By Julie Sara Porter
Horror
This is a fun and interesting take on the Grim Reaper.
Patrice Williams is the latest in a long line of Reapers in her family. Her latest assignment puts her in the middle of a murder investigation, a turf war between warring demons, a meddlesome angel, and a demon that possesses her niece.
Much of the humor in the book comes from Patrice treating reaping like any other regular 9-5 job. Patrice clocks in and out, takes breaks, deals with annoying coworkers, collects her earnings, and goes home. She just happens to carry recently deceased souls into the Afterlife.
She also has to deal with family struggles. Her father is proud of her upholding the family legacy. Her mother and sister believe that she is consorting with demons. This accusation becomes more troubling when Patrice’s niece’s soul is on the line.
This is an eerie nightmare of a book that presents the post-Apocalyptic landscape as a literal Monster Mash.
Avery Winters is part of a group of survivors that hunt for witches, vampires, were creatures, and zombies. It is a fight for survival that becomes more personal when a witch and a vampire are imprisoned and Avery has to guard them.
The book's strongest theme is the line between human and monster. Avery has become detached and jaded in her fight against her adversaries so much that she has lost her humanity. She ignores or takes part in medical experiments and torture sessions. She vows that if one of her people transforms, she would kill them without a second thought.
However her views begin to change the more she talks to her captives Whitney, the witch and Mathias, the vampire. Suddenly the faceless enemies have faces, names, personalities, and histories. She starts to wonder if she had been wrong about who the monsters really are.
This is a gripping and eerie ghostly mystery that reminds us that cold cases don't always close.
News reporter Kara King returns to her hometown to reopen the local paper. At the office, she sees the ghost of Renee West, a reporter who may have been murdered. Kara decides to look for answers.
This book is both ominous and purposeful. Renee begins as a silent wispy presence that gets more pronounced the closer Kara gets to the truth.
Kara’s interactions with Renee show her as a vibrant dedicated woman whose life ended abruptly. Now it's up to Kara to find out who ended it and why.
This sequel to Kaleidoscopic Shades Within Black Eternity, my favorite book read in 2022, limits the widespread perspective of its predecessor to tell a narrow focused streamlined story that is mystifying, unearthly, and uncanny.
A boy disappears in an area known as “The Playground.” The investigator, Ben McLevy is afflicted with disturbing sounds and images. Meanwhile Josh Triplow has visions about a missing friend and feels compelled to go to Australia to find him. This search takes him right to The Playground.
This book thrives on immediate urgency and personal connections to these strange events. These sinister presences are related to the physical and mental torture of children and are a reflections of the hatred and trauma experienced in the past involving the central characters.
The Playground inspires feelings of fear, anxiety, loneliness, and trauma. It is festered with the violent history of the people who lived within and did unspeakable things to others. It's practically a gateway to Hell where if you don't lose your life, you are guaranteed to lose your mind.
This spooky anthology crosses genres to give the Readers a full effect of dark twisted tales that deliver on chills, ominous energy, and unforgettable mental images.
A woman looks for her missing sister who may have been abducted by fairies. A boy is haunted for years by the presence of a menacing demonic clown. Three witches debate about taking the life of their latest potential victim. Three teens become obsessed with The Axeman of New Orleans unsolved mystery.
It combines Traditional Paranormal Horror with Dark Fantasy, Suspense Thriller, Psychological Suspense, and Historical Fiction to give a full view of the different layers that define Horror.
This novella depicts the sinister mysterious Hat Man of recent lore and builds a story around its enigmatic otherworldly presence.
Sadie Burrows and Colton Garrett lost loved ones to this nightmarish creature. They investigate its origins, presence, and ways to face and defeat it.
The Hat Man doesn't just take lives, it destroys the people around the victim. It doesn't just kill physically, it destroys them emotionally by removing those they love the most, leaving the victim emotionally and mentally vulnerable and helpless when The Hat Man attacks.
This version gives The Hat Man a more violent edge. Instead of frightening people by appearing in their nightmares, it uses more aggressive tactics and unstoppable rage to seek the vengeance and justice after death that it didn't have in life. It's not an understandable or sympathetic character but it was once human and had a history.
This book is a confusing, captivating, surreal look at life beyond death.
Will Deadmarsh is haunted by the demonic presence of his deceased sister. Atra Hart escapes from her paranoid adopted father. The two escape and become involved in experiments to research life after death, particularly The Otherside and its portal, The Altered Planes.
Will and Atra are face to face with spirits that can't be studied or understood. Part of their presence is in defiance of the human arrogance to research and contain them. If they can't be studied or can't be contained, they can't be destroyed or defeated. The online options are to run from them or live with them.
The surrealism can be found in the setting. There are times when the land and nature resist Will and Atra's attempts at normalcy. For example, they go to small towns which are unnervingly silent and devoid of any life but Will and Atra. These experiences leave them vulnerable to those that attack them. Their worst fears are multiplied in the silence.
This is a rich, enchanting, disturbing, complex novel about a witch that is reincarnated over the centuries.
The incarnation that is explored is Merona, the adopted daughter of Mairead, the Druid High Priestess in 5th century Brittany. Merona must be taught to use her powers and to recognize her former and future incarnations so she can fight Armaeus, the most feared Daemon in the entire realm.
Those who are interested in folklore and legends will be fascinated by the abundance of witch lore weaved into narrative. The book is set when Druids were still in high authority but were aware that the transition to Christianity is on its way. They are determined to pass their Pagan knowledge along even if it means hiding underground.
Some of the most fascinating chapters occur during Merona’s training. The flashes of intuition and wisdom from various incarnations become more concrete as she explores her past and future lives. She also expands on her magical abilities by facing tests of elemental magic through earth, fire, air, and water. The final test takes her to the Labyrinth of Shadows where she has to encounter her fears, face her biggest challenges, and embrace her powers to become a potent witch.
This book's setting and tone depicts Hell with all of its overall darkness, graphic violence, scares, and ominous chills coming from every chapter.
Melody is abducted and taken by a demon named Nyx into Hell. She learns that she is the daughter of one of the Fates of Greek Mythology and has to journey through Hell and learn how to see and change destinies before she comes face to face with The King of Hell.
The descriptions of Hell aggravate the senses and the landscape shapes itself to torture those suffering. It is a composite of different mythologies and religions, mostly Abrahamic religions and Hellenic mythology. There are representations of the 7 Deadly Sins and the Titans are present.
There is a sense of abandonment, hopelessness, and desolation that exists primarily throughout the book as Melody fights the King of Hell. But the outlook is so dismal that there are hints that all that is occurring is one tyrant being overthrown for another.
Anytime a book journeys into Hell, it's bound to produce some graphic Horror images and this book has some of the most disturbing moments produced by supernatural and human characters.
This book uses fantastic and dark elements from Old Testament scripture, Jewish folklore, and European myths and legends to tell a challenging story of mortality, prejudice, Antisemitism, courage, sacrifice, maturity, faith, hatred, vengeance, justice, punishment, and retribution.
Aliza Auerman and her adopted father and sisters are Holocaust survivors trying to adjust to life in the United States. A planned demonstration by a local Antisemitic Holocaust denial group traumatized Aliza so when she receives a visit from Ha-Satan, she accepts her offer to be in charge of one of Hell’s Zones, the zone that contains many of the most prominent Nazis including Hitler himself.
At first the punishments are humorous in a dark twisted comic way and become more grotesque, gruesome, and painful. She soon acquires a sadistic delight in torture. It is a vindication of the horror that was inflicted upon her by the human monsters that she now leads. Her desire for vengeance is understandable considering the trauma that was inflicted upon her.
Aliza is also inflicted with a conscience that allows for limits. She dials back on punishments doled out to families and doesn't want the Nazis' children to suffer because they had horrible parents. She also questions her role as a Hell Zone Master when another one shows punishments too severe even for her. There is a connection between her family and one of the Nazis in the other Zone. She has to weigh if vengeance only creates more monsters and if there are limits to hatred.
Honorable Mention: Dead People Anonymous by Loraine Hayes, The Slither Queen by Tamara Lawson, Sinister Ascension by Marc L. Abbott
Mystery/Thriller
This Cozy Historical Mystery features a charming couple solving a murder mystery on the high seas.
1931, engaged couple Jack Sullivan and Frances Palmer travel with Frances’ Uncle Sal on a cruise from Australia to the UK. What should be a peaceful luxurious voyage becomes fatal as another passenger is murdered and a new friend is accused of the crime.
This book hearkens back to the early mysteries where stylish, sharp couples are often surrounded by dead bodies and the worst of human nature and use their wit and observation to save the day. Frances is an outgoing, spirited, vivacious assistant to her magician uncle. Her natural charm and empathy draws people to her and her working class street smart savviness gives her a common sense outlook and knowledge of human nature.
Jack is a staid, steady organized nightclub owner. He has a paternal demeanor and wartime experiences that help him understand the troubles that others go through. His sharp intellect, dry wit, and managerial skills allow him to put the details together to find a solution. The couples' strengths balance each other out in their personal and professional lives, whether they are solving mysteries or having a night out with each other.
This is an enthralling character driven Crime Thriller about an assassin whose heart and emotions put her career on the line.
Delia Cahill is a happily married successful attorney who is also a high priced and deadly assassin. Her latest assignment, Alexander Thorne, proves to be quite a challenge since she has fallen in love with him.
Delia straddles the lines between consummate professional and romantic heroine and plays both extremes rather well. She's like a black widow spider or praying mantis attracting her captive before destroying him. She is so deliciously fun, that it would have been nice to see more aspects of this side of her character.
Mostly we see her when she realizes that her job isn't what she thought. After she falls in love with Alexander, her former employers go through extreme measures to break her, treating her the same way that she treated her targets. Delia lived a life of violence and tried to live without a conscience. It worked until her conscience overpowered her.
This Spy Thriller combines the flashy colorful adventure of an Ian Fleming James Bond novel with the duplicitous realistic tension of a John LeCarre George Smiley novel.
In 1965, orphaned James Vagus is recruited to join MIS-X a secret organization which recruits young spies. James is partnered with Dakota Walker and his first assignment to trail a corrupt East German businessman to a conspiracy involving a manufactured killer virus.
James and Dakota are spies with all of the gorgeous locations, beautiful people, cool toys, vehicles, and gadgets, and daring narrow escapes. However, there is also an awareness that the governments can't always be trusted, even the ones they work for, that agents can be quickly betrayed, and murder is never far away.
There is a seedy underside to this seemingly glamorous exciting world. It is a seedy underside in which young adults in their late teens whose brains haven't fully developed are being thrown into and expected to survive within it. Characters are betrayed, deceived, tortured, and murdered. The bond between James and Dakota is the only real honest thing in the entire book.
This is a modern day Neo-Noir Murder Mystery with a seedy location, troubled detective, ineffective or corrupt authorities, powerful and dangerous men and women in suits, and innocents who get swept up in a dangerous life that they are unprepared for.
Lee Jensen, an Australian PI exiled in Bangkok is hired to look for Zoe Burgess who goes missing after working as a jazz singer in a nightclub. Lee learns that she was kidnapped, trafficked, drugged, and forced into sex work. Now Lee has to find her while facing the Yakuza who pay a large part to her situation.
There is a hard boiled detective edge to the novel. Lee goes through various clubs, businesses, and hangouts, encounters many unsavory characters, and isn't above bribery or using force to get answers. It's a dark world made even darker by the presence of its protagonist.
He knows this world because he has to live not just in his job but in his mind and body. He is Schizophrenic and his hallucinations and delusions are kept at bay by his meds. This makes him vulnerable at times particularly when he is held captive by the Yakuza and is deprived of his medication. He is not just surrounded by enemies outside, but enemies in his mind that threaten to destroy and annihilate him from within.
This novella is a short but tight Crime Thriller about a rich aristocrat with a very dangerous side.
Edward Kenworthy is a rich playboy who is also a serial killer. When Edward's latest conquest is reported missing, the trail appears right at Edward's doorstep and his collection of dead bodies won't be hidden for long.
There isn't a moment in this book that is wasted because of its short length and tense plot. It tells a fascinating psychological thriller by taking multiple points of view of the murders, coverups, investigation, accusations, evidence gathering, arrest, and trial.
Edward makes a charismatic manipulative and terrifying killer reminiscent of an Alfred Hitchcock character who hides a sinister veneer under wealth and privilege. He thinks that his wealth and privilege will keep him from facing retribution until he runs out of allies and protection.
This is a complex engrossing Adventure Thriller about ancient secrets leading to ancestral memory, goddess figures, and future possibilities.
Peter Gollinger and Zara Khatum are the heirs to oral traditions and prominent ancestral legacies. These legacies lead them on a mission at Gobleki Tepe and an object that could lead to untold power, knowledge, and potential destruction.
The adventure has many Byzantine layers that link past and present. Many characters are descended from others and follow similar paths of their ancestors. People switch sides, family members face each other, and couples are United as though they were predestined to get together.
The strengths in characterization are particularly shown in the second volume where the women like Zara, and two antagonists, Rachel and Mei are particularly memorable. They embody different pantheons and goddesses like Xwede, Asherah, and Jiang based on their origins, back stories, personalities, and character arcs. They are women of substance and goals and propel the narrative by their actions.
4. Con and Consequence/ Cease to Exist/ The Wine Broker (The Richard O'Brien Series Book 1-3) by Ian Rodney Lazarus
This series has a compelling protagonist with a shaky love life and who possesses brilliance, physical toughness, and a morally gray philosophical outlook on life. However each volume includes antagonists who are captivating, stimulating, and often the most fascinating aspects of the books.
FBI linguist turned special agent Richard O'Brien gets involved in a series of murders that often begin as connections to minor crime such as cyber fraud, lab theft, or wine smuggling. They then lead to conspiracies involving warring nations, government conspiracies, and organized crime.
O’Brien is a good lead for this series. He is an anti hero who respects the law but isn't above bending some rules. He has a complicated love life that carries over into multiple volumes. He has a close Irish Catholic family which takes center stage in the first book when they are caught in the crossfire of O’Brien’s investigation. He is put in some difficult situations that reveal his vulnerabilities especially when he is held captive by his enemies.
Many of the antagonists are brilliantly written from the genius con artist, Jelani, to the enigmatic terrorist cell leader The Professor, to chameleon like DNA thief Emma, to the wealthy conniving Spence, to the hapless stand up comedian/Yakuza inductee Jack. Each character has a story to tell about why they committed the crimes, the means of doing so, what they hoped to gain, and how they planned to get away. They aren't characters to root for but they are fascinating and understandable.
Unlike many Murder Mysteries that star witches the emphasis on this one is not on magic but on mystery. It is a realistic Murder Mystery that stars a woman who happens to be a witch.
The body of a former high school acquaintance of Arista’s, a witch and New Age shop associate, is found. Arista and her friends try to find out what happened. Arista uses her intuition and spiritual connections to investigate the truth.
This book shows how witches operate in the real world. It is not based on amazing special effect driven magical things happening or communicating with creepy demons and wise cracking ghosts. The rituals, tools, and intuition are based on belief, focus, and intention.
This realistic look also spills into the antagonists. Instead of wizards, vampires, and demons, Arista has to face criminals that are all too human. They have sick perverted minds over how they think the world should be and who they have to hurt. They have violent destructive impulses, no respect for those around them, and dehumanizing views of their victims.
2. Shadow Runner (Book 1 of The Shadow Series) by K.J. Fieler
This book uses shadows as a frequent motif as characters disappear in and out of them or hide their true natures behind veils of environment and secrecy.
Ada was kidnapped from her opulent Victorian home by Nadine, who is part of a team of well trained thieves, spies, and assassins. When she finds no home to return to, Ada joins The Shadows.
Ada has to be stripped down to her barest minimum before she recognizes the hidden strength and adaptability that she needs to survive in the world. She begins as an object of beauty living an existence of artifice, almost a doll-child made of porcelain in a dollhouse. The moment that she discovers some disturbing facts about her family, she realizes that her world was a complete fabrication. She was exalted only to be knocked down, a shiny bauble that has lost its value and is completely disposable.
Ada’s training as a Shadow is both disturbing and mesmerizing. The Shadows are stripped of their former identities and trained rigorously in fighting techniques and subterfuge. Ada is drilled not to trust anyone and doubts her family, colleagues, her mentor, her assignments, and herself. They hide in and out of shadows and hide themselves to find information or kill intended targets. They no longer trust a world in which they are no longer a part of.
1. The Sixth Victim (A Constance Piper Mystery) by Tessa Harris
This is an effective Historical Mystery in which Jack The Ripper is the primary antagonist. It captures time, place, and important themes about the degradation of women in the Victorian Era.
Two acquaintances of flower seller Constance Piper have been murdered and their deaths are linked to The Ripper. Constance has reached the interest of Emily Tindall, a school teacher looking for some missing students. The two cases end up linked in surprising ways.
The separation between rich and poor is revealed through the contrast between the two protagonists. Emily lives with the upper middle class while Constance is part of the lower working class. However their friendship is a bridge between the gap as Emily becomes a mentor to Constance by teaching her literacy and encouraging her ambitious goals to ascend higher in life.
The book is adept at recounting the Jack the Ripper case from the discovery of his canon victims and two others that might be attributed to him, to focusing on the investigation including graphic violence, potential suspects, and theories. In revealing the case and details, the book opens many larger concerns including xenophobia, class struggles, fear of authority, and dehumanization of “The Other.”
It's a mean world where Jack can hide in plain sight because he fits right in. It's a world where Victorian moralists lecture women about propriety while at the same time restricting them, justifying violence towards them, and maintaining a patriarchal system which makes seeking independence and justice impossible.
The Hidden Raphael's Banker (The Art and Finance Mystery Series) by Alessandra Oddi Baglioni, Britannia Rises by Russell Dumper, Muted Rage/ Folded Steel (The Forge Trilogy in The Shadow Guardians Series Book 2-3) by G. Russell Gaynor, Girls, Crime, and The Ruling Body by Barry Ziman,
10. The Red Wedding by Alessandra Oddi Baglioni
The book focuses on the powerful influential family who fit the Renaissance ideals of politics, finance, leadership, science, culture, and domination. They had many important allies but just as many enemies.
The book is an intricate work that captures the culture, class, and conspiracies that made the Renaissance. There are plenty of moments that depict whispered conversations, feigned friendships, and harsh betrayals. Many were on the hunt for financial gain and family power.
The eponymous Red Wedding is a graphic slow moving conflict that fills various pages and chapters. It was tightly plotted as though it were a secret invasion during war. The attackers hid until their targets were separated and at their most vulnerable and unobservant. Astor and Lavinia just consummated their wedding night when their assassin appeared out of the shadows and ended their potential future in the most violent bloody way possible.
9. The Wise Marie: Paradise Edition by Natasha Brune
This is a troubling and traumatic autobiography about a woman's involvement with crime and drugs. Brune’s alter ego turned to drugs, abusive relationships, and criminal activity to escape her fractured family and self esteem issues.
Brune's writing style is straightforward and matter of fact. Terrible things happened but she doesn't get sentimental or cloying in describing them. This style gives Brune a detachment towards the events described.
It also makes use of the Hawaiian setting by downplaying the paradise connotations to focus on the reality that Brune experienced. She reveals the poverty of people living in a state noted for its beautiful year end weather and exorbitant high cost of living.
While crime, drugs, and violence can be found everywhere, in Hawaii's case, this ugly reality clashes with the beautiful image that no person and no place can fill forever.
8. In Search of Cognizance by Nabraj Lama
This is an evocative and insightful Travel book about Lama’s travels to Mount Kailash in Tibet.
The book is rich in sensory detail and deep in spiritual meaning. It fills the senses with physical descriptions of the landscape and soothes the brain and emotions with its theme of connecting the physical plane with the spiritual.
The journey allowed Lama to confront his fears and anxieties. He recognized kindness, respect, gratitude, and selflessness that transformed his life and those around him. He saw the interconnectedness of humanity, nature, and the divine.
The experience gave him a stronger sense of purpose and spirit. He connected the physical and metaphysical world and found mental, emotional, and spiritual clarity and peace.
This is a tragic and triumphant memoir about coming out, authenticity, and finding the physical and emotional space to live one's truth.
Mok’s writing style is both personal and informative as she describes her difficult relationship with her parents, growing awareness of her sexuality, and her need to leave home to carve her own identity. She summarizes and gives dry fact based accounts about her experiences but also uses literary techniques like dialogue and internal thoughts in parts. This dual nature is a means to highlight the most conflicts and themes within her story.
Most of the book focuses on Mok’s toxic relationship with her parents. Their conflicts went beyond generational, cultural, and gender gaps. They weren't above using emotional blackmail and mental abuse to force their children to conform to their expectations.
Mok had to use different means to find her own strengths and personal happiness. One was exploring her sexuality and another was therapy and introspective healing. They reveal someone who was willing to move onto her next life experience.
6. In Search of Rain From Motel Qu to Pittsburgh by Syed Nourashrafeddin
This memoir is an inspirational, moving, and meaningful look at war, revolution, addiction, trauma, immigration, and the pursuit of professional success and personal happiness.
Nourashrafeddin was five years old during the 1979 Iranian revolution. The life before was recalled by elders but he recalls people being deprived of music, art, free expression, women's independence. Even as a child, he knew that something wasn't right in a country that deprived its people of so much.
His descriptions of the Iran-Iraq War are unsettling, particularly cities annihilated with destroyed buildings, sounds of explosions and air strikes, food shortages, wounded neighbors, casualties during what he saw as a futile and needless war.
Nourashrafeddin also had personal problems as well including an addicted father, health problems, an unhappy first marriage. He persevered in medical school, became a geneticist, had a much happier second marriage, and emigrated to the US. His story reveals how important it is to find positive interests and relationships that clear the mind, soothe the soul, and lead to personal happiness.
5. The Dressing Drink by Thomas King Flagg
This is a revealing memoir about Flagg’s dysfunctional upbringing by his troubled parents, Dorothy Mary Flagg and Irwin Whittridge. Flagg brought his parents to life with detailed description and literary devices.
The majority of the book focuses on the comparisons and contrasts between his parents. Dorothy had a wealthy upbringing and Irwin a poor one, but had troubled relationships with parents, siblings, unhappy early marriages, addiction, and mental health issues that marked their relationship with each other and their son.
Flagg recognized his parents as individuals first and parents second. He dissects their background and how they became the people that he knew. Their emotional and mental disorders, insecurities, and parenting difficulties became understandable when Flagg and the Reader realized where they came from.
To really understand his parents, Flagg wrote about his book as a nonfiction narrative getting their internal points of view and describing events that he would not have known but probably speculated about. This technique helps us understand his family inside and out.
4. Chomp Press Pull by Elaine Battista-Parsons
This amusing and moving memoir discusses Battista-Parsons’s struggles with sensory dysregulation. It is rich in personal experiences and sensory detail from someone who had to look at the world in her own way.
Her experiences are rich in various details such as crowded and sweaty classrooms, noisy family events, items like stickers and air fresheners making her nauseous, food that tasted good or bad before she ever put them in her mouth, and bright neon colors and flashy images of her 80’s upbringing. The senses can be overwhelming when they are increased or decreased.
She has brilliant ways of writing about her issues. One chapter describes alphabetically some of the difficulties that her condition caused. Certain gestures like biting fingernails and cracking air pockets were stress relievers. Arm hair was uncomfortable so she shaved it. Certain colors like green and gray were soothing while others like red were disturbing. Anything considered innocuous and minor to other people like zippers, Play-Doh, dry lips, suitcases, lemons, and sandals were huge obstacles to her.
Battista-Parsons used various coping mechanisms to deal with her dysregulation like chewing or biting anything edible, pressing down crayons and pencils on paper, or pulling on objects like hair and string. She also took comfort in texture by holding objects. She later studied her condition, consulted experts, and learned various techniques like Reiki and therapy to soothe her and diminish the sensory impact.
3. The Bluestockings: A History of the First Women's Movement by Susannah Gibson
This is a fascinating Historical Nonfiction account of the Bluestockings, a group of 18th century women who hosted salons, encouraged creative talents, and discussed politics, philosophy, and other topics in which women were often excluded from.
These women supported each other in their creative pursuits like writing and art. There were women whose voices might otherwise have not been followed without an understanding network.
They also lived unconventional lives. Some married supportive husbands, had lesbian relationships, or opted not to marry at all.
The Bluestockings did not last very long but they were an influence for many women like Jane Austen, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Elizabeth Gaskell who in turn inspired various waves of Feminism. Women's History would have been very different without them.
2. The War on Love: The Origin Story of Love Has Won and The Rise of Mother God by Andrew Ryan-Profaci
The story of the Love Has Won cult and its founder Amy Carlson is a twisted tale of divine worship, mental manipulative, and belief gone horribly wrong. Profaci’s memoir takes us inside a personal journey into a cult and specifically their leader whom he felt equal parts fascination, fear, love, and loathing.
A dysfunctional upbringing, low self-esteem, and a constant search for truth brought Profaci to Carlson's website. He attended her online sessions and finally he decided to meet Carlson in person. After joining the cult, he became her lover and ascended the title of Father God.
Profaci's personal experience with the cult ended before the abuse allegations began and Carlson's grisly death and her cult’s gruesome display of her body. Those were only known to him secondhand so his book glosses over those events.
What he does reveal is a toxic tumultuous relationship between Profaci and Carlson in which Profaci loved Amy, the kind, friendly, warm hearted woman that he met online but grew to despise The Mother God persona, the manipulative leader, the Narcissist controlling others, and the delusional woman who lied about having all of life's answers so often that she genuinely believed the lie.
This is a sobering unnerving account about the effects of child molestation on a woman’s family.
Both of Colne’s daughters were molested by their uncle. Their uncle was arrested and charged but that's not the end of the story. Colne’s younger daughter, Emma reveals that she was also molested by her father, a charge that Colne supports but her older daughter, Katherine denies.
Colne's intense descriptions of her daughter's abuse and the aftermath including their fractured mental states reach into the Reader's souls. We understand the pain that this family went through and are still going through. The abusers left their marks leaving their victims in fragile states unable to cope with the stress in their lives.
It wasn't just the initial crime of sexual assault that made these men monsters. It was the continuous after effects that created a lifetime of trauma from two innocent girls who were hurt by men that they should have trusted to love and protect them. Katherine and Emma suffered from physical, mental, and emotional scars that never healed as they grew. They were in tears, enraged, and engaged in self-harm.
By far the biggest crime that their father did was break apart the whole family. The sisters were on the same side against their uncle but stood on opposite sides when it came to their father. Emma and her mother, Colne pressed charges against him so he was tried. Katherine denied the abuse and turned against them by venerating her father and encouraging other family members to do the same. This shows a painful truth that sometimes trauma brings people closer together but sometimes it drives them further apart.
Honorable Mention: From Emoji to Empathy Mastering Customer Service in the Digital Age by Susan Williams, Keep on Glowing: Your Guide to Graceful Empowerment and Unstoppable Glow by Robin Emtage, Dr. Sebi’s Ancient Wisdom/Ancient Natural Remedies by Kai Oman, The US Citizenship Study Guide by Crestline Press, Women! Wake Up. Stand Up! Speak Up! By Julie Greggs, Microsoft Office 365 Bible by Zen Tasker Publishing
Thank you Julie, I appreciate the recognition and opportunity to be included among such a talented group of writers!
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