Bøker av Gerald W. McFarland

Don Carlos Buenaventura, a powerful brujo in his sixth life, practices a benign form of sorcery based on his motto "Do no harm." His great powers derive from intensive training in heightened awareness akin to Eastern yogic disciplines rather than from incantations, spells, or aid from demon allies. He is accidentally born in 1684 into an aristocratic Catholic family in Mexico City, a social and religious milieu in which his identity as a brujo, if known, would put him in mortal danger. In repressing any sign that he is other than an ordinary young man, he forgets both his brujo powers and who he really is. Exiled at nineteen to the remote frontier town of Santa Fe, New Mexico, he is exposed during the journey northward to wild desert landscapes that awaken his forgotten powers. In Santa Fe he resumes his conventional persona to protect what he now recognizes is his true identity and is caught in the tension of trying to live two lives. An arduous return trip to Mexico City and back further intensifies his brujo powers, leading to many adventures, including dangerous encounters with an evil sorcerer, an Apache war party, and a woman devotee of an ancient Aztec goddess, and also stimulates his recall, in dreams, of his brujo training in past lives. A chance meeting in Mexico City with a woman trained in Tantric spirituality is life-changing, opening him to other dimensions of consciousness. Returning to Santa Fe, he faces the task of learning to unite his Brujo's Way with his new spiritual path.

"What the Owl Saw," the second volume in the Buenaventura Series and the sequel to "The Brujo's Way," opens in December 1705 with a terrifying nightmare that fills Don Carlos Buenaventura, a powerful brujo in his sixth life, with dread. Feeling the need to strengthen his brujo powers, always weakened by town life, he rides out into the wild mountain landscapes around Santa Fe in order to practice his sorcerer's technique of transforming himself into hawks and owls. Transformations are exhilarating, but they do not dispel his sense of an impending menace. In addition, as he tells his friend Inéz de Recalde, whom he has rescued from a difficult past and to whom he has declared his love, he is impatient to move forward in his quest for wisdom on what he calls the Unknown Way. Into this picture comes a trio of itinerant entertainers, a magician and two women dancers, who offer an ambiguous promise. Can they lead him to deeper realms of consciousness, or are they agents of his enemy, the evil sorcerer Don Malvolio? The magician and his alluring companions introduce Carlos to dances that transport him into ecstatic mind states, but he remains uncertain about what master they serve. Despite the risk of exposing his secret brujo identity and of being disloyal to Inéz, Carlos allows himself to be drawn ever farther into their web of dark and dangerous enchantments. Includes Readers Guide.

Don Carlos Buenaventura, the protagonist of "The Last of Our Kind," is a powerful brujo living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a remote settlement on the edge of Spain's North American empire. The year is 1706. Comanche war parties are boldly conducting raids nearby, French traders and soldiers are aggressively expanding toward New Mexico from the Great Plains, and agents of the Spanish Inquisition have arrived in search of a brujo suspected of being in Santa Fe. That brujo is Don Carlos, respected citizen under the name of Don Alfonso Cabeza de Vaca, his true identity known only to a small coterie of friends. Given the many dangers that threaten the town, will he be able to bring his powers to bear and still keep his brujo identity secret? When his mortal enemy, a sorcerer with formidable powers, arrives on the scene in the midst of these troubles, how will Don Carlos figure out a way to deal with him? Includes Readers Guide.