Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Haunted by Dana Michelle Burnett

Haunted:
Becca has accepted the horrors of her past life, and emerged with her ghostly love Alastor at her side. But her happiness is short lived when she realizes that balancing her past and present won't be easy...

Becca has already decided that it's Alastor that she loves, but now, as their uncommon relationship limits Becca's future, Alastor must decide if he's willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for Becca's happiness....And will Becca's sanity survive?











Haunted by Dana Michelle Burnett is the second book in the Spiritus trilogy, and was emotionally gripping. I wanted to dislike the main character: Becca, because of her constant need for the love of a ghost, but I found that I just couldn’t. She was one of those characters that gets under your skin and just won’t let go. There were times that I truly hated Alastor for hanging around Becca: for being the reason she was unable to move on with her life. But then he would do something romantic and I found my anger dissipating. Her story was so consuming that I finished the book in one sitting. I was completely blown away by the beginning and captivated by the ending, I am looking forward to finishing this series with: Incarnate.

This book left shivers in my spine and chills over my skin. Told in separate stories through Becca and her therapist romantic depictions of Becca’s doomed relationships—both in her past and her present—and the doctor’s clinical chronicling of her treatment. Becca’s love for Alastor has completely taken over her life, but Alastor wanted her to have more; he wanted her to fall in love with a living man and have a fulfilling life. So, he pushed her towards her high school crush, Jonah. But she still couldn’t tear herself fully away from Alastor, causing a rift in her relationship with Jonah, and its tragic end led her to a mental institution. Alastor still haunts Becca while she receives treatment for her illness and the doctor is determined that she is completely delusional, but by listening to her story, the doctor is turned into a believer.





Happy Halloween!



I hope everyone has a happy and safe Halloween!


My Book Boyfriend (89)


My Book Boyfriend is a weekly meme hosted by Missie of The Unread Reader and co-hosted by Lesley of My Keeper Shelf, in which we swoon over boys in books!

Charlie
A.K.A. Boston
Book:
Nailed by Jennifer Laurens
Series: N/A

He’s in his early twenties with intense, deep brown eyes and hair the same rich chocolate color of his eyes, he has a firm, wide mouth and a beautiful smile. Sun bronzed skin, absolutely ripped abs and a muscular body from many hours of working construction sites. He’s not the type of guy to throw caution to the wind and has dreams of doing more with his life than just constructionHe got burned pretty bad by his last girlfriend and took a vow to stay away from women for a while, only one young woman gets under his skin and when it looks like he might have some competition, he proves himself to be the right man for her.




Quotes:

His dark eyes locked on her as she sat, arms stretched out along the rim of the [truck] bed. He lifted the bill of his cap in a gesture of good-bye that sent a nice tickle through her blood.


“So you’re giving yourself a break. I still think that’s a smart idea. Wounds need time to heal.” She heard him sigh and looked over in time to see frustration on his face. “Something wrong?”

He squinted, looking at the vacant lots as they drove by. “Yeah. Actually, there is.”

“Having second thoughts about her?”

He shook his head, still not meeting her gaze. “No. That’ll never be a problem again.”

“Wow, must have been pretty nasty. I’m sorry.”

When he looked at her, it wasn’t with anything but truth. “I can tell that about you. I appreciate the honesty.”

“Is it work? I can talk to Marc—”

“I don’t think I can keep my vow.”

Mandy’s eyes opened wide just as the truck pulled to a stop. Dust blew up around the wheels, and circled in the air. She heard the doors of the cab open, but her gaze was fixed on Boston’s face. There was no disguising what she saw coloring his eyes a deep, sober black, drawing his jaw into a knot. But he heart refused to believe it.


Boston stormed from the door and in two long strides was against her. His hands, warm and firm, cupped her cheeks and in the next thing she knew, his damp lips were on hers. Fire shot from her head to her shaking knees.

Just as fast as he’d grabbed her, he released her, and stood back, dark eyes locked on hers, a fast pant in his chest.




Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Queene of Light by Jennifer Armintrout

Queene of Light:
In a time not long from now, the veil between fantasy and reality is ripped asunder--creatures of myth and fairy tale spill into the mortal world. Enchanted yet horrified, humans force the magical beings Underground, to colonize the sewers and abandoned subway tunnels beneath their glittering cities. But even magic folk cannot dwell in harmony, and soon two Worlds emerge: the Lightworld, home to faeries, dragons and dwarves; and the Darkworld, where vampires, werewolves, angels and demons lurk.

Now, in the dank and shadowy place between Lightworld and Darkworld, a transformation is about to begin....

Ayla, a half faery, half human assassin, is stalked by Malachi, a Death Angel tasked with harvesting mortal souls. They clash. Immortality evaporates, forging a bond neither may survive. And in the face of unbridled ambitions and untested loyalties, an ominous prophecy is revealed that will shake the Worlds.



First in the Lightworld/Darkworld trilogy by Jennifer Armintrout; Queene of Light took me into a whole new world of the Fae. I enjoyed the vivid storytelling and intricate world building; there was a lot if information forced on me in the beginning of the book, and it honestly wasn’t until I hit the midway point that I really got into the story. For the most part I did enjoy the characters, although I sometimes found myself hoping for more. Jennifer managed to scratch the surface of these wonderful characters, but I would have loved it if she dug a little deeper. There were a few things that left me questioning the story as well, but the romance between Ayla and Malachi was fast and packed with tension. I loved how they had to fight to be together, because it made me appreciate their relationship more. This book had an excellent villain, a person Ayla once thought she could trust; one you could thoroughly and completely dislike for the roadblocks and danger he puts in Ayla’s path concerning her future. There wasn’t enough mystery and danger throughout the story to truly keep my interest, but even so, I can see myself picking up the other two books in the future, but for now I think I’m going to set this series aside.




Future Favorites (104)


Future Favorites is an awesome blog feature created by Alex over at Electrifying Reviews. I post about a book that is yet-to-be-released that I can't wait to read!


The Sweet Dead Life by Joy Preble
Release Date: May 2013 by Soho Press

“I found out two things today. One, I think I’m dying. And two, my brother is a perv.”

So begins the diary of 14-year-old Jenna Samuels, who is having a very bad eighth-grade year. Her single mother spends all day in bed. Dad vanished when she was eight. Her 16-year-old brother, Casey, tries to hold together what’s left of the family by working two after-school jobs— difficult, as he’s stoned all the time. To make matters worse, Jenna is sick. When she collapses one day, Casey tries to race her to the hospital in their beat-up Prius and crashes instead.

Jenna wakes up in the ER to find Casey beside her. Beatified. Literally. The flab and zits? Gone. Before long, Jenna figures out that Casey didn’t survive the accident at all. He’s an “A-word.” (She can’t bring herself to utter the truth.) Soon they discover that Jenna isn’t just dying: she’s being poisoned. And Casey has been sent back to help solve the mystery that not only holds the key to her survival, but also to their mother’s mysterious depression and father’s disappearance.


Monday, October 29, 2012

It's Monday, What Are You Reading? (123)


This is a fun weekly meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

**This is a two week edition**

Books I read last week:
The Wood Queen by Karen Mahoney
Forgiven by Janet Fox
Wyoming Fierce by Diana Palmer
Hauntedby Joy Preble 


The book I’m reading now:
Queene of Light:
In a time not long from now, the veil between fantasy and reality is ripped asunder--creatures of myth and fairy tale spill into the mortal world. Enchanted yet horrified, humans force the magical beings Underground, to colonize the sewers and abandoned subway tunnels beneath their glittering cities. But even magic folk cannot dwell in harmony, and soon two Worlds emerge: the Lightworld, home to faeries, dragons and dwarves; and the Darkworld, where vampires, werewolves, angels and demons lurk.

Now, in the dank and shadowy place between Lightworld and Darkworld, a transformation is about to begin....

Ayla, a half faery, half human assassin, is stalked by Malachi, a Death Angel tasked with harvesting mortal souls. They clash. Immortality evaporates, forging a bond neither may survive. And in the face of unbridled ambitions and untested loyalties, an ominous prophecy is revealed that will shake the Worlds.



Books that spark my interest this week:
Grace Doll by Jennifer Laurens
Passenger by Andrew Smith


The Crossroads Blog Tour Twitter Chat Cancelled


TWITTER CHAT for tonight is CANCELLED.

Due to the wicked storm nature is sending - it's wise to nix the Twitter chat as people are busy with safety concerns, and there will likely be large internet / power outages.


Sunday, October 28, 2012

The Crossroads Tour: Christine Fonseca & Lucienne Diver



1. What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

As a kid, I used to LOVE to create haunted houses. I would plan out how to do the special effects, read up on everything (pre-internet days) and attempt to scare my friends. Even now, I like to decorate the house accordingly.

2. Would you share an embarrassing or funny Trick-or-Treat moment with us?

Ha! In Middle School I went to a Halloween party dressed as the Wicked Witch of the West – green makeup and all. Of course, I had no idea that the boy I had a crush on would be there. Imagine my horror when we all decided to play spin the bottle and there I was…covered in GREEN.


3. What is your favorite Halloween candy?

I LOVE chocolate – especially dark chocolate.So maybe Mounds or York Peppermint Patties??


4. Would you rather be a monster or an alien?

I am pretty partial to monsters, so that’s my vote!




1. What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

Trick-or-treating! I don’t think I’ll ever grow out of the thrill of this (who’d want to?). I love dressing in costume, seeing what all the kids come up with, taking my son around (sadly, people look at me funny if I try to go without him)…

Actually, I trick-or-treated myself well into college. My excuse then was that I lived in International House—a portion of my dorm dedicated to our exchange students and those who wanted to live among them—and I had to introduce everyone who’d never been to the joys of Halloween.


2. Would you share an embarrassing or funny Trick-or-Treat moment with us?

Probably my favorite Halloween memory is when we took Yukio, who was a Japanese exchange student, trick-or-treating with us. She wore a gorgeous kimono and wooden platform sandals I marveled at her ability to walk in, and had a wonderful time. The next day I saw her giving all of her candy away! I was stunned. Isn’t that main reason for trick-or-treating?! But she didn’t want the chocolate, just the experience. It was wonderful.


3. What is your favorite Halloween candy?

Baby Ruths! Always have been.


4. Would you rather be a monster or an alien?

I’ve been both in my time . My husband would say, “oh, you mean just last week.” He and I met as actors at a haunted house in New York. I’ve been, among other things, a swamp witch, a murderous chef, a vampiress, a hand coming out of a wall, a cavewoman, a gypsy fortuneteller…you name it. I’ve always loved to play parts. Growing up, I did a lot of local and school theatre, and I made my own Halloween costumes every year —Isis, a bat, an alien, a horse, Batgirl (the lavender years).

As much as I love playing roles, the heroine of my Vamped series, Gina, is totally good with just being herself, which is probably why I have so much fun throwing her out of her comfort zone in each book and giving her a part to play that is alien to her. Maybe some of the maniacal characters I’ve played have rubbed off on me just a tiny bit!





How The Tour Works:

Each day of The Crossroads Blog Tour, a new research question will be revealed on The Crossroad Blog Tour main page: HERE.
And each day the answer to that question will be found within one of the different blog posts by Crossroads Tour authors. Your job is to get the question, read the blog posts, and collect all answers by the end of the tour.  
At the end of the tour all of your answers are to be emailed to Judith at: judithgraves@ymail.com by midnight on October 29, 2012.

The Grand Prize:

A KINDLE, preloaded with an ebook from each of the Crossroads authors. That’s right folks, a free KINDLE and 13 free EBOOKS! 

The Other Bloggers:




The Wood Queen by Karen Mahoney

The Wood Queen:
Donna Underwood is in deep trouble. An ancient alchemical order is holding her accountable for destroying the last precious drops of the elixir of life. Never mind the fact that Donna was acting to free her friend, Navin, from the dangerous clutches of the Wood Queen at the time. But what the alchemists have in store is nothing compared to the wrath of the fey. The Wood Queen has been tricked and Donna must pay. Get ready for all hell - quite literally - to break loose...










Karen Mahoney has created such an interesting and intricate world within the Iron Witch trilogy, and I just can’t seem to get enough, I’m simply on pins-and-needles waiting for the final installment. The wood Queen picks up shortly after The Iron Witch left off, and while the romance is a little less apparent in this book, the complexities of Donna’s world--or at least the one she thinks she knows--became more apparent. Donna is still a very enjoyable and realistic character. She is also independent, and as much as she would sometimes like to depend on others, she is unwilling to let them fulfill her responsibilities. In this book, Donna discovers alarming truths about herself and her past, and it will change the course of her future forever. The relationships formed throughout Donna’s life begin to take on an interesting change, and new alliances and enemies are revealed in The Wood Queen. Secrets have surrounded Donna her entire life, and now the lies everyone have spoken are beginning to quickly unravel. Unsure of just who she can trust, and unwilling to put her best friend, Navin, in harms way again, she makes a deal with the Wood Queen. Only the Queen deceives her and now Donna has opened a door that she may never be able to close again, and this time no one is safe.




Saturday, October 27, 2012

The Crossroads Tour: Janet Fox



1. What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

I really love carving pumpkins. And decorating my house. Fall colors are my colors! Green and orange and deep red and yellow...For a number of years we lived in a place where it was hard to buy a pumpkin, and hard to keep one, so I’m feeling very deprived. This will be the first Halloween in a long time that I can carve one and set it out, and I can’t wait!

Oh, and I make a wicked good pumpkin pie. Yes, you are invited.


2. Would you share an embarrassing or funny Trick-or-Treat moment with us?

I remember one Halloween when I was a kid, and my sister and I came to a very decorated house with windows that looked like they were lit by flames. When we knocked on the door, the woman who answered was dressed like a witch. A really authentic and terrifying-looking witch. She asked us to come in but we were shaking like leaves by then (no pun intended). She pointed to a cauldron – I swear, it looked like she had flames underneath (but of course she didn’t), and that’s where she’d put the candy.
The next morning I was so embarrassed that I’d been too scared to get any candy from her...but I still remember how terrified I was and can still see the whole scene in my mind.


3. What is your favorite Halloween candy?

Candy corn. The best!


4. Would you rather be a monster or an alien?

Oh, alien, hands down. For one thing, I’d have a huge brain, right? For another, I’d get to fly around the universe in a fast-moving space craft. And I’d wear slinky spandex. And finally I’d get to meet some hunky astronaut looking for life forms. I mean, there is no choice here. Really.


Click image for review



How The Tour Works:

Each day of The Crossroads Blog Tour, a new research question will be revealed on The Crossroad Blog Tour main page: HERE.
And each day the answer to that question will be found within one of the different blog posts by Crossroads Tour authors. Your job is to get the question, read the blog posts, and collect all answers by the end of the tour.  
At the end of the tour all of your answers are to be emailed to Judith at: judithgraves@ymail.com by midnight on October 29, 2012.

The Grand Prize:

A KINDLE, preloaded with an ebook from each of the Crossroads authors. That’s right folks, a free KINDLE and 13 free EBOOKS! 

The Other Bloggers:

Friday, October 26, 2012

The Crossroads Tour: Carrie Harris & Ty Drago



1. What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

I love it when people decorate their houses. Right now, my kids are still pretty young, and they love the idea of Halloween but get scared walking down the aisle with all the plastic skeletons at Target. So I have to go pretty campy for the moment, but I look forward to the day when I can finally dress up some fake zombies in football and cheerleader uniforms and have them climb out of my lawn. I just love that it’s the kind of day that makes people step out of their comfort zones and go a little nuts. Maybe because I’m already a little nuts to begin with!


2. Would you share an embarrassing or funny Trick-or-Treat moment with us?

Last year, I gave an entire bowl of candy to three teenage boys who were dressed up like a box of mutant dinosaurs. I always buy a little extra so that when someone really creatively whack-a-ding-hoy comes along, I can dump the whole thing in appreciation. Because that’s the kind of thing that makes Halloween AWESOME.

And just in case you’re wondering, a box-of-mutant-dinosaur costume is a REALLY big box with three sets of leg holes cut in it and three teenagers in regular clothes with dinosaur heads and hands and the words “A BOX OF MUTANT DINOSAURS” written on the side.


3. What is your favorite Halloween candy?

YES. I will take them all except for the black licorice ones and the jelly beans that taste like vomit. But if I have to pick only one thing, I pick Reese’s. Nothing goes better together than chocolate and peanut butter. Maybe chicken and telephones, but that’s it.

That chicken and telephone thing was a quote. Do you recognize it, or do you think I’m nutsier than you did before? And yes, I just made up that word. NUTSIER.


4. Would you rather be a monster or an alien?

Dude, YES. I’ll take either. But if I can only have one, I think I’ll go for monster. Given a choice between being dissected by scientists in Area 51 or being hunted down by angry villagers with torches and pitchforks, I think I’ll take the villagers. Maybe I can charm them with my monsterific wit and convince them to do the Thriller dance instead of lynching me. It’s worth a try, right?


Click image for review




1. What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

For years, when my kids were young, I used to dress up as a zombie on Halloween – all in black, with black gloves and black shoes, and this whole head mask that hid everything, including my eyes. Then, armed with a plastic knife, I would stand outside our front door. Perfectly still.

When kids would come by, I’d size them up. The little ones, say 10-year-old and younger, I’d let pass. I wouldn’t move and I wouldn’t speak. If they started to cry I’d show them my face and smile and wish them a Happy Halloween.

But the older ones. Well, that was a different story.

I’m six-and-a-half feet tall and a weigh about an eighth of a ton. And when the older kids appeared, ready to Trick or Treat, they would see me. They would stare at me. They would wonder if I was real or just some scarecrow or statue someone had put up. I’m really good at standing perfectly still.

The boys might touch me. I wouldn’t move. They might mock me a little. I wouldn’t reply. Finally, unnerved but refusing to show it, they would step past me to knock on the front door. As they did, I would step out into the pathway, blocking it from behind, and raising my plastic knife.

My wife would give them candy, rolling her eyes I imagine. Then the kids would turn around to leave – and jump right out of their skins! Sometimes they’d actually scream before darting around me and taking off down the block. The girls were even better. No one loves to be scared on Halloween like a middle grade girl!

And you know what? They would usually be back within half-an-hour, dragging some friends.

It was a great tradition that I kept up for a long time. But, finally, as my kids grew up and left Halloween behind, I had to let it go. There’s a fine line between a neighborhood father having fun on Halloween, and the “creepy old guy who likes to scare kids”. I figured I’d call it quits while I was still on the right side of that line.

Great memories, tho.


2. Would you share an embarrassing or funny Trick-or-Treat moment with us?

One group of teenage girls came by one Halloween and apparently mistook me for a teenage boy under my zombie mask. They started trying to flirt with me. It was very funny. As usual, I stood perfectly still and said nothing, figuring they’d get bored and move on. But they didn’t. They hung around, asking me questions: where I went to school; did I play football.

Finally, I’d had all that I could stand. I could have pulled off my mask and grossed them all out with the old guy underneath. But instead, I slowly raised my plastic knife and pointed it at the worst of the flirters. She stared at it for a long second before her nerve failed. Then she yelped and giggled and then all left.

Frankly, I hope the girl never runs into a real horror monster. She’d probably ask it to the prom.


3. What is your favorite Halloween candy?

Tootsie-Rolls. God help me, I love Tootsie-Rolls!


4. Would you rather be a monster or an alien?

Tough one. For Halloween, it’s monsters – hands down. They’re just more fun! Aliens have their place, of course. But once an alien turns scary, in my mind, they cease to be “aliens” and become “monsters”.

So, if someone gave me the choice – especially on Halloween: monster is it!






How The Tour Works:

Each day of The Crossroads Blog Tour, a new research question will be revealed on The Crossroad Blog Tour main page: HERE.
And each day the answer to that question will be found within one of the different blog posts by Crossroads Tour authors. Your job is to get the question, read the blog posts, and collect all answers by the end of the tour.  
At the end of the tour all of your answers are to be emailed to Judith at: judithgraves@ymail.com by midnight on October 29, 2012.

The Grand Prize:

A KINDLE, preloaded with an ebook from each of the Crossroads authors. That’s right folks, a free KINDLE and 13 free EBOOKS! 

The Other Bloggers:

Blog Tour & Guest Post with Paul Batista

WHY MAKE THE TRANSITION FROM BUSY LAWYER TO NOVELIST?

More basically, why exit from a business with a good regular paycheck to a business where the financial rewards are uncertain? Why exchange a suit for a casual shirt and jeans? I get asked these questions a lot, and they are in fact questions I ask myself.

Let's start with a disclaimer. I haven't entirely abandoned the practice of law. This is work I've done for more than thirty years, and old habits die hard. Besides, I like it. More important is the fact that the legal work I do provides fuel for the novels I write. A criminal case or even a civil lawsuit involves a story, a narrative. Part of the function of a lawyer is to shape the narrative -- not to fabricate facts but to tell a story.

Creating fiction, however, does give me a license to do more than just shape the narrative of a case. In writing a novel I have the ability and the incentive to weave imagined events together, to create personalities and personal histories, to generate intrigue and conflict. In practicing law, I’m confined by facts -- and those facts can be extremely interesting given the nature of the work I do -- but there are no such constraints in writing fiction.

There's another factor. Law is a highly regulated business. No matter how independent you may be as a lawyer, there are people known as judges. They require you to do specific things on their schedule, not on yours. They want you to do things their way, not necessarily yours. They tend to have outsized personalities -- wearing a robe can transform a guy or gal who in civilian clothes is demure and shy into a muscled-up action figure. And there are also clients. They get to call you in the middle of the night.

The external controls on fiction-writing are different. Sure, an editor can set "deadlines" but those are more goals and aspirations rather than drop-dead dates. You can be disbarred for missing a judge-imposed deadline if you do that too often. The worst a publisher can do is get mad at you.

But the most important reason for transforming myself into a novelist from a practicing lawyer is the beauty of transformation. The stuff of a novelist's life is different from the stuff of a lawyer's life. Creating novels is a liberating experience; you can let loose your imagination. I find I can have a passion and a drive that, even though I’ve loved practicing law, I can't completely tap into in a courtroom. You hear commencement speakers constantly delivering to young graduates the trite mandate to "follow your passions." As you move through life and hit the jarring realities of jobs, families and obligations, you can get cynical about those conventional admonitions to follow your passions, live out your dreams, and fulfill your talents.

But those inspirational messages do have meaning, at least for yours truly. Even a lawyer can break out of the constraints of the life he or she has lived. There is something invigorating, even for a seasoned adult, in taking risks and having the courage to give up security and embrace something unknown, strange, exciting -- fresh.


About the Book:

When Ali Hussein—suspected terrorist and alleged banker for Al Qaeda—is finally transported from Gitmo to the US mainland to stand trial, many are stunned when Byron Carlos Johnson, pre-eminent lawyer and the son of a high-profile diplomat, volunteers as counsel. On principle, Johnson thought he was merely defending a man unjustly captured through Rendition and water-boarded illegally. But Johnson soon learns that there is much more at stake than one man’s civil rights.

Hussein’s intimate knowledge of key financial transactions could lead to the capture of—or the unabated funding of—the world’s most dangerous terror cells. This makes Hussein the target of corrupt US intelligence forces on one side, and ruthless international terrorists on the other. And, it puts Byron Carlos Johnson squarely in the crosshairs of both.

Pulled irresistibly by forces he can and cannot see, Johnson enters a lethal maze of espionage, manipulation, legal traps and murder. And when his life, his love, and his acclaimed principles are on the line, Johnson may have one gambit left that can save them all; a play that even his confidants could not have anticipated. He must become the hunter among hunters in the deadliest game.


Excerpt:


When the guard left, the iron door resonated briefly as the magnetic lock engaged itself. Byron sat in a steel folding chair. Directly in front of him was a narrow ledge under a multi-layered, almost opaque plastic window, in the middle of which was a metal circle.

Ali Hussein seemed to just materialize in the small space behind the partition. Dressed in a yellow jumpsuit printed with the initials “FDC” for “Federal Detention Center,” Hussein, who had been described to Byron as an accountant trained at Seton Hall, in Newark, was a slender man who appeared far more mild-mannered than Byron expected. He wore cloth slippers with no shoelaces. The waistband of his jump suit was elasticized—not even a cloth belt. He had as little access to hard objects as possible.

He waited for Byron to speak first. Leaning toward the metal speaker in the partition and raising his voice, Byron said, “You are Mr. Hussein, aren’t you?”

The lawyers at the Civil Liberties Union who had first contacted Byron told him that, in their limited experience with accused terrorists, it sometimes wasn’t clear what their real names were. There were often no fingerprints or DNA samples that could confirm their identities. The name Ali Hussein was as common as a coin. It was as though genetic markers and their histories began only at the moment of their arrest.

“I am.” He spoke perfect, unaccented English. “I don’t know what your name is.”

The circular speaker in the window, although it created a tinny sound, worked well. Byron lowered his voice. “I’m Byron Johnson. I’m a lawyer from New York. I met your brother. Did he tell you to expect me?”

“I haven’t heard from my brother in years. He has no idea how to reach me, I can’t reach him.”

“Has anyone told you why you’re here?”

“Someone on the airplane—I don’t know who he was, I was blind-folded—said I was being brought here because I’d been charged with a crime. He said I could have a lawyer. Are you that lawyer?”

“I am. If you want me, and if I want to do this.”

All that Ali’s more abrasive, more aggressive brother had told Byron was that Ali was born in Syria, moved as a child with his family to Lebanon during the civil war in the 1980s, and then came to the United States. Ali never became a United States citizen. Five months after the invasion of Iraq, he traveled to Germany to do freelance accounting work for an American corporation for what was scheduled to be a ten-day visit. While Ali was in Germany, his brother said, he had simply disappeared, as if waved out of existence. His family had written repeatedly to the State Department, the CIA, and the local congressman. They were letters sent into a vacuum. Nobody ever answered.

Byron asked, “Do you know where you’ve come from?”

“How do I know who you are?”

Byron began to reach for his wallet, where he stored his business cards. He caught himself because of the absurdity of that: he could have any number of fake business cards. Engraved with gold lettering, his real business card had his name and the name of his law firm, one of the oldest and largest in the country. Ali Hussein was obviously too intelligent, too alert, and too suspicious to be convinced by a name on a business card or a license or a credit card.

“I don’t have any way of proving who I am. I can just tell you that I’m Byron Johnson, I’ve been a lawyer for years, I live in New York, and I was asked by your brother and others to represent you.”

Almost unblinking, Ali just stared at Byron, who tried to hold his gaze, but failed.

At last Ali asked, “And you want to know what’s happened to me?”

“We can start there. I’m only allowed thirty minutes to visit you this week. Tell me what you feel you want to tell me, or can tell me. And then we’ll see where we go. You don’t have to tell me everything about who you are, what you did before you were arrested, who you know in the outside world. Or you don’t have to tell me anything. I want nothing from you other than to help you.”

Ali leaned close to the metallic hole in the smoky window. The skin around his eyes was far darker than the rest of his face, almost as if he wore a Zorro-style mask. Byron took no notes, because to do so might make Ali Hussein even more mistrustful.

“Today don’t ask me any questions. People have asked me lots of questions over the years. I’m sick of questions.” It was like listening to a voice from a world other than the one in which Byron lived. There was nothing angry or abusive in his tone: just a matter-of-fact directness, as though he was describing to Byron a computation he had made on one of Byron’s tax returns. “One morning five Americans in suits stopped me at a red light. I was in Bonn. I drove a rented Toyota. I had a briefcase. They got out of their cars. They had earpieces. Guns, too. They told me to get out of the car. I did. They told me to show them my hands. I did. They lifted me into an SUV, tied my hands, and put a blindfold on me. I asked who they were and what was happening.”

He paused. Byron, who had been in the business of asking questions since he graduated from law school at Harvard, couldn’t resist the embedded instinct to ask, “What did they say?”

“They said shut up.”

“Has anyone given you any papers since you’ve come here?”

“I haven’t had anything in my hands to read in years. Not a newspaper, not a magazine, not a book. Not even the Koran.”

“Has anyone told you what crimes you’re charged with?”

“Don’t you know?”

“No. All that I’ve been told is that you were moved to Miami from a foreign jail so that you could be indicted and tried in an American court.”

There was another pause. “How exactly did you come to me?” Even though he kept returning to the same subject—who exactly was Byron Johnson?—there was still no hostility or anger in Ali Hussein’s tone. “Why are you here?”

In the stifling room, Byron began to sweat almost as profusely as he had on the walk from the security gate to the prison entrance. He recognized that he was very tense. And he was certain that the thirty-minute rule would be enforced, that time was running out. He didn’t want to lose his chance to gain the confidence of this ghostly man who had just emerged into a semblance of life after years in solitary limbo. “A lawyer for a civil rights group called me. I had let people know that I wanted to represent a person arrested for terrorism. I was told that you were one of four prisoners being transferred out of some detention center, maybe at Guantanamo, to a mainland prison, and that you’d be charged by an American grand jury rather than held overseas indefinitely. When I got the call I said I would help, but only if you and I met, and only if you wanted me to help, and only if I thought I could do that.”

“How do I know any of this is true?”

Byron Johnson prided himself on being a realist. Wealthy clients sought him out not to tell them what they wanted to hear but for advice about the facts, the law and the likely real-world outcomes of whatever problems they faced. But it hadn’t occurred to him that this man, imprisoned for years, would doubt him and would be direct enough to tell him that. Byron had become accustomed to deference, not to challenge. And this frail man was suggesting that Byron might be a stalking horse, a plant, a shill, a human recording device.

“I met your brother Khalid.”

“Where?”

“At a diner in Union City.”

“What diner?”

“He said it was his favorite, and that you used to eat there with him: the Plaza Diner on Kennedy Boulevard.”

Byron, who for years had practiced law in areas where a detailed memory was essential, was relieved that he remembered the name and location of the diner just across the Hudson River in New Jersey. He couldn’t assess whether the man behind the thick, scratched glass was now more persuaded to believe him. Byron asked, “How have you been treated?”

“I’ve been treated like an animal.”

“In what ways?”

As if briskly covering the topics on an agenda, Ali Hussein said, “Months in one room, no contact with other people. Shifted from place to place, never knowing what country or city I was in, never knowing what month of the year, day of the week. Punched. Kicked.”

“Do you have any marks on your body?”

“I’m not sure yet what your name really is, or who you really are, but you seem naive. Marks? Are you asking me if they’ve left bruises or scars on my body?”

Byron felt the rebuke. Over the years he’d learned that there was often value in saying nothing. Silence sometimes changed the direction of a conversation and revealed more. He waited.

Hussein asked, “How much more time do we have?”

“Only a few minutes.”

“A few minutes? I’ve been locked away for years, never in touch for a second with anyone who meant to do kind things to me, and now I have a total of thirty minutes with you. Mr. Bush created a beautiful world.”

“There’s another president.” Byron paused, and, with the silly thought of giving this man some hope, he said, “His name is Barack Hussein Obama.”

Ali Hussein almost smiled. “And I’m still here? How did that happen?”

Byron didn’t answer, feeling foolish that he’d thought the news that an American president’s middle name was Hussein would somehow brighten this man’s mind. Byron had pandered to him, and he hated pandering.

Ali Hussein then asked, “My wife and children?”

No one—not the ACLU lawyer, not the CIA agent with whom Byron had briefly talked to arrange this visit, not even Hussein’s heavy-faced, brooding brother—had said a single thing about Hussein other than that he had been brought into the United States after years away and that he was an accountant. Nothing about a wife and children.

“I don’t know. I didn’t know you had a wife and children. Nobody said anything about them. I should have asked.”

It was unsettling even to Byron, who had dealt under tense circumstances with thousands of people in courtrooms, that this man could stare at him for so long with no change of expression. Hussein finally asked, “Are you going to come back?”

“If you want me to.”

“I was an accountant, you know. I always liked numbers, and I believed in the American system that money moves everything, that he who pays the piper gets to call the tune. Who’s paying you?”

“No one, Mr. Hussein. Anything I do for you will be free. I won’t get paid by anybody.”

“Now I really wonder who you are.” There was just a trace of humor in his voice and his expression.

As swiftly as Ali Hussein had appeared in the interview room, he disappeared when two guards in Army uniforms reached in from the rear door and literally yanked him from his chair. It was like watching a magician make a man disappear.


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Thursday, October 25, 2012

The Crossroads Tour: Amanda Ashby



1. What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

We don’t really celebrate Halloween in Australia so I didn’t grow up with any traditions at all. However, if I lived over in the US I think I would like dressing up for a night. That looks like lots of fun!


2. Would you share an embarrassing or funny Trick-or-Treat moment with us?

Because Halloween isn’t a big deal over here, it is difficult to go Trick-or-Treating but since my kids watch so much US television, they always insist on doing it. There are normally a few other kids out and about as well, but it’s embarrassing because hardly anyone opens up the door and not many people have candy (or lollies as well call them over here!)


3. What is your favorite Halloween candy?

M&M’s (though I tend to eat them all year round!)


4. Would you rather be a monster or an alien?

Monster. Grrrrrrr.


Click image for review




How The Tour Works:

Each day of The Crossroads Blog Tour, a new research question will be revealed on The Crossroad Blog Tour main page: HERE.
And each day the answer to that question will be found within one of the different blog posts by Crossroads Tour authors. Your job is to get the question, read the blog posts, and collect all answers by the end of the tour.  
At the end of the tour all of your answers are to be emailed to Judith at: judithgraves@ymail.com by midnight on October 29, 2012.

The Grand Prize:

A KINDLE, preloaded with an ebook from each of the Crossroads authors. That’s right folks, a free KINDLE and 13 free EBOOKS! 

The Other Bloggers:

Forgiven by Janet Fox

Forgiven:
Kula Baker never expected to find herself on the streets of San Francisco, alone but for a letter of introduction. Though she has come to the city to save her father from a cruel fate, Kula soon finds herself swept up in a world of art and elegance - a world she hardly dared dream of back in Montana, where she was no more than the daughter of an outlaw. And then there is the handsome David Wong, whose smiling eyes and soft-spoken manner have an uncanny way of breaking through Kula's carefully crafted reserve. Yet when disaster strikes and the wreckage threatens all she holds dear, Kula realizes that only by unlocking her heart can she begin to carve a new future for herself.





Forgiven by Janet Fox is a companion book to Faithful, and unfortunately I found it to be rather disappointing in comparison. The story started out strong, with Kula being a strong, fierce character; she journeys far from all that is familiar in order to save her father from the accusation of a crime he didn’t commit. But shortly into the novel, the story becomes bogged down with less interesting events. While the writing was beautiful, I found the main character: Kula, to be selfish and greedy. All she can think about is bettering her station in life, and her need to free her father falls to the wayside as she pursues her own dreams. For me, there wasn’t enough romance and mystery to really keep my attention and I found it hard to finish this book. Janet really tugs strongly on your heartstrings near the end of the story, and it concludes with complete resolution and no left over questions about Kula’s future.