The Siren Awakening

Synopsis            

THE SIREN
AWAKENING

A LIVING WATERS
MYSTERY SCHOOL

BOOK ONE

Starbucks’
Mermaid Mysterium 
& Kurzweil’s Quest for
The Secret Bliss Brew 

by  Merlyn J. Travis, Ph.D.

Synopsis


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The life of Harvard Divinity School professor Aaron Kurzweil takes a radical turn when he begins hearing voices in March 2011.  They’re emanating from Starbucks’ logo – an enigmatic two-tailed mermaid the company calls The Siren.

When The Siren’s not seductively crooning to him in the voice of Norah Jones, she dialogs with him in the voice of NPR’s Terry Gross and others. 

But the call of The Siren is clear and urgent: massive flooding will wipe out civilization by the year 2021, preventing it from further poisoning of the planet’s waters –unless Aaron reawakens people to a loving reverence for the Living Waters - with the help of a secret Bliss Brew. 

The Siren wants Kurzweil to convince Starbucks to serve the brew to its hundreds of millions of weekly customers  - so they awaken to the preciousness of the
Living Waters ... and to, once again, reverently protect them. 

In the professor’s quest to discover the magical brew, he’s accompanied by an old flame, Deja (as in Deja Vu), a wildly sensuous and 
adventurous tree-hugging - and kissing - sex-ecologist  who teaches orgasmic meditation and Gaian "eco-sexuality." 

Their journey of awakening deepens when Aaron’s reunited with his Zaydee (yiddish: grandfather), a Hasidic rabbi turned psychedelic researcher, under the CIA’s controversial MK-Ultra “mind-control” program of the 1960s.  Long-presumed dead, the old man is now a leader of The Tribe, a secret utopian commune deep in the rain-forest of Jamaica’s Blue Mountain.

Aaron is
 mentored by Zaydee in the Living Waters mysteries - hidden in the ancient Hebrew of Genesis, the Bible's creation story - and he's initiated into The Tribe’s esoteric water-devotion practices.  

Before receiving The Tribe’s  sacred elixir - an important key to discovering the Secret Brew - Aaron experiments with altering his own consciousness using a variety of ancient psychoactive concoctions, and some newly discovered by the "godfather of psychedelics," Alexander Shulgin.  Kurzweil also consults with cutting-edge researchers in psychopharmacology – the scientists behind new FDA approved human experiments with psychedelics.

On the trail, Aaron and Deja encounter leaders of the consciousness-hacking movement.  They get deep access into BRAIN - the White House’s multi-billion dollar neurotechnology initiative and the Pentagon's research on consciousness-tweaking effects of story-telling for future “brain wars."  And then Deja gets involved with DARPA-funded research on military uses of oxytocin - the "love and bonding" hormone.
As Aaron and Deja uncover the secrets of the Bliss Brew, they join forces with a fast-growing group of radical undercover baristas called The Siren Sisterhood.
The Sisterhood feels that market pressures are preventing Starbucks from focusing deeply on its revised mission (2008): "to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup, one neighborhood at a time."   

​
Frustrated, The Sisterhood initiates 
unauthorized 
experiments to inspire and nurture their customers. 
Outraged by polluters, some inspire others to get political.  Other baristas inspire and nurture through song.  Some turn to Reiki-energy work, therapeutic touch and movement arts. 
With Deja and Aaron, The Sisterhood leadership takes a more mystical turn.  Communing with The Siren as sea-goddess Yemanja,  or river-goddess Oshun, they sing devotional water songs and begin cracking the mermaid mysterium - the esoteric code hidden in Starbucks' enigmatic logo. As the Temple of Living Waters, the Sisterhood begins holding clandestine circles at Starbucks around the world.

The professor's One Cup Research group teams up with
The Sisterhood to infiltrate Starbucks’ corporate fortress. They seek to awaken the company to the imminence of catastrophic global flooding, due to humanity's poisoning of the waters, and the need for the Bliss Brew. Slowly, they find corporate sympathizers open to their quest for the consciousness-altering elixir and to Starbucks’ destined role in humanity's awakening. 

But CIA agents - seeking to both infiltrate Starbucks and get control of the 
Bliss Brew for their own nefarious purposes - are on Kurzweil’s trail. And Raymond Stone - once a key handler in the CIA’s MK-Ultra program, and now a strategic consultant for Starbucks -- is dead-set on stopping him. 

As they all converge on Seattle for Starbucks' 2014 Annual Meeting of Shareholders - with special guest 
Oprah! - The Sisterhood receives telepathic messages from Tahlequah - a new Orca mother in the matriarchal Killer Whale "pod" of The Salish Sea, now going extinct. 

​
The Sisterhood learns to commune with the Orcas and they form an alliance to reclaim the vitality of Puget Sound's poisoned waters, where Starbucks's Seattle HQ is based.  Seeking Oprah's support, they try to make contact and find a way to communicate with her through the star's dreams.
​Will Aaron, Deja and 
The Sisterhood succeed
in convincing Starbucks to serve
the secret Bliss Brew at
30,000+ global coffeehouses,
keep it from falling into the
wrong hands ... and survive
​the ordeal? 
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THE SIREN AWAKENING: BOOK ONE is a phenome-novel, a blend of genres - historical fiction, magical realism, corporate satire, sexy romantic-comedy, neuro-psychological thriller and contemporary spiritual quest -  portraying historical events and people - both famous and little-known - through an imaginative lens.   But at its heart, the novel’s chapters come together as an immersive Living Waters Mystery School, going deep into the harsh realities of intensifying water pollution, species extinction and climate chaos - wrought by extractive, disembodying, disconnecting corporate greed - and honoring the redemptive feminine mermaid qualities of water: wiley and maternal; soft, flowy, responsive and resilient; creative, inspiring and nurturing; embodying ... dissolving and connecting. 

THE SIREN AWAKENING will ignite a global conversation, not only about Starbucks’ ubiquitous and enigmatic mermaid logo, but about the very future of our waters, and thus our planet ... and our selves - body, mind and spirt.

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  • The Siren Awakening
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  • The Siren Awakening
  • Synopsis
  • First Chapters Free
  • Her Vision
  • Her Voice
  • Her Circles
  • Author
  • Connect