Wild Card Tour: Who Made You a Princess? (All About Us Series #4) by Shelley Adina

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

Today's Wild Card author is:

Shelley Adina

and the book:

Who Made You A Princess? (All About Us Series, Book 4)

FaithWords (May 13, 2009)

Plus a Tiffany's Bracelet Giveaway! Go to Camy Tang's Blog and leave a comment on her FIRST Wild Card Tour for Be Strong and Curvaceous, and you will be placed into a drawing for a bracelet that looks similar to the picture below.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Award-winning author Shelley Adina wrote her first teen novel when she was 13. It was rejected by the literary publisher to whom she sent it, but he did say she knew how to tell a story. That was enough to keep her going through the rest of her adolescence, a career, a move to another country, a B.A. in Literature, an M.A. in Writing Popular Fiction, and countless manuscript pages. Shelley is a world traveler and pop culture junkie with an incurable addiction to designer handbags. She writes books about fun and faith—with a side of glamour. Between books, Shelley loves traveling, playing the piano and Celtic harp, watching movies, and making period costumes.

Visit her book site and her website.


It's All About Us is Book One in the All About Us Series. Book Two, The Fruit of my Lipstick came out in August 2008. Book Three, Be Strong & Curvaceous, came out January 2, 2009. And Book Four, Who Made You a Princess?, came out May 13, 2009.


Product Details:

List Price: $9.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 240 pages
Publisher: FaithWords (May 13, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0446179620
ISBN-13: 978-0446179621

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

NOTHING SAYS “ALONE” like a wide, sandy beach on the western edge of the continent, with the sun going down in a smear of red and orange. Girlfriends, I am the go-to girl for alone. Or at least, that’s what I used to think. Not anymore, though, because nothing says “alive” like a fire snapping and hissing at your feet, and half a dozen of your BFFs laughing and talking around you.

Like the T-shirt says, life is good.

My name’s Shani Amira Marjorie Hanna, and up until I started going to Spencer Academy in my freshman year, all I wanted to do was get in, scoop as many A’s as I could, and get out. College, yeah. Adulthood. Being the boss of me. Social life? Who cared? I’d treat it the way I’d done in middle school, making my own way and watching people brush by me, all disappearing into good-bye like they were flowing down a river.

Then when I was a junior, I met the girls, and things started to change whether I wanted them to or not. Or maybe it was just me. Doing the changing, I mean.

Now we were all seniors and I was beginning to see that all this “I am an island” stuff was just a bunch of smoke. ’Cuz I was not like the Channel Islands, sitting out there on the hazy horizon. I was so done with all that.

Lissa Mansfield sat on the other side of the fire from me while this adorable Jared Padalecki look-alike named Kaz Griffin sat next to her trying to act like the best friend she thought he was. Lissa needs a smack upside the head, you want my opinion. Either that or someone needs to make a serious play for Kaz to wake her up. But it’s not going to be me. I’ve got cuter fish to fry. Heh. More about that later.

“I can’t believe this is the last weekend of summer vacation,” Carly Aragon moaned for about the fifth time since Kaz lit the fire and we all got comfortable in the sand around it. “It’s gone so fast.”

“That’s because you’ve only been here a week.” I handed her the bag of tortilla chips. “What about me? I’ve been here for a month and I still can’t believe we have to go up to San Francisco on Tuesday.”

“I’m so jealous.” Carly bumped me with her shoulder. “A whole month at Casa Mansfield with your own private beach and everything.” She dipped a handful of chips in a big plastic container of salsa she’d made that morning with fresh tomatoes and cilantro and little bits of—get this—cantaloupe. She made one the other day with carrots in it. I don't know how she comes up with this stuff, but it’s all good. We had a cooler full of food to munch on. No burnt weenies for this crowd. Uh-uh. What we can’t order delivered, Carly can make.

“And to think I could have gone back to Chicago and spent the whole summer throwing parties and trashing the McMansion.” I sighed with regret. “Instead, I had to put up with a month in the Hamptons with the Changs, and then a month out here fighting Lissa for her bathroom.”

“Hey, you could have used one of the other ones,” Lissa protested, trying to keep Kaz from snagging the rest of her turkey-avocado-and-alfalfa-sprouts sandwich.

I grinned at her. Who wanted to walk down the hot sandstone patio to one of the other bathrooms when she, Carly, and I had this beautiful Spanish terrazzo-looking wing of the house to ourselves? Carly and I were in Lissa’s sister’s old room, which looked out on this garden with a fountain and big ferns and grasses and flowering trees. And beyond that was the ocean. It was the kind of place you didn’t want to leave, even to go to the bathroom.

I contrasted it with the freezing wind off Lake Michigan in the winter and the long empty hallways of the seven-million-dollar McMansion on Lake Road, where I always felt like a guest. You know—like you’re welcome but the hosts don’t really know what to do with you. I mean, my mom has told me point-blank, with a kind of embarrassed little laugh, that she can’t imagine what happened. The Pill and her careful preventive measures couldn’t all have failed on the same night.

Organic waste happens. Whatever. The point is, I arrived seventeen years ago and they had to adjust.

I think they love me. My dad always reads my report cards, and he used to take me to blues clubs to listen to the musicians doing sound checks before the doors opened. That was before my mom found out. Then I had to wait until I was twelve, and we went to the early shows, which were never as good as the late ones I snuck into whenever my parents went on one of their trips.

They travel a lot. Dad owns this massive petroleum exploration company, and when she’s not chairing charity boards and organizing fund-raisers, Mom goes with him everywhere, from Alaska to New Zealand. I saw a lot of great shows with whichever member of the staff I could bribe to take me and swear I was sixteen. Keb’ Mo, B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Roomful of Blues—I saw them all.

A G-minor chord rippled out over the crackle of the fire, and I smiled a slow smile. My second favorite sound in the world (right after the sound of M&Ms pouring into a dish). On my left, Danyel had pulled out his guitar and tuned it while I was lost in la-la land, listening to the waves come in.

Lissa says there are some things you just know. And somehow, I just knew that I was going to be more to Danyel Johnstone than merely a friend of his friend Kaz’s friend Lissa, if you hear what I’m saying. I was done with being alone, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t stand out from the crowd.

Don’t get me wrong, I really like this crowd. Carly especially—she’s like the sister I would have designed my own self. And Lissa, too, though sometimes I wonder if she can be real. I mean, how can you be blond and tall and rich and wear clothes the way she does, and still be so nice? There has to be a flaw in there somewhere, but if she’s got any, she keeps them under wraps.

Gillian, who we’d see in a couple of days, has really grown on me. I couldn’t stand her at first—she’s one of those people you can’t help but notice. I only hung around her because Carly liked her. But somewhere between her going out with this loser brain trust and then her hooking up with Jeremy Clay, who’s a friend of mine, I got to know her. And staying with her family last Christmas, which could have been massively awkward, was actually fun. The last month in the Hamptons with them was a total blast. The only good thing about leaving was knowing I was going to see the rest of the crew here in Santa Barbara.

The one person I still wasn’t sure about was Mac, aka Lady Lindsay MacPhail, who did an exchange term at school in the spring. Getting to know her is like besieging a castle—which is totally appropriate considering she lives in one. She and Carly are tight, and we all e-mailed and IM-ed like fiends all summer, but I’m still not sure. I mean, she has a lot to deal with right now, with her family and everything. And the likelihood of us seeing each other again is kind of low, so maybe I don’t have to make up my mind about her. Maybe I’ll just let her go the way I let the kids in middle school go.

Danyel began to get serious about bending his notes instead of fingerpicking, and I knew he was about to sing. Oh, man, could the night get any more perfect? Even though we’d probably burn the handmade marshmallows from Williams-Sonoma, tonight capped a summer that had been the best time I’d ever had.

The only thing that would make it perfect would be finding some way to be alone with that man. I hadn’t been here more than a day when Danyel and Kaz had come loping down the beach. I’d taken one look at those eyes and those cheekbones and, okay, a very cut set of abs, and decided here was someone I wanted to know a whole lot better. And I did, now, after a couple of weeks. But soon we’d go off to S. F., and he and Kaz would go back to Pacific High. When we pulled out in Gabe Mansfield’s SUV, I wanted there to be something more between us than an air kiss and a handshake, you know what I mean?

I wanted something to be settled. Neither of us had talked about it, but both of us knew it was there. Unspoken longing is all very well in poetry, but I’m the outspoken type. I like things out there where I can touch them.

In a manner of speaking.

Danyel sat between Kaz and me, cross-legged and bare-chested, looking as comfortable in his surf jams as if he lived in them. Come to think of it, he did live in them. His, Kaz’s, and Lissa’s boards were stuck in the sand behind us. They’d spent most of the afternoon out there on the waves. I tried to keep my eyes on the fire. Not that I didn’t appreciate the view next to me, because trust me, it was fine, but I know a man wants to be appreciated for his talents and his mind.

Danyel’s melody sounded familiar—something Gillian played while we waited for our prayer circles at school to start. Which reminded me . . . I nudged Carly. “You guys going to church tomorrow?”

She nodded and lifted her chin at Lissa to get her attention. “Girl wants to know if we’re going to church.”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Lissa said. “Kaz and his family, too. Last chance of the summer to all go together.”

And where Kaz went, Danyel went. Happy thought.

“You’re not going to bail, are you?” Carly’s brows rose a little.

It’s not like I’m anti-religion or anything. I’m just in the beginning stages of learning about it. Without my friends to tell me stuff, I’d be bumbling around on my own, trying to figure it out. My parents don’t go to church, so I didn’t catch the habit from them. But when she was alive and I was a little girl, my grandma used to take me to the one in her neighborhood across town. I thought it was an adventure, riding the bus instead of being driven in the BMW. And the gospel choir was like nothing I’d ever seen, all waving their arms in the air and singing to raise the roof. I always thought they were trying to deafen God, if they could just get up enough volume.

So I like the music part. Always have. And I’m beginning to see the light on the God part, after what happened last spring. But seeing a glimmer and knowing what to do about it are two different things.

“Of course not.” I gave Carly a look. “We all go together. And we walk, in case no one told you, so plan your shoes carefully.”

“Oh, I will.” She sat back on her hands, an “I so see right through you” smile turning up the corners of her mouth. “And it’s all about the worship, I know.” That smile told me she knew exactly what my motivation was. Part of it, at least. Hey, can you blame me?

The music changed and Danyel’s voice lifted into a lonely blues melody, pouring over Carly’s words like cream. I just melted right there on the spot. Man, could that boy sing.


Blue water, blue sky

Blue day, girl, do you think that I

Don’t see you, yeah I do.

Long sunset, long road,

Long life, girl, but I think you know

What I need, yeah, you do.


I do a little singing my own self, so I know talent when I hear it. And I’d have bet you that month’s allowance that Danyel had composed that one. He segued into the chorus and then the bridge, its rhythms straight out of Mississippi but the tune something new, something that fit the sadness and the hope of the words.

Wait a minute.

Blue day? Long sunset? Long road? As in, a long road to San Francisco?

Whoa. Could Danyel be trying to tell someone something? “You think that I don’t see you”? Well, if that didn’t describe me, I didn’t know what would. Ohmigosh.

Could he be trying to tell me his feelings with a song? Musicians were like that. They couldn’t tell a person something to her face, or they were too shy, or it was just too hard to get out, so they poured it into their music. For them, maybe it was easier to perform something than to get personal with it.

Be cool, girl. Let him finish. Then find a way to tell him you understand—and you want it, too.

The last of the notes blew away on the breeze, and a big comber smashed itself on the sand, making a sound like a kettledrum to finish off the song. I clapped, and the others joined in.

“Did you write that yourself?” Lissa removed a marshmallow from her stick and passed it to him. “It was great.”

Danyel shrugged one shoulder. “Tune’s been bugging me for a while and the words just came to me. You know, like an IM or something.”

Carly laughed, and Kaz’s forehead wrinkled for a second in a frown before he did, too.

I love modesty in a man. With that kind of talent, you couldn’t blame Danyel for thinking he was all that.

Should I say something? The breath backed up in my chest. Say it. You’ll lose the moment. “So who’s it about?” I blurted, then felt myself blush.

“Can’t tell.” His head was bent as he picked a handful of notes and turned them into a little melody. “Some girl, probably.”

“Some girl who’s leaving?” I said, trying for a teasing tone. “Is that a good-bye?”

“Could be.”

I wished I had the guts to come out and ask if he’d written the song for me—for us—but I just couldn’t. Not with everyone sitting there. With one look at Carly, whose eyes held a distinct “What’s up with you?” expression, I lost my nerve and shut up. Which, as any of the girls could tell you, doesn’t happen very often.

Danyel launched into another song—some praise thing that everyone knew but me. And then another, and then a cheesy old John Denver number that at least I knew the words to, and then a bunch of goofy songs half of us had learned at camp when we were kids. And then it was nearly midnight, and Kaz got up and stretched.

He’s a tall guy. He stretches a long way. “I’m running the mixer for the early service tomorrow, so I’ve got to go.”

Danyel got up, and I just stopped my silly self from saying, “No, not yet.” Instead, I watched him sling the guitar over one shoulder and yank his board out of the sand. “Are you going to early service, too?” I asked him.

“Yeah,” he said, sounding a little surprised. “I’m in the band, remember?”

Argh! As if I didn’t know. As if I hadn’t sat there three Sundays in a row, watching his hands move on the frets and the light make shadows under his cheekbones.

“I just meant—I see you at the late one when we go. I didn’t know you went to both.” Stutter, bumble. Oh, just stop talking, girl. You’ve been perfectly comfortable talking to him so far. What’s the matter?

“I don’t, usually. But tomorrow they’re doing full band at early service, too. Last one before all the turistas go home. Next week we’ll be back to normal.” He smiled at me. “See you then.”

Was he looking forward to seeing me, or was he just being nice? “I hope so,” I managed.

“Kaz, you coming?”

Kaz bent to the fire and ran a stick through the coals, separating them. “Just let me put this out. Lissa, where’s the bucket?”

“Here.” While I’d been obsessing over Danyel, Lissa had run down to the waterline and filled a gallon pail. You could tell they’d done this about a million times. She poured the water on the fire and it blew a cloud of steam into the air. The orange coals gave it up with a hiss.

I looked up to say something to Danyel about it and saw that he was already fifty feet away, board under his arm like it weighed nothing, heading down the beach to the public lot where he usually parked his Jeep.

I stared down into the coals, wet and dying.

I couldn’t let the night go out like this.

“Danyel, wait!” The sand polished the soles of my bare feet better than the pumice bar at the salon as I ran to catch up with him. A fast glance behind me told me Lissa had stepped up and begun talking to Kaz, giving me a few seconds alone.

I owed her, big time.

“What’s up, ma?” He planted the board and set the guitar case down. “Forget something?”

“Yes,” I blurted. “I forgot to tell you that I think you’re amazing.”

He blinked. “Whoa.” The barest hint of a smile tickled the corners of his lips.

I might not get another chance as good as this one. I rushed on, the words crowding my mouth in their hurry to get out. “I know there’s something going on here and we’re all leaving on Tuesday and I need to know if you—if you feel the same way.”

“About . . . ?”

“About me. As I feel about you.”

He put both hands on his hips and gazed down at the sand. “Oh.”

Cold engulfed me, as if I’d just plunged face-first into the dark waves twenty feet away. “Oh,” I echoed. “Never mind. I guess I got it wrong.” I stepped back. “Forget about it. No harm done.”

“No, Shani, wait—”

But I didn’t want to hear the “we can still be friends” speech. I didn’t want to hear anything except the wind in my ears as I ran back to the safety of my friends.

Dynamic Uno here: Whew the sparks are hot as Shani returns to Spencer and finds herself "in love" with two fine men-both as different as night and day! One is a great guy named Danyel, who is down to earth and just happens to enjoy having fun in the great outdoors--including surfing. The other, well he's a prince. No really, he's a real prince named Prince Rashid al Amir, who also happens to be Shani's childhood playmate. Will Shani be able to maintain a relationship with both guys without going crazy, or will she have to choose? You'll have to read the book to find out!

I will say that I expected this book to be a bit cookie-cutter because it's part of a series, but surprisingly the tension was held throughout the entire book--especially with the surprise twists and turns. I know my girls (students) can't wait to find out what happens next, and they'll be especially thrilled to find out that there's a real prince in the book. (Hey--Disney is only a few hours away--what can I say?) I wish I had such generous friends, then I could pay off my debt. (It'll make more sense after you read the book.) Definitely go out and buy the series if you haven't done so already. It's the Christian version of Gossip Girls at boarding school and if you have pre-teens or teenaged girls, they will LOVE these books!

Let me know what you think! Happy Reading!!

Wild Card Tour: Memory's Gate by Paul McCusker (Time Thriller Trilogy)

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

Today's Wild Card author is:

Paul McCusker

and the book:

Memory's Gate by Paul McCusker (Time Thriller series)

Zondervan (May 1, 2009)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Paul McCusker is the author of The Mill House, Epiphany, The Faded Flower and several Adventures in Odyssey programs. Winner of the Peabody Award for his radio drama on the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer for Focus on the Family, he lives in Colorado Springs with his wife and two children.

Visit the author's website.

Product Details:

List Price: $9.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 208 pages
Publisher: Zondervan (May 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0310714389
ISBN-13: 978-0310714385

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

Chapter One

What in the world am I doing here? Elizabeth Forde asked herself as she followed a silver-haired woman down the main hallway of the Fawlt Line Retirement Center.

Of all the things I could have spent the rest of my summer doing, why this? Yes, she had agreed to volunteer at the retirement center. She had even felt enthusiastic about the idea at the time. But walking down the cold, clinical, pale green hallway with the smell of pine disinfectant in the air, Elizabeth wondered if she had made a mistake.

She’d been swept along by Reverend Armstrong’s passionate call to the young people of the church. He had exuberantly insisted that they get involved in the community. They must be a generation of givers rather than takers, he’d said. His words were powerful and persuasive, and before she knew what she was doing she had joined a line of other young people to sign up for volunteer service. Just a few hours a day, three or four days a week, for a couple of weeks. It hadn’t sounded like much.

An old man, bent like a question-mark, stepped out of his room and smiled toothlessly at her.

It’s too much, she thought. Let me out of here.

“I know what you’re thinking,” said her guide, Mrs. Kottler, with a smile. “You’re thinking that a few hours a day simply won’t be enough. You’ll want more time. Everyone feels that way. But if you do the best you can with the hours you have, you’ll be just fine. I promise. Maybe later, once you’ve proven yourself, we’ll let you come in longer.”

Elizabeth smiled noncommittally.

Mrs. Kottler wore masterfully applied makeup, discreet gold jewelry, and a fashionable dark blue dress. She smelled of expensive perfume. Elizabeth thought she looked more like a real estate agent than the administrator of an old folks’ home.

“We don’t call it an ‘old folks’ home,’ by the way,” Mrs. Kottler said, as if she’d read Elizabeth’s mind, “or a ‘sanitarium’ or any of those other outdated names. It’s just what the sign says: it’s a retirement center. People have productive and active lives here. Being a senior citizen doesn’t mean you have one foot in the grave. People who retire at sixty-five often have another twenty or thirty years to enjoy their lives. We’re here to help them do it as well as it can be done.”

Elizabeth noted a couple of productive and active people staring blankly at the television sets in their rooms.

“Of course, we do have older residents who have gone beyond their mental or physical capacity to jog around the center six times a day, if you know what I mean,” Mrs. Kottler added as they rounded a corner and walked briskly down a short corridor toward two large doors. “For the rest of them, there’s a full schedule of activities throughout the day. Most take place here in the recreation room.”

She pushed on the two doors. They swung open grandly to reveal a large room filled with game tables, easels, bookcases filled with hundreds of books and magazines, and a large-screen television. Unlike the main halls and cafeteria Elizabeth had just seen, this room was decorated warmly with wooden end-tables, lace doilies, and the kinds of chairs and sofas found in showcase living rooms. Tastefully painted scenes of sunlit hills, lush green valleys, and golden rivers adorned the walls.

“Pretty, huh? I decorated this one myself,” Mrs. Kottler said. “I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that they should have let me decorate the entire center. Well, that wasn’t my decision to make. The residents are responsible for decorating their own rooms any way they like. Most of the other assembly areas were done before I joined the staff.”

“How long have you been working here?” Elizabeth asked politely.

“Five years,” Mrs. Kottler answered, then added wistfully, “Time. It goes by so quickly, don’t you find?”

For Elizabeth, who had been only eleven years old when Mrs. Kottler started her job, the last five years hadn’t gone by quickly at all. She had traveled from the carefree days of Barbie dolls to the insecurities of middle school to the early stages of womanhood and wide-eyed wonder over her future. And she had also traveled to a parallel time, not that she’d be inclined to mention such a thing to Mrs. Kottler. No, it hasn’t gone by very quickly, she thought. And as she considered the residents of the center and realized that one day she might have to live in a place like this, she hoped life would never go by that quickly. She shuddered at the thought.

A tall, handsome young man entered through a door at the opposite end of the recreation room. “Mrs. K., I was wondering—”

“Doug Hall, come meet Elizabeth Forde,” Mrs. Kottler said, waving her arms as if she might create enough of a breeze to sail Doug over to them.

Doug strode across the room with a smile that showed off the deep dimples in his cheeks. He’s a movie star, Elizabeth thought. His curly brown hair, perfectly formed face, large brown eyes, and painstakingly sculpted physique that was enhanced, not hidden, by the white clinical coat made her certain. He’s a movie star playing a doctor, she amended.

Doug outstretched a hand and said, “Well, my enjoyment of this place just increased by a hundred percent.”

She shook his hand and blushed. “Hi.”

“Doug is our maintenance engineer,” Mrs. Kottler explained.

Doug smiled again. “She means I’m the main janitor. But I’m more like a bouncer, in case these old madcap merrymakers get out of control with their wild partying and carousing.”

“Stop it, Doug,” Mrs. Kottler giggled. Then she turned to Elizabeth. “I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, what’s a good-looking and charming young man like him doing in a place like this?”

For once, Mrs. Kottler had it right. He’s a movie star playing a janitor? It didn’t seem appropriate somehow. She waited for the answer.

“Well, if you can find out, please let me know,” Mrs. Kottler said with another giggle. “He won’t tell anyone. I assume he has a deep, dark secret. Perhaps he was involved in some sort of intrigue in France and barely escaped from the police on his yacht. Why else would he be hiding in a retirement center in a small town?”

“If you have to know the truth, I ran off with the church funds,” Doug said. He and Mrs. Kottler chuckled as if this little exchange had been their own private joke for a long time.

Doug rested his gaze on Elizabeth, making her feel self-conscious about how she appeared to him. How did she look in her freshly-issued white-and-pink clinic jacket—frumpy or professional? Had she taken pains with her makeup? Were her large brown eyes properly accented? Did her smile look natural? Her skin was freshly tanned, no unsightly pimples, which made her glad. She had tied back her long brown hair, but now she wished she had let it fall loose. It looked better that way, Jeff always said.

Jeff.

Thinking of her boyfriend at that moment gave her pause—as if her self-conscious vanity was, in and of itself, an act of infidelity to him. She glanced away from Doug self-consciously.

“Well, back to business,” Doug said pleasantly, as if he’d picked up on her feelings and wanted to spare her any embarrassment. “I was wondering if now would be a good time to adjust the settings on the Jacuzzi. You don’t have any plans to let the kids in this afternoon, right?”

“No, Doug, the ‘kids’ won’t be going in today,” Mrs. Kottler replied. “Do whatever you need to do.”

He nodded. “Maybe Elizabeth will want to test it later when I’m finished.” He gave her a coy grin.

“I think Elizabeth will be too busy getting acclimated to her new duties,” Mrs. Kottler replied.

Doug tipped a finger against his brow as a farewell. “If there’s anything I can do to help ...”

Mrs. Kottler watched him go. “He’s such a flirt. A charming, good-looking flirt, but a flirt nonetheless.” Elizabeth detected a hint of jealousy in her voice.

The tour of the center eventually led Elizabeth and Mrs. Kottler outside to the five acres of manicured grounds, landscaped into gentle green slopes that ultimately rolled down to a small manmade lake called Richards Pond. It was enclosed on one side by a natural forest that extended off to the horizon. Elizabeth walked alongside Mrs. Kottler, feeling oppressed by the humidity of the August afternoon. She swatted at the occasional mosquito that wanted to make a meal of her arms.

“The heat and mosquitoes tend to keep everyone inside on days like this,” Mrs. Kottler said.

“Except those two,” Elizabeth said, gesturing to two people in a white Victorian-style gazebo near the lake.

“That’s Sheriff Hounslow and his father,” Mrs. Kottler said, with just enough annoyance to betray her usual professional detachment. “I suppose we should say a quick hello.”

As they got closer, Elizabeth saw that the sheriff, a large man in a light gray uniform, was pacing in an agitated way. His father, a shadow from this distance, was sitting on one of the benches that lined the gazebo. Sheriff Hounslow saw them coming and waved.

Mrs. Kottler spoke to Elizabeth in a low voice, “Adam Hounslow joined us just a couple of days ago. Like many new residents, he’s having a hard time adjusting. Hello, Sheriff!”

Mrs. Kottler and Elizabeth mounted the steps to the shade of the round white roof covering the gazebo. The heat and humidity were not relieved there.

“Look who’s here,” Sheriff Hounslow announced. “Mrs. Kottler and—well, well—Elizabeth Forde.”

“Oh, you know my new volunteer. Elizabeth will be with us a few hours a day for the next couple of weeks.”

“How nice. You be sure to take special care of my father,” the sheriff said. “His name is Adam.”

Elizabeth could see the old man clearly now. He was bent over from some sort of arthritis and had a pale wrinkled face with hazel eyes encased in deep, worried frowns—in them, she could see the resemblance between the father and the son. Wisps of thin white hair sprayed out from a spotted crown.

“Wouldn’t you like a pretty girl like Elizabeth to help take care of you, Dad?” the sheriff asked.

“I don’t need to be taken care of,” the old man growled. He tucked his head down against his chest.

Sheriff Hounslow ignored the remark and continued, “I’m surprised to see you here, Elizabeth. Shouldn’t you be getting ready for the grand opening of that historical amusement park, or whatever Malcolm calls it?”

“It’s not an amusement park,” Elizabeth corrected him. “It’s called the Historical Village.”

“I didn’t know you were connected to Malcolm Dubbs!” Mrs. Kottler said, impressed. Malcolm Dubbs was the closest thing Fawlt Line had to royalty, a member of the English branch of the Dubbs family who’d been in the area for nearly 300 years. Malcolm came to manage the estate after the last American adult member of the Dubbs family was killed in a car accident.

“She’s also dating Jeff Dubbs,” the sheriff informed her.

“Are you? Doug will be very disappointed,” Mrs. Kottler teased, then said earnestly, “Jeff’s parents died in that terrible accident awhile back, didn’t they? That was so sad.”

Elizabeth nodded without responding. Jeff’s parents—Malcolm’s cousin and his wife—had died in a plane crash a couple of years before. That’s why Jeff lived with Malcolm.

Mrs. Kottler fluttered her eyes as if she might cry. “I think Malcolm Dubbs is a remarkable man. Imagine taking in that boy.”

“That boy is the true heir to the estate,” Sheriff interjected sarcastically. “If I were him, I’d have a lot of trouble with Malcolm using the family money to build that park.”

“It’s not Jeff’s money unless Malcolm dies,” Elizabeth corrected him. “He’s entitled to do whatever he wants with it. And Jeff is very proud of Malcolm.”

Mrs. Kottler nodded. “After all, Malcolm is using it to create something everyone will learn from. It’s not as if he’s wasting it.” She turned to Elizabeth. “Is it true that he’s brought in authentic buildings, displays, and artifacts from all over the world?”

“Whatever he can find. From picture frames and hairbrushes to school houses and church ruins, as much as he could find from the past few hundred years is represented.” She covered a smile, realizing she was reciting one of Malcolm’s brochures. “Phase One opens on Saturday.”

“Phase One?”

“Malcolm says the village is a work in progress. He’ll open various sections of it as they’re ready.”

“As I said, it’s a Disneyland of history,” the sheriff said derisively.

Elizabeth frowned at Sheriff Hounslow, knowing better than most the adversarial relationship the two men had. Elizabeth suspected that the sheriff was jealous of Malcolm’s wealth and the respect he commanded from the townspeople. But whatever the reason, Hounslow never missed an opportunity to poke fun at Malcolm’s projects or eccentricities.

“I can’t wait to go on the rides!” he added.

“Are there rides?” Mrs. Kottler asked, amazed.

Elizabeth shook her head. “No. Just buildings and displays.”

Sheriff Hounslow grinned. “There’s going to be a big celebration. The mayor will be there and a special assistant to the governor, and there’ll be a telegram from the president and maybe even world peace—all thanks to Malcolm Dubbs.”

“Don’t be such a pompous fool, Richard,” Adam Hounslow barked at his son. “I’m looking forward to seeing the village.”

“I’m glad you’re looking forward to something,” the sheriff remarked.

“Living in a place like this, I’m lucky to look forward to anything,” Adam snapped.

“Oh, I’m sure you don’t mean that,” Mrs. Kottler said. “The Fawlt Line Retirement Center will be like home to you in no time at all, I promise.”

Adam scowled at her. “This will never be my home. My home has been sold right out from under me by my thoughtful and compassionate son.”

“I’m not getting into this argument with you again, Dad,” Hounslow said irritably.

“Yes you will,” Adam replied. “As long as you force me to live in places where I don’t want to live, we’ll have this argument.”

The sheriff turned on his father. “Where else are you going to live? You couldn’t stay in that big old place alone. You can barely take care of yourself, let alone keep up with a big house.”

The old man snorted and turned away.

Sheriff Hounslow wouldn’t let it go. “Do I have to remind you of what led up to this? Do I have to announce to the whole world how you nearly burnt the house down—twice—by forgetting to turn the stove burners off? Or the time you flooded the house by wandering off to the store while the bath water was running?”

Mrs. Kottler caught Elizabeth’s eyes and jerked her head towards the center, signaling that they should leave. Heading across the grounds, Elizabeth could still hear the voices of the two men arguing behind her.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Mrs. Kottler said. “You’re thinking that Adam must be crazy not to like our center. Well, I agree. But he’ll get used to it. They always do.”

They approached the building from the back, where a stone patio had been added to the recreation room. It was congested with plants and flowers of all kinds. A man in a wheelchair was pruning the plants, meticulously spraying the leaves and wiping them with a water bottle. He had long gray hair that poured out from under a large baseball cap. Beneath the brim of the cap he wore sunglasses so dark that she couldn’t see his eyes at all. A bushy mustache and beard flowed downward. It struck Elizabeth that, apart from his cheeks, his face couldn’t be seen at all. He wore a baggy jogging suit that, to Elizabeth’s thinking, must have been unbearably hot in the heat and humidity.

“That’s Mr. Betterman, another new resident,” Mrs. Kottler said. “Come meet him.”

They crossed the patio where Mrs. Kottler introduced them.

Mr. Betterman didn’t speak, but grunted and held a carnation out to her.

“Very nice,” Elizabeth said.

“Take it,” Mrs. Kottler whispered.

Elizabeth reached out to take the flower. For a second he didn’t let go, but used the moment to lean closer to her and whisper, “I know who you are.” He gave her a slight smile then turned away to fiddle with the planter.

Disconcerted, Elizabeth looked to Mrs. Kottler again, who gently shrugged. They walked inside.

“What did he mean by that?” Mrs. Kottler asked once they were inside and clear of Betterman’s hearing.

“I don’t know,” Elizabeth replied. She didn’t say so, but something about the man’s half-smile and voice seemed familiar to her.

“Still, That’s quite an honor,” Mrs. Kottler said. “He doesn’t usually talk to anyone. He’s a little eccentric.”

No kidding, Elizabeth thought.

As they drifted through the recreation room, Elizabeth found herself looking for Doug. She wasn’t a flirtatious person—nor was she interested in anyone but Jeff—and yet she was drawn to him. Maybe because he was someone else in the building who was young and sympathetic, like her.

Mrs. Kottler smiled contentedly. “Well, that’s most of it. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that this is more like a beautiful hotel than a retirement center. We do our best. Now, let me show you where the storage closets are and introduce you to your new responsibilities.”


Chapter Two

Malcolm Dubbs lived in a cottage on the edge of the Dubbs family’s vast estate bordering the north edge of Fawlt Line. It had a manor house, built in the 17th century, which was now part of the Historical Village. The cottage, which he said suited him perfectly and reminded him of England, seemed to fit him perfectly. It seemed to suit Jeff, who lived there with him. Elizabeth thought that the two were remarkably happy, considering the tragedy that had brought them together.

Tall and slender, Malcolm sat at the large desk in his den when Elizabeth and Jeff arrived. The sun was soon to set, and a dim yellow light washed the cluttered room. Thanks to the oak tree just beyond the French doors leading out to the patio, drops of cooler, green light filtered into the room. They highlighted the old-fashioned furniture and skimmed along the dark wood paneling, the classic paintings, the shelves sagging under too many books. Jeff smiled and turned on the banker’s lamp at the head of the desk.

Malcolm looked up and blinked at Jeff. “Oh, hi,” then, “And good evening, Elizabeth,” he said wearily, his British accent making him sound intelligent and genteel.

“Good evening,” Elizabeth said, remembering why so many young girls in Fawlt Line had a crush on the man.

“Are you all right?” Jeff asked.

Malcolm sighed. “All the preparations for the grand opening have left me with too much to do and too little time.”

Jeff gestured to the papers on the desk. “What are you working on now?”

He pushed the papers away disdainfully. “These are daily reports of completed projects within the village, and this is another report discussing the security system and inherent weaknesses that might leave some areas vulnerable to theft.”

“Vulnerable?” Elizabeth asked.

“The security cameras still aren’t working.” Malcolm leaned back in his chair and shoved his hands into the pockets of his tweed sports coat. He stretched his long legs as far as they would go.

“It’s not all doom and gloom, I hope,” Elizabeth said.

“No. The eighteenth-century windmill from Holland is working perfectly. And we wrapped up the construction on the miners’ row houses from southwest Pennsylvania. I’m particularly proud of that exhibit.”

“Why that one?”

Malcolm smiled. “Because it shows the chronology of change better than most of the displays. You start at one end of the row houses, and as you walk through each one you’ll see exactly how the miners lived during the last 180 years. Go in the first door, and you’ll see how it was in 1820. Move on to the next door and you’re looking at 1840, then 1860 and 1880 and so on until you come to the present day. We spent a lot of time getting every detail just right.”

Elizabeth shook her head. “I don’t know how you pulled it all together.”

“Sometimes I wonder myself,” Malcolm admitted. “It’s been a long time in the making.”

“Hundreds of years, I figure,” Jeff said.

Malcolm waved his hand as if brushing away the subject. “Forget about the village for now. How was your first day as a volunteer, Elizabeth?”

Elizabeth was pleased that he even remembered, considering all the other demands on his mind. She said, “It was mostly just a chance to look around. I only met a couple of people. The center is nice, I guess, if you have to live in a place like that.”

Malcolm chuckled. “Your faint praise is overwhelming.”

Jeff dropped himself onto the sofa opposite the desk and ran his hands through his wavy dark hair. “She’s sorry she ever volunteered.”

Elizabeth rebuked him with a sharp look. “Jeff.”

“What?” Jeff asked innocently. “Did I say something wrong?”

Malcolm stood up and smiled sympathetically. “If it’s any consolation, Elizabeth, I think volunteering to help out at a retirement center is a noble and difficult thing to do. Many retirement homes are downright depressing, and elderly people can be very unpredictable, depending on their states of minds. But if you remember that they’re people, and not just old people, you have the opportunity to do them a world of good.”

Elizabeth thought of how Doug Hall called them ‘kids’ and probably charmed the socks off them, if only because he didn’t treat them differently from anyone else.

“As quirky as your parents are, you should feel right at home,” Jeff said with a laugh. Elizabeth kicked at his ankle before sitting next to him on the sofa.

Malcolm tugged at his ear thoughtfully. “I haven’t been out to the center since they renovated it. When I was a kid, it wasn’t a retirement home. It was just a house on a farm owned by someone the two of you know.”

Elizabeth and Jeff looked at each other blankly.

“That’s where the Richards property is,” Malcolm said. “It’s where Charles Richards disappeared.”

Elizabeth’s and Jeff’s faces lit up with the realization.

“You mean the Charles Richards?” Jeff asked.

“My Charles Richards?” Elizabeth added in disbelief.

Malcolm nodded. The three of them looked at each other silently as the story and the memories came back.


**********


For years the remarkable case of Charles Richards was whispered about around Fawlt Line, but treated as an unsolved mystery by those who investigate such things. Most people considered it one of those small-town myths that make their way into the consciousness of the locals—like haunted houses and boogy-men—particularly by parents who want to scare their kids into behaving. But Malcolm, Elizabeth, and Jeff knew this particular story was more than a myth. They believed every word of it, and for very good reason.

The story went that over thirty years ago; Charles Richards, the son of a wealthy merchant, settled with his wife and two children on a modest farm outside of Fawlt Line. One morning, the two children were playing next to the sidewalk leading from the house to the front gate. Charles and his wife, Julia, stepped out of the front door, where Charles kissed his wife good-bye. He was leaving to run a few errands in Fawlt Line. Charles walked down the steps toward his children and patted them on their heads as he passed. As he reached the front gate, a car came up the road toward the house. In it was Dr. Hezekiah Beckett, the local veterinarian, and a young boy who was helping the doctor that summer. Charles waved at the doctor, paused to check the time on his wristwatch, then turned as if he might head along the fence to greet the approaching car. He took three steps and, in full view of his wife, his children, Dr. Beckett, and the boy, he disappeared.

Horrified, the five of them raced to the spot and looked around. They saw only the fence and the grass. There were no bushes or trees for him to hide behind, no holes to fall into, nothing to explain how he could simply vanish into thin air.

Dr. Beckett and Julia Richards searched everywhere. Then the townspeople helped. They even dug up the ground where Charles had disappeared, in the belief that he’d fallen into a sinkhole or underground cavern and was trapped below. The ground was solid. Charles was gone. An investigation over the next few weeks failed to establish any clues. There was no explanation for it. Julia was bedridden for months, lost in the hope that her husband would return. No funeral or memorial service was ever held. Later, the family sold the farm and moved away.

The story would have been easy for Elizabeth to dismiss, had it not been told to her by Malcolm, who was the young boy in the car, working with Dr. Beckett during one of his summer vacations to America. And that was only the beginning. Malcolm spent years studying theories of time travel, parallel universes, and alternative dimensions in the belief that he’d find an explanation. All he wound up with were theories and a deep suspicion about the town of Fawlt Line itself. There had been enough weird occurrences in the area—Malcolm had chronicled and investigated them all—for him to determine that Fawlt Line wasn’t so named because it was on a geographical fault, but a time fault.

Then, a few months ago, Elizabeth herself became a victim of the time fault.

While taking a bath one night, she had slipped through a fracture in time and wound up in a parallel Fawlt Line where everyone knew her as a girl named Sarah. As she insisted that she was really Elizabeth and didn’t know anyone there, she was taken to the hospital and treated as an amnesiac. The understandable pressure on her to become Sarah—and to accept this new and different Fawlt Line—was intense. There was no point in arguing against the reality directly in front of her, even though her memories told her otherwise. Alienated and confused, she very nearly gave in to the pressure to be Sarah.

But the circumstances of her disappearance caused Malcolm to think that they weren’t dealing with a normal disappearance. Too much didn’t add up. And the arrival of someone in this Fawlt Line who looked exactly like Elizabeth but wasn’t Elizabeth led Malcolm to work out a theory that she was some sort of “time twin” who had switched places with Elizabeth.

In that other time Elizabeth met a man who gave her hope that she wasn’t an amnesiac after all: Charles Richards. He claimed he knew how she felt because he had made the same switch from one time to the other. He helped her and, ultimately, saved her life from a couple of people who wanted her dead. It was a nightmarish experience.

Elizabeth eventually made it back thanks to Jeff and Malcolm. But Charles remained trapped in the parallel time.


**********


Elizabeth still got upset when she thought of Charles stuck in a time that wasn’t his own. She hardly talked about her time-travel experience because of the sadness it brought to her. Even now, as she sat in the security of Malcolm’s study, it made her uneasy to discuss it again. In the deepest part of her heart, she feared that the nightmare might return just by invoking its name.

“They tore down Charles’s house and built a gaudy mansion on the site,” Malcolm went on to say. “It was the kind of place kids liked to throw rocks at. Then they tore that down and put up the new building a couple of years ago. How does it look inside?”

Elizabeth didn’t answer, her mind still on Charles Richards and her own nightmarish adventure.

“Bits?” Jeff asked, concerned.

Elizabeth lifted her head, catching up with Malcolm’s question. “Huh? It’s … modern. Just one story with a lot of hallways. More like a hospital than a home.”

Jeff and Malcolm glanced warily at each other.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Maybe you should take her home,” Malcolm suggested. “She’s probably tired from her first day there.”

“No, really—I’m all right,” she said.

Jeff stood up and held out his hand. “Come on.”

She took his hand and he helped pull her to her feet.


***


Jeff brought his Volkswagen to a squeaky stop in front of Elizabeth’s house and turned off the headlights. They both looked up and saw through the front window Alan Forde pacing in the living room. He was waving his hands and talking animatedly.

“Is he lecturing someone?” Jeff asked.

Elizabeth shook her head. “Sort of. He’s been recording a series of talks about the legends of King Arthur.”

“Recording them for whom?”

“Whoever wants them,” she answered. “He’s been obsessed with Arthur ever since ... well, you know.”

The ‘you know’ was a reference to yet another adventure—this one shared by Jeff, Malcolm, and Alan Forde—with a man who showed up in Fawlt Line one night claiming to be King Arthur himself. The adventure resolved itself in England where, according to Malcolm and Jeff who witnessed it all, the man really was King Arthur.

“I’d like to hear what he has to say,” Jeff said.

Elizabeth glanced at Jeff gratefully. “He’d be happy if you asked.”

“I’ll wait for some other time. Meanwhile, I want you to tell me what’s going on with you.”

Elizabeth hadn’t expected such a direct question, though she should have. Jeff could always tell when something was wrong. Sometimes it was a comfort to her. At other times it made her feel uneasy, particularly when she didn’t have an answer—like tonight. “I don’t know,” she said after a long pause.

“You must have a clue,” he probed.

She turned in the seat to face him. “I really don’t know, Jeff. Maybe it’s just volunteering at the center. It was so ... strange. At first I thought it was because I don’t know anything about helping old people. But ...”

“But what?”

She struggled over what to say next. “Sheriff Hounslow’s father is a resident there, and the two of them were arguing and it was embarrassing … and then I met a guy in a wheelchair who gave me a carnation, and he said he knew me.”

Jeff grimaced. “He knows you? How?”

“He didn’t say, and I was too surprised to ask. It was really weird. I had this feeling that I’d seen him before, but I don’t know where.”

Jeff took her hand in his and spoke softly. “Look, Malcolm’s probably right. Old folks can be unpredictable, and that makes you nervous. Do you remember how Grandpa Dubbs was before he died?”

Elizabeth nodded. “He kept accusing the servants of stealing things.”

“Because he kept forgetting where he put them,” Jeff finished. “It used to scare the wits out of me when he launched into one of his tirades. Maybe the guy in the wheelchair really thought he knew you, but he was thinking of someone else. Probably someone from his past.”

Elizabeth agreed silently.

“And I’m just guessing, but it gave you the creeps to find out that the retirement center was built on Charles Richards’ place, right?”

“It brought back a lot more than I wanted to remember.”

“That’s what I figured.” Jeff was quiet for a moment. His expression told Elizabeth that he was forming his words carefully before speaking. “Maybe … you should get some counseling about what happened to you. Maybe we all should.”

“Oh, right,” Elizabeth said with an unamused laugh. “I can see me now in the first session with the counselor: ‘I’m here because I traveled to a parallel time …’ Yeah, that’ll work. He’ll have me committed just like the doctor in that time wanted to do.”

“I’m just saying that getting bounced around in time and going through what you went through can’t be healthy.”

“You’re right about that.”

“I mean, especially since you don’t like to talk about it.”

“I’m okay,” Elizabeth insisted. “I think it’s just today, volunteering at the center, bumping into some weird people, and then thinking about Charles Richards. I’ll be all right. Really.”


***


Elizabeth had a hard time falling to sleep that night. Images of Charles Richards spun through her mind and mixed with scenes from the Fawlt Line Retirement Center. Mrs. Kottler kept saying, “I know what you’re thinking,” and then Doug Hall offered her flowers carefully pruned by George Betterman in a wheelchair. The floor opened up to expose a dark cavernous time fault that threatened to pull her in. She fell—and never stopped falling.

Elizabeth suddenly sat up in her bed and knew that one way or another she had to take back her offer to volunteer at the center.

Chapter Three
Elizabeth spent most of the next day trying to figure out how to gracefully get out of helping at the retirement center. She knew her parents expected her to be more responsible than to quit without a good reason. The challenge was to find a good and plausible reason. School hadn’t started yet, so she couldn’t blame homework. She had no other jobs or commitments, so she couldn’t say her schedule was too busy. One by one she raised up excuses. One by one her better judgment knocked them down.

Even up to the point when her mother dropped her off at the center, she was thinking of stories she could tell Mrs. Kottler to justify handing in her immediate notice. Despondently, she kissed her mother on the cheek and climbed out of the car. Her only hope was that something might happen during her shift that would provide a solid way out.

Mrs. Kottler gave her a simple assignment to start with: take the cart around and fill the water jugs in all the rooms.

Elizabeth guessed that this was a standard job for new volunteers and a shrewd way to help them get to know the residents. Many were up and about when Elizabeth walked into the various rooms and assembly areas. It was her first full view of the people she would be mingling with. While some were kind and welcoming, others regarded her with wariness or skepticism. Just like kids on the first day of school, she thought. You can’t tell about people until you get to know them better. That was a good way to think about them, she decided. They were just older kids watching a new student.

But these “students” sure looked different from the ones at school. Elizabeth was instantly struck by the crowns of white hair and varying styles of hairpieces worn by both the men and women. Her next impression was that many were quite agile, moving quickly and freely up and down the hallway, in and out of chairs, without the stiff or stooped gait she expected from older people. Some used canes and walkers, others simply steadied themselves against whatever sturdy objects happened to be nearby. They’re people, Elizabeth was reminded as they chatted amiably among themselves or played games in the recreation room or strolled thoughtfully alone. There were others, of course, who were less capable and needed more attention and care. Sharp minds were encased in fragile bodies. Sharp bodies sometimes encased fragile minds. It varied from room to room, person to person.

The most uncomfortable moment came when she reached Adam Hounslow’s room. The door was slightly ajar, and she could see through the crack that the room was dark. The blinds had been drawn, and Adam was talking to someone in a wheelchair. Though his back was to her, Elizabeth recognized the telltale baseball cap and knew it was George Betterman. The men spoke in low voices. Elizabeth was unsure whether to knock, clear her throat, or simply walk in. She paused in her indecision.

Adam handed something to George, who quickly shoved it under his loose-fitting jogging jacket. The hushed voices and quick action told Elizabeth that she wasn’t supposed to be seeing what she was seeing. She turned to sneak away, but banged the four-wheel cart against the wall. The jugs and glasses rattled, and the two men to spun around to face her.

“Sorry to interrupt,” she stammered nervously, “but Mrs. Kottler asked me to bring some fresh water.”

Adam looked particularly guilty. “I don’t need fresh water,” he said with a sneer.

“I’m sorry,” Elizabeth said again and retreated back into the hallway. With shaking hands, she grabbed the handle on the cart. Why was she so nervous? What was it about the men that scared her so?

She heard a soft whirring sound behind her. Seconds later, George Betterman navigated his electric wheelchair past her, pausing to look up at her through the black circles of his sunglasses. I know who you are, she expected him to say again. But he didn’t say a word. He rode away, down the hallway.

Elizabeth closed her eyes, trying to calm the irrational fear that gripped her. A heavy hand fell on her shoulder, and she cried out, nearly jumping out of her skin.

“Whoa, now, calm down,” Sheriff Hounslow said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I’m a little jumpy,” Elizabeth admitted quickly.

“I guess you are. Is everything all right?”

“Yeah,” she said. “First-day jitters.”

“I thought yesterday was your first day.”

“It was. But that was a tour. Today is my first day of work. Excuse me,” she said and raced away with the cart. Before she rounded the next corner, she heard the sheriff greet his father. Adam Hounslow launched the first assault by complaining about his room.

Safe down the next hallway, she stopped again to take a deep breath. This is stupid, she told herself. There’s nothing to be afraid of. It was just two old men talking. She rebuked herself for being so weird and, after a moment, continued her rounds.

The rooms—or apartments, as Mrs. Kottler called them—varied in their looks. A few looked sterile and hospital-like. Others reflected attempts by the residents or their families to liven them up with a few sticks of furniture, knickknacks, mementos, souvenirs, and treasures. If awards were given for the homiest room, Frieda Schultz would have won hands down.

From the moment Elizabeth stepped into Frieda’s room, she felt transported out of the retirement center into a cozy bungalow. The room was colorful, with bright floral-patterned curtains, and lampshades, and the smell of a light perfume that made her think of purple flowers. A chaise-lounge had been placed in the corner, smothered with pillows that Frieda had probably made herself, Elizabeth guessed, and a quilt that looked older than anything or anybody in the center. The windowsill was covered with cards, fashion magazines, catalogues, and books by authors with names like Baroness Orczy and Georgette Heyer and Elswyth Thane—people Elizabeth had never heard of. Victorian tapestries did their best to hide the institutional-white walls. An oak wardrobe with elaborately-carved edging along the top and bottom replaced the plain pressed-wood box the center issued. The matching bureau and vanity table, squeezed in along the opposite wall, were overrun with costume jewelry, evening purses, scarves, gloves, perfume bottles, jars, cold cream, tubes, magnifying mirror, boxes, silver combs, and brushes. It gave Elizabeth the impression that Frieda might suddenly decide to call her chauffeur and go out to the theater for the evening.

“I know, I know, it’s a cluttered mess,” Frieda said from the bathroom door in the corner.

Elizabeth realized she’d been standing in the middle of the room, staring. “I think it’s wonderful,” she said.

“Well, aren’t you the kind one to say so.” Frieda, a heavyset woman in a silk housecoat, sashayed into the room as if she were making an entrance at a formal ball dressed in chiffon and lace. Her beauty had faded, but she exuded a poise and charm that hadn’t. “Tell me your name, child.”

“I’m Elizabeth. I’m here to give you some fresh water.”

“A new volunteer?”

Elizabeth nodded as she flipped open the top on the copper-colored jug. Empty. She retrieved the large jar from the cart and poured water from one to the other.

“You must be traumatized,” Frieda said. “A pretty young girl like you thrown in with all these fossils. What in the world are you doing here?”

“I volunteered through my church.”

“And regretted it every minute since, I’ll bet,” Frieda laughed.

Elizabeth answered with a guilty smile.

“If it’s any consolation, I’m very happy to meet you,” said Frieda. “I get so tired of old people. And you’re a churchgoer too. All the better. I’d go to church if it weren’t such a major production to do so.”

Elizabeth was surprised. “Production? Why is it a production?”

“I’m not about to bore you with my health problems. We have a chapel here that I can pray in. That’ll do for now.” Frieda pushed aside some of the pillows on the chaise-lounge. “Put down those water jugs and come sit.”

“But Mrs. Kottler wants me to—”

“Forget Mrs. Kottler,” Frieda said. “I want you to sit down right here and tell me all about yourself. I don’t get to meet new people very often and, when I do, I want to know their stories.”

Elizabeth shyly sat down on the lounge.

Frieda placed herself on the opposite end, leaned back and tucked one leg under her large frame. “Comfy? Now … what’s your story?”

Elizabeth began slowly, with a few basic facts about growing up in Fawlt Like, her parents, her school. Soon, she was chatting away as if she couldn’t help it. Any lull, any missing pieces, any evasion, and Frieda asked just the right question to set it straight and keep the conversation going. Elizabeth surprised herself by talking about more personal experiences: how her friendship with Jeff had eventually led to their dating.

“Do you love him?” Frieda asked.

“Yes, I do,” Elizabeth admitted, blushing.

“Childhood sweethearts,” Frieda mused. “My Alexander and I were childhood sweethearts. We were married for forty-seven years. It wasn’t always bliss, but I wouldn’t have wanted to spend that time with anyone else.”

They continued to talk for another half-hour. At various points, Frieda would drop in her own memory of a similar experience she’d had when she was Elizabeth’s age. Elizabeth didn’t mind. She found comfort in knowing that her experiences weren’t unique only to her, but that a woman four times her age felt the same.

Elizabeth glanced at her watch and stood up quickly. “Oh! I’ve been here too long. Mrs. Kottler’ll be looking for me.”

“Wait,” Frieda said and placed a soft hand on Elizabeth’s arm. “There’s something you haven’t told me.” Her gaze was penetrating.

“What do you mean?” Elizabeth asked feebly.

“I have a sense about these things—a gift, in a way. There’s something you haven’t told me. You’re holding something back.”

Elizabeth glanced away nervously. Frieda was right: Elizabeth hadn’t mentioned her time-travel nightmare. Having made a friend in the center, she wasn’t eager to lose her by talking like a lunatic. “Yeah, but it’s too crazy. I can’t talk about it now. Maybe some other time.”

Frieda watched her for a moment, then decided to let the subject drop. “All right. We have time. Other days, other talks, and maybe you’ll tell me about it. I feel that somehow you should tell me. Maybe there are secrets I can tell you too.”

Elizabeth felt such an instant rapport with the older woman that she was tempted to take her invitation and pour out the whole tale on the spot. But just then Mrs. Kottler appeared in the doorway.

“There you are!” she exclaimed. “I’ve been wondering what became of you. I need your help in the recreation room. There aren’t enough judges for the Twister contest!”


***

Frieda insisted that Elizabeth could go only if she escorted her into the recreation room. “My ankles are hurting today,” she complained and sat down in a wheelchair that was folded up behind the door.

Elizabeth happily grabbed the wheelchair, clicked it into place, and whisked Frieda away, the smell of pretty perfume trailing back to her.

“What’s wrong with your ankles?” she asked as she pushed Frieda down the hall.

“I have occasional bouts with arthritis. Not today, actually, but I didn’t want to let you go yet,” Frieda replied.

The recreation room was filled with residents, many of whom Elizabeth had seen on her rounds. They sat at the card tables, on the sofas and chairs, engaged in different games and hobbies. At the opposite end of the room, Elizabeth saw Doug Hall in earnest conversation with George Betterman.

“Oh,” she said, without meaning to.

Frieda turned around to look at Elizabeth’s expression, then followed her gaze over to the two men. “I see,” she said with a smile. “Handsome, isn’t he? But watch out for him.”

“Don’t worry. I’m with Jeff, remember?” she reminded her newfound friend.

“Of course you are. But one can’t help but notice Doug,” Frieda said. “I’m sure he’s already flirted with you. No pretty girl goes through here without him pouring on the charm.”

“I talked to him for a minute yesterday.”

Frieda smiled. “Uh huh. It’s nice, isn’t it—having a handsome young man pay attention to you? Even if you know nothing will come of it.”

“I guess.”

“Just be certain that nothing does come of it, my dear,” Frieda warned.

“What do you mean?”

“I know his type. He’s a charmer, and the charmers are the ones who can hurt you the worst.”

Doug and George Betterman parted, and George wheeled himself out to the patio.

Elizabeth knelt closer to Frieda. The purple perfume lightly tickled her nose. “Do you know Mr. Betterman?” she asked.

Frieda folded her arms across her chest as if she were trying to contain a shiver. “As much as I care to,” she said.

“You don’t like him?”

“I don’t know him well enough to like or dislike him.”

“You’re evading my question,” Elizabeth teased her.

“I don’t know him,” she said carefully, “but I know my impressions.”

“What’re your impressions?”

She thought for a moment. “How can I put it in terms you’ll understand? He gives me the creeps. There’s something about him that seems ...” Her voice trailed off.

Elizabeth waited. When Frieda didn’t continue, Elizabeth pressed her. “Seems what?”

“Evil.”

Dynamic Uno here: Elizabeth decides to volunteer at Fawlt Line's retirement center, and turns up with more than she's bargained for as a volunteer. There's the hottie handyman Doug, who seems to enjoy flustering her while she tends to the residents; the eccentric Ms. Freida Schultz, who ends up dying suddenly, after befriending Elizabeth and giving her a cryptic message, as well as the strange Mr. Betterman who wheels around in his wheelchair, not speaking to anyone. Talk about a recipe for creepiness and potential disaster. Especially since Fawlt Line's retirement center sits atop the land that used to belong to a man who disappeared over 20 years ago. What is happening at the center and how will it affect the opening of the Historic Village that Malcolm Dubbs had recreated? You'll have to read the book to find out!

I will say that that I breezed through the book in about an hour because I wanted to find out what was happening with the retirement home's residents. The story was definitely over too soon, but the ending was left open just a bit so that if Paul McCusker decided to make it into a series rather than a trilogy, he could probably add a few books. (I know I'm definitely interested in the relationship of Elizabeth and Jeff. I'm also interested in finding the people who have slipped through time and seeing if they are able to come back to their "real" time and the time portals close permanently. I would also like a little more background on Malcolm--why does the sheriff hate him so much? There was a bit explained in this book, but I still think there's more of a back story there.)

If you haven't read any of the rest of the books in the series, you probably won't be as attached to the characters as if you had started from the beginning. However, I think there's enough of a back story to help beginners understand what's happening in each book. As my niece says, "two thumbs up." Let me know what you think! Happy Reading!

WILD Card: Gatekeepers (Book #3 in the Dreamhouse Kings series) by Robert Liparulo

It is time to play a Wild Card! Every now and then, a book that I have chosen to read is going to pop up as a FIRST Wild Card Tour. Get dealt into the game! (Just click the button!) Wild Card Tours feature an author and his/her book's FIRST chapter!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

Today's Wild Card author is:

Robert Liparulo

and the book:

Gatekeepers

Thomas Nelson (January 6, 2009)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Robert Liparulo has received rave reviews for both his adult novels (Comes a Horseman, Germ, and Deadfall) and the first two novels in his Dreamhouse Kings series for young adults (House of Dark Shadows, Watcher in the Woods). He is an avid scuba diver, swimmer, reader, traveler, and a law enforcement and military enthusiast. He lives in Colorado with his wife and four children.

Visit the author's website.

Here are some of his titles:

House of Dark Shadows (Dreamhouse Kings Book #1)
Watcher in the Woods: (Dreamhouse Kings Book #2)
Comes a Horseman
Germ
Deadfall

Product Details:

List Price: $ 14.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Thomas Nelson (January 6, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1595544984
ISBN-13: 978-1595544988

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

Tuesday, 6:58 P.M.

Pinedale, California

Xander’s words struck David’s heart like a musket ball.

He reeled back, then grabbed the collar of his brother’s grimy Confederate coat. His eyes stung, whether from the tears squeezing around them or the sand whipping through the room, he didn’t know. He pulled his face to within inches of Xander’s.

“You . . . you found her?” he said. “Xander, you found Mom?”

He looked over Xander’s shoulder to the portal door, which had slammed shut as soon as Xander stumbled through. The two boys knelt in the center of the antechamber. Wind billowed their hair. It whooshed in under the door, pulling back what belonged to the Civil War world from which Xander had just stepped. The smell of smoke and gunpowder was so strong, David could taste it.

He shook Xander. “Where is she? Why didn’t you bring her?”

His heart was going crazy, like a ferret racing around inside his chest, more frantic than ever. Twelve-year-olds didn’t have heart attacks, did they?

Xander leaned back and sat on his heels. His bottom lip trembled, and his chest rose and fell as he tried to catch his breath. The wind plucked a leaf from his hair, whirled it through the air, then sucked it under the door.

“Xander!” David said. “Where’s Mom?”

Xander lowered his head. “I couldn’t . . .” he said. “I couldn’t get her. You gotta go over, Dae. You gotta bring her back!”

“Me?” A heavy weight pushed on David’s chest, smashing the ferret between sternum and spine. He rose, leaped for the door, and tugged on the locked handle.

He wore a gray hat (“It’s a kepi,” Dad would tell him) and jacket, like Xander’s blue ones. They had discovered that it took wearing or holding three items from the antechamber to unlock the portal door. He needed one more.

“Xander, you said found her! ”

Xander shook his head. “I think I saw her going into a tent, but it was at the other end of the camp. I couldn’t get to her.”

David’s mouth dropped open. “That’s not finding her! I thought I saw her, too, the other day in the World War II world. . .”

“Dae, listen.” Xander pushed himself up and gripped David’s shoulders. “She saw the message we left. She saw Bob.”

Bob was the cartoon face and family mascot since Dad was a kid, drawn on notes and birthday cards. When David and Xander had been in Ulysses S. Grant’s Union camp the night before, Xander had drawn it on a tent. It was their way of letting Mom know they were looking for her.

“She wrote back!” Xander said. “David, she’s there!”

“But . . .” David didn’t know if he wanted to scream or cry or punch his brother. “Why didn’t you go get her?”

“Something was happening on the battlefield. They were rounding up all the soldiers and herding us toward the front line. I tried to get to her, but they kept grabbing me, pushing me out of camp. When I broke away—“ Xander’s face became hard. “They called me a deserter. That quick, I was a deserter. One of them shot at me! I barely got back to the portal.” He shook his head. “You gotta go! Now! Before she’s gone, or the portal changes, or . . . I don’t know.”

Yes . . . no! David’s stomach hurt. His brain was throbbing against his skull. His broken arm started to ache again, and he rubbed the cast. “Xander, I can’t. They almost killed me yesterday.”

“That’s because you were a gray-coat.” Xander began taking off his blue jacket. “Wear this one.”

“Why can’t you? Just tell them—”

“I’ll never make it,” Xander said. “They’ll throw me in the stockade for deserting—if they don’t shoot me first.”

“They’ll do the same to me.” David hated how whiney it came out.

“You’re just a kid. They’ll see that.”

“I’m twelve, Xander. Only three years younger than you.”

“That’s the difference between fighting and not, Dae.” He held the jacket open. “I know it was really scary before, but this time you’ll be on the right side.”

David looked around the small room. He said, “Where’s the rifle you took when you went over? The Harper’s Ferry musket?”

His brother gazed at his empty hand. He scanned the floor. “I must have dropped it one of the times I fell. I was just trying to stay alive. I didn’t notice.” He shook the jacket. “Come on.”

David shrugged out of the gray jacket he was wearing. He tossed it onto the bench and reluctantly slipped into the one Xander held. He pulled the left side over his cast.

Xander buttoned it for him. He said, “The tent I saw her go into was near the back of the camp, on the other side from where I drew Bob.” He lifted the empty sleeve and let it flop down. He smiled. “Looks like you lost your arm in battle.”

“See? They’ll think I can fight, that I have fought.”

“I was just kidding.” He took the gray kepi off David’s head and replaced it with the blue one. Then he turned to the bench and hooks, looking for another item.

“Xander, listen,” David said. “You don’t know what’s been happening here. There are two cops downstairs.”

Xander froze in his reach for a canteen. “What?” His head pivoted toward the door opposite the portal, as though he could see through it into the hallway beyond, down the stairs, around the corner, and into the foyer. Or like he expected the cops to burst through. “What are they doing here?”

“They’re trying to get us out of the house. Taksidian’s with them.” Just thinking of the creepy guy who was responsible for his broken arm frightened David—but not as much as the thought of getting hauled away when they were so close to rescuing Mom. “Gimme that,” he said, waggling his fingers at the canteen.

Xander snatched it off the hook and looped the strap over David’s head. “Where’s Dad?”

“They put him in handcuffs. He told me to come get you. That’s why I was here when you came through.”

“Handcuffs!”

“And one more thing,” David said. He closed his eyes, feeling like the jacket had just gained twenty pounds. “Clayton, that kid who wanted to pound me at school? He came through the portal in the linen closet.” He opened one eye to see his brother’s shocked expression.

“How long was I gone?” Xander said. “Where is he now?”

“I pushed him back in. He returned to the school, but he might . . . come back.”

“Great.” Xander glanced over his shoulder at the hallway door again, then back at David. “Anything else I should know?”

David shook his head. “I guess if I die, I won’t have to go to school tomorrow.” He smiled weakly.

The school year—seventh grade for David, tenth for Xander—had started just yesterday: two days of classes. Mom had been kidnapped the day before that. David couldn’t believe they’d even gone to school under the circumstances, but Dad, who was the new principal, had insisted they keep up normal appearances so they wouldn’t attract suspicion.

Lot of good it did, David thought, thinking of the cops downstairs.

“I don’t know,” Xander said. “Dad would probably figure out a way to get your body there.”

David’s expression remained grim.

“You’ll be fine.”

“Don’t get taken away,” David told his brother. “Don’t leave with me over there. Don’t leave me alone in this house when I come back. Don’t—“

Xander touched his fingers to David’s lips. “I won’t leave,” he said. “I’ll go see what’s happening downstairs, but I won’t leave. No way, no how. Okay? Besides—“ He smiled, but David saw how hard it was for him to do it. “You’ll have Mom with you when you come back. Right?”

It was David’s turn to smile, and he found it wasn’t so hard to do. “Yeah.” He turned, took a deep breath, and opened the portal door.

Dynamic Uno here: WOW!!!! I could not put this book down! I think I read it in a couple of hours because I was glued to the pages. If you have not read the first two books in this series (The House of Dark Shadows and Watcher In The Woods)--GO GET THEM NOW (or this book will not make too much sense)!!!! Gatekeepers is only the third book in the Dreamhouse Kings series and I can't wait for the fourth one. (Mr. Liparulo--if you're reading this, can I be an advanced reader??? PLEASE????? I REALLY want to know what's going to happen next. )

Gatekeepers will leave you on the edge of your seat, flipping pages as quickly as possible to find out what happens to the King children in their crazy house. Between having to"fight" the house on their own while their Dad is being taken to jail--David, Xander, and Toria meet up with the towering hulk (and his friends) that stole their mother and barely survive the beating, only to then run into a "family friend" that knows the secrets of the house. Will they ever find their mother? Will their dad be released from jail, or will Taksidian take away their house while he's locked up? What information does the family friend hold about the secrets of the house? You'll have to read this book to find out!

Let me know what you think--I have several students who begged me to bring this book in as soon as I finish it because they've been sucked into the story as well. In fact, one kid asked if he could read it before I had it added to the collection! He promised me to have it back the next day--and he did! Let me know what you think.

WILD CARD: Eternity's Edge by Bryan Davis

It is time to play a Wild Card! Every now and then, a book that I have chosen to read is going to pop up as a FIRST Wild Card Tour. Get dealt into the game! (Just click the button!) Wild Card Tours feature an author and his/her book's FIRST chapter!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

Today's Wild Card author is:

Bryan Davis

and the book:

Eternity's Edge

Zondervan (October 1, 2008)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Bryan Davis and his wife, Susie, have seven children and live in western Tennessee, where he continues to cook up his imaginative blend of fantasy and inspiration.

Besides the Echoes from the Edge Series that begins with Beyond the Reflection's Edge, Bryan Davis is the author of the Dragons in Our Midst and Oracles of Fire series, contemporary/fantasy books for young adults. The first book, Raising Dragons , was released in July of 2004, followed by Candlestone , The Circles of Seven, and Tears of a Dragon . Eye of the Oraclelaunched the Oracles of Fire series and hit number one on the CBA Young Adult best-seller list in January of 2007. Book number two, Enoch's Ghost , came out in July and will be followed by Last of the Nephilim in the spring of 2008.


Visit him at his website.

Product Details:

List Price: $ 12.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: Zondervan (October 1, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0310715555
ISBN-13: 978-0310715559

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

A Stalker


Nathan strode down the hospital hallway, his brain focused on a single thought—finding his parents. Once mutilated and dead in matching coffins, now they were alive. He had touched his father’s chain-bound arms through the dimensional mirror and felt his loving strength. He had heard his mother’s voice and once again bathed in the majesty of her matchless violin.

Yet, the beautiful duet they had played at the funeral had once again become a solo. He had failed. The dimensional portal collapsed, and there was no word from Earth Blue as to whether or not his parents might still be in the bedroom where they had sought rescue from their captivity.

He sat down on a coffee-stained sofa in the waiting area and clenched his fist. His parents were real. They were alive. And now he had to move heaven and earth, maybe even three earths, to find them.

Staring into the hall, he mentally reentered Kelly’s room and saw her lying on the bed, beaten and bruised from their ordeal, her shoulder lacerated and her eyes half blind. The words he spoke to her just moments ago came back to him. We’ll search for them together. But how could she help? With all the dangers ahead, how could a blinded, wounded girl help him find his parents?

A sharp, matronly voice shook him from his meditative trance. “Ah! There you are!”

Nathan shot to his feet. Clara marched toward him, her heels clacking on the tile floor as she pushed back her windblown gray hair. Walking stride for stride next to the tall lady, Dr. Gordon stared at a cell phone, his face as grim as ever.

As they entered the waiting area, Nathan nodded toward the hallway. “Tony’s with Kelly. Thought I’d let them have some daddy-daughter time.”

While Dr. Gordon punched his cell phone keys, apparently typing out a text message, Clara lowered her voice. “Dr. Gordon received a cryptic email from Simon Blue. Solomon and Francesca aren’t there in your Earth Blue bedroom, but apparently something very unusual is going on, and we’re trying to get details.”

“So that’s our next destination,” Nathan said.

“Yes. We have already alerted my counterpart on Earth Blue. She and Daryl will be ready to pick you up at the observatory and take you to Kelly Blue’s house.”

“Good. Even if Mom and Dad aren’t there, it’s the logical place to start looking for them.”

“Are you going to break the news to Kelly?”

“I guess I’ll have to. She’s in no shape to come with me, but convincing her of that won’t be easy.”

Dr. Gordon closed his phone and slid it into his pocket. Turning toward Nathan, he spoke in his usual formal manner. “There are no further details available. We should proceed to the observatory at once. With Mictar’s associates gone, there should be no trouble gaining access. I have dismissed the guards, with the exception of one whom I trust, so we should not run into any unexpected company.”

“Okay,” Nathan said. “Let me talk to Kelly. I’ll be right back.”

As he walked down the hall, he wondered about Dr. Gordon’s words. It was true that Mictar’s goons were gone, giving him free access to the dimensional transport mirror on the observatory ceiling, but what about Mictar himself? He had disappeared into the mirror with Jack riding on top of him, but where could he have gone? And what could have become of Jack? Even if he escaped, he would be lost, especially after his recent brush with death in the Earth Yellow airline disaster and his subsequent discovery of his own burial site. Since Jack’s dimension lagged Earth Red’s by about thirty years, he would feel like a time-traveling visitor from the past.

A man in scrubs caught up and passed Nathan, pushing a lab tray stuffed with glass bottles and tubes. With lanky pale arms protruding from his short green sleeves, he kept his head low as he hurried. He slowed down in front of Kelly’s door, but when it opened, he resumed his pace and turned into a side corridor, his head still low.

Nathan could barely breathe. Could that have been Mictar? Would he be bold enough to come into the hospital? And why would he be so persistent in trying to get to Kelly? What value was she to him?

As Nathan neared the room, Tony came out. Bending his tall frame, he released the latch gently and walked away on tiptoes. When he spied Nathan, he jerked up and smiled, his booming voice contradicting his earlier attempts to be quiet. “Hey! What brings you back so soon?”

Nathan kept his eyes on the side hallway. No sign of the technician. “Some news for Kelly. I have to head back to the scene of the crime.”

Tony shook his finger. “Better not. She was so tired, she fell asleep in mid-bite. And if she’s too tired for pizza, she’s too tired for company.”

“You let her eat it? She’s only supposed to have—”

“Hey,” Tony said, pointing at himself, “I didn’t know about her diet until after I brought the pizza. But if you want to tell her what she should and shouldn’t eat, be my guest.”

“I know what you mean.” Nathan glanced between the door and the other hallway. “Okay if I sneak in and leave her a note?”

He grinned, his eyes bugging out even more than usual. “Just don’t get any ideas, Romeo.”

Nathan returned the smile, though he chaffed at the comment. Tony was joking, of course, but sometimes he blurted out the dumbest things. He wouldn’t dream of touching her inappropriately, not in a million years. His father had drilled that into his head a long time ago—never intimately touch a woman who is not your wife.

“I’ll behave myself.” He reached for the knob and nodded toward the other hallway. “Mind checking something out for me? I saw someone suspicious, a guy in scrubs, head that way. It looked like he was going into Kelly’s room, but when you came out, he took off.”

“You got it.” Tony crept toward the other hall, pointing. “That way?”

“Yeah. Just a few seconds ago.”

“I’m on it.” When he reached the corridor, he looked back, his muscular arms flexing. “Time to take out the trash.”

Nathan opened the door a crack, eased in, and closed it behind him. Walking slowly as his eyes adjusted, he quietly drew the partitioning curtain to the side and focused on Kelly’s head resting on a pillow, her shoulder-length brown hair splashed across the white linen. He stopped at her bedside, unable to draw his stare away from her lovely face.

Black scorch marks on her brow and cheeks and a thick bandage on her shoulder bore witness to her recent battle with Mictar. Her closed lids concealed wounded eyes, maybe the worst of all her injuries, the result of Mictar’s efforts to burn through to her brain and steal her life. So far, no corrective lenses seemed to help at all. If anything, they made her vision worse. Still, even in such a battle-torn condition, she was beautiful to behold, a true warrior wrapped in the sleeping shell of a petite, yet athletic, young lady.

He searched her side table for a pen and paper. A portable radio next to a flower vase played soft music, a piano concerto—elegant, but unfamiliar. He spotted a pen and pad and pushed the radio out of the way, but it knocked against the vase, making a clinking noise. He cringed and swiveled toward Kelly.

Her chest heaved. Her hands clenched the side rails. She scanned the room with glassy eyes, panting as she cried out. “Who’s there?”

Nathan grasped her wrist. “It’s just me,” he said softly.

Her eyes locked on his, wide and terrified. “Mictar is here!”

Making a shushing sound, he lowered the bed rail and pried her fingers loose. “You were just dreaming.”

“No!” She wagged her head hard. “I saw him! In the hospital!”

“Do you know where?”

She turned her head slowly toward the door. As a shaft of light split the darkness, her voice lowered to a whisper. “He’s here.”

A shadowy form stretched an arm into the room, then a body, movement so painstakingly deliberate, the intruder obviously didn’t want anyone to hear him.

Nathan grabbed the vase and dumped the flowers into a basin. Wielding it like a club, he crept toward the door, glancing between Kelly and the emerging figure. She yanked out her IV tube, swung her bare legs to the side, and dropped to the floor, blood dripping behind her.

The shadow, now fully in the room, halted. Nathan clenched his teeth. Kelly scooted to his side, tying her hospital gown closed in the back.

As the door swung shut, darkening the room, a low voice emanated from the black figure. “If it is a fight you seek, son of Solomon, I am more than capable of delivering it. In my current form, a glass vase will be a pitifully inadequate weapon. I suggest you give me what I want, and I will leave you in peace.”

Nathan tightened his grip on the vase. Should he ask what he wanted? Even replying to a simple remark seemed like giving in. Mictar was baiting him, and he didn’t want to bite. “Just get out, Mictar. It’s two against one. It only took a violin upside your head to beat you before, and you couldn’t even take on Jack by yourself at the funeral.”

Mictar’s voice rose in a mock lament. “Alas! Poor Jack. He was a formidable foe … may he rest in peace.” His tone lowered to a growl. “You can’t take me by surprise this time, you fool. Your base use of that instrument proves that you have no respect for its true power. And now you have neither a violin nor a Quattro mirror to provide a coward’s escape.”

Nathan peered at Mictar’s glowing eyes. The scarlet beacons seemed powerful and filled with malice. Yet, if he had as much power as he boasted, why hadn’t he attacked? Nathan set his feet and lifted the vase higher. Maybe it would be okay to find out what this demon wanted. “Why are you here?”

“To finish my meal. I have enough energy left to fight for what I want, but I would prefer not to expend it. If you will turn the girl over to me freely, I will consume what I merely tasted at the funeral and be on my way. In exchange, I will leave you with two precious gifts. I will tell you how to find your parents, and I will relieve you of that handicapped little harlot.”

Nathan flinched. Kelly gasped and backed away a step.

“Ah, yes,” Mictar continued, his dark shape slowly expanding. “That word is profane in your ears, yet I wager that it rings true in your mind. Kelly Clark is not the paragon of virtue your father would want for your bride. She clings to you like a leech, because she is soiled by—”

“Just shut up!” Nathan shouted. “I don’t want to hear it!”

The humanlike shadow swelled to twice its original size. “Oh, yes, you do. You want to know every lurid detail. She is your dark shadow, and you will never find your parents while you entertain a harlot at your side.”

“No!” Nathan slung the vase at Mictar. When it came within inches of his dark head, it stopped in midair. Nathan tried to reach for Kelly, but his arm locked in place. His head wouldn’t even swivel. Everything in the room had frozen … except for Mictar.

The shadow continued to grow. His dark hands drew closer and closer. “I saved the last bit of my energy,” Mictar said, “to perform one of my brother’s favorite tricks, motor suspension of everything within my sight. Now I will take yours and the harlot’s eyes, and I will need no more to fill Lucifer’s engine.”

A knock sounded at the door. “Nathan? Is everything okay?”

Tony’s voice! Nathan tried to answer, but his jaw wouldn’t move. His tongue cleaved to the roof of his mouth. A dark hand wrapped around his neck and clamped down, throttling his windpipe.

Another knock sounded, louder this time. “Nathan, the nurse says it’s time for vitals.”

Another hand draped his face. Sparks of electricity shot out, stinging his eyes.

“I’m coming in!” Light flashed around Mictar’s hand, but Nathan still couldn’t budge. Pain jolted his senses. His legs shook wildly as if he had been lifted off the floor and rattled like a baby’s toy.

Suddenly, the darkness flew away. Mictar’s body, a black human form with no face or clothes, zoomed past the nurse and crashed against the back wall. “Stay right there,” Tony shouted, “or I’ll introduce your face to the other wall.”

Like a streaking shadow, Mictar pounced on Tony, wrenched his arm behind him until it snapped, and slung him against the wall. Tony staggered for a moment, then slumped to the floor, dazed.

Mictar grabbed the nurse from behind. As she kicked and screamed, he laid a fingerless hand over her eyes and pressed down. Sparks flew, and Mictar’s body lightened to a dark gray, details tracing across his gaunt pale face and bony hands. His white hair materialized, slick and tied back in a ponytail. The lines of a silk shirt and denim trousers etched across the edges of his frame, completing the full-body portrait of the evil stalker.

Nathan tried to help, but his feet seemed stuck in clay. He slid one ahead, but the other stayed planted. Kelly hobbled toward the melee and helped her father to his feet. While she cradled his broken arm, Mictar’s body continued to clarify. The nurse sagged in his clutches, but he held on, light still pouring into his body from hers.

His legs finally loosening, Nathan stumbled ahead and thrust his arms forward. He rammed into Mictar, but, as if repelled by a force field, he bounced back and slammed against the floor. New jolts sizzled across his skin, painful, but short-lived. He looked up at the stalker’s pulsing form, now complete and radiant.

Mictar dropped the nurse into a heap of limp arms and legs and kicked her body to the side. Tony crouched as if ready to pounce again, but his movements had slowed. Wincing, he picked up an IV stand and drew it back, ready to strike.

Mictar tilted his head up and opened his mouth, but instead of speaking, he began to sing. His voice, a brilliant tenor, grew in volume, crooning a single note that seemed to thicken the air.

Dropping the IV stand, Tony fell to his knees. Kelly stumbled back and pressed her body against the wall. A vase exploded, sending sharp bits of glass flying, and a long crack etched its way from one corner of the outer window to the other.

Fighting the piercing agony, Nathan rolled up to his knees and climbed to his feet, but the latest shock had stiffened his legs, and the noise seemed to be cracking his bones in half. He could barely move at all.

Mictar took a breath and sang again. This time, he belted out what seemed to be a tune, but it carried no real melody, just a hodgepodge of unrelated notes that further thickened the air. Red mist formed along the floor, an inch deep and swirling. As Mictar sang on, the fog rose to Nathan’s shins, churning like a cauldron of blood. With the door partially open, the dense mist poured out, but it wasn’t enough to keep the flood from rising.

A security guard yanked the door wide open. With a pistol drawn, he waded into the knee-high wall of red. Dr. Gordon and Clara followed, but when the sonic waves blasted across their bodies, the guard dropped his gun, and all three covered their ears, their faces wrinkling in pain.

The window shattered. Mist crawled up the wall and streamed through the jagged opening. The floor trembled. Cracking sounds popped all around. The entire room seemed to spin in a slow rotation, like the beginning of a carousel ride.

“Nathan!” Dr. Gordon shouted. “He’s creating a dimensional hole! He’ll take us all to his domain!”

“How can he? There’s no mirror!”

“He can stretch one of the wounds that already exists.”

The spin accelerated, drawing Nathan toward the window. “How do we stop him? He’s electrified!”

Dr. Gordon staggered toward Nathan, fighting the centrifugal force, but he managed only two steps. “Neutralize his song!”

Nathan leaned toward the center of the room but kept sliding away. “I don’t have my violin!”

The outer wall collapsed. Fog rolled out and tumbled into the expanse, six stories above the ground. The floor buckled and pitched, knocking everyone to their seats. While Nathan pushed to keep from being spun out of the room, the nurse’s body slid across the tile and plunged over the edge with the river of red mist.

Too weak to fight, Nathan slipped toward the precipice. He latched on to the partitioning curtain and hung on with all his strength.

Mictar took a quick breath and sang on.

The bed’s side table bumped against Nathan’s body. The pen fell, bounced off his shoulder, and disappeared in the fog. Still hanging on to the curtain with one hand, he looked up at the wobbling table. The radio! With his free hand, he shook the supporting leg and caught the radio as it fell. With a quick twist, he turned the volume to maximum.

Now playing a Dvořák symphony, the radio blasted measure after measure of deep cellos and kettle drums. Trumpets blared. Cymbals crashed. Violins joined in and created a tsunami of music that swept through the room.

As if squeezed toward him, the mist swirled around Mictar’s body. His song weakened. He coughed and gasped, but he managed to spew a string of obscenities before finally shouting, “You haven’t seen the last of me, son of Solomon!”

The mist covered his head and continued to coil around him until he looked like a tightly wound scarlet cocoon. The room’s spin slowed, and the cocoon seemed to absorb the momentum. Mictar transformed into a red tornado and shrank as if slurped into an invisible void.

Seconds later, he vanished. Everything stopped shaking. Nathan turned off the radio and crawled up the sloping floor to where everyone else crouched. Dr. Gordon latched on to Nathan’s wrist and heaved him up the rest of the way. His voice stayed calm and low. “Well done, Nathan.”

Kelly threw her arms around Nathan from one side and Clara did the same from the other. “Don’t ever leave me alone again,” Kelly said, “not for a single minute.”

Sirens wailed. An amplified voice barked from somewhere below, but Nathan paid no attention to the words. He just pulled his friends closer and enjoyed their embraces.

Tony, sitting on his haunches in front of Nathan, clenched his fist. “Now that’s what I call taking out the trash!”

Dynamic Uno here: Bryan Davis has done it again! Book two (Eternity's Edge) in the Echoes from the Edge series is just as fabulous as the first book-Beyond the Reflection's Edge!


Nathan and Kelly are back trying to save the world(s) from Interfinity and total destruction. Unfortunately, Nathan's parents are still missing and Mictar is still chasing after them. Can they continue to trust their Earth Red, Earth Blue, and Earth Yellow friends to help them overcome Mictar's evil killings or will Interfinity bring about the destruction of billions of people?

I will say that you need to read the first book Beyond the Reflection's Edge before you start Eternity's Edge, or parts of the book will not make sense to you because of the back story and the different dimensions and characters. However, you will not be disappointed because the series is great. Now, get thee to a bookery and pick up Bryan Davis' latest!