Mystical Paths part I.

This is the 5th Novel in the Starbridge series and like Glamorous Powers, it's not one of my favourites. I am a little uneasy with the emphaisis on the supernatural. It is set in the 1960s, and it follows the early life of Nicholas Darrow, Jon Darrow's son by his second marriage. Nick has some of his father's psychic gifts.. He has visions, and finds conventional religion dry and boring. His father has always wanted him to go into the church, but because he himself made a mess of his ministry of healing, he feels that Nick should not go in for that area of work. Nick's mother, Anne, an upper class girl many years Jon's junior, died in middle age, and that removed her robust common sense from the family. Nick feels her loss. He is like his father in being a loner, and he's annoyed when he gets pushed into the set of socialites headed by Marina Markhampton, a beautiful upper class girl who has been living temporarily in the Cathedral Close. He does like Venetia Flaxton who is at that time, Marina's flatmate. Then a tragedy occurs in the group. Christian Aysgarth, Neville's eldest son, takes up sailing and is drowned. Some time after the death, Marina, who is a close friend of Katie, Christian's wife, comes to visit Nicholas. She tells him that Katie is a total mess and she thinks that Katie needs to find out exactly what happened to her husband or she will never recover.