Forbidden Fruits: An Occult Novel

Joscelyn Godwin & Guido Mina di Sospiro

Inner Traditions 2020

Pb, 282pp, £16.99, ISBN 9781644111574

Forbidden Fruits is an occult thriller set in Malta and Rome. An American archæologist, Monica Bettlheim, working with billionaire Sebastian Pinto, a knight of the Order of Malta, finds a millenniaold golden pomegranate on the seabed – and inside it, the remains of vegetable matter, probably a cereal, and fungal spores. She gets together with Pinto’s son; the occult part of the novel is about them using psychotropic substances – ergot and mushrooms – to experience communion with the divine. That would be fascinating, except it’s completely buried in an over-written thriller whose murderous plot becomes less and less credible as the story goes on and written with clichéd characterisation and clumsy conversation. One of the authors, Prof Joscelyn Godwin, is a highly respected authority on esoteric beliefs and musicology; I’ve had several of his excellent books for years. It’s a shame he’s lent his name to this overblown novel.