Two'fer

Noah and Kaleb are best friends growing up in hard times. They live on adjoining farms, and both families are suffering greatly. Kaleb's dad has died, leaving Kaleb to take on the role of the provider at just seventeen years of age; the weight of caring for his five siblings and his mom is staggering. Noah, at only fourteen, has witnessed the daily verbal and physical abuse of his mother at the hands of his drunken step-dad. They realize that life on the farm is not an option. They must go where the jobs are. They must reach a small coastal village and secure jobs as fishermen. Trouble is, they have no money, no supplies, and have never been past their own gates. Noah full of youthful exuberance and is eager to begin their adventure, while Kaleb has reservations. After danger and exhaustion threaten their progress, they finally arrive at the village and secure jobs on a boat. Their happiness is shattered when tragedy strikes. Their promise to stay together forever is tested, and they begin to drift apart. As their lives take drastically different paths, they seem to accept that time and circumstances may weaken their bond. They have no idea their paths will cross many years later. Following the lives of each boy, we are introduced to their families and life choices. As their paths twist and turn, their stories lead the reader to a stunning reunion that is unexpected and almost magical.

A Comedy of Pretzels

When tradition twists with popular culture and lands on “people’s oral humor,” idealistic Reuben Lamberth finds himself in a mess. He is a young, progressive, inspired scholar teaching at a prestigious northeastern university, but his other unique self has another foot planted secretly in the world of standup comedy as Josh Sandburg. His stage name is a composite of ‘joshing’ and the renowned American poet Carl Sandburg. Neither his fully tenured professor wife Byrra who is enmeshed in a cabal of women’s faculty; his tough minor gangster-hood father Solly; his staid sociology chairperson and conventional colleagues; nor his tyrannical University President Jeremiah Brittle have any idea that he performs in comedy clubs as Josh Sandburg. Should he be outed, there is considerable doubt that he will be upgraded to the coveted position of tenure, and his marriage may suffer as well. Reuben wonders, Is it worth giving up academia and taking a flyer in the world of comedy culture? The finale in this novel reveals tantalizing internecine connections that land squarely the realm of people’s oral humor.

Claudette Monet in America

This novel by widely published author, London Fell, centers on Claudette Monet, a pseudonym of Claude Monet, the famous French painter who never came to America. Her travels will take you through France to America in search of her long-lost father. There, she experiences many memorable adventures such to interest general readers, art lovers, and those searching for history and historical romance, as well as those who are, like her, in search of themselves.

Ozark Justice

The year is 1938, and it’s a beautiful Indian summer day in the Ozark Mountains. Yarnell Cates, his wife Thelma, and his father are returning home with a wagonload of stove wood when they discover the sheriff’s car in their front yard. Sheriff J. D. Hawkins is there to arrest Yarnell on trumped-up charges concocted by the prosecuting attorney and his brother, the circuit judge. The charge is part of an ongoing feud between their families and the Cates. In a twist of fate, Yarnell is forced to kill the sheriff in self-defense. This act incites the prosecuting attorney to form a posse with orders to burn down the Cates’ home, slaughter their livestock, and shoot Yarnell on sight. A bounty of five hundred dollars is placed on Yarnell’s head, later increased to fifteen hundred dollars, driving Yarnell and Thelma to seek refuge in a cave in the mountains. Throughout the winter, they endure harsh conditions while evading the men of Sycamore County in a desperate bid for survival.

Redemption in the Majella Mountains

Ken’s grandfather always inspired him, as a child, to respect and love the outdoors and to find in nature the introspection and refuge to allow every person to solve any of life’s vicissitudes. Recalling his grandfather’s philosophy, the author carries the reader through the mesmerizing beauty of the Majella mountains in the Abruzzi region of Central Italy. There Ken has the protagonist first find refuge, and ultimately, find redemption from the helter-skelter corporate life he left behind. These two existences, ambition and introspection, clash and confront each other so that the reader sees the unforgiving life of ambition lived by a grizzled corporate veteran pit itself against the newly-found introspective existence of a young man whose soul is forced to reawaken and leave behind the societal ladder to success in favor of the more simple, but much more satisfying, life of ethics and morality.

Scare Record

In the 1970s, a comic book ad promised a chilling record: sold alongside Sea Monkeys and a towering “you control it” Monster Ghost. These novelty ads were often more thrilling than the cheap trinkets they sold, and wise parents spared their children the inevitable disappointment.

But this ad was different. Its eerie artwork hinted at something far more sinister, and for $1.25, buyers got more than they bargained for. The mysterious Gayle House, the company behind it, vanished without a trace. Was it just another gimmick, or something cursed?

For 50 years, parents’ skepticism may have saved us. Or did it?

The Right Oath

What will you do for the person you care about most? How about what you’ll be willing to sacrifice to make amends? Gabriel Ern has committed himself to a troubled life all for the sake of one person. What it ultimately leads to is more tragedy than he has already experienced. He finds himself haunted by his own actions, all done with the best intentions, and is continuously haunted while awake with a girl named Raven he lives at home with. Gabriel wants to do what is right; he wants to feel he is doing the best he can. Instead, the sins he commits only pile up, and the only means of escape is through the truth, which would cost him dearly. For Gabriel, the question isn’t how far he will go, it’s now how much further in the hole he will bury himself in.

The Nightingale Sings

On the Greek island of Lesbos, in the seventh century BCE, a young lyric poet hones her craft while navigating the world of love, loss, friendship and sex, after having suffered years of abuse by a member of her father’s household. After a series of attempts at a healthy relationship, all the while struggling with the effects of post-traumatic stress and profound grief, she is forced to leave her home for a faraway land across the sea. There she would make a name for herself as an artist that would spread all across the Mediterranean, continuing her search for love and friendship, and trying to raise her only child in a safe and nurturing environment – until her whole world is suddenly upended.

The Nightingale Sings is an imaginary tale of what might have been in the life of the historical Sappho of Lesbos, whose artistry would lead to her becoming one of the most revered poets of the ancient world, and would still be cherished today – more than two and a half thousand years after her death.

And so, the story begins with a simple celebration.

A birthday party for a nine-year-old girl…

The Clara Conjecture

The Clara Conjecture is a new interpretation of historical facts. In 1938 Germany occupied Austria. Professor Lise Meitner, no longer shielded by her Austrian passport from measures against Jews, was fired. An equal of Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein, she had led the world’s best theoretical physics institute for nearly 30 years. In Berlin she designed the experiment that would split the uranium atom to produce energy. Before it could be executed she fled to Sweden. Without the ability to continue her research, impoverished, fearing for her relatives in the Nazi Reich, she became depressed.

In the tiny community of women scientists in Stockholm she met a psychoanalyst, the Canadian Dr. Leone McGregor Hellstedt (alter ego “Clara”), who rescued Lise with psychotherapy and money. When her German colleagues performed Lise’s experiment, they asked her to explain the result: she did, in terms of Einstein’s E=mc², and called the new phenomenon “nuclear fission” in her article for Nature. Early in 1939 physicists everywhere grasped the menace of nuclear energy. From her former colleagues and students Lise received information about the Nazi atomic bomb program and relayed it to Clara, who then informed Allied spies including William Stephenson (“Intrepid”) of British Security Coordination and Ian Fleming of British Naval Intelligence.

Informed by this detailed knowledge of Nazi atomic bomb initiatives, the Allies were able to efficiently sabotage facilities, kill key personnel, deny resources, and thus cripple the German program that had begun more than two years before the Manhattan Project.

Full of Grace and Mischief

From the moment they meet at a Catholic summer camp in Savannah, Georgia, Mary Margaret and Theresa, polar opposites, become inseparable. Each summer, they embark on wild adventures, exploring waterways, pulling pranks, and challenging boys to daring contests. But one prank too many gets them banned from camp, and the nuns can’t shield them from the real world forever. As tragedy strikes, their friendship is forged in both joy and hardship.

The girls carry their bond to the beaches of Tybee and through the trials of a Catholic high school, where they face bullies, first romances, loss, and heartbreak. As their lives begin to diverge, Mary Margaret and Theresa struggle to hold onto the friendship that once seemed unbreakable. Can they find a way to salvage their connection as they enter the unpredictable world of adulthood?

The first in a generational trilogy, Full of Grace and Mischief vividly captures the coming-of-age experiences of two young women in the Deep South, celebrating their resilience and the enduring strength of friendship.

The Loura Lure – Book 2

Dr. Shamus Bergin and his former patient Erladoch Dunbar have leapt into a time portal hurtling them backwards 20,000 years to Loura, a time and place erased from history. Before the seas rose up to separate Ireland and the British Isles from the rest of Europe, the Kingdoms of Loura thrived in peace.

Much has changed since Erladoch’s departure four years earlier. Enilorac, the Evil King of Treborg has already begun his invasion. He has come looking for the last Angel’s Itavo stone. If found, Enilorac will use it to open the gates of Hell and usher in the end of times.

Having accepted that his parents were descended from the Sacred Order of Keepers, Shamus must find his place amongst this army of part-human, part-angel warriors in their struggle to repel the encroaching darkness. Can this man of science come to terms with a world filled with magic, or will he lose his sanity in the presence of so many emerging voices seeking to direct his Will? These voices, whispers from the past and echoes of future battles, threaten to overwhelm him.

Burdened with so much, the answers he seeks may lie in the hands of a woman he has never met. He doesn’t know her, but her call grows stronger in his mind with every passing danger. With the weight of obligation crushing down on him, he must have faith that his allegiances will hold and that not all paths laid before him will ultimately yield the same destiny.

Four Seasons – Book One

Mark Marteau thought he had retired from the FBI after Red Widow almost killed him in his own apartment, but Hector, his partner and best friend, shows up on his property near Glacier Park, Montana to inform him his godson Dylan may be in trouble. But before Mark goes, he first must go back to a time over 40 years before, when it all started at a wrecking and salvage yard in East Pasco, Washington, where he is witness to the murder of his friend. The next story shows how Mark meets Hector following his best friend’s Dave Baker’s assassination by the order of Che Lopez.