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The Last Book
Booklover and Professor Charles Sutton is intrigued by the old
book he had been given by the elderly and enigmatic instrument
repairer. He likes the old leather-bound book and reads a tale
that is completely absorbing. Finishing and closing the cover,
he sees the title fade away and a new one gradually emerge.
Inside is a new story. How? Magic? Digital trickery? He is pulled
anew to open the aged volume. All night and much of the next
day, Charles reads story after story, each one as compelling as
the last, somehow perfectly suited to his eclectic tastes. It is a
wonderful and satisfying repetition of the emergence into the
timeless realm of reading. Between stories, though, he feels a
growing sense of unease.
Charles learns that others want, even need, the book, leading the
quiet academic into intrigue, suspense, danger, and unexpected
romance.
The Last Book traverses the mystery of Charles’s book with
witty repartee, poetic descriptions of the wonders of music, and
reflections on education and creativity. It is ultimately a paean to
the enriching, even vital, qualities of language and literature.
WRITING
I have had numerous short stories, essays, and cartoons published in magazines and anthologies, including, Short Story, Surfer’s Journal, Petroglyph, Easy Reader, Fretboard Journal, Surfer’s Path, H20, Julian News, Lives On Board, and Inside English. I also have written four novels, Echoes Over Water, The Last Orange Grove and The Queen's English and now one more: The Last Book!
In 2019, I was a featured presenter at Vashon Center for the Arts' Lit Conference.
ECHOES OVER WATER
Dizzied by the tragic-comedic events of his modern Californian life, Alan Griffin is determined to trace his British roots. Sailing from Maine on a yacht being delivered to Britain, he reverses the voyage of his immigrant forbears. He stops in Newfoundland, Greenland and Iceland learning more than he dreamed about his ethnic past and his future.
Hundreds of years earlier, a band of banished Celts follow in the wake of Saint Brendan hoping to find the legendary Blessed Isles of the West, encountering beings of their myths and then natives of Newfoundland.
The two voyages in opposite directions across the Atlantic, are eerily similar.
Available from Amazon.com or Me
THE LAST ORANGE GROVE
The Last Orange Grove is about both historical and present day southern California. It is a place in the midst of unparalleled demographic shifts. A fourth generation native tries to make sense of the diverse people who currently inhabit his home state. Incorporated into the story are love, satire, art and literature. It includes people seeking their dreams in California from "back east," as well as those first Europeans who accompanied Portola and Father Serra in the 1700's, who similarly imposed their dreams on a native locale. The story alternates from Indian village to freeway to surf line, while the characters accommodate commerce, hypocrisy, grief, and disparate visions of California's future.
Available from Xlibris.com or Me
THE QUEEN'S ENGLISH
We follow the Queen of America in the bawdy, picaresque, Medieval spoof, The Queen’s English, as she and her entourage “go a progress” through her realm, the landscape that once was The United States of America. It is a land in geologic and linguistic turmoil, and the Queen needs every scrap of sexy wisdom she can muster to deal with matters great and small, in and out of the Ivory Tower. She must humble herself (no small thing) to ask advice of the Oracle of Style and Perspicuity, the late Diana Hacker, of the Bed by the Ford. And on her journey, she must face dangers and conundrums with only the help of her band of academics, her lewd Consort, Dripping Sea God, and Mascot, Diving Squirrel.
Available on Smashwords.com