Blurb:

WHITES ONLY
Those words adorned every building in Livingston, Virginia during the summer of 1963 confusing and angering a five-year-old Stephen Phillips. Those words told Stephen that what he felt for his colored neighbor Ruthie was wrong. As he grows older, Ruthie becomes the only ray of sunshine in his abusive life and he is not willing to let her go without a fight, a fight that could lead to murder.

 
 
This story wowed me. I was immediately drawn in, and the wonderful narration kept me glued. The imagery is strong and the dialogue is believable and engaging. The characters are well developed and I cared about their outcome.
 
The story begins as Stephen Phillips is interrogated by a badgering Chicago police officer. “Did you do it, Stephen?” The officer places gruesome photos of Reverend Phillips’ bloody corpse on the table, but Stephen refuses to look at them. “Why don’t you look at your father’s mutilated body? Beaten to death with a shovel outside his own home.”
 
The officer continues asking Stephen if he murdered the man who lay dead in Virginia. The same man who raised and loved him for eighteen years. Stephen replies, “My father never loved me. Never.”
 
When the officer’s goading doesn’t get the desired response, he attempts another tactic—changing the direction of the conversation to Stephen’s girlfriend Ruthie who sits in a nearby interrogation room.
 
 

“Maybe I’ll just have to ask that pretty little colored girlfriend of yours,” he said, staring at Ruthie’s picture and licking his lips.

“You leave her out of this.” My hands clenched into fists.

“I don’t know if I can do that. She seems to be pretty involved.” He kept staring at her picture as he spoke. “Your father is found dead at your home in Virginia and you’re found seven hundred miles away with a Negro whore. I can’t -”

He didn’t get to finish his thought. I leapt across the table and started pounding his face in. Seconds later, I was subdued by several officers. They placed me back in the chair and handcuffed me to the table.

This was getting worse and worse by the minute. I’d gladly go to jail for killing that man. He deserved to die. I just didn’t want Ruthie to get dragged into this. After all we’d been through, at least one of us deserved a chance to be happy.

 
After the room settles, another officer enters the room. Lieutenant Drake has a friendlier, gentle approach, and Stephen begins to soften.
 

“Why are you running? You know running only makes you look guilty and I don’t really believe you killed your father. I don’t think you’re capable.”

I stared at him. “You have no idea what I’m capable of. You have no idea what that man did to me.”

“You’re right. I don’t,” he said, trying to hide his surprise at my response. He sat down and crossed his arms. “So why don’t you tell me? You obviously have a story and you need someone to listen. So tell me your story. Tell me everything.”

 
 
Stephen’s story soon begins to flow. He tells about Ruthie, his childhood friend, and how their friendship eventually blossomed into a powerful love as they grew—despite the fact that loving a ‘colored’ was forbidden. He remembered staring up at the colored balcony in his father’s church when he was six years old, trying to catch a glimpse of his beautiful Ruthie. He paid for it when he got home with a beating. That didn’t stop his love for Ruthie. He refused to let his father take the one thing in his life that brought him true happiness.

He tells the officer about the lifetime of abuse he, his brother (Matthew), and mother (Marjorie) endured by the hands of the cherished small town Virginia reverend, Theodore Phillips. His father’s explosive anger and violence plagued him every day. After years of violent abuse, Matthew disappeared, and Marjorie suffered mercilessly until becoming an empty shell; but Stephen endured by retreating into that loved part of his heart. The beautiful part that Ruthie filled.

Stephen divulges the many ordeals that cursed his life that led to the day Theodore Phillips died. He reveals the eccentricities, secrets, and atrocities his father kept concealed behind his reverend cloak, and in the end, the truth behind the reverend’s death.

Upon completing this novella, I felt somewhat changed. It is a sad story with victories, and a terrifying tale with soft and loving moments. Such a wide range of emotions that finally left me feeling satisfied—yet not settled.
 
 
Review by C.E. Hart. C.E. Hart, a closet writer for several decades, is now knocking on doors, pushing send buttons, and flying paper airplanes into publishers open windows. She writes poetry, memoirs, and short stories, and is currently working on three novels. Her southern upbringing often gives her work a nostalgic flavor; but that’s not to say she doesn’t have a fun quirky side as well. Visit C.E. Hart (aka Nic) on her new author blog http://cehart.blogspot.com and on her quad-authored writing blog http://www.wenchwriters.blogspot.com.

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6. Perfect Plot Structure

 
If you had the chance to sit down and talk with a charming and enlightened guru at length, would you take it? Author and spiritual seeker Cheryl Simone did exactly that when she hosted Indian mystic and yoga master Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev at her home in the mountains for one week. Under the stars, Cheryl asked many searching questions she had sought answers to during her own thirty-year spiritual quest for understanding and enlightenment.
 
Those midnight conversations on a sandy island by campfire resulted in a wonderful book called Midnights with the Mystic: A Little Guide to Freedom and Bliss (Hampton Roads Pub Co, 328pp, ISBN-13 978-1571745613). Over those nights, Sadhguru answered questions with a combination of simplicity and wisdom that resonates deeply within you.
 
With his ready laugh, love of speed and fondness for joke telling, Sadhguru is not your average expectation of a guru by any means – or mine anyway. Some of the book’s snapshots show this visionary is just as happy sporting Ray-Ban sunglasses and shorts as more traditional garments.
 
In fact, if you were to judge him by appearance only, he’s a perfect expression physically of how we limit ourselves with our beliefs, one of the lessons he teaches on those moonlit nights. If you expect your guru to be found only on a remote mountaintop garbed in a loincloth, you may never find them. Appearances can certainly be deceptive.
 
Equally, don’t let Sadhguru’s Western attire fool you either. The more absorbed you become in Midnights with The Mystic, the more you become convinced that this man is the real deal. I feel, and believe Cheryl also touched on this, that his casually dressed appearance would be as much for our comfort in his presence as for his own physical comfort. It would be easy to become overwhelmed by Sadhguru’s intensity and depth which comes through beautifully on the written page. I came away from this book with the deepest respect for him, his teachings, Cheryl’s passion and a newly formed understanding of Isha Yoga.
 
The introduction is by Richard from Texas of Eat, Pray, Love fame. At one point he says “When you read this book, I know you’ll resonate with its own truths, be touched in ways that can trigger your own transformation.” A lofty claim indeed you may think. That is, until you begin to read and discover this startling fact: he’s not kidding.
 
That was no marketing ploy. Many times when I was reading the profound yet clearly expressed spiritual insights in this book I could feel tears well up and a physical stirring in my heart. Not because a passage was particularly sad, I hasten to add. This was no ordinary emotional reaction. I know deep down that Midnights with the Mystic: A Little Guide to Freedom and Bliss touched me on a level beyond the simply physical, and the lessons within it will always remain within me on both a conscious and unconscious level. This is one spiritual book I will return to again and again and I’ve read many in the last decade or so.
 
It’s difficult to choose a favorite passage to share with you as there are countless gems. This is one favorite of mine, when Cheryl had asked if we actually have a life’s calling. At the end of the discussion, Sadhguru summarized it like this:
 

“Now, I want you to get this right: There is no life’s calling, but life is calling–both from within and without. Only when you truly respond to the call of life will you know life in its entirety. Only when you know an unprejudiced and absolute involvement with the universe, every atom of the universe, will you explore, experience, and know the full scope of who you are. And, in this absolute involvement, you need not be limited by your own past experience and capabilities; you can imbibe and have access to the great storehouse of knowing that is the very nature of the universe. It is also through this absorbed, unadulterated involvement that one can know the true nature of the self, which is boundless, and the basis of all, which is the ultimate destiny that the all-desiring process is actually leading you to.”

 
I’m thankful for their joint willingness to share that week of conversations with readers. Cheryl Simone, with Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev, has meticulously compiled a book that makes life’s complexities more fathomable, the unexplained more intelligible and clarifies through its unfolding how spiritual enlightenment is attainable for all. A truly inspirational, compelling, and important read for all those seeking answers to big questions in life. I loved it and hope you will too. Fingers crossed for a sequel! To find out more, please visit http://www.midnightswiththemystic.com/.
 
 
Disclosure: Thanks to FSBAssociates.com for providing me with this book for review.

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Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself From Negative Emotions and Transform Your Life written by Judith Orloff MD is the perfect book to come along at the perfect time. I couldn’t put it down!

We live in a tumultuous, fear-dominated period in history and must become masters at overcoming fear and other negative emotions so they don’t sabotage our power. With skill and compassion, Dr. Judith Orloff shows us how to become heroes in our own lives by transforming anger, loneliness, and envy and more rather than simply “reacting” when our buttons get pushed.

An Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA and intuition expert, Dr. Orloff shares her wealth of personal and professional knowledge to illuminate the field of emotions. She draws on wisdom from traditional medicine but goes light years beyond it by presenting emotions as a path to spiritual, energetic, and intuitive awakening. Why is this leap so important? The intellect has restricted vision about emotions, but bringing intuition into the feeling realm lets us go deeper within. Dr. Orloff asks us to see every success, every heartbreak, every loss, every gain as vehicles for transformation. She teaches readers to view emotions in a non-ordinary way, rather than simply making you happy or miserable. Everyone will benefit from the insightful instructions that continually guide us and also from the author’s intimate personal journey and well-earned life wisdom. Judith is the kind of doctor we wish we all had.

Part One of the book introduces you to the four components of emotions: their biology, spirituality, energetic power, and psychology. Understanding each component in yourself will lead to inner breakthroughs that aren’t possible without seeing the whole picture. It offers a self-assessment test to evaluate your current level of emotional freedom so you can increase it practicing this book’s principles. Dr. Orloff invites you into her romance with sleep and dreams as revolutionary states of consciousness. She also helps readers determine their “emotional type” including “the intellectual,” and “the empath. “so they can make the most of their own finest qualities. As an empath, Dr. Orloff knows the gigantic challenges of being an “emotional sponge” and teaches other empaths who’ve been labeled “overly sensitive” how to stay grounded in an often-overwhelming world.

You’ll enjoy the “emotional vampire survival guide”–specific advice for dealing with emotional drainers. We’ve all met them. You’re talking to someone, when suddenly you feel anxious, depressed, or tired. She describes the narcissist, the victim, the controller, and other types of vampires. Plus, there are quizzes to help you determine “Are you in a relationship with an emotional vampire?” or if you might be one yourself. Sometimes, we all have the capacity to be draining, but with mindful compassion we can catch ourselves early and make a shift.

Part Two of the book offers a hands-on approach for facing the most prevalent negative emotions and building positive ones Each chapter is called a “transformation” in which you learn how to transform a negative emotion into its counterpoint. For instance, fear is transformed with courage, frustration with patience, and jealousy with self-esteem.

You learn to do this in your life by taking a wealth of quizzes, from Dr. Orloff’s patient studies, and her own intimate journey with each emotion.

Emotional Freedom is the rare book that can open your mind and your heart to more empowerment. Give yourself a gift and read it.

This book review is by Caroline Myss.

EMOTIONAL FREEDOM: LIBERATE YOURSELF FROM NEGATIVE EMOTIONS AND TRANSFORM YOUR LIFE
UPLIFTING NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER BY Judith Orloff MD (in paperback now!)

Judith Orloff MD, a UCLA psychiatrist, presents her unique approach for viewing emotions as a path to spiritual and intuitive awakening. You’ll learn how to stop absorbing other people’s negativity and how to stay calm instead of reacting when your buttons get . Synthesizing neuroscience and intuitive/energy medicine, this book liberates you from fear—and the emotional vampires who suck you dry.

Purchase book plus get your “Embrace Joy” gift collection at http://www.drjudithorloff.com/emotional-freedom-paperback/
 

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Paul Auster’s novel, Oracle Night, explores the possibility that words can alter reality. The novel invites readers into the mind of Sidney Orr, an author living in New York with his wife, Grace. Sidney is doing errands in Brooklyn when he notices a stationary store in his neighborhood that wasn’t there before. The small building lures him in and once inside, Sidney makes a decision that the entire novel is based upon. He buys a blue notebook.

After months of not writing, due to a near fatal accident, Sidney returns to his apartment and opens the notebook.  Like so many other descriptions in the novel, Auster’s portrayal of the author returning to his pen rendered a sense of being suspended in the moment.  The blue notebook, purchased from a shop that disappears two days later, turns out to have a somewhat supernatural effect on Sidney.  Sidney begins to spin out a story about Nick Bowen; a successful editor who is walking to the mailbox one evening when a stone gargoyle falls off of a building and barely misses him.  Convinced that he was supposed to die and therefore he must now begin a new life, Nick impulsively walks away from his established life and boards the airport’s next flight.  If this is starting to seem complex, thinking about Paul Auster writing a novel about Sidney writing a novel about Nick (who is editing a book called Oracle Night), well, that’s because it is.  Auster artfully layers story upon story.

Absorbed in this structure, it is easy to lose a definite sense of when the story moves from Sidney’s thoughts about developing his characters and plot, to Sidney’s actual life.  Yet, it is through this structure that the reader witnesses how words flowing from Sidney’s imagination impact the circumstances of his reality.  Auster seems to do this on purpose, conveying the blurred places of imagination and reality.

Auster takes us into Sidney’s mind in an original and refreshing style by using footnotes from Sydney to consistently interrupt Sidney’s own creation of plot and character in the blue notebook.  Three page long footnotes risk three pages of annoying the reader as an interruption to the original story.  However, these footnotes accomplish quite the contrary.  The footnotes are like windows into the author’s thought processes, like appetizers to later developments of Sidney’s actual life.  For example, as Sidney invents the moment that Nick first meets his wife, a footnote directs the reader to Sidney’s personal memory of when he first met his wife, Grace:

Grace’s eyes were blue.  A dark blue flecked with traces of gray, perhaps some brown, perhaps some hints of hazelish contrast as well.  They were complex eyes, eyes that changed color according to the intensity and timbre of the light that fell on them at a given moment, and the first time I saw her that day in Betty’s office, it occurred to me that I had never met a woman who exuded such composure, such tranquility of bearing, as if Grace, who was not yet twenty-seven at the time, had already moved on to some higher state of being than the rest of us…that was what I fell in love with:  the sense of calm that enveloped her, the radiant silence burning within.

Knowing about Sidney’s love for his wife Grace and how that love developed shapes the reader’s perception of events that happen in their marriage later in the novel.  Sidney reveals this information through footnotes that interrupt the story he is creating about Nick.  The use of footnotes creates a dynamic force that weaves together the stories of Nick and Sidney, and makes the reader more curious about Sidney’s life.

As the novel progresses, Sidney’s life becomes the focus of the plot.  Sidney’s wife Grace seems to be hiding something and tension erupts in their marriage.  Their family friend and famous author, John Trause, gets sick and his son escapes from drug rehab.  The Chinese owner of the stationary store has a mysterious source of money and tries to pull Sidney into a strange friendship.  In the story Sidney is writing, Nick gets locked inside a bombproof room in a warehouse full of historic telephone books in Kansas City.

Unfortunately, that is where Sidney leaves Nick. About halfway through Oracle Night, Sidney stops writing his story about the editor who abandons his old life for a new one.  The novel’s emphasis shifts to what is happening in Sidney’s real life, although he continues to notice links between what he has written in his blue notebook, and what happens in his reality.  The dismissal of Nick’s story was disappointing. When Nick’s story faded away from the pages, the intrigue of the novel faded with it. The events of Sidney’s life, though interesting, make the novel almost ordinary.

By the end, Oracle Night lost the energy it began with.  It maintains its eventful plot, yet loses some of its playful subtleties.  Oracle Night begins with dynamic originality of structure, style, and content.  When the novel shifts from Nick’s creative story to focus on realistic, yet overly dramatic details of Sidney’s personal life, the book becomes less than satisfactory.  But maybe this was all part of Auster’s plan to challenge his imaginative reader to accept reality and the need to persevere through it.  Maybe he is challenging us to consider that regardless of the influence of time and words upon events, life still happens.

Book review by Danny Offer. Danny is a partner in the Facebook chat program Chit Chat for Facebook. The desktop Facebook chat application makes it easier to send a Facebook message to your friends whilst surfing the internet.

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HARD – 1 : not easily penetrated : not easily yielding to pressure

CACHE – 1 : a hiding place especially for concealing and preserving provisions or implements
: b : a secure place of storage
2 : something hidden or stored in a cache
3 : a computer memory with very short access time used for storage of frequently or recently used instructions or data —called also cache memory

- Definitions courtesy of Merriam-Webster Dictionary.

My reading time is valuable to me. Much like a kid in a candy shoppe when I do find I can set aside a few precious hours for some alone time with a book I want it to be the best choice I can make. Just like the kid who wants the most candy he can get for his nickel, I want the most enjoyable or exciting book I can get for my time. The title Hard Cache (Bennett & Hasting Publishing, ISBN: 978-1-934733-57-8) did not reach out and grab me. Also I had never heard of author Charles B. Neff. For these two reasons I passed on grabbing this one off the shelf for several days.

But I must admit I kept returning to read the title. Hard Cache. And I would ask myself why the Author would use that spelling of cache. Because it was obvious from the front cover this was not a computer geek type book. We all know cache is something that stores things in the memory of our computer. Finally my interest in knowing why the author chose this title overwhelmed my sense of value for my time and I pulled the book off the shelf. Little did I know I was about to get the most for my nickel!

Blessed God,

I searched my faith for the message I know is there. The helpful, joyous message that I have accepted as the new center of my life. Your will is in everything. Even in the act I committed three days ago.
It was not my hand that lifted and moved the stone in its fatal arc. It was Yours. A life was not removed, but affirmed, and now knows the richness of the Kingdom Of Heaven.

(From Chapter 8, Hard Cache by Charles B. Neff)

Hard Cache took me some time to warm up to because I didn’t know what to expect and getting to know the characters is often times the weak point for me in any novel. My leeriness of this thriller soon ended and fast. By Chapter Two I found I was fully submerged and not only in the developing characters. So let me be clear from the start: Hard Cache has all the components a good thriller requires.

You have a compelling cast of central characters: Magnus Torval, a recently retired police offer; Mariela, Troval’s fiancée who despises the thought that he may one day return to the Police Department. Then there’s Greg Takarchuk, a member of the Swiftwater Police Department and son of Dmitry, owner of the local Russian antique store. And most importantly Leonid Kuzma, Pastor of the Family of Christ Church near Swiftwater.

These characters’ history and their interaction keeps the story moving along at a nice, interesting pace. Readers might pick any one of them as the novel’s protagonist. But I was starting to realize Hard Cache was going much deeper than any surface impressions I’d formed initially of individual characters and the book. Much, much deeper.

Someone is hiding something and whatever it is has the potential to destroy the lives of many. But wait. Isn’t that the same old story line played out in countless fiction novels? It would be if that was what was going on here. But it’s not. Dark and Evil things can consume your life at any time, young or old. At its worst you may become the vessel in which all secrets are stored. You may become “Hard Cache” .

Becoming “Hard Cache” at any age would be terrible. Becoming “Hard Cache” as a young soldier would be unimaginable. Try if you can to imagine what it would be like to spend a lifetime trying to exorcise an Evil so strong that mere words could entice you to murder women and children. Imagine trying to create a normal life in hopes the Evil forgets you in your old age. That it never returns. Now imagine during the ensuing years of creating this normal life the number of innocent people who may have come to love you, trust you, or follow you. What happens to them when you find that even after all these years, all your attempts, you are still…”Hard Cache”?

The back cover tells us author Charles B. Neff “has been an administrator at four U.S. universities and has led international development projects in Colombia and Russia. He has authored books on cross cultural learning and executive searches, and has written three previous novels.”

In Hard Cache Neff used his substantial depth of knowledge and experience well to draw the reader into a vivid image about life and just how easy it is for the power of evil to enter at any time. I would relate the real storyline and message of Hard Cache to another one of my favorite novels; The Stand by Stephen King because just like The Stand, Hard Cache will absolutely terrify you on a deeper level.

Learn more about Hard Cache and the author at http://www.booksbyneff.com. Hard Cache is available now at all good bookstores.

Review by Mike, who has loved books since Curious George Gets a Medal landed in his lap in 1962.

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Guest Review Writer Danny Offer reviews the Map of True Places.

Brunonia Barry’s sophomore novel, The Map of True Places, (HarperCollins, ISBN 9780061624780, Hardcover, 416pp) is an aptly titled book. The novel charts the course of psychotherapist Zee Finch as she embarks upon a journey of self-discovery. Having long ago come to terms with the suicide of her mother and her father’s homosexuality, Zee’s life appears to have finally relegated itself to a state of some normalcy. This all changes when the protagonist is thrown into a tail spin following the presumed suicide of a patient with whom she shares an unusual connection. This incident, along with her father’s rapidly declining health, serves to dredge up Zee’s troubled past and doubts about her current station in life. Ultimately, it is when Zee begins to delve into the past once again that she begins to question the direction her future is headed in and learn about who she truly is and what she really wants.
 
As with her debut novel The Map of True Places is set in contemporary Salem, Massachusetts. Barry even borrows characters from her previous work, The Lace Reader, which adds a bit of cohesiveness and fun for those who have read her first novel. Barry’s flair for descriptive writing is extremely well suited to the Salem locale. She uses an abundance of colorful imagery to paint a vivid picture of the historic harbor town.
 
One has to wonder whether Brunonia Barry has a background in psychology after reading The Map of True Places. The author does a wonderful job of touching upon sensitive issues like bipolar disorder and homosexuality without ever being judgmental or overly clinical. In fact, part of what makes Barry’s book so engaging is the sheer depth of her complicated, flawed, yet beautiful characters. Each has a unique set of strengths and weaknesses coupled with a complex history that serves to make them all believable, identifiable and likeable even at their weakest moments. The reader fully understands each character’s motivation and mentality with unusual depth.
 
At its heart, The Map of True Places is a story about coming to terms with the past and learning from it. Witnessing Zee Finch cope with her father’s debilitating Parkinson’s disease and dementia is both heart-breaking and empowering. Add to this the richly drawn tensions between her bipolar mother and the father who could not give her the Great Love she had always looked for and the reader is left marveling at the power of humans to both hurt and heal. In more ways than one Barry uses this novel to reveal to the reader the latent strength that an individual can contain within themselves without even knowing it. This is what makes The Map of True Places a beautiful and inspiring work of fiction.
 

Review by Danny Offer. Danny is a partner in the Facebook chat program Chit Chat for Facebook. The desktop Facebook chat application makes it easier to send a Facebook message to your friends whilst surfing the internet.

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The Shimmer (Vanguard Press, ISBN 9781593155377, Hardcover, 352pp) is an engrossing and suspense packed thriller from the pen of Rambo creator, David Morrell. Set in and around the fictional Rostov, Texas, The Shimmer‘s about mysterious lights in the sky near the small town. Are they so much more than they appear to be or just some geological anomaly as some think? An out of town policeman’s search to discover their source unveils centuries old sightings, hidden government projects and that his marriage is suddenly in turmoil.

There’s action from the story’s outset. Dan Page, our Santa Fe cop, witnesses from the air the fatal end to a disastrous car chase he’s involved in. After the debriefing, he quits for the day. Upon arrival home, he finds his wife Tori has disappeared. Page finds her eventually outside the small town of Rostov, sitting almost catatonic at an observation deck in the middle of nowhere. Tori tells Page she’s watching for the mysterious Rostov Lights she remembers from childhood. Page, understandably upset and confused about what’s going on with his wife and her reasons for her sudden departure, is even more so when he sees the impact these lights have upon her.

Crowds come from miles around hoping to catch a glimpse of the unexplained phenomena. What’s unusual about these stunningly beautiful lights is that not everyone sees them, even when standing shoulder to shoulder. Those who do experience different reactions to the sighting. Some may feel a euphoria, while others can feel a rage. What is it about these lights that creates such a wide spectrum of emotion and this overriding compulsion to always be close to their mystical luminosity? No one has ever come close to solving their existence. But when a deranged man fires a rifle into the lights as the crowd gathered at the viewing platform one night, Page becomes more deeply embroiled in finding out.

I enjoyed The Shimmer very much and this fast-paced mystery’s intricacies. Thanks to the presence of comprehensively developed characters, the lights shine in more ways than one for the reader and from many perspectives. There’s Brent Loft, a small station TV reporter who sees the slaughter not as a tragedy but as his ticket to the big networks; the secretive and callous Colonel Raleigh who protects his long forgotten research base and its workings at any cost; and the Rostov townsfolk with tales of the lights that span decades.

No matter which one of Morrell’s characters you are reading about at any given moment, the light’s power over its uninformed witnesses grows and matures in your mind just as they do. Some smaller character roles are played in The Shimmer but none are insignificant, each weaving another thread in the mysterious lights’ history and their wide reaching effects. This attention to detail, a hallmark of David Morrell’s writing,  adds a three-dimensional vividness and depth to the lights that slimmer descriptions could never have achieved.

David Morrell has hit the New York Times bestseller list more times than I’ve had hot dinners and his success is well deserved. Incredible as it sounds, Morrell’s first novel, First Blood, was published way back in 1972. Many of my generation will remember this as the thriller that introduced us to John Rambo, the movie of which starred Sylvester Stallone.  Morrell’s skills as a master craftsman of mystery and thrillers certainly haven’t diminished over time. With excellent characterization, an unusual plot line and a believable setting that’s based loosely on real life happenings in a real small Texas town, Morrell has created in The Shimmer a thriller that’s intense, thought provoking and exciting all at once.

I don’t want to give too much away. Suffice to say that The Shimmer makes you wonder upon completion of this book how those lights would have affected you and that thought doesn’t fade easily from your mind.

With eighteen million copies of his books in print and in twenty six languages, David Morrell reigns supreme as a thriller writer extraordinaire. The Shimmer is a cracking good read and Morrell is quite simply a phenomenally good writer. I guarantee you that The Shimmer‘s suspense laden pages will grab you by the throat and not let go until the very end. You won’t be disappointed in this glittering prize of a thriller. Don’t miss it!

Visit David Morrell’s website here.