TEMPLE DANCER Backstory Part Two: Devadasi Research
After my return from India, I researched devadasi ritual and culture and discovered a league of auspicious, empowered women. For over 1,200 years, temple dancers, or devadasis, were educated and revered. Their sacred temple duties brought them honor and status. Devadasis maintained community life cycle rituals: they tied the sacred gold thread, the tali, around the bride’s neck; they led religious processions. Within the temple, [...]
Podcast with J. Brown on Love and Sacred Sexuality
Sacred Sexuality in Temple Dancer "I got an email from your publisher... your name was on the top, and I was like, wait a minute, Amy Weintraub. And I look at the book. It's a fiction book, a connection between sexuality and spirituality, and I was like, wow! Isn't she the Yoga for Depression lady I used to know way back when...??" J. Brown and [...]
TEMPLE DANCER Backstory: Part One
Every novel has a backstory arising from the author’s experience, imagination and research. Because there are several plot threads in Temple Dancer, there are at least three backstories. In this 3-part series, I'll review the backstory that led to the emergence of Saraswati as a character in an Indian village in 1938. Goddess Yellamma Reaching Out On the day I stood in [...]
The Promise that Keeps Me Going
Dears Ones, do you know how hard it is to release your first published novel (Temple Dancer, September 8th!), especially in a pandemic? These days, I’m immersed in the hard part—promotion. What keeps my head above water is that I feel I’m fulfilling a promise I made 26 years ago. After a second sojourn in India, I received a gift from an eight-year-old girl, born [...]
My Journey Back to Fiction via Kripalu
This unfamiliar pause in our ordinary lives has been a time of loss and also a time of birth--my daughter gave birth to a son, Shalom Raphael, three weeks ago, and I am about to deliver my first novel, Temple Dancer. I'll be live on Facebook for a reading and brief talk. I hope you'll join me here tomorrow, May 21 at 4pm PT, 7ET. [...]
A practice to widen the window while flattening the curve
During the Pandemic, many conflicting emotions are arising for me, as I imagine they have for you. I am grateful to be well, to be living with my partner in peace and in love, and to be learning new technologies in order to offer free online webinars and practices during this time. I’m a slow learner, and I’m crawling like a baby up the learning [...]