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Overview
"It's all in the past where the past should stay. But it really never does, does it."
Amanda has stepped around the darkest shadows where the demons of a traumatic childhood lurk to build a normal life for herself; satisfying career, married, owns a comfortable home with a backyard just big enough to throw a Frisbee. Even with the recent events of her husband losing his dream job and his father, and her mother flying off to Vegas to remarry, she's optimistic things will improve. 'This is normal. Focus on work — everything will be fine.'
But in the back of her mind, a haunting premonition dream from her childhood plays like a TV left on, day and night, in an apartment down the hall. She tries to brush it off as nothing more than a nightmare of a damaged child. But her premonition dreams have always come true; sometimes like a newsreel flash before the event, a literal play-by-play, and at others, they need a bit of deciphering.
In the dream, she was a child hiding in the hydrangeas, watching her own funeral. "So tragic," a mourner said, "only thirty-two." At eight, thirty-two was a lifetime away.
Amanda J. Wilde turned thirty-two on Christmas.
On a humid August morning in Chicago, she's awakened predawn from a deep sleep under the oak in her backyard by her old dog and a ghost from her childhood.
The vivid nightmares, premonition-dreams, and sleepwalking have all returned, along with Ghost and his cat — who woke her as a child when her life was in danger.
She can no longer ignore the dream.
Within a matter of days, tragic events cause the thin walls between the present and the past to blur with sadistic twists. Amanda heads down a dangerous path, clinging to the slippery edge of a mental breakdown, where she's forced to untangle the damaging psychological events of her childhood from the life she's built as an adult.
The clock is ticking on the year of her death.
Rich with emotion and driven by suspense, Tumbling Down reminds us that life is often forged by events that threaten to destroy us.
*Contains violence, alcohol, and profanity.
Amanda's journey continues in Refuge.
Excerpt:
A cloud passes over the parking lot, dimming the sun on the glaring
white gravel. She lies there, staring up into the blue sky, unblinking,
flat on her back like roadkill in the dirty parking lot, her hands in front
of her face. I notice a slight movement, a twitch of life, as she lets a
butterfly walk across her fingers, moving it from hand to hand as if it's
climbing stairs.
"Remember that time, when we were sick with a flu, and Daniella
brought home the yellow kitten?" I remember. "He told me his name
was Jass. But she insisted, since he was left behind the club, his name
had to be Jazz. He told me the best stories that week — how he used
to live on a big old sailing ship, then on a little island with a girl. He
had lived way more than nine lives. He said he never understood where
humans got that silly notion. Daniella said it was just the fever talking,
but I know it was Jass. He was so beautiful with those big bright green
eyes of his and yellow tiger stripes. When he curled up on my neck at
night and purred me to sleep, he'd just melt my heart like butter."
She kicks rocks. Kicks the dust up from the gravel, angry, scuffing
toes hard into the dirt under it, "They took him! F**k."
After a few minutes, walking around with the butterfly riding her
shoulder, she calms down. "Nothing's permanent, you know? Nothing's
really what it seems. We create rock-solid illusions for imagined
security."
She stops and watches the butterfly flutter on her shoulder. "But
we were happy with Daniella and Zita. We laughed so loud. Remember
laughing loud?"
"Just a kid—"
"True. Just a kid. A month and a day, before life went all
catawampus on our ass, and Hell arrived with the Devil's runny eyes
glaring from the rearview mirror."
She has her hands on her hips while walking around in a circle,
talking more to the butterfly sitting on her shoulder than me. "There's
a chance we were a part of a mad doctor's experiment. I mean, they
know damn well, by the time we're five, our view of the world and how
we fit in it are set like Jell-O. A bit squiggly and wiggly, but pretty
damn solid. You can slice and dice it any way you please, but it's still
going to be Jell-O solid."
The butterfly flaps its wings, testing them before taking flight.
As it flies up through the trees, she waves goodbye.
***
*Published briefly as Butterfly Bones (2015), Tumbling Down (2021) includes deleted scenes to follow the author's original manuscript and intent.
*Reading order of the Amanda J. Wilde series.
1 Disruption (short read - prequel)
2 Tumbling Down (novel)
3 Refuge (novel)
4 Asylum (novel)
5 gifts from the gods (a short story)
Amanda has stepped around the darkest shadows where the demons of a traumatic childhood lurk to build a normal life for herself; satisfying career, married, owns a comfortable home with a backyard just big enough to throw a Frisbee. Even with the recent events of her husband losing his dream job and his father, and her mother flying off to Vegas to remarry, she's optimistic things will improve. 'This is normal. Focus on work — everything will be fine.'
But in the back of her mind, a haunting premonition dream from her childhood plays like a TV left on, day and night, in an apartment down the hall. She tries to brush it off as nothing more than a nightmare of a damaged child. But her premonition dreams have always come true; sometimes like a newsreel flash before the event, a literal play-by-play, and at others, they need a bit of deciphering.
In the dream, she was a child hiding in the hydrangeas, watching her own funeral. "So tragic," a mourner said, "only thirty-two." At eight, thirty-two was a lifetime away.
Amanda J. Wilde turned thirty-two on Christmas.
On a humid August morning in Chicago, she's awakened predawn from a deep sleep under the oak in her backyard by her old dog and a ghost from her childhood.
The vivid nightmares, premonition-dreams, and sleepwalking have all returned, along with Ghost and his cat — who woke her as a child when her life was in danger.
She can no longer ignore the dream.
Within a matter of days, tragic events cause the thin walls between the present and the past to blur with sadistic twists. Amanda heads down a dangerous path, clinging to the slippery edge of a mental breakdown, where she's forced to untangle the damaging psychological events of her childhood from the life she's built as an adult.
The clock is ticking on the year of her death.
Rich with emotion and driven by suspense, Tumbling Down reminds us that life is often forged by events that threaten to destroy us.
*Contains violence, alcohol, and profanity.
Amanda's journey continues in Refuge.
Excerpt:
A cloud passes over the parking lot, dimming the sun on the glaring
white gravel. She lies there, staring up into the blue sky, unblinking,
flat on her back like roadkill in the dirty parking lot, her hands in front
of her face. I notice a slight movement, a twitch of life, as she lets a
butterfly walk across her fingers, moving it from hand to hand as if it's
climbing stairs.
"Remember that time, when we were sick with a flu, and Daniella
brought home the yellow kitten?" I remember. "He told me his name
was Jass. But she insisted, since he was left behind the club, his name
had to be Jazz. He told me the best stories that week — how he used
to live on a big old sailing ship, then on a little island with a girl. He
had lived way more than nine lives. He said he never understood where
humans got that silly notion. Daniella said it was just the fever talking,
but I know it was Jass. He was so beautiful with those big bright green
eyes of his and yellow tiger stripes. When he curled up on my neck at
night and purred me to sleep, he'd just melt my heart like butter."
She kicks rocks. Kicks the dust up from the gravel, angry, scuffing
toes hard into the dirt under it, "They took him! F**k."
After a few minutes, walking around with the butterfly riding her
shoulder, she calms down. "Nothing's permanent, you know? Nothing's
really what it seems. We create rock-solid illusions for imagined
security."
She stops and watches the butterfly flutter on her shoulder. "But
we were happy with Daniella and Zita. We laughed so loud. Remember
laughing loud?"
"Just a kid—"
"True. Just a kid. A month and a day, before life went all
catawampus on our ass, and Hell arrived with the Devil's runny eyes
glaring from the rearview mirror."
She has her hands on her hips while walking around in a circle,
talking more to the butterfly sitting on her shoulder than me. "There's
a chance we were a part of a mad doctor's experiment. I mean, they
know damn well, by the time we're five, our view of the world and how
we fit in it are set like Jell-O. A bit squiggly and wiggly, but pretty
damn solid. You can slice and dice it any way you please, but it's still
going to be Jell-O solid."
The butterfly flaps its wings, testing them before taking flight.
As it flies up through the trees, she waves goodbye.
***
*Published briefly as Butterfly Bones (2015), Tumbling Down (2021) includes deleted scenes to follow the author's original manuscript and intent.
*Reading order of the Amanda J. Wilde series.
1 Disruption (short read - prequel)
2 Tumbling Down (novel)
3 Refuge (novel)
4 Asylum (novel)
5 gifts from the gods (a short story)
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940163084142 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Nereid press LLC |
| Publication date: | 02/02/2021 |
| Series: | Amanda J. Wilde , #1 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 823 KB |
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