Mario E. Martinez The Man From Autumn: A Psychological Novel

Rarely has a book so compelled me, that upon closing the final page, I opened again to page 1 to start re-reading it immediately. The Man from Autumn is such a book. Crafted by wordsmith and bio-cognitive psychologist, Mario Martinez, Psy.D., it has the rich allure of a novel with excellent characterization and plot, mystery, embedded clues, and cultural dimensionality.

Dr. Martinez, the developer of the field of bio-cognitive psychology, asserts that the scientific basis of psychoneuroimmunology cannot be isolated from our beliefs and our cultural norms. Using a technique he refers to as incidental learning, he gently, subtly, yet powerfully introduces the fundamentals of bio-cognitive psychology to the reader.

While framed as a work of fiction, an immense amount of information and perspective from medical anthropology, neuroscience, and spirituality find their way into the storyline in a seamless, unobtrusive way.

The author has served as a consultant to the Catholic Church, the BBC and National Geographic on cases of stigmata, the appearance of non-healing, and bleeding wounds of Christ on the hands and feet of certain faithful. He uses this background as one of several methods and scenarios in the book to introduce the ability of mind and culture to affect our bodies in profound ways. This is done in narrative style that introduces many religious and political questions when a cardinal from Cuba develops this mysterious condition. He also poses these questions in the context of modern science.

The most valuable theme of the book to me, however, was that we can transform personal and cultural norms that demand suffering and pain as requisites to growth and to aging into joy. The Man from Autumn confronts directly the expectation that in our autumn years, we automatically must endure programmed obsolescence. Instead, using the tools of bio-cognitive psychology, he demonstrates how we can shirk off societal and cultural programs about senescence and disability. Instead, we can choose at any age to continue to grow, to experience love, prosperity, stimulating relationships, intellectual vigor, to savor excellent food and wine, and all things wonderful in life.

With a wide range of topics from stigmata to voodoo, immunology to anthropology, dream work and helpful Muses, this book is lovingly and masterfully written. It is a joy to read. You will find yourself transformed in your own personal psychological constructs from pain into joy, from the Crucifixion to the Resurrection, and from being a victim of cultural beliefs to being a joyful co-creator of your future.

This review will also appear in "Explore: The Journal of Science and Healing".

Victor S. Sierpina, M.D.

Nicholson Professor of Integrative Medicine

University of Texas Medical Branch - Galveston

The Man from Autumn is a navigational chart for the private journey of Self, concealed in a psychological novel. It takes the reader on a path that explores a non-linear world of meaningful coincidences and other mystical experiences, where joy is the rule, and anguish an exception. The imagery this work can elicit, transforms a mundane existence of the known into portals of discovery that affirm love, health and longevity, as our inherent rights rescued from a dimension of fear.

When a parallel reality is introduced, it must offer a language to establish horizons for the bio-informational space it creates.