Sangoma

Nothing in James Hall's midwestern childhood or professional writing career had prepared him for such an unexpected life. When Hall was on assignment in Africa working with legendary singer Miriam Makeba, she perceived he had the rare gift to see both into the future and into people's souls. At her urging, Hall consulted a sangoma, a traditional healer, who told him he was possessed by ancestral spirits who could give him the power to heal others and to become a sangoma himself - if he was willing to take the risk.

The risk he took required him to break with the past and embrace an uncertain future, and undergo a two-year spiritual and physical ordeal - initiation into the mysteries of psychic possession and traditional healing. His is a story never heard before, told by the first white person to complete these demanding and secret rituals. Hall's grasp of reality was shaken to the core as he was forced to surrender himself to souls from the spirit world who now use him as their liaison with the living. Hall also learned how to read meanings and messages in his set of divination bones, and began his education in the collection and preparation of plants and roots used as traditional medicines - knowledge that takes a lifetime to master.

James Hall has written a candid and dramatically personal account of his unique journey from a comfortable, predictable life in Los Angeles to a harsh and uncharted one in the tiny kingdom of Swaziland. His story shows how the pieces of life can fit together to balance people and nature, the mortal and the immortal, the physical and the spiritual. Sangoma weaves together the excitement of an adventure story and the wisdom of a deeply felt memoir from a man who has blended his roles as modern American and as diviner and healer of timeless provenance.