Urban Green Man Anthology

Well, well! Lookie what popped up in my backyard earlier this month…  My contributor copy of the brand new Urban Green Man Short Fiction Anthology from Edge Publishing – complete with its own Green Man talisman/pendant! (See the little foliate face upper left in the tree?) When was the last time a publisher gave you jewelry for your part in a book?

But then this isn’t just any book. From the publisher’s website:

The stories in this anthology are ripe with magic of new beginnings and will change the way you look at life, forever. Psychologist Carl Jung once suggested that an archetype will reappear in a new form to redress imbalances in society exactly when it is needed. Perhaps the Green Man is rising yet again just in time to help us cultivate a harmonious and sustainable relationship with Nature. Your imagination will run wild. The vibrant stories presented in this anthology are all new and original…. Every story follows the theme of renewal surrounding the mythology of the Green Man.

The mystical face of the Green Man can be found on churches and other buildings throughout northern Europe. It is believed that the Green Man mythology developed independently in various cultures and is a remnant of ancient pagan beliefs. The human face, hidden in the green foliage, shows a longing for the natural world and reminds us that we are dependent on a healthy planet not only for physical sustenance, but for our mental health as well.

My own short story “Neither Slumber Nor Sleep” closes off this phenomenal anthology, and it begins like this:

Neither Slumber Nor Sleep

by Kim Goldberg

God speaks to each of us as he makes us,

then walks with us silently out of the night. 

-Rainer Maria Rilke

When a thing that cannot be, nevertheless exists, does the devout man deny it or expand his faith to hold it?

Three a.m., and still I cannot sleep. Every time I close my eyes, my mind opens wider. I am gripped by a feverish urgency—a pressing need to record, with as much accuracy as memory permits, the strange events of these past six months taking place up-Island in Nanaimo.

Now that I am no longer Rabbi of Congregation Beth Shalom here in Victoria, it would seem I have nothing but time (and my blog) on my hands. So why do I feel the chokehold of desperation to get this told? …

~

Green man talisman given to the authors in the book

The Urban Green Man Short Fiction Anthology, edited by Adria Laycraft and Janice Blaine, is available on amazon.com and amazon.ca

-Kim Goldberg