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Summary: Entertaining but subtle manipulative
Review: In this age of questioning organized religion James Redfield explores alternative spirituality. In his own way he preaches to the reader his own slant. Some of it's good and some of it's not. Redfield is obviously a broad thinker. One thing that flabbergasted me was a comment that he made. He credited his generation, the Woodstock generation, for deemphasizing materialism. The Woodstock generation turned out to be the most materialistic generation of our time. They popularized the 5000 square foot house with the three car garage, the law degree, the BMW, the........
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Summary: THE SECRET OF SHAMELESS-BHALA-BLAH
Review: In this third book we journey even deeper into the magical realm of New Age Land. The saga continues as our New Age heroes take a journey to the land of Tibet to "uncover" yet one more--and one hopes last-- truth. Nothing will stop these valiant pursuers of New Age truth, not even the evil Chinese military! Throughout the story, our hero reminds us of the importance of putting into daily practice the truths learnt from the previous 10 insights. Once we collectively begin to put into daily practice the previous ten insights, we will all enter the eleventh insight, which is the magical world of Shambhala. Here in Shambhala there is no hunger and no one lacks anything. There is no need for food, clothing or anything, for that matter, because all you have to do is to think it into existence. Yeah, right. Reading this book reminded me of the children's story of the Emperor's New Clothes. In fact, any child above the age of, say, four could read this book and see that the entire book in fact has no "clothes" on. OVERVIEW OF THE SERIES: To paraphrase Tweedledee's story of the Walrus and the Carpenter in Alice in Wonderland: "It is time to talk of New Age Things," said the author, / "Of soul groups and force fields and astral projection / Of time travel and things / And why our energy levels are not boiling hot / And whether dakinis have wings." Like Alice, I think the author James Redfield has been drinking too many magic potions and smoking too much hookah with the caterpillar and his New Age friends. In his trilogy, the author weaves fictional stories around New Age doctrines and beliefs. Each book starts out "above ground" in the realm of reality but soon, like Alice, we find ourselves falling down into the rabbit hole of the New Age mind. Here in New Age Land that we learn the "TRUTH" that everything above ground is not as it appears to be. One key truth to unlock the door and enter the magic of New Age Land is to be very careful of what one eats. The food of choice is to eat only live greens, preferably uncooked, which will increase your energy levels so that you can disappear and reappear like Cheshire cats on demand. Poor Alice, if only she hadn't eaten the cake! Once your energy levels are high enough, and with a little practice, you too will be able to escape reality and enter New Age Land, any time, anywhere and any place. Here you will learn how to perform all sorts of reality-escaping magic, including astral projection and time travel. You can even visit your past and future lives or just sit around and vibrate at high energy levels. Just as in Wonderland, New Age Land is also full of mystical and magical creatures that appear and disappear to help you on your journey. However, these creatures are not seen by everyone, you have to increase your energy levels high enough and look out of the corners of your eyes or cause your eyes to go out of focus to see them. Soon, with a little practice, you will be able to see them too. Some of these "colorful" beings include angels like creatures called dakini (apparently similar to angels) and soul groups that are part of your previous and future lives to help you along your journey. What is the ultimate purpose of all this? Well, after you learn the ten truths taught in the first two books you must begin to make them an integral part of your life and teach others these truths. Soon many people will embrace these truths to the point where we collectively reach critical mass and then POOF, we all evolve consciously into a spiritual society where there is no need for clothing and no one goes hungry because we all can just create it in our minds in the land called Shambhala! I hope none of this makes much sense to you, because if it does, you're beginning to worry me. Lewis Carroll wrote Alice in Wonderland for a young girl named Alice. Young children, as every parent knows, have a vivid imagination and in their early years they have a hard time distinguishing between reality and fantasy. Fortunately, most children eventually grow up and learn the difference; unfortunately, the author of these books was not one of them.
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Summary: Celestine Expectations. . . Redfield Delivers Again!
Review: James Redfield has successfully written another book which not only gives a better understanding of human evolution, but captures the essence of the human spirit in today's ever-changing world. Although the ending is a bit abrupt, Redfield manages to entwine his ideas into a story which captures and keeps the mind focused on what he is trying to express to the reader. I put the book down and wanted to start again from page #1! Previous Celestine reading is not a must, but definately recommended to fully understand the brilliant concept.
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Summary: again,very good
Review: My hope is that this reveiw gets on. the last one was in the middle of the book and wasn't fair. It gets better and what I thought was going to happen(chronic chase) wasn't as bad as I thought. My last review was 10-31 loved the fact that everyone except one thought it was as good as I did.
Rating:
Summary: Redfield's best yet
Review: Probably Redfield's best yet. Highly readable and full of important advice. The parable is easy to follow and the insights it imparts are so critical for the times we are living in. Read this book, follow its insights and pass it along to others.
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Summary: A good sandwich with bad bread
Review: Shambhala is like a good sandwich with two pieces of bad bread holding it together. It took quite a while to read through what I thought was a slow beginning, then it took off and became really exciting, only to finish with a very weak ending. I love Redfield, and will read everything he writes, but this one could have been a lot better.
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Summary: Redfield no longer such a superstar, but has staying power
Review: The Celestine Prophecy was a great idea for a way to get spirituality across to the public: a synthesis of the most popular threads of 'New Age' thought that were circulating in the mid-1990s, packaged as a fast-paced action-adventure novel. The underlying metaphysics claimed to embrace all religions, yet also professed to be based on an empirical approach to life. Sales show that a lot of the sensationalism which surrounded Celestine faded with Redfield's consecutive books. Some of this is just the nature of trends: anyone who has such monumental success with their first publication has little chance of producing a sequel that achieves the same results. On the other hand, there are some factors that could account for this decline in popularity. In his second book, The Tenth Insight, Redfield compromised part of his original formula by introducing themes like reincarnation and animal omens--subjects that departed from the religious middle ground which initially let many people stay open to his theories. He also told his readers that human beings have abilities which are a good stretch further away from Pop Mysticism than communing with nature or perceiving auras. His third book, The Celestine Vision, was nonfiction, and discussed progressions in science and social thought that Redfield believes are precursors to a major revolution in global consciousness; it did well enough, but didn't come near to his early success. With the release of The Secret of Shambhala, Redfield returned to the ongoing fictional storyline, continuing where The Tenth Insight left off. In this book, he posits that the energy generated by our thoughts and emotions actually goes out into the world as a force that he calls 'prayer,' and influences both outer events and the awareness of the people with whom we interact. I found his theories (which are embedded in the text as elaborate monologues followed by scenarios which illustrate them) to be as applicable to my own experiences as any other book in the series. The concepts were more advanced--and therefore, more challenging--than those in Celestine. This has probably contributed to its (relatively) low sales up to this point.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointed
Review: The original CELESTINE PROPHECSY was successful in part because of its freshness. While Mr. Redfield's core ideas: synchronicity, energy fields, and the spiritual evolution of the planet, were in themselves hardly original, he presented them in an appealing new way that had resonance for contemporary readers. His sequels, however, especially this one, have been disappointments because his thinking has hardened into a kind of repetitive ideology. There's still some compelling material here underlying all this, but Mr. Redfield needs to take a break to get back in touch with it
Rating:
Summary: Enlightening!
Review: The Secret of Shambhala is the best story yet, in Redfield's continuing saga of the Insights. The journey was intriguing, fast paced, and yes, often times predictable, but the ending was great - I would never have imagined it to end that way. The story captivates your attention and will have you pondering and wondering on the marvels of the Eleventh Insight. This insight could very well be applied to life situations now. I would be curious to find out how many have tried and were successful! I disagree with the other reviewers on bringing the government into the story. I think that it adds to the suspense and one must realize that the country of Tibet is not like our country in the sense of religious freedom that we have. This book contains many wisdom filled passages, which speak to the heart. In the chapter titled, The Life Process, I was captivated on the "parenting" issues brought up. Makes one stop and think. "We choose our parents in part to be awakened to what is missing, to what needs to be added to human understanding, and we begin that process by being dissatisfied with what we find in our lives with them." As many are awakening to the spiritual consciousness that is blossoming on this planet, we are learning that our thoughts as well as we are connected. We are learning that our thoughts are energy and we can influence our own lives. This newest book by Redfield helps bring all of that into focus, expounds on this concept and gives us a new tool to use in our spiritual evolution. I highly recommend this book!
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Summary: A WELCOME SEQUEL
Review: This is a fine entry in Redfield's "CELESTINE" series. As others have stated, it does feel very "LOST HORIZONish" in plot, but it is much deeper than that. Redfield asks and challenges readers to think-not only about his stories, but about the individual reader themselves. Whoever reads this will have a different opinion on what it means to them-and that's a good thing! I think every reader will agree that more positive energy flow from everybody can only result in good things for the planet.
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