Fiction | Book Spectrum

Lorraine Geraci the Girls from Brooklyn book

Lorraine Geraci Tells Her Story Through the Girls from Brooklyn

Author Lorraine Geraci set an intriguing fictional story based on her own real-life experience with recently finding her own birth mother in her new book: Girls from Brooklyn.
In the story, Ms. Geraci takes the reader to secret hidden magical realms, the lives of three unique women from the sixties into today, their lifelong connection and their showing that family is not always blood. Readers will the heroic actions of family and friendships that shaped their journeys. Mystery, adventure, magical powers and the unknowing demon that lies in the magical realm of Brooklyn is a rather enjoyable story on several levels both in the real world and fantasy realm.

Lorraine has been a Learning and Professional Development leader and speaker in the Mortgage and Utility Industries over the last 30 years.Her professional experience has also allowed her to instruct and present to over 15,000 Real Estate and Mortgage professionals nationwide. The art of verbal expression and writing was always part of what she focused on.As a certified professional coach, and novice writer for many years prior, Lorraine finally wrote and published her first book Living A RockStar Life in 2014. This self-help focused book provided advice on getting out of your own way to have the life you want and deserve. She incorporated this thought process into her personal and professional life over the years in Corporate America. In 2023, some major unforeseen life events provided her with the direction and passion to continue her writing crusade and share important stories and lessons.

Houdini’s Last Handcuffs with Charlie and Cheryl Young

Harry Houdini’s magic, career and life were all fascinating. He escaped all kinds of restraints, encasements and situations. Still, there was one thing even the great Houdini could not escape: mortality, which hit him at an early age in 1926. He did, however, say he would try. Houdini reportedly told his wife, Bess, “If there is any way out. I will find it… I will find you and I will make contact with you on the anniversary of my death.” While that never happened, the escape artists’ fascination with spirituality and communication with those in the afterlife from his attempts to contact his deceased mother though to his own passing provide the background for this highly intriguing “what if” historical fiction book, Houdini’s Last Handcuffs, by Charles C. Young and Cheryl L. Young.
The Young siblings drew from their own childhood and family background, providing a real-life scenario for the book. Their father, Morris Young, was a stellar magician in his own right and hugely influenced by Houdini. In this alternative world, the authors take Houdini’s own dabblings into the spiritual realm to a new level, hypothesizing the potential of the performer’s resurrection.
Charles and Cheryl Young brilliantly balance Houdini’s own explorations into spiritualism, skepticism of the realm’s grifters, real artifacts from the escapologist’s performance years and the showman’s mystique while telling a captivating story through their younger selves’ eyes about what started as a mere curiosity which snowballed into a battle between good and evil involving not only powerful forces, but their own childhood friends.

Pick up the book here: Houdini’s Last Handcuffs by Charlie and Cheryl Young – VINE LEAVES PRESS

Fiction Mystery Suspense Thriller

Dream Me Home: A Mind’s Adventure – In and Out of Consciousness with Laurie Elizabeth Murphy

Registered Nurse and Psychotherapist Laurie Elizabeth Murphy draws from her own experience working in the field to create a uniquely intellectual and entertaining mystery in her new book, Dream Me Home.
The idea of one’s real life and dreams intersecting into an interwoven story fascinated me. While I expect twists and curveballs involving the main characters, Laurie Elizabeth Murphy brings the reader into different planes and with this psychological mystery and, dare I say, mind’s adventure.
Ms. Murphy’s background as a nurse and in the psychological field enables her to present to the reader a more unique and thought-provoking journey quite different from the regular whodunnits and love/relationship stories. Many authors have combined the two, but Ms. Murphy introduces us into the minds and motives of the main protagonist through several means: her experiences, her conversations with a therapist and through her own dreams – all realized after a traumatic home invasion which gradually changed her life in several ways. The writer also looks more deeply into our own human emotions, desires and failings through the other main characters.
In Dream Me Home, Ms. Murphy offers the reader not only the thrills of a mystery, psychological drama and unexpected turns, she conveys real-life ponderances about marriage, crime, passion vs. true love, control and finding one’s true self.

Fiction Science Fiction Thriller

S3 E09- The Devil’s Calling: Will Over-Reliance on Tech and AI Wilt Our Humanity?

Imagine a world where technology allows for direct interface between the human brain and quantum computers, exponentially increasing the creative abilities of humanity and holding the potential to make war, hunger, poverty, pandemics and other human suffering obsolete. When human capability is enhanced by that much, how does ego resist the temptation toward power and control? What would happen if an ultimate technological power gets into the wrong hands – those who further seek to link minds directly through this quantum computer into an augmented hive-mind?

A sequel to his first offering, The Lost Theory, Michael Kelley takes the reader to the characters’ lives nine years later in the thrilling sci-fi adventure, The Devil’s Calling.

Kelley mixes mystery, science-fiction, philosophy, spirituality and action in this globe-spanning thriller of a novel. As in the previous book, the story centers around Sean McQueen and Emily Edens, the latter nominated for a Nobel Prize in Physics, finding themselves thrust into the position of having to save the world with the help of friends and an AI the two befriended.

On the surface, Kelley takes the reader around the planet for an intriguing high-tech experience while at the same time leading a similar tour of McQueen’s mind, inner conflict and feelings for Emily.

For those in our listening audience who enjoy the proverbial “Easter Eggs” within books and other creations, Kelley offers nods to some of the great classic rock artists sprinkled throughout the book.

Michael Kelley fell in love with literature and creative writing while at the University of Pennsylvania. He put this passion to the side during a lengthy career on Wall Street, where he worked as a lawyer, built an international business, and founded his own investment management firm. After leaving the financial world, he engaged in studies of quantum physics, Eastern mysticism, and philosophy. From these studies, he developed a “Theory of Everything” which became the basis of his novels.

After years of life in New York City, Michael now lives in the peaceful woods of Dutchess County with his wife and daughter. There, he enjoys meditation, yoga, wine, reading, and hiking, all of which inspire his writing.

Adventure Fiction Science Fiction

S3 E06- Fionne Foxxe Farraday’s Sci-Fi Adventure: KAIRN, Mates of the Alliance

Fionne Foxxe Farraday talks with Chris Cordani on Book Spectrum about her first novel: KAIRN, Mates of the Alliance.
It is what she calls a a sci-fi adventure romance which combines an alien invasion, a rescue effort an inter-species love story and a thrilling adventure.

Farraday’s story brings us sometime in the near future, Earth is reeling from its first contact with a predatory alien species, the Ichori. Daria, a human ICU doctor, struggles with loneliness and wishes for a partner to share her life, but puts her own desires aside to tend to the wounded. On the heels of the invasion, things look dire until another species of aliens – the Luperans – show up to help repair and rebuild. Members of the Galactic Alliance, the stunningly handsome and muscular Luperans and their captain, Kairn, establish an alliance with Earth and utilize their advanced technology to begin repairing the ravages of the Ichori. Kairn and Daria, members of two different species, each with hopes, dreams, and visions of a one of a kind relationship, meet and are instantly drawn to each other.

The book shows parallels between the plot’s events and today’s world turmoil while exposing the flaws in pre-perceptions of others, whether they be ally or enemy though the eyes of complex characters and perhaps will raise questions as to whether world technological leaders should or should not step up efforts to try and communicate with other life forms throughout the universe. Will we attract friendly aliens or perhaps a predatory society much like the Ichori?

Current Events Fiction Issues Sports

S3 E01 – M K Lever Reveals the Dark Side of College Sports in Surviving the Second Tier

We kick off Season 3 of Book Spectrum with a new author, M. K. Lever, whose new book Surviving the Second Tier depicts a dystopian world with an all-powerful NCAA which consolidated every collegiate sport into one super smackdown league. Lever’s knockout debut book weaves major issues and themes throughout a parallel Earth and the main character, “Sis,” to display the real world truths that face athletes in the college athletic world as told by someone with experience inside and a track record of in-depth research into the system.

“I wrote this book to educate readers about the reality of the college sports industry, as someone who has been there before,” Lever says. “Sometimes, facts and statistics don’t stick with people and since we are intrinsically wired to follow narratives, I wanted to tell people a story in hopes that the message would resonate in a unique and powerful way. I wanted to give college sports the 1984 treatment and create a narrative that would be impactful and a little unsettling.”

Lever, a former Division 1 athlete and PhD candidate at UT Austin, combines her personal experiences as a student athlete and the weight of her academic research in areas concerning NCAA rhetoric, discourse, and policy to create her stunning and emotionally driven literary debut. She tells the story through “Sis,” who competes in the only NCAA sport, a no-holds-barred fighting league while dealing with trying to keep winning and maintaining a perfect GPA.

M. K. Lever is a doctoral candidate at the University of Texas, researching NCAA rhetoric and policy, and working as a freelance sportswriter and sports consultant. She graduated from Western Kentucky Univiersity with a B.A. in Communication Studies and an M.A. in Organizational Communication. While at WKU, she was a Division 1 athlete running track and cross country and was a two-time Sun Belt Conference champion in track and field (indoor and outdoor).

Adventure Alternative History Fiction Science Fiction

S2 E18 – Kevin Schewe: Bad Love Medicine

From Russian spies to Nazi plots, to alien planets, to true love, Kevin L. Schewe is back on Book Spectrum with another action-packed romp in his critically acclaimed Bad Love series that will have you wishing for more.

Bad Love Medicine takes readers from the deep-space beauty of Planet Azur back to a WWII Europe riddled with danger and espionage, bringing the Bad Love Gang face-to-face with one of history’s greatest villains—Adolf Hitler himself.

In this 4th book of the Bad Love Series, The Gang (based on his own friends in high school) once again set out to save history—this time, by stopping the Nazis from efforts to create a time machine of their own.

Adventure Fiction Humor Science Fiction Thriller

S2 E17 – Phil Granchi’s Dystopian Comedy Thriller, Mart of Darkness

There aren’t too many Comedy Dystopian Thrillers out there, so naturally we had to put its author, Phil Granchi, on Book Spectrum.

In Mart of Darkness, the debut author takes readers (and your audience) to an American which has turned into a weird materialistic dystopia where Ted — a screenwriter with no marketable skills with little screenwriting talent and a long list of temp jobs — who finds himself somehow assigned to take down the CEO of Allmart, who is bent on taking over the world. Ted and his new team face off with Zombie shoppers, Purple Psycho People, Converts and Black Light Specials in this satirical homage to Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now.

Alternative History Fiction History

S2 E13 – Bevis Longstreth: Chains Across the Hudson River

During the Revolutionary War, undermanned but with something of a home-field advantage, leaders of the Continental Army concocted a cunning plan to keep the British from advancing up the Hudson River: setting up long metal chains in some locations from end-to-end. While a sound defensive strategy, the chains were not needed. Historian and author Bevis Longstreth, a Hudson Valley resident, imagines a scenario where the British found a way into the Hudson and would face the mega-traps in his new book, Chains Across the River.

Longstreth brings to life the efforts of the Secret Committee of the “Committee of Safety” and how Thomas Machin was dispatched to handle the situation. He then tells the story of what might have happened had the British Empire sent an armada upward to try and take the Hudson.

“Why do historians devote so little attention to Machin?” says Longstreth. “It’s because of what didn’t happen on the Hudson. The British cut the first chain without testing it, and they never sailed against the second. Washington and Machin understood that the chain could deter without being tested at all.”

Bevis Longstreth is the author of four historical novels: Spindle and Bow, Return of the Shade, Boats Against the Current, and Chains Across the River. He combines his passion for history with a unique, contemporary perspective.

Pick up Chains Across the River here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/56186392-chains-across-the-river—a-novel-of-the-american-revolution

Fiction History Issues

S2 E10 – Kenneth James Moore: Pieces of Wood. Exposing WWII Atrocities Against Women

If we do not learn, or know enough about history, perhaps we will repeat mistakes of the past. In an era when history has been oversimplified, much of the important events and lessons are forgotten or completely ignored. Such is the case with the atrocities committed against women by the Imperial Japanese before and during World War II. Kevin James Moore tells the story about the regime’s “Comfort Women” in his new novel, Pieces of Wood.

Kenneth James Moore was researching the whereabouts of his World War II hero uncle who died during the battles in the Pacific Ocean between US and Japanese forces. While tracking down the events of his uncle’s service and death, Moore uncovered information about how women were taken from poor villages in Japan and the nations it occupied then brought to any one of a series of facilities to be used as “Comfort Women” to be brutalized and used as sexual slaves by Imperial Soldiers. Moore turned this information into the informative and intriguing novel designed to tell us what schools and much of the media eschewed.

When one is seeking answers regarding World War II in the Pacific, it is virtually impossible to avoid uncovering Imperial Japanese atrocities,” says Moore. “I was looking for data regarding my uncle’s plane. I initially had no intention of writing a novel focused on violence against women. Though that subject has haunted me the vast majority of my adult life, it wasn’t until happening upon the ‘ovens’ that the need to write such a work imploded across every measure of my being.”

Kenneth James Moore was born in 1949 in Tacoma, Washington. He graduated from Arizona State University and continued his education as a graduate student at Georgetown University. Political science and international relations were his calling.

Mentored by a former professor who was a Cold War counter-intelligence officer, Ken spent a year long stint as a volunteer alongside Admiral Bobby Inman, the Director of the National Security Agency during its reconstruction phase. Ken and his wife Patricia moved to Southern California, where Ken worked at Beverly Hills Securities as a commercial loan officer. He quickly moved to the investment banking side of the house and was able to retire at 45.

In 1994, Ken was the victim of a horrific automobile accident. Rehabilitation consumed every moment of the next four years as he relearned how to talk, walk, and swallow solid foods.

Ken was haunted by a promise he had made to his mother at age seven, pledging to unravel the mystery behind the disappearance of her youngest brother during WWII, Lt. Billy Weber, a B-29 Bomber pilot. His journey to the Pacific theater lead him to write the books The Hunt for the Life of Riley and Pieces of Wood. Learn more about Ken at www.kennethjamesmoore.com.