Braden clearly summarizes our current position in the world and suggests how we can improve our future for 2012 and beyond. He presents Six Deep Truths that solve personal and world problems if we accept them and states Five Major Crises confronting us.

The story of Esther, living in Jerusalem in the early 1900s, takes us into the lives of the Jewish people adhering to strict rules at a time when the plight of the women was to have as many children as possible to provide more Jews to populate the area. Esther rebels against such a future, wanting to be an artist after realizing her talent.

I am impressed with Hearne's knowledge of magic. As with the first book in this series, Hounded, this fantasy, is intriguing as the hero, a 2000 year old Druid living in present day Arizona, fights evil forces.

This book describes the 21 Prophecies that Benedict has drawn from a variety of sources, mainly from the Chilam Balam Books. I will comment on the ones most relevant to 2012. Please note that these Prophecies do not predict the end of the world.

Mother Teresa is such an intriguing and mystifying figure who suffered with self-doubts, as revealed in recent books, so the idea of finding out more about her from a sister of her Missionaries of Charity is appealing. The book was not disappointing, as Mother Teresa is seen as perhaps a more real person than in other books. She is not diminished in this view; she only seems more larger than life and holy.

Barrios is a member of the Guatemalan Elders Council and a Mayan Priest. He writes of his experiences with two Mayan leaders: Don Pascual - a leader of the Eagle clan and Don Isidro - a Mayan ruler. According to Barrios, 2012 is the beginning of a change of consciousness, a time when peace and harmony can exist during this next stage of evolution. The Mayan view is that we have forgotten what is most important in our lives: to balance the material and spiritual.

As we approach 2012, we care about the Mayas because 1) they predicted that the sunrise of the solstice sun on December 21, 2012 marks the end of a cycle of precession at which time an alignment of the Sun and the center of the Milky Way occurs; this happens only every 26,000 years, and 2) their Long Count calendar ends on that same date, which some people interpret as the end of the world; the Mayas, however, did not predict such an ending. Precession and the Long Count Precession...

The author spends more time promoting the facts of Jesus as a literary figure than discussing Harry Potter, but he clearly makes his point. Both Jesus Christ and Harry Potter had miraculous births, childhood miracles, and miraculous powers; battled with evil; were sacrificed in death with a rebirth or resurrection; and dealt with the symbolism of seven, Jesus in the Seven Seals of the Book of Revelation and Harry with his seven magical tasks in Books 6 and 7.

This is as important a book to read as Howe's first book How To Read the Akashic Records. While her discussion on healing sacred wounds is important, I will focus my comments on the three main keys she suggests in the last part of her book: Gratitude, Grace and Generosity.

Price suggests we are here as humans for one purpose: to find our way back to God. He provides ways to do this. This is a classic in the spirituality/metaphysical library, a book as relevant today as when it was published in 1981. I continue to be amazed, and I guess I shouldn't, that we knew so much over 20 years ago. While new information comes to light each year, and we find new tools to help, there is a validity and truth in this book.

Ambiguity is the real story here. Alchemy's history is provided, but what I most responded to was the entrance into a world where nothing is as it seems, where all is uncertain and unclear. The "marriage of heaven and earth" relates to the union of the above and below, as in the universal, "As above, so below."

This is a bloody and brutal story but exciting. Two main female characters' lives are intertwined - Leoni in the 21st century and Ria in prehistoric Spain of 24,000 years ago. As Leoni experiments with drugs, she is drawn into the world of Ria who is fighting for her life and that of her tribe. Enter the world of other dimensions and of one's of one's past.

In this book, Hancock is asking us to see with different eyes. From cave art to fairies to shamanic activities to UFOs, he presents an intriguing possibility that other dimensions may exist and that the beings encountered are, as suggested in his subtitle, not physical beings but ancient teachers helping in our spiritual evolution.

What if there were civilizations much earlier than any previously recorded, ones preceding the flooding and before the Ice Age melt down. Hancock discusses the current history of human civilizations, but he also provides much evidence to show that new discoveries may deviate from the standard accepted facts.

What is the message of the Sphinx? The statue remains a mystery, but a puzzle with new insights. Is the statue older than the conventional wisdom of about 2500 BCE? Could it have been gazing at the sky as early as 10,500 BCE, which was the time of the Age of Leo and when the statue faced directly east at the constellation of Leo and when the pyramids of Giza form a precise map of the three stars in Orion's Belt?

Greene also presents a mental health aspect that I found intriguing, and new to me - the idea that defensive mechanisms in a young child, or an adult, may be healthy ones providing a positive way of dealing with a trauma in life. Isn't it interesting that, in many arenas, old ideas have value?

What is a Spiritual Path? A spiritual path leads to Universal Consciousness and Unselfish Love and has a spiritual, not material, focus.

Caroline Myss is a great storyteller, irreverent with no sympathy for those who wallow in self-pity. Perhaps we can listen to her advice that forces us to see ourselves and our lives clearly with no excuses.

The story is riveting in parts but, despite my strong spiritual leaning, I thought the personification of God as a character named "Papa" was overly sentimental, inappropriate and hard to believe, even in a novel. The main character is a man whose daughter is kidnapped by a serial killer and relays his journey coming to terms with that horrific loss.

Philip Smith's father, Lew Smith, was a healer and psychic in Miami in the 1980s. This memoir reminds us of some of the unusual activities that happen to real people. Among other things, Lew Smith healed people using techniques that he developed, often using the pendulum. We forget how many very talented people exist with such unusual healing and otherworldly abilities.