Continuum announces a new series of classic works of mysticism with representative texts from all the major world religions: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Taoism.

A mix of familiar texts with proven sales potential and less familiar works with untapped readerships will introduce the committed of all faiths to key contemplative texts from outside their traditions. Each volume will be bound with lavish, full-color covers, and illustrated throughout.

The Book of Concealed Mystery is a book of the key text of the Kabbalah, a work known as the Zohar ("Splendour"). The Zohar is a commentary on the Torah and although it is sometimes ascribed to a second-century rabbi, Simon Bar-Yochai, the form in which it is most widely known originates with Moses of Leon, a native of Granada, who died in 1305.

The kabbalists believe that the undefinable origin of all things is Ein Sof -- the cause of causes, the infinite, that which underlies everything. The universe emanates from the divine in successive layers called esefiroti. Everything exists in God, but God extends infinitely beyond existence. All we know and are is linked together, pervaded and maintained by the divine. According to The Book of Concealed Mystery, the light of God must be concealed in order to be revealed to creation. Even though the kabbalists believe that ultimately Ein Sof is beyond expression or understanding, the contemplation of God's presence in all things causes our thoughts to be purified

These three journeys take theater critic Margaret Croyden to a Polish forest retreat devised by experimental theater director Jerzy Grotowski, through intensive sessions at a Catskills ashram with Hindu guru Baba Muktananda, and, finally, to a spiritual teacher in an Israel divided by both the metaphor and the reality of war. Each experience, powerfully evoked, arouses memories of Croyden's past - her long forgotten childhood with her Jewish family in Brooklyn, her youthful dreams and aspirations, and her adult search for fulfillment and spiritual transendence. Each experience brings her closer to her identity as a woman, a Jew, and a writer. Croyden's quest turns up no easy answers, no doctrinaire catharses. The struggle for self-knowledge is slow and painful, requiring both a remembering and a forgetting. Croyden's perceptions may sometimes shock - especially those of the relationship between sexuality and religious ecstasy and of the Arab-Israeli conflict. This memoir - moving, thought-provoking, and daringly honest - tells a brave tale of a modern woman's discovery of her authentic self.

i could feel pulses of energies emanating from the light tutoring my being coercing measure for measure my breath and beat for beat my heart a corporeal bypass keeping kilter of my anatomy against the siege of my endocrine system preventing me from going into shock which was very important if i went into shock mytelepathic sense would shut down i knew that i knew that in the same astonishing way that i knew where i was who these people were what the blue lights did and ... what was about to happen next

i could feel pulses of energies emanating from the light tutoring my being coercing measure for measure my breath and beat for beat my heart a corporeal bypass keeping kilter of my anatomy against the siege of my endocrine system preventing me from going into shock which was very important if i went into shock mytelepathic sense would shut down i knew that i knew that in the same astonishing way that i knew where i was who these people were what the blue lights did and ... what was about to happen next

Now in its 37th edition, and compiled in association with the Publishers Association, this is the most authoritative, detailed trade directory available for the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, listing over 900 book publishers. Comprehensive entries include, where available: - full contact details including addresses and websites - details of distribution and sales and marketing agents - key personnel - listing of main fields of activity - information on annual turnover, numbers of new titles and numbers of employees - ISBN prefixes including those for imprints and series - details of trade association membership - information on overseas representation - details of associated and parent companies. In addition to the detailed entries on publishers, the Directory offers in-depth coverage of the wider UK book trade and lists organizations associated with the book trade: packagers, authors' agents, trade and allied associations and services. The directory is also available to purchase as an online resource, for more information and a free preview please visit www.continuumbooks.com/directoryofpublishing