The Return of the Goddess: A Divine Comedy

By Elizabeth Cunningham

Book Overview

"Gracefully crosses the borders of plausibility into a luminous metaphysical realm."-Publishers Weekly

"A highly sexual, highly sensual spiritual realm...Passionate and unified at the same time."--Woodstock Times

The Goddess is returning She takes shape in the hands of an Episcopal priest's shy, retiring wife. She invades the dreams of a grande dame who thinks women priests are a scandal. She lures a poker-playing ex-convict onto unfamiliar terrain. Then there is the mysterious old man in the wood, who's been watching, waiting for a sign of her return.

Who is the Goddess? Where has she been for so long? What does she want from the four human beings whose lives she is turning upside down and inside out?

As they confront these questions, Esther, Spencer, Marvin and Fergus find themselves drawn together, forging friendships across boundaries of age, class and race, discovering--and recovering--powerful, erotic passions. All their encounters, with themselves and each other, lead them deeper into Blackwood, an old estate that shelters an imperiled grove of trees sacred to the Goddess, a grove it becomes their mission to save.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1948626985
• ISBN13: 9781948626989
• Release Date: August 2023
• Publisher: Monkfish Book Publishing
• Length: 484 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.8" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

The Goddess is Alive & Well!

We hadread the first book of Ms. Cunningham's new trilogy, The "Daugther of the Isles" and read it aloud & loved it!! So, wewent & found this earlier work ..which is also about spirituality & nature & the Goddess & is peopled by amazing characters. We can not reccomend it enough!!!

Great Fiction for Goddess Lovers

A wonderful novel for both people who want an introduction to the Goddess as well as those who already are faithful believers. I agree with the other reviewers who say this book is meant to be reread and reread. As a true believer, I would send this to my circle friends,but I would also feel comfortable and sharing it with friends who don't know about female centered religions.

This is my all-time favorite book.

THE RETURN OF THE GODDESS is my all-time favorite book. Author Robert Kelly called it a "celebration of how four remarkable people grow into godhood, the journal all love tries to make". I grew to love these four unforgetable characters. The story is also called "a divine comedy", and I laughed my way through it. I celebrated Esther's journey to self discovery and personal growth--and related to it--and most women can. THE RETURN OF THE GODDESS begins on Halloween night, and so I re-read it every October. The imagery--sights, sounds, smells--bring this book to life. Every time I read it, I envision this story made into a movie--it would be wonderful! Thank-you, Elizabeth Cunningham, for bringing these characters and this town to life.

The Goddess is dancing...

I love this book. I've read it so much that the pages are almost all dog eared. I've given copies of it to 6 of my friends and have loaned mine to at least five others. Elizabeth Cunningham is a fantastic storyteller and she leads us on a journey through a woman's spirit, awakening to the power of her self. It is a hard journey, but a worthwhile one, and you'll laugh all the way through until you cry at the end. Beautiful, poetic writing and outrageously funny realism combine to make this a "can't put it down 'til I'm done" kind of book. The Goddess dances across the pages and into your heart as you read it, and the book leaves you with a sense of hope and a feeling that somehow, someway, justice will always be done. Thanks, Elizabeth Cunningham, for the book that always picks me up when I'm in a low place.