Rue Allyn joins us this week with her views on reincarnation and some facts inside her fiction.
I believe the last time I visited I gave you a great deal of information about how ghosts and other spectral beings might be represented in fiction. I did not try to claim that spirits are real or not. However, they certainly exist in fiction, so know the ‘facts’ of what readers might expect about a phantasmic character is important.
I mention this because my topic today is ‘reincarnation’. This is another subject that maybe exists in what I term reality or may not. I have no firm opinion either way other than to say that reincarnation, like ghosts etc. does exist in fiction. I had tremendous fun researching this topic. So much so that when I used it in Cursed, A Corsair’s Tale, my editor insisted I have a character explain some of the ‘facts’ about reincarnation. Here’s the excerpt where the heroine (Grace) explains the basics of reincarnation to the hero (Luc).
Luc’s head whipped up, and his long dark hair scattered over his broad shoulders. When their gazes met, his eyes went wide. “How could you possibly know about that kiss?”
“I think I may have dreamt it, but when I first thought about it, the incident felt more like a memory.”
“Yet ’tis a memory of something you could not have experienced,” he breathed.
“Precisely, that’s when reincarnation occurred to me,” Grace said, with complete reason. She felt so alone, abandoned this far from Luc, but she’d not finish if she moved closer, touched Luc.
“So, you researched that for nearly a whole month” his tone incredulous. “What conclusion did you draw?”
“I learned that every culture has some belief in reincarnation. The native Americans, the Africans who were forced to come here and those who didn’t. Medieval Christians, the Asian cultures, the ancients.”
“An interesting list, I’m sure, but what did it tell you?” he urged, folding his arms across his splendid chest.
“Possibly, I’m not the only person to experience reincarnation. Most of the belief systems that include reincarnation, hold that the rebirth is an essential part of the soul working its way back to some universal oneness. Each life teaches lessons necessary to reaching that goal, and the soul will be reborn as many times as necessary to learn the lessons. A few systems believe that reincarnation is a means for righting wrongs.”
“Mambo Ayezan said, ‘An evil tide pursues her, until a great wrong is corrected, and the time is right once more.’ She meant you.” Disbelief choked Luc’s voice.
“So, you were the person she was talking to when I couldn’t see anyone else.”
He nodded.
“I wondered for a while, then I forgot the incident, until I did my research and started putting pieces together. I think, if we could ask her, the mambo would say I am Grainne, or at the very least had lived her life.”
Luc paled, and the apple of his throat bobbed once, then again as he swallowed twice. “That is impossible to prove.”
“Impossible by any scientific means.” Grace nodded.
“Then how can you think your conclusions are correct?” He frowned.
“I don’t think it. I know it,” she insisted, placing a hand over her heart.
“Think, know, that’s all irrelevant, semantic nonsense. Why? That is important. Especially since you agree no science exists to prove it,” Luc slashed a hand across the air in impatient denial.
“Once I accepted that you could be cursed, believing myself to be reincarnated wasn’t so difficult. As I said, our first kiss drove me to do the research.
LATER—as the pair are examining an amulet given them by a VooDoo priestess aka a mambo, Grace provides a bit more detail on how the possibility of her reincarnation might impact Luc’s curse.
Then she arranged the amulet on the table, laying the gold chain and cylinder to one side. “I understand this gold piece, now that I’ve done all that research.” She opened the cylinder’s latch and withdrew the small gold sheets. “The sheets in the cylinder contain instructions, telling the reincarnated spirit how to proceed on its journey. In the early Greek, Orphic tradition, the belief was that the instructions would help the spirit escape the circle of grief that they believed was the cycle of reincarnation.”
“However, you are not an ancient Greek, and you received this from a VooDoo priestess,” Luc said. A worry line formed between his brows.
“Knowledge of the ancients is imprecise at best,” Grace pitched her voice to soothe. “We do know that the Greeks interacted with peoples from all over the Mediterranean, including northern Africa. That, the tradition of these cylinders emigrated to one of the African cultures, from which VooDoo originated, is not out of the realm of possibility.” She bent to inspect the characters inscribed on the sheets.
“You said the instructions would remove the spirit from the reincarnation cycle. Will you and Grainne both vanish?” Luc’s tone was a mix of disbelief and concern.
“That is a possibility, if this is an ancient Greek cylinder. Because of its source—coming from Mambo Ayezan—I believe the instructions will cause the cycle to change in some other way.” She stroked a hand down his arm in reassurance.
About the Book: Cursed, a Corsair’s Tale
He’s been cursed to remain a specter until he earns the love of a heartless woman. Is she the one?
Privateer or pirate? Lucien Flynn never makes promises to any woman. Then a scorned lover curses him to live the life of a specter until he ‘earns the love of a heartless woman.’ Decades pass, and Luc abandons hope. When he meets a woman he cannot resist, a woman with too much heart, he knows he may never be set free. Can he avoid loving her, or will he give her his heart and be cursed forever?
Grace Thibodaux is a woman driven to escape her own demons. Hurt beyond hope of healing, she protects her tender heart, refusing to allow anyone, man or woman, close. However, she can’t escape the man who haunts her dreams and her life. Is he as cursed as he claims, or is she simply falling for another, heart-breaking rogue?
Pre-order Cursed at Amazon– https://www.amazon.com/Cursed-Corsairs-Lucien-Flynns-Story-ebook/dp/B0G54FPMRY or Books2Read– https://books2read.com/u/bwpVMO
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About the Author
Award winning romance author, Rue Allyn has a lifelong passion for happy ever after. She lives south of the border with her husband of more than forty years and their cat, Tanto. She has two sons and is a proud veteran of the US Navy. She writes heart melting romance in all sub-genres, but her favorite is historical romance, especially medieval. Subscribe to Rue’s News where you may learn more about Rue and receive a FREE download. https://rueallyn.com/mailing-list
Note: La Roue du Monde, painting by Jean Delville, 1940. Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp