This book certainly does prove sonmeting

That you can get a book published with no writing talent, no spell checker and no real undrstanding of what you are writing about.
Peace is Possible by Andrea Cagan is a much, much, much better book.

This book is utter crap

There are some priceless gems contained here within - assuming you have a month free to look for them.

I think Arthur's on something, the cult he boldly names on page 9, The Divine Uniting Order, well it gives me the strong impression that if you can remember the Seventies - you definitely weren't there.
But good fiction, true lies. If only the writing skills matched the imagination.

Mr Chappell deserves an A-Z of quotes made up, for in the first six pages I found these beauties without even looking.

'What my Aunt said should have told me to distance myself too, but it wasn't enough. The group did seem happy, and there was this Knowledge they spoke of. I dreamed of getting the Knowledge and then showing it for the sham it was.'

Yup, that's a genuine sincere seeker alright.

'The (meditation) techniques were gleamed from behavioral psychology, and FIRST given prominent use in the Korean War, often in conjunction with physical torture and violence.'

Crikey! And for the author who to this day gets his jollies by pretending to be a fighting soldier from the middle ages, this violence thing would have been the cherry, no doubt.

Talking of which, here the author veers slightly off the cult course and discusses his recruitment into the guild of ye ancient yeomen (who dress up and re-enact famous olde battles).

'It's easy I tell you, if you sit in the landscape of some very odd picture, to begin thinking, WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME? WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE? ( the 747s flying overhead perhaps?) You see that everyone else thinks this odd place is normal, and because you don't see it as normal, well, then you must be abnormal. You start questioning yourself. Your judgement gets wacky. You don't want to be odd, you want to fit in, so you become normal as defined by the abnormal picture. You become odd.'

Indeed, it must be a strange experience finding oneself in the middle of a field dressed in hemp-cloth and skirt tunic holding a large iron Pike to ward off marauding attackers wielding swords and balls on chains - as flight GLV550 to New York passes serenely overhead.

But back to the evil cult.

'We had to keep our identity secret, because there were people out there who want to hurt us and laugh at us. I asked about brainwashing, the answer was blunt, "if this is brainwashing I want more of it, I love being brainwashed." I was too far gone now, had I discovered that Maharaji had an atom bomb and ate babies I still wouldn't have left.'

Great Scott, nurse could you increase the dose to 500 milligrams please.

In summary, if there hadn't already been a spate of TV dramas and movies featuring the cardboard cutout cliches of every imaginable cult under the sun, this would have provided some excellent dialogue. Sadly the woeful valium fuelled writing style leads the reader into a gradual stupour, I found myself shaking my head every few minutes until finally having to concede defeat.

As one would expect, this is the sort of result we get when 'Lulu lets YOU take control of publishing!'

Leaving aside how gifted Mr. Chapell is as a writer, the whole objective of the book seems to probe he was victim of a cult. But... you can make a cult of anything, from soccer to religion. It is up to the individual to decide what he really is looking for. I don't see self-criticism in the book but a lot of blaming others...of course being a sales person I can understand it would be hard to sell a book that would be called "I should be ashamed for what I did" or "How I brainwashed myself and wasted my time in the 80's". I have been in contact with Maharaji since 1973 and I never felt manipulated or forced to do anything, I just had a wonderful time learning the good values he has promoted since I started listening to him in those days. I have to admit I was never looking for anything else than to learn about myself and why I had that atraction towards feeling really good and happy. I was very curious about that and he offered himself to teach me and I let him do it. My story is not of brainwashing but of recovering my human memory. If I ever write a book about all of these years since I first heard from him "What you are looking for is already inside of you", I would like it to be filled with the beautiful stories I can recall and feel fortunate with every word I write. I get the feeling there are less and less people interested in reading about the miseries of life but rather the opposite. I doubt Mr. Chapell can cover expenses. But I wish him to put the binoculars in the right position and to realise that what he really is looking for is not far but still with him. If he writes a book about that, look me up.
Best regards

This guy has "degrees in literature and philosophy"? British academe must be in disarray.

Oh my ....

As someone who works closely, with folks trying to recover from alcoholism and drug addiction, the tenor of Arthurs book is patently familiar to me. I did read the preview, as far as it would let me, but the Autobiography sketch on page 3, says it all; “Arthur writes to prove that he is more than just a victim...”, the operative word here being “victim”. Anyone in the helping professions knows exactly what I mean.

Arthur was a victim before he met the “divine lighters”, and if he hadn’t met them, he would have sought refuge from his inner demons, at the next bus stop, or the next one after that. That’s what victims do. Just working the numbers, it is a fact that there was a quite a few folks back in the 70’s and 80’s that were “religious fanatics” looking for something to make a religion out of, whether it was a spiritual movement, or a historical re-enactment society. (Which is also a “cult”ure, by definition.)

I have had more than my fair share of interractions with “ex cult members”, and almost without exception, they have all shared perceptive pathologies that, if you remove the drugs or alcohol, appear exactly like the alcoholic or drug addict, who wants to blame “them” (as in everbody else. “It’s not my fault!”)

I have to say, I don’t intend this review to be unkind, and I mean that. That said, it never fails to amaze me, when someone has the audacity to call hogwash “a true story” (page 1), and even more so, when they direct their distortions at another with the intent to lay blame. But forget about that for a moment! Golly dang dude, didn’t you even consider getting some help from a real writer on this? (I’m sorry. It’s just really bad.)

I sincerely hope Mr. Chappell, eventually, some sunny afternoon when the weather is just right, has an Aha! moment, and realizes what we all know, or should know. The only singularly clear fact, about all the troubles he has ever had, is that he, himself, was always there. If such a thing could happen, Mr. Chappell can graduate from the ranks of being a “victim”, move on, and as a collateral benefit, his life would get better than he can imagine as a result.

This guy needs some serious help. The numerous spelling and grammar errors could be forgiven if this "Arthur" had something to say that was worth reading.


From the hilarious to the utter nonsense this is a narrative constructed by a feeble minded individual with too much free time in his hands, an obsession with UFOs and cults, and follies de grandeur. Dunno if to laugh, or to fell sorry for the poor guy.


(He even goes and write about himself in the third person in the description... As if it is not clear that this is a self-publishing platform, LOL!)





I guess that wonderful tools such as Lulu opens the stage for people as Mr. Chapell's diatribes. Nevertheless, I think it is actually great: let these people be judged by their own words.





:: Mia ::

Without wishing to be unkind to Mr Chappell, his book is not what it purports to be. A more appropriate title would be, for example, The Delusions of a Paranoid Psychotic Person. In his misspelt but sobering account Chappell describes meeting happy, smiling, open and friendly people, and feeling that they are somehow sinister. He perceives them to be somehow acting in concert, as though connected by single thread of consciousness for a purpose that is somehow vaguely threatening, but not clearly understood or defined. Chappell wants to escape, but is drawn to them, perhaps by their warmth or kindness. His book may be useful as a reference for therapists engaged in treating patients who remain functional in society while suffering from various forms of psychoses or displaying obsessive behavior similar to Chappell's.



The people Chappell encountered in the early 1980s were students of Prem Rawat, an Indian bourn teacher who emigrated to the United States as a teenager in the early 1970s and who has for many years traveled the world speaking about inner peace. His early followers were drawn from the counter culture movement of that era. U.S. academic, J. Gordon Melton, has described the evolution of Rawat's teaching. In 1982 he abandoned the trappings of Indian culture and dissolved his own support base. He then established a new organization and began moving it into mainstream society. Powerful consciousness changing techniques comprise the core of Rawat's teaching. He makes these techniques freely available to anyone who expresses a sincere desire to learn them. Evidently, Chappell slipped through whatever screening process existed in 1981. He was insincere from the beginning. He writes, "I dreamed of getting the Knowledge and then showing it for the sham it was."



Chappell's book is not a reliable source of information on the subject. Detailed information is available in new biography, Peace is Possible, by independent author, Andrea Cagan.

What a load of rubbish this is.



A short read of the preview is enough to tell you that Arthur Chappell is a man of little talent but a huge ego. The number of spelling and grammatical mistakes on every page makes this vanity publication torture to read. Even the title is missing an apostrophe!!! (He's fixed it now)

It appears his only motivation, other than claiming to be a published author, is to bad mouth his guru of twenty years ago.
His pal Hannah Rosha has written 4 reviews of this book and given it five stars every time in order to boost its rating.
I won't ask for them to be removed, reading this "book" is its own punishment.



Why he would think anyone would read his ramblings is beyond me.



TT

The author is honest and forthright about his involvement with the cult of Rawat, formerly known as the Guru Maharaji and the Divine Light Mission.

Obviously, the current followers of this cult (now known as Elan Vital) will denigrate this effort, but it serves as a warning to everyone not to give their power over to another.

Hopefully it will also help those who have left the cult to see that they were not alone in their disillusionment and disgust at the so-called "Lord of the Universe".

Thank goodness for places like Lulu where a person can tell their story in his or her own way. This is yet another harrowing tale of how one person was able to regather their own personal perspective on life, realise their own way, their own light, and shine once more.

No matter what you do or don't think of cults, to commit yourself to another's ego can be a very dangerous thing to do.

Arthur now follows his own way and this book will provide others wishing to do so a guiding light to do the same.

Clearly, Arthur is someone who has been deeply hurt from his experience to be brave enough to bare all in this heartwrenching way. The text is complete with all the tracks of being abused and his courage to lay bare such truth in light of immediate and unrelenting adversity is to be applauded.

Impassioned, broken, strong, disarrayed, deep and honest, this text will allow you to make your own mind up about cults. It will show you how unfortunate the side-effects of putting a human, a leader, a chosen one, above and beyond a simple universal message can be.

Arthur does no want to be followed. He simply wants his message to be heard. There is nothing more honourable.