Dateline -- Healing Currents Magazine April 1997
HCJ BOOK REVIEWS
by Michele Urso
The Secrets Inside Copper Mountain
by Janai Lowenstein
Erin Madison, a bright and spiritual preteen, is embarking on a vision quest in search of
a cure for her mundane life.
As her spiritual journey begins she finds herself being gently guided by her Grandmother Nettie, a Cherokee medicine woman, who encourages Erin to shed her old way of thinking and open herself to her connection to the earth and her own state of being.
Erin's journey brings her to Grandmother Nettie and Copper Mountain, where she is taught many of the ceremonies that her grandmother performs to bring herself closer to a harmonious coexistence with nature. When Nettie has prepared Erin for her journey inside Copper Mountain, Erin's quest begins. She is met by thrilling and frightening adventures, battling a shape-shifting Coyote Man and other powers of darkness which represent negative energy and self-doubt.
Author Janai Lowenstein does a beautiful job of offering picture-perfect details. Her seedling sentences should thrive in the minds of readers, creating crops of breathtaking images and ideas. The pages practically turn
themselves.
This novel will teach young people ways to become more centered and at peace within themselves. After reading Erin's tale of adventure and enlightenment, even adults may wish for their own vision quest. The morals that Janai Lowenstein promotes in The Secrets Inside Copper Mountain encourage us all to find our own peace and to share it with the world-a simple lesson beneficial to all.