Well, it’s been almost five months since my last post . . .
I almost forget I had a website!
To make up for lost time, I’m going to post a snippet from latest release: Catching Ivy
Total Recall meets Inception in this Science Fiction Romance where dreams and technology collide.
Damion Scole has an obsession and it’s one that just might get him killed. He spends his free time hooking into VRR’s: Virtual Reality Reads. These electronic devices replaced e-readers almost thirty years ago. Now, in the year 2048, you can be in the story rather than just reading.
But Damion doesn’t buy your everyday VRRs, he’s only into the black-market ones.
His connection sells him a new vid, fresh on the market, and so hot there’s only one copy. As Damion slips into the virtual world, safe in his father’s penthouse, he watches a grim scene unfold. The main character is running for her life. A girl with bright blonde hair, deep amber eyes, and a mission to take down the biggest biotech company in the world.
When he gets a few chapters in, he notices a local news story appears in the vid. It isn’t until a fire he witnesses in the book makes the headline news the next morning that he realizes something is very wrong. Convinced what he’s watching is in real time, and the mysterious girl is in real peril, he begins a desperate search through the city to find her.
What he discovers will force him to leave his virtual world of safety, to save his real one.
TEASER
The penthouse is dark, except for the flashing colors of the TV screen. Walking over to turn it off, I see Mom asleep on the couch. I grab a nearby blanket and tuck it around her, then kiss the top of her forehead. She shifts and hugs the blanket closer, snuggling down and rubbing her cheek against the pillow.
Dad hasn’t come home yet, and I wish for her sake he would. I know he isn’t having an affair, but all the late-night business calls with a myriad of international clients always keeps him out to all hours of the night. I can’t remember the last time we ate dinner as a family.
My bedroom lights turn on with a silent flicker as I cross the threshold. Turning to a keypad on the wall, I punch a button and the door locks behind me with a barely audible click. I quickly change into sweats and slide the VRR device out from under my bed. The silver visor resembles oversized sunglasses, the only difference being the tiny electrodes that latch onto the forehead.
I load the tiny disc into the reader slot, sit back into the buttery, soft leather recliner, and put on the visor. After a tiny pinch from the VRR’s implants, I’m plugged in. My bedroom fades away until I’m surrounded by a white menu screen.
The AI sits behind a sleek, ebony desk that floats eerily in the stark white room. Her dark hair is twisted into an efficient bun and a communicator sits on her head. She smiles with perfect, white teeth.
“Welcome back, Mr. Scole,” she declares in a sultry voice.
“Hi, Vicki.”
She taps expertly manicured fingernails on a flat screen housed within the desk, sliding images back and forth. “Will you be reading your latest installment?” she inquires solicitously.
“Yes.” I walk soundlessly across the room and take a seat in an overstuffed, antique chair across from her. Instead of the sweats I wore when I plugged in, I’m wearing grungy black pants with heavy buckled boots and a nubby grey sweater that covers my arms and wraps around my hands, where only my fingers show.
When you’re inside a VRR, everything you visualize is perception. There’s no mirror, so I don’t know how different I look, but the fringe of black hair that always seems to fall in my eyes is still there.
“Download is now complete,” Vicki announces. “You may speak a command when ready.”
“Play.”
You can order Catching Ivy HERE