Traversing the Land of Fanatics, Part I

“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.” — Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World.

My Body is a Book

“My body is like a book that people pass around to make their research,” Silvia wrote one day.

This Game of Life, Chapter 1 of A Dangerous Woman

The murder happened by the water. Silvia knew who was responsible: Gerardo, the man of her dreams, her only love, the one who made her feel like she was the luckiest girl on earth.

Trouble in Paradise

A few months ago I walked out of my house to find a razor sharp javelin stuck in the middle of my front door. It was at eye level, right where my forehead would have been if I’d opened the small window in the door. I guess if I’d looked, I wouldn’t be here right now. I’d be dead.

At the Gates of Hell and of Heaven

But no, the big entrance door swung open and out of it came a woman dressed in a long black gown with a white covering on her head. I blinked, thinking surely I was dreaming. But she was still there, greeting us as we climbed out, saying “Welcome to the Sisterhood of Mary.” And with that welcome, in the space of a single day, we passed through the gates of heaven after escaping the gates of hell.

What Happened In Luxor…

There’s a saying in Luxor, Egypt, “A woman is only allowed to leave with the skin on her body.”

That Hideous Strength II

I learned so much from attending the village school. It was the late 1960s and to those Swiss children, we might just as well have been aliens from another planet. I hated that school, to me, they were all aliens, too. Here’s how I found out that it’s what’s beneath the surface that unites us, or, “the content of our character,” not the facade.

The Man Who Saved Monsters

the story of casey cohen and the woman he loved This is always a difficult day for me. On Valentine’s Day, February 14, 2000, Casey Cohen left this earth. Casey was a highly respected private investigator often said to have been the foremost authority on the death penalty phase and the first PI to make […]

What About Rabbits?

cute and cuddly or vicious killers? When most people think of rabbits they think of cute and cuddly little critters, and story characters such as the mischievous Peter Rabbit. And then there’s this poor pet rabbit in The Lost Princess who gets thrown at the king and queen in a fit of rage by their […]

Love & Lunacy on the Nile: Jellabiya Time

A Visit to the Tailor When I was in Egypt at age ten, that would be in 1967, my siblings and I found the clothes men wore to be very funny. They looked like pajamas to us, long striped cotton garments,. Women were covered from head to toe, all in black. In the villages of […]