Cave in the Snow Tenzin Palmo's Quest for Enlightenment

This is the incredible story of Tenzin Palmo, a remarkable woman who spent 12 years alone in a cave 13,000 feet up in the Himalayas. At the age of 20, Diane Perry, looking to fill a void in her life, entered a monastery in India--the only woman amongst hundreds of monks---and began her battle against the prejudice that had excluded women from enlightenment for thousands of years. Thirteen years later, Diane Perry a.k.a. Tenzin Palmo secluded herself in a remote cave 13,000 feet up in the Himalayas, where she stayed for twelve years. In her mountain retreat, she face unimaginable cold, wild animals, floods, snow and rockfalls, grew her own food and slept in a traditional wooden meditation box, three feet square. She never lay down. Tenzin emerged from the cave with a determination to build a convent in northern India to revive the Togdenma lineage, a long-forgotten female spiritual elite. She has traveled around the world to find support for her cause, meeting with spiritual leaders from the Pope to Desmond Tutu. She agreed to tell her story only to Vicky Mackenzie and a portion of the royalties from this book will help towards the completion of her convent. Vicki Mackenziehas written for theDaily Mailand theMail on Sunday, among other publications, for the past thirty years. She is the author ofReincarnation: The Boy LamaandReborn in the West: The Reincarnation Masters. Dianne Perry led an average childhood in London's East End until, in her teens, she became convinced there must be a spiritual dimension to life of a kind unavailable to her. After reading a book on Buddhism she realized that this was what she had been seeking and left England for India at the age of twenty. After considerable searching she entered a monastery. The only woman among hundreds of men, she grew determined to break down the prejudices that had excluded women from the path to enlightenment for thousands of years. She left after six years, set on attaining enlightenment in the body of a woman, a totally radical objective. She decided to seclude herself in a remote cave, 13,000 feet up in the Himalayas. For twelve years she faced unimaginable cold, wild animals, floods and rockfalls, grew her own food and slept in a traditional wooden meditation box, three feet squareshe never lay down. In 1988 she emerged from the cave determined to build a convent in northern India, and to revive the Togdenma lineage, a long-forgotten female spiritual elite. From living as a mendicant of $80 a year, she became a globe-trotting fundraiser. In this book, Tenzin Palmo tells her story to Vicki Mackenzie. "InCave in the Snow, Mackenzie, a journalist with a special interest in Buddhism, recounts with passion and beauty the story of Tenzin Palmo (neacute;e Diane Perry), which involved 12 years of living in an Indian cave, snowbound for eight months of each year. She delves into Palmo's motivations, feelings, thoughts, and teachings, presenting the facts of her life while preserving the anguish, desire, conviction, and conflict that accompanied her conversion to Buddhism. The result is thoroughly engrossing."Library Journal "Cave in the Snowis full of such extraordinary insights. It is a desert island bookone we can't very well live without."Tricycle

Vicki Mackenzie has been a features writer for The Daily Sketch and The Daily Mail and has written for The Sunday Times, The Observer, The Daily Express, The Mail on Sunday, and many national Australian magazines.