REVIEW: THE LEGEND OF ALTHAZAR

A middle-aged man with a pornstache and jean-shorts parks outside of a music festival, you can see yourself reflected in his aviator sunglasses as sells you talismans from the back of his van.

Painted on the side of the van, there is a mural of a wizard. That wizard wrote this book.

The Legend of Althazar, A Fragment of the True History of Plane Earth by The Hermit of the Crystal Mountain is a shining example of a genre that pulls from Ancient Aliens and Starseed lore that I am going to call Aurapunk. Here are the Lost Empires of Crystal Pyramids, of Sacred Light Vibrations, of Enlightened Alien Half-Breeds. These are stories from a more enlightened time, when our ancestors knew the sacred sciences of focusing the aura through crystal formations to manipulate the earths sacred magnetic energy grid.

Our Author, The Hermit of the Crystal Mountain, aka Solara, aka Nani Sheppard, has published a litany of other works, books with titles like “Invoking Your Celestial Guardians” and “Through the Doorway of the 11:11.” Though difficult to know for sure, her occultism appears sincere. One gets the sense that she literally does believe that mankind is descended from a myriad of alien races. Many of Sheppard’s works seek to help others discover their “alien ancestry” and activate all the magical powers that come with that sort of thing.

Personally, I feel the concept of Ancient Aliens has done significant damage to the fields of archeology and anthropology. The idea that the wonders of the ancient world are the result of alien intervention robs these indigenous civilizations of their accomplishments. The concept of “Starseeds” is similarly troubling. “Starseed” was coined by Brad Steiger in his 1976 book Gods of Aquarius.