Freewheeling: Writing on Crete: BOOK IV

By Tom Foran Clark

Book Overview

Writing on Crete, the fourth and last book of the Freewheeling series, opens on Emery, having departed Spain alone, making his way to Grez-sur-Loing, France, where he learns the George Sand Bookshop proprietor Walt Lowen has something he wants his vagabond friend to do for him. It involves Emery''s traveling to Crete on Lowen''s behalf and, at his expense, writing back to him up close about certain vague, intriguing things apparently going on there, in which Lowen, even from his distance, has somehow got himself entangled. "Old Lowen got Emery a flight out of Paris on a 1-300 B4 plane seating 315 people. The plane was soon twelve meters up, flying 870 kilometers an hour, passing over the snow covered Austrian Alps, next flying over Yugoslavia, then Albania, and on to Athens where luminous, delicious oranges were being sold on bleak, ashen streets. The grim city was surrounded on three sides by rough mountains - Mount Parnitha, Mount Penteli, and Mount Hymettos. At the core of the congested city was Plaka. In Plaka there were cheap flop houses with communal bedding for half a dollar, where local wines cost seven cents a glass. "In the morning, Emery took a bus to Piraeus on the Saronic Gulf, hidden by clouds. He enjoyed early morning coffee at a harbor front cafe. Black-haired, brown-eyed sailors in green uniforms stood idly about. Emery had evening tickets for Heraklion, and so had time to kill. He''d be on the ferry traveling overnight to Heraklion. He walked to the town center. He ate bread and Feta cheese. It was very cloudy, very chilly. Back at the docks in the evening, he boarded the ferry, the Knossos. "Over much commotion of boats came a splendid lavender sunset. Stars emerged. About sixty percent of those aboard the ferry were Greeks; the rest were tourists - couples, families. Old women in black held their hands in their laps; old men in black sipped black coffee, smoked cigarettes, sat at card tables. At the railing, Emery silently regarded the quiet lapping waters. "The boat departed the port of Piraeus at 6:00 p.m. Emery laid out a sleeping bag on the deck. Emery was awake at sunrise, and could see the coming land. The boat arrived at the shores of Crete at 6:00 a.m. - Kriti, the Greeks call it, the center of the ancient Minoan civilization that had flourished more than 4000 years before, until Santorini''s volcano exploded in 1628 BC, engulfing the ancient kingdom in ash and tidal waves." In the Sfakia and Loutro regions, "long the site of heroic deeds, ancient civilizations, and constant intrigue for thousands of years, Emery reconnects with Frida, the Scandinavian beauty and "girl of Emery''s dreams," first introduced to readers in Riding in Italy. Frida has found a new coterie of oddball friends, all of whom want to tell Emery everything there is to know about contemporary Crete and everything there is to know about ancient Crete - Minoa. Everywhere Emery turns, he finds parallels between ancient times and current times. At the center of the revelations is the king of Minoa -- Minos - whose wife, Pasipae, knew "the king liked to consort with different women. Jealous, she was always trying to think of ways to get even. Finally, she cursed the king in such a way that whenever he took a new woman to his bed, wild beasts would fly out from his orifices, devour the women, and then disappear." Nevertheless, King Minos put his trust in reason. "Our Freedom and democracy has been a rock in a raging sea, King Minos told the people of Minoa. Now it is a seed on the wind, taking root on all the islands." But, "while many of our citizens prosper, others doubt there is truly justice in our country. The ambitions of many Minoans are limited by failing schools and prejudice and the circumstances of their birth. Sometimes our differences run so deep, it seems we share an island but not a country. This is my pledge: I will work to build an island nation of justice and opportunity. I know this is in our reach because we are watched and guided by powers larger than our own, and the gods look well on Minoa. Of course, "some disagreed - some felt the gods did not look with favor on Minos." Help would be coming - maybe not.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 150359856X
• ISBN13: 9781503598560
• Release Date: September 2015
• Publisher: Xlibris
• Length: 100 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.2" x 6.0" x 9.0"