A Stop At Matala

Adventure and ancient mysteries at the hippy ’hot spot’ of Europe. In the late 1960’s in Athens, young American traveler, Joseph Maretti, disillusioned with Western culture and preparing travel to India, meets Lissa, an English visitor. After a brief romance, Lissa returns home. Pausing to get over their separation, Joe takes a detour to the Greek island of Crete. On the ferry, he meets Heini, a German student, who reveals the mysteries of Europe’s oldest civilization, the Minoans. At the coastal village of Matala, Joe finds an elaborate cave commune and a beautiful bay with a mythic past. Troubled by his separation from Lissa, he begins to have dreams involving her in this ancient setting. He takes up residence in one of the abandoned caves overlooking the tiny village and encounters summer tourists, seasonal travelers and long-time troglodytes and soon becomes involved in events that endangers the very existence of the hippie commune with the Greek military police. As Joe delves into the secrets of the Minoans and gains a seminal understanding of his western heritage, his visit ends abruptly, and he resumes his journey eastward along the now famous ’hippy trail.’
In his first novel, Gene Arnone presents a first-person narrative told in three parts with approximately 200,000 words. The story is mostly fiction although many of the incidents are taken from the author’s own experiences, combined with his interest in mythology. The story is told in language that is both enjoyable and insightful with enough poetic license to fill in the gaps between the archaeological record and the fictional world created by the author.