The Air That We Breathe - Book One

Father Marcellinus warns the young monk, saying, ‘The air that we breathe, that is the creature that we become’ explaining how every influence, both good and evil ultimately shape us into the person that we are. Based on real events, this novel unfolds in a nineteenth century abbey and is about a young man who struggles to face the truth of who he really is, something that all of us must ultimately do in our own lives. The reader is invited into that cloister, so full of passions and conflicts.

Simon desires only one thing since he was a little boy, and that is to serve God as a priest. He dreams of wearing silken gold vestments and being enveloped in great clouds of incense, offering the Sacrifice to God. When he is seventeen, he leaves home and becomes a monk far north in the mountains of Pennsylvania. His faith is genuine, and he gives himself to his studies in order to become a Roman Catholic priest.

But not all is as he expected. A sexual awakening he had not anticipated, blossoms in him and boyhood dreams are shaken to the core as he wrestles with a side of himself he never counted on. He falls in love in a monastic world filled with holy men, mischievous souls, colorful individuals and also great scoundrels.

A powerful visitor invites him to Rome, something Simon never expected. There is a dark price tag, however, something Simon is unaware of.

Submission

This is a story about a marriage breakdown and the difficulties facing primarily women in protecting themselves and in collecting support payments under the Ontario justice system.

This is a story about justice delayed, justice denied, and how the justice system failed to level the playing field.

Every day a woman is demoralized in not being able to collect on support orders.

Every day in Canada a woman is subjected to ongoing abuse with her partner with minimal assistance through the legal system.

This story is typical of a woman’s plight going through a legal system where the parties have lost faith and face the dilemma of giving up or taking the law into their own hands.

Stories From the Heart

Be it the sweetness of courtship, the fragility of flirtation or deep prevailing commitment, these are stories that bring a sigh and a smile as we glimpse love in all its iterations.

Set against the backdrop of Italy, whose very essence is romance, we spend time with a woman who flips the script on actors; a little boy and his beloved violin; a snowy-haired cupid and destined dance partners, all of whom are connected by the powerful theme of love.

Sacred Life and Demons

Is life sacred, and to whom? If our lives are sacred to each of us, should we be in control of how we are to die? Or should questions of life and death be answered only by those who believe and interpret the Bible as the will of a supernatural creator god? Does the Bible confirm the existence of a god who loves, and would never harm, an innocent child? Did this god create our reproductive processes such that the most unique human DNA ends in abortion? Or, are spontaneous abortions just the result of sin? How do we define a person, and when does a unique human DNA become a person? Is elective abortion murder? Do demons really exist? This nation is in serious conflict over the answers to these questions.

Dr. Tom Tanner, an oncologist in a Mississippi town, becomes entangled in all these questions and in the mystery of a boy thought by some to be of supernatural birth. Perhaps the boy is a demon.

Run Johnny, Run

Just days after his unexpected dismissal as the head track and field coach at the University of Minnesota, Ralph Dexter found himself lost in thought in a quiet café in South Dakota. On his way to Texas to seek solace with his best friend, the head coach at the University of Texas in Austin, Ralph’s self-pity was interrupted by an astonishing sight.

Outside the café window, he watched in awe as a young Native American boy dashed with uncanny speed to rescue a girl in danger. The townspeople revered the boy for his heroics and compassion, but Ralph was transfixed by something else — the boy’s extraordinary running prowess. In his esteemed career, Ralph had witnessed some of the world’s most elite athletes, yet never someone with such natural talent.

In a twist of fate, a recently ousted track and field coach stumbles upon a prodigious talent. The question remains: Can Ralph harness this serendipitous encounter into an opportunity for both of them?

Powder River, 1957

“The year my mother left us, my father found a dog along the highway just outside of Powder River.”

Thus opens the beginning of sixteen-year-old Matthew Christman’s account of his senior year. Reeling from his loss, Matthew struggles to make sense of the adult world into which he has been forced to enter prematurely. He faces other losses, foremost among them his innocence, as he tries to figure out the difference between being a man’s man, or a good man like his father.

The threat of death is ever present for Matthew as he learns the value of love and friendship in his journey to find his way in a world fraught with unpredictable challenges.

Pierced Girls

Sheena wants nothing more than to leave her troubled childhood behind. With no money and nowhere to go after high school, it seems her future will be more of the same, despite her dreams of becoming a music teacher. Desiring connection, Sheena imagines visits from her supposed father, deceased rock star, Joey Ramone. With tragic optimism, Sheena confronts poverty, violence, and the desperate world of drug addicts with the hope that she and her mother can forge a loving relationship and overcome their addictions.

Nama

When we write the story of one person, we tell the story of all people who have lived through all times, across the entire geography of the universe. We borrow from the history of life and its footprints, emerging from the deep past and leading into the ever-receding future. One life is a mirror for all, in a very important sense, though not in every sense. In Nama, an ancient Native American woman recounts the mystery of life, weaving the tapestry of life – of birth and death, of brave battles to be won, dreaming of love and justice, of creating a heaven on earth. She sings of grief over loss of love, of greed and rivalry that tear us apart, pushing us to harm, and even to kill. Yet she is also firm in her trust in the affirmation of life. Battles are never lost, lives are never given in vain. She preserves her faith in the redeeming power of grace and self-expansion and is willing to wait patiently for future generations to pick up the cross and find the path of emancipation for imprisoned humankind. Should we join her march?

Money Is Sweeter Than Honey

“It is the preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else that prevents us from living freely and nobly.” 
― Bertrand Russell

For other people, Dohan Choudhury is just a weird Bangladeshi immigrant halfway to lunacy as he throws away every opportunity. He is unemployed, he hates businessmen and pawnbrokers, he makes fun of the police, he talks to rivers and trees, and he burns money.

At least, that is what Dohan is in a glance.

The truth is Dohan Choudhury is an idealist who is also a loving husband, a doting father, a poet and writer, and a highly educated man who finished his PhD in Columbia University. He is a man full of dreams, aspirations, ideals, and hopes he was so optimistic to use when he landed in America… until the rampant capitalism, oppressive materialism, pro-American objectivism, tyrannical stereotyping, and severe alienation sucked out all the positivity in Dohan’s life. In a few years, these negativities defining the world poisoned Dohan’s mind, heart and soul… along with his relationship with his family and relatives who are all corrupted by money and high reputation.

Will Dohan be able to free himself from the veil of pretension and greed in the society, or will he succumb to the devils of worldly possessions… just like how everybody else did?

Missing Parts

In Missing Parts, a powerful and thought-provoking novel, the unbreakable bond of friendship is tested when Lacey Pierce encounters her childhood best friend, Mimi Faraday, in a Boston homeless shelter. The story delves into the complex factors that contribute to resilience in the face of mental illness and life’s challenges, exploring why some individuals thrive while others struggle.

Lacey and Mimi’s story begins in a charming New England town during the transformative 1960s and 70s, where they attend a prestigious prep school. After Mimi’s wedding to Chapin, the couple embarks on a life of community service in Newfoundland, while Lacey joins the Peace Corps in Africa, all young, idealistic, and full of promise.

Fast forward to the summer of 1995, when Lacey’s world is shaken by the discovery of Mimi among the homeless at a soup kitchen in a Boston cathedral. After a quarter-century in Newfoundland, Mimi has returned to Boston, destitute and living in a halfway house for abused women in Cambridge. The novel masterfully traces the parallel journeys of these two women over the intervening decades, revealing the twists and turns that led them to their current circumstances.

Missing Parts is a standalone fiction that explores the enduring power of friendship, the impact of life’s choices, and the resilience of the human spirit in the face of adversity. Through Lacey and Mimi’s story, readers are invited to contemplate the complex interplay of factors that shape our lives and the lives of those we hold dear.

Meghan and Beth Discover, It's a Men's World

Intrigued by whispers of a community connection, Beth picks up the book chronicling Meghan’s life after graduate school. As both women navigate careers amid outdated attitudes about women’s place, they discover the persisting barriers of a man’s world.

While Meghan conducts research into the decline of family farms, her work conjures Beth’s own rural upbringing and current reality as a farm wife straddling tradition and technology. Their parallel sexual awakenings underscore the universality of women’s experience.

An insider’s glimpse of Meghan’s faculty position reveals to Beth the complex machinery underlying campus life. As Beth reflects on the roads untaken, Meghan’s bold choices highlight the excitement missing from Beth’s more traditional path.

Ultimately, their interwoven stories surface timeless questions about agency, destiny, and the feminine struggle to balance fierce independence with enduring community. Do we ever really choose our fate, or does life choose for us?

Love, Ruthie

Was the poet, William Wordsworth, right when he wrote “the child is the father of the man”? That is the question Jane Meyer asks Ruth Lucas in a letter. Best friends since high school, and now in their early thirties, Ruth and Jane keep in close touch through letters, phone calls, and when they can, visits.

When Ruth gets Jane’s letter with this question about Wordsworth’s line, she decides to review what stood out in her childhood and ask herself if those times informed and shaped the woman she became. This process takes her weeks and traverses early family memories, her college years, a job in Washington, her first lover, and other experiences on her way to becoming her own woman. Her answer to Jane’s question is Love, Ruthie.