I don’t mind admitting to PS-Magazine.com readers that I struggled with this book.

My battle began with Coletta’s awkward style of writing and continued with trying to understand her disjointed thoughts. As this wrestling match continued I became involved in her struggle and continued to turn the pages. I cared enough to see if she would wade out of her emotional quagmire and become a more streamlined version of herself.

The Author takes on the alias of 'The Fool' of the Tarot, and in an unusual yet thought provoking way brings alive the actors in her life's story as major Tarot cards. As characters enter her life, their influence ‘shapes’ Coletta, they become a prism through which each experience can be interpreted. These characters symbolise, in turn, the lessons of the major arcana.

For instance, the husband is the Chariot, ‘because he represents to me a handsome man with a nature reflecting light and dark’. The Chariot’s male colleague, who entices him away from the marriage with ‘offerings of freedom, fantasy, alcohol, school boy pranks, humour and rivers of money’, is The Devil. Coletta’s mother is named after the card called The Lovers; their relationship is akin to a love affair, extremely close but with furious rows and long estrangements. The Empress is the maternal grandmother, The Hanged Man the maternal grandfather and The Knight of Cups symbolises a potential lover.

Though I found Coletta’s journey too personal for my taste, at times her honesty was endearing. Whilst living through the misery of divorce, having realised that knights in shining armour don’t exist, a certain grace prevails. There is nothing bitter in this story, no laying of blame at anyone’s door, nothing is said to diminish ‘dad’ in the eyes of the children.

At the end of the book, she includes few meditations.

Nature is relentless in providing thorny challenges. The way through, according to Coletta, is to submit to experience and to learn. To bare one’s soul in print is a brave act. Such bravery comes from a heart which understands that to share one’s struggles helps others to become stronger.

The author’s website camillastrust4healing.com has a very personal message, ‘passionate about finding and passing on the tools to turn adversity around, to learn to accept where we are and to do something about it’.

More about Camilla Coletta:
Born in London 11 January 1968.

“What is the point to life?
To be happy.
I began my first book last February whilst waiting for my Decree Nisi which reflects my life journey. I’ve continued my writing, with three further books recording my life experiences which show techniques aimed to assist people with their own life experiences and changes.

My primary years were spent travelling around the world with my mother and step-father. I was educated at many schools in the UK and by governesses whilst travelling. Spirituality was an on-going theme in my life. A large part of my secondary education was at a boarding school in Sussex

With a wealth of life experiences behind me I offer a progressive, personal spiritual training programme to raise our vibration, a guide to a new and better you. I desire to founder a charitable organisation to help people in all areas of healing.”

More About her book, The Journey of the Fool, in the author's words:
The Journey of The Fool is an auto-biography. A record of a spiritual journey, triggered by my divorce which reflects backwards to put all the pieces in the puzzle of my life together. Written with the intention of helping others, who are going through big transitions in their lives, and may have been flattened by their life experiences. Hoping that it will be inspiring, and that it may help as a spring-board, or a stepping stone, to setting life goals and moving forward.

The Journey of the Fool, by Camilla Coletta

Buy the book: Amazon UK, Tesco.co.uk , not available from Amazon USA yet.

ISBN-10: 1905621922

ISBN-13: 978-1905621927

Paperback: 138 pages

Author’s website www.camillastrust4healing.com

Publisher: Pen Press Publishers Ltd (10 Sep 2007), www.penpress.net