Tale of a Thriller !!!

From the Editors' Choice Award Winning poet & Book Awards Finalist: 

A "HYPNOTIC" POLITICAL THRILLER WITH AN EPIC COURTROOM SHOWDOWN.

A real "wow" factor! What's really scary about this story is that it's probably the kind of stuff that's happening right now and we don't know a thing about it. Fantastic read 

- READERS' FAVORITE

--------------------

“This firecracker female lead--Rita Spencer--is a force of nature who drives her powerful enemies to their knees. She's smart, she's brave. She's sexy as hell.” 

- Tracy Edingfield, author of The Law Firm of Psycho & Satan

--------------------

  “If you are looking for a good mystery/thriller, with an incredibly strong  female character, this is definitely the book for you!” 

- Teresa Kander - Freelance writer, poet, reviewer

--------------------

THE CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE 

A depiction of the life-and-death struggle of a young female lawyer who goes to great lengths to outwit a diabolical trio in order to save her lover from a murder rap

--------------------

 “The character of Rita Spencer is crafted with astute perfection. A woman with  high self-respect, smartness, brilliance, style, compassion, impetuous and  sincerity; she grabs the spotlight from numerous characters hovering around the storyline.” 

- Rakhi Jayashankar, Outset Blog - http://ow.ly/TySDK 

--------------------

CHARACTER PROFILE 

Rita Spencer - An introverted young lawyer is thrust into the spotlight she's dreaded all her life by an unexpected murder for which her lover is accused...

Quote: 

“I believe I’m more equipped than you to take the risk. You are a respected attorney and I’m an orphan, twice for that matter, I lost my biological father while still a kid and my stepdad just when I was getting to know him. Now, I’ve lost my home with everything in it, including an innocent life. Can you understand now? There’s only one thing left and that’s the man I love, who is being framed for a murder he did not commit—whatever else his shortcomings are—and for that, Marty, I’m willing to die.”

--------------------

 “Rita is a surprise element and her character has been well shaped. She is the embodiment of a modern woman - beautiful, stylish, independent, career oriented, intelligent, intuitive, loving and thoughtful.” 

- Sheryl - Book reviewer, Texas

--------------------

  “What lengths would you go through to save the man you love? That's what Augustine Sam shows us in The Conspiracy of Silence. I like to read a good mystery novel every now and then, and this one did not disappoint.”

    - T. L. Coulter - author  

Book Description

Indy Book Fairy ~ BOOK SPOTLIGHT

The conscience of a town steeped in sexism, vanity and hypocrisy is pricked by the brutal murder of a mysterious woman in a park in Los Angeles. But the shock is transformed into a steamy, seductive scandal when the body turns out to be that of Susan Whitaker, the flamboyant wife of the governor of California.

Soon, a dazzlingly intricate shuffle of volatile links leads the police to the delicate theory of a secret lover/blackmailer, and to the indictment of Benjamin Carlton, Hollywood’s most influential black celebrity.

Then curious things begin to happen when Carlton’s ambitious girlfriend, Rita Spencer suddenly unearths the shocking secret that Susan Whitaker, in fact, did not exist. She little realizes that her discovery of this colossal fraud is a mere curtain raiser to a chilling world of ugly skeletons dating back to the assassination of a U.S. senator in a Washington hotel sauna, skeletons connected to riveting sex scandals in high places, skeletons the FBI and political kingmakers will kill for…

THE CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE 

Book Excerpt

A RenAfrique Feature

"An exposé on the murky world of high-stakes politics and its attendant scandals..."

Author Interview 

The Book Adventures of Emily Blogspot

    

Tweet

From the Romance Community...

3 kindle Fires & 4 Amazon Gift Cards in prizes 

 “Art is a marriage of the conscious and the unconscious.”

– Jean Cocteau

Enter here for a chance to win...

Tweet

Words of Wisdom

Actions, they say, speak louder than words. That is quite true as far as judging people by what they do rather than by what they say, is concerned. But the power of words can’t be over-emphasized. Words can save lives, erase doubts, and alter perspectives. Here are some words of wisdom to live by.

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”

            - Aristotle

“It is possible to store the mind with a million facts & still be entirely uneducated”

- Alec Bourne

“I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.” 

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view...until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it...” 

                                                     

        - Harper Lee

“If you are depressed, you are living in the past.

If you are anxious, you are living in the future.

If you are at peace, you are living in the present.”

                              - Lao Tzu

Winston Churchill

“The pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”                         

“We are masters of the unsaid words, but slaves of those we let slip out.”                    

An idea can turn to dust or magic, depending on the talent that rubs against it. 

- Bill Bernbach

Tweet

Horoscope Test

Horoscope has been defined as a diagram of the heavens showing the position of planets and the signs of the zodiac, as at the moment of a person’s birth, used especially to predict events in a person’s life. 

Here are Unusual Predictions Based on such a diagram

Write your answers to these questions on a piece of paper.

No cheating!!! 

The answers are at the bottom of this page.

1. Write the name of a person of the opposite sex.
2. Which is your favorite color out of red, black, blue, green, yellow?
3. Write your first initial.
4. Write your month of birth.
5. Which color do you like more, black or white? 
6. Name of a person of the same sex as yours.
7. Write your favorite number.
8. Do you like New York or Los Angeles more?
9. Do you like a lake or the ocean more?
10. Write down a wish (a realistic one).

When you're done, scroll down...

 Here are the answers

 1. You are completely in love with this person.

 2. If you chose:

Red - You are alert and your life is full of love.
Black  -You are conservative and aggressive.
Green - Your soul is relaxed and you are laid back
Blue - You're spontaneous & enjoy affection from the ones you love.
Yellow- You are a happy person & good at giving advice to the downcast.

 3. If your initial is:

A-K You have a lot of love and friendship in your life.
L-R You try to enjoy your life to the maximum / your love life will blossom.
S-Z You like to help others and your future love life looks very good.

 4. If you were born in:

Jan-Mar: The year will go very well for you and you will fall in love with someone totally unexpected.

April-June: You’ll have a great love affair and thought it’ll be short-lived the memories will last forever.
July-Sep: You’ll have a great year and will experience a major & positive life-changing experience.
Oct-Dec: Your love life will not be exceptional, but eventually you’ll find your soul mate.

 5. If you chose:

Black: Your life will take on a different direction, it might seem difficult at the beginning but this new direction will turn out to be a good thing for you, and you’ll be glad for the change.
White: You will have a friend that completely confides in you and would do anything for you, but you may not realize this.

6. This person is your best friend.

7. This is the number of close friends you have in your life.

8. If you chose:

New York: You are an ambitious & adventurous person.

Los Angeles: You are a laid-back person.

 9. If you chose:

Lake: You are loyal to your friends and your lover and are very reserved. 

Ocean: You are spontaneous and like to please people.

10.  Regarding the wish you wrote, you’ll find the words of Lev Grossman in The Magician quite useful: “If there’s a single lesson that life teaches us, it’s that wishing doesn’t make it so.” 

Even so, remember what T.S. Eliot said: “Sometimes things become possible if we want them bad enough.” 

Finally, here’s some wisdom from Zora Neale Hurston extracted from Their Eyes Were Watching God:

“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board. For some, they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the same horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by Time. That is the life of men. Now, women forget all those things they don’t want to remember and remember everything they don’t want to forget. The dream is the truth. Then they act and do things accordingly.” 

Tweet

Photo-Synthesis

Memorable Images of the Year in Review

2016: A year that marked a striking repudiation of the status-quo... 

There were a number of unpredictable celebrity deaths—Fidel Castro, David Bowie, Mohammed Ali, Prince, George Michael, Carrie Fisher & her mom, Debbie Reynolds, among others. History was also made—The Chicago Cubs won the World Series after a 108-year drought, Donald Trump defied polls, party establishments, and the mainstream media to become the 45^th president of the United States, Britain voted to leave the European Union, a young African American gymnast and first-time Olympian, Simone Biles, won 

Ieshia Evans protesting in Baton Rouge

four gold medals after a spectacular performance in Rio. There were some iconic happenings too—from the soaring of Vienna waltzes at the New York City Ballet to “Hamilton,” a Broadway hit about the American Revolution. Female empowerment was dealt a mighty blow—the defeat of Hillary Clinton (the first ever female

In Remembrance Celebrity Deaths in 2016

 presidential candidate of any major political party in the US) at the presidential polls, the shocking impeachment and removal from office of two female presidents, Dilma Rousseff of Brazil & Park Geun-hye of South Korea. And, of course, the familiar tragedies—the barefaced killing of unarmed African American men by white policemen in many American cities and getting away with it, multiple terrorist attacks in continental Europe, and massive earthquakes in Italy.

President Obama

January: A mosquito-borne Zika virus introduced itself to the world as Brazil saw a surge in birth defects related to the virus. In Washington D.C., President Obama had tears in his eyes while speaking at the White House in condemnation of gun violence. On the 10th day of the month, David Bowie died at age 69.

Beyoncé channeled the Black Panther

February: During the Super Bowl halftime show, singer Beyoncé introduced a controversial element into her performance when she and her dancers appeared on stage with outfits reminiscent of the Black Panther movement. On the 13^th of that month, Justice Antonin Scalia died and his seat was draped in black at the Supreme Court.

March: A bomb blast at the Brussels Airport killed 15 people and two suicide bombers. Islamic State extremists claimed responsibility for the

Aftermath of Brussels bomb attack

disaster. An agreement signed between the European Union and Turkey was broadly successful in reducing the refugee and migrant flow into Europe. And, with the closing of the main route to Germany, more than 40,000 migrants were stranded near Indomeni in Greece.

Prom queen Zarifeh Shalabi

April: Music legend, Prince, died from an accidental overdose of the painkiller fentanyl. In California, a 17-year-old Muslim girl, Zarifeh Shalabi, was elected prom queen at her high school (a few miles from the site of the terrorist attack in San Bernardino in December 2015). Her non-Muslim friends campaigned for her by wearing hijabs in solidarity.

May: The warming effects of Climate Change shocked many

Bolivia's second largest lake dried up 

when a picture was published of Felix Condori, mayor of Llapallapani and a former fisherman, standing in the dry bed that was once Bolivia’s second-largest lake, Poopò. With the vanishing of Lake Poopò, the Uru-Murato people (the oldest indigenous group in the area) lost their livelihoods.

June: Boxing legend, Mohammed Ali, died. Nine days later, violence struck in Orlando, Florida when a

Demonstration in the UK for Brexit

29-year-old security guard, Omar Mateen, killed 49 people and wounded 53 others inside Pulse, a gay nightclub that was hosting Latin night festivities. Shot and killed by the Orlando police after a three-hour standoff, Omar’s act was the deadliest mass shooting by a single shooter and the worst incident of violence against LGBT people in US history. That same month, contrary to every hope and prayer, Brexit happened, and with it, British Prime Minister, David Cameron, resigned.

Philando Castile shot by police

July: Images from a Facebook live video showed the aftermath of the fatal shooting of Philando Castile during a traffic stop by a police officer. Later, during an organized protest over police injustice against African American men, five officers were killed. 

In Turkey, a military coup was staged against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which failed spectacularly. 

Aftermath of Turkey's failed coup

On the 14^th day of the month, Mohammed Lahouaje-Bouhlel, a Tunisian man (residing in France) deliberately drove a 19-tonne cargo truck into crowds of people celebrating Bastille Day on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice. The terrorist was shot and killed by the French police following an exchange of gunfire. As if that wasn’t painful enough, about two weeks later, two terrorists attacked the Saint-Ėtienne-du-Rouvray church in the French region of Normandy during a mass, killing an 86-year-old priest. ISIS claimed responsibility.

Omran Daqneesh

Dilma Rousseff 

August: A 5-year-old Syrian boy, Omran Daqneesh, was rescued after a devastating airstrike in Aleppo, and the image of his dust and blood-covered face not only captured the imagination of the world, it also became a symbol of the havoc caused by the Aleppo airstrikes. In Brazil, just before the Rio Olympics began, President Dilma Rousseff was impeached and removed from office after a bitter fight following accusations of corruption.

Simon Biles at the Rio Olympics

Luckily, it didn’t derail the Games, where Simone Biles, an American gymnast, and first-time Olympian, delighted her country with graceful performances on the uneven bars at the gymnastics arena, winning four gold medals. As the month edged slowly to an end, a 6.2 m earthquake hit the Lazio, Umbria and Marche regions of Italy, killing nearly 300 people.

September: For the umpteenth time, a rather scandalous event—a recurring nightmare in the African American community—played out when protests in 

Presidential debate: Clinton/Trump

Charlotte, North Carolina, set off by the police killing of a black man, Keith L. Scott, spiraled into violence, with gunfire leaving a 26-year-old man, Justin Carr, fatally wounded. 

Later that month, the first of three presidential debates between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump took place at the Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York, with millions of people glued to the television for 95 minutes.

San Francisco 49ers players protested police injustice

October: People noticed when San Francisco 49ers players, Eli Harold, Colin Kaepernick and Eric Reid, protesting racial injustice, knelt during the national anthem. The second & third presidential debates between Hillary Clinton & Donald Trump took place on the 9^th and the 19^th.  Clinton was believed to have won all three debates.

Effect of Duterte’s war on drugs

In the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte’s ruthless antidrug-campaign led to overcrowded prisons. In one city jail, inmates took turns sleeping in any available space, including a basketball court. 

And in Italy, earthquakes ranging from 5.5m to 6.6m hit the regions of Umbria and Marche between the 26^th and 30^th of the month.

Chicago Cubs won the World Series

Trump & Obama at the oval

November: Donald Trump won more than the 270 electoral college votes needed to clinch the presidency. Hillary Clinton said in her concession speech, “This loss hurts. But please never stop believing that fighting for what’s right is worth it.” Two days after the election, President Obama met the President-elect at the Oval office. In Havana, the Cuban revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro, died at 90. Chicago Cubs made history by winning the World Series for the first time in 108 years.

Gunman killed Russian envoy

December: Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi resigned after losing a major referendum on constitutional reform on which he had staked his premiership. In South Korea, President Park Geun-hye was impeached after a political scandal involving the level of access to the presidency by an aide. And in Ankara, a gunman (who was identified as a police officer) shot and killed Andrey G. Karlov, the Russian ambassador to Turkey, at an art exhibition in the full glare of television cameras, shouting, “Don’t forget Aleppo! Don’t forget Syria!”

Park Geun-hye of South Korea

Just days before Christmas, a 24-year-old Tunisian, Anis Amri, who had earlier pledged allegiance to ISIS, hijacked a truck and drove into crowds at the Breitscheidplatz Christmas market in Berlin, killing twelve people. He then fled Germany and was later shot and killed by the Italian police in Milan. On Christmas Day, sadly, George Michael died. Two days later, Carrie Fisher died, and the next day, her mother, Debbie Reynolds, joined her.  

GOODBYE 2016!

Tweet