"While I observed a body, half-buried in the glacial ice, I could not reach out and touch it. While I heard the shrieking winds, I could not feel the frigid snow being pushed up into towering drifts. While I shouted my anguish aloud, my words fell silent on the mountainside. If it is true that I existed, then it must be also true that I am not of body."
~ Excerpt from Otzi’s Odyssey
Ötzi's Odyssey - The Troubled Soul of a Neolithic Iceman is a metaphysical fantasy thriller. It embraces these genres in a manner that will intrigue and delight readers looking for something refreshingly action-packed, employing a different flavor in timelines that move from modern to prehistoric eras and back again.
Ötzi the caveman's mummified body is found trapped in ice, in 1991. What isn't trapped is his soul, which awakens from its long sleep to find itself in a strange new world.
In an effort to uncover answers to many questions about his life and reincarnation, Ötzi journeys from present to past. This brings readers into his perception of caveman conflicts and daily life and the conundrums his journey poses not only to that world, but present-day events.
Imagine waking up to see your frozen body. Neil Perry Gordon paints a vivid picture of Ötzi's awakening: "While I observed a body, half-buried in the glacial ice, I could not reach out and touch it. While I heard the shrieking winds, I could not feel the frigid snow being pushed up into towering drifts. While I shouted my anguish aloud, my words fell silent on the mountainside. If it is true that I existed, then it must be also true that I am not of body."
As he struggles to answer haunting questions of how his soul remains connected to his body, and what the purpose of his reincarnation serves, readers follow him a journey that brings him to Jolly Jane, who joins him and others in this strange state of being half-alive.
Jane was known as a murderess, committing others to death because it "helped her cope." Ötzi sold his soul to the devil in a bargain which has apparently landed him in this position. Both find themselves undertaking a journey through tortured souls, guided by a Voice that seems to inject a higher purpose to their conditions and present-day dilemmas.
Gordon's story is thought-provoking, action-packed, and thoroughly unpredictable. Spiritual wisdom and guidance juxtapose nicely with the adventure component to keep readers both entertained and enlightened.
As memories of past life and loved ones are channeled in unexpected ways, Ötzi must find the courage to follow his calling through past lives and into a future where he makes better choices.
Readers who enjoy more than casual metaphysical inspection, spiced with the thriller components of an adventure through past and present realms, will relish Ötzi's Odyssey. The story is highly recommended for fantasy, spirituality, and thriller collections alike.
~ D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review
Ötzi’s Odyssey – The Troubled Soul of a Neolithic Iceman, opens in the year 1991 with the remarkable sighting of a mummified man, half frozen in glacial ice, whom two hikers stumble upon. Along with this profound archeological discovery, the soul of this five-thousand-year-old iceman is awakened.
Ötzi the iceman’s adventure takes him to the modern era, where his observant soul tries to comprehend why it remains tethered to the frozen mummy, as well as to make sense of a technologically advanced world. The story then returns to 3300 BCE, to the life and times of clan chief Bhark as he lives with his family in a peaceful village upon stilt homes clinging to the shore of the great Lake Neith, located in the shadows of ominous Similaun Mountain.
Bhark and his family are ambushed by his rival Shadrach, who insists that he, not Bhark, is the clan’s rightful heir. A subsequent encounter with the soul hunter Creyak, who promises to return to Bhark all that was lost, sends our hero on a perilous journey into the four demonic realms of Gehenna. Along the way, he receives wisdom from Miko the Seer and guidance from his clairvoyant daughter, Amica, both of whom have the power to pierce the veil that separates the upper and lower spiritual realms, while Bhark fights for the salvation—and ultimate redemption—of his eternal soul.