heavens Leslie- -the patient, mint teadrinking second wife to whom Richard recounts what he learns--remains deep, mysterious, and challenging. The treadmill of rhetoric keeps turning as Dickie goes grocery shopping with Richard, wakes him up at night, and accompanies him in flight. In the paraglider, they achieve the ultimate insight: There's lots in life over which we have no control; sometime we must trust what we cannot see. Not much originality here, but at least the clich‚s feel universal. Bach tills fertile New Age ground, emerging with such self-helpers' delights as crystals and ``soul on a sunbeam.'' Either you buy it or you don't. (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

The author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull attempts to soar again with this introspective journey into his psyche and childhood. He tells about how he recently met an angel as he was coming up a mountain after a successful but fairly boring paraglide. This angel offers Bach a ride and challenges him to keep a promise he made to himself as a child. The promise was to write a book filled with the secrets of life: "what to look out for, how to be happy, knowledge to save your life." Instead, Bach looks hard at his childhood, speaks directly to the child he was, and faces some truly serious and painful issues in his life. Denise Perry Donavin

The author of such best-selling bellybutton dander as Jonathan Livingston Seagull returns with another philosophical tale about learning and loving.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: William Morrow & Co
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0688127169
• ISBN 13: 9780688127169
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 274