Swallowed resentment, a bitter sweet sense of humor, the evolution of three different generations, life and death are closely mixed up in Arno Geiger’s masterpiece that takes place in Vienna, Austria.

The book is puzzled into numerous parts, that go from 1938, tragic date of Hitler’s Anschluss to 2001. It all begins when Philipp Erlach inherits his grandparents’ house. Suddenly, as he decides to renovate his house and to get rid of some of its furniture, Philipp suddenly realizes that we live with the dead…some ghosts of the past seem to haunt his past and some closet skeletons seem to escape from his mind. The beauty of the book is that you will wander through the time- there seems to be no borders between present, past and future. You will meet sensitive and rough characters. The grandparents’ generations face a difficult political time… you’ll be invited to share some parts of Richard and Alma daily life…you’ll go through their life dramas, the loss of their kids, Otto and Ingrid. While Richard is opposed to nazism, Peter ( Ingrid’s future husband) was in the Hitlerjugend .

Richard never really granted Ingrid to date Peter, who didn’t seem to be able to stand on his own feet with his business…however, Ingrid’s stubborn character always rebelled against her father’s opposition and married Richard.

Despite the fact Richard never liked his step son, the couple’s kids, Sissy and Philipp will remain a bridge between the generations.

I like the way Arno Geiger described the frustration between couples, including the aldulterous relationship between Philipp and Johanna. His writing talent is also revealed in the sad revelation of Richard’s dementia that seems close to Alzeimer’s illness.

Philipp’s description of the workers he employs to renovate the house is quite funny.

If you’re fluent in German or a skilled German reader ( a good level of German is required), I’d strongly advice you to read this book. It is really worth it.

Copyright© by Isabelle Esling
All Rights Reserved

Following a tough schedule of interviews, appearances and promoting, new author Donna Kshir is releasing her second book in just three months.

In April, Kshir released her first book titled, “My Life’s Fight.” Kshir told the dramatic life story of mixed martial arts fighter Mark Bailey. Kshir’s book dramatically climbed the charts on the Barnesandnoble.com website, and to date maintains a 4 1/2 star rating. Kshir is best known for her ability to paint negative images of a tough childhood, that touch and feel like reality.

In a recent interview, Kshir was asked if she was happy with the results of her first book.

Kshir said, “there was a lot left out of Mark’s book, that I thought should have been included. In the beginning, the book was double in size, but in the end there was a lot of cuts. We had several guide lines to follow due to details of circumstances beyond my control. I felt, it left several questions un-answered, but our plans are to touch on them in the next book due out later this year. But in the end, Mark and his people were happy with the final result and overall so was I.”

Kshir’s second book titled, “Dear Diary- Oh Mother” is the first of a six book fictional series. The series is based on a elderly woman named Jade and her life experiences.

As an elderly Jade looks back on her life, she relives a lifetime of verbal abuse, regret and pain caused by her stepmother, Alice. Jade struggles with the tough decision to find forgiveness or go to her grave with hate in her heart. The end may just surprise you.

Kshir stated, “I am very excited about this book. I’m not telling anyone’s story, it’s my own creation of characters. I can’t wait for my friends and family to read it.”

Excerpt from Dear Diary- Oh Mother: “The worst day of my life should have been the day my mother died, but it wasn’t. I loved Mother because she was my mother, and I was taught to love and respect her. Mother wasn’t my birth mother; she was my stepmother. No one ever told me she was my stepmother. I accidentally found out when I was ten.

“While growing up, all of us children had daily chores. We had to do our chores immediately after school, and we had to finish them before we could go outside and play with our friends. One of my chores was to do the laundry. Once, while I was putting socks in my dad’s dresser drawer, I found an envelope of black-and-white photographs. I was curious, so I looked through them.

“I saw my dad with a woman who wasn’t my mom. She was cradling a baby and my dad had his arms around her. From the surroundings, I could see the photographs were taken in a hospital. I flipped the photograph over. On the back, someone had written in black ink, ”Chester, Elizabeth, and Jade. October 17, 1940.” That’s my birthday.

“I stood in shock. I was frozen in time. For the first time in my life, I was speechless. I tried to speak, but the words wouldn’t come out. I couldn’t get the thought of this woman out of my mind. My mind raced. Who was she? Who is this woman, and why is she with my dad? Why does my dad have photographs of her? Am I that baby?”

Kshir’s book is available online at barnesandnoble.com, amazon.com, target.com and wheatmark.com.

Bailey’s turbulant and violent childhood later turned into an adulthood plagued by drinking, crime, and more violence, ultimately leading to prison. Kshir tells the story of the life Bailey lived before he found God, and how he turned his life around to become a MMA world champion fighter.

Bailey is well known in the ring, as he participated in over three hundred fights, held the World Fighting Championship title twenty-seven times, is a five-time shoot fighter of the year and has won over five hundred and fifty grappling fights. Kshir adds, “Bailey’s greatest honor was being a 2007 MMA Hall of Fame inductee.”

As revealed by Bailey on his myspace, for each book purchased a portion of the book sales will go towards domestic violence to help stop women and child from being abused. To help fight the fight “My Life’s Fight as told to Donna Kshir” is currently available online at amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com, and target.com.

You can read her King Mathers article here.

This nice, young woman had entered a writing competition. Her writing sample has been posted on the following website.

Donna Kshir is a gifted and creative writer. If you want to help her getting noticed as a writer, please vote for her.
Thank You.

In her confession to her diary, Donna Kshir exposes a heartbreaking problem many women can relate to. Once in a happy relationship with Ryan, a man she deeply loved and still loves, a young woman pours her heart out while exposing her inner feelings in her diary.

Ryan used to be a loving person and probably an incredible lover too who deeply loved his partner. Time passing by, things changed. Ryan let the greed for money change his heart and corrupt his soul. The greedier you are, the angrier you get, because material possessions can’t bring you happiness and inner satisfactions.

Is love blind? Do women idealize the person they love? Certainly, yes.

Women in love always find sweet excuses in order to defend the person they love. Even heartbroken and rejected by their beloved one, they also refuse to envision the change of character that may have happened with their boyfriend or husband.

I have been there too and I perfectly understand it from a woman’s psychological point of view. We are the most likely to blame ourselves for his faults and misbehaviors. Even verbal and physical abuse won’t discourage them from defending a man who obviously has no excuses at his active.

Donna Kshir has a refreshing writing style that offers the reader some interesting perspective about a woman’s introspection about her own mistakes. She manages to captivate her readership with her sense of realness that is reflected through her words.

Copyright©2006 by Isabelle Esling
All Rights Reserved

Check out her sample writing and judge by yourself:

« Dear Diary–Confessions. page 1 Dear Diary, He’s late again. In some ways it’s almost normal. I know what to expect from him. In the beginning Ryan was a good man, a good person. We were so young, so much in love. We had so many plans, goals and most of all dreams. Over the years, money has changed Ryan. The more money he made, the more he changed. At times, I felt like he was a stranger. It’s almost like, I didn’t know him anymore. My problem was I loved him. I loved him so very much. I believed in him, trusted in him. Whether he was right or wrong, I stood by his side. It was partly my fault, I made excuses for him. When he blamed our problems on everything around us and everyone in our lives, for him changing. I blamed myself and allowed him to separate us from everyone and everything in our lives, that we ever knew. As the months went by and things didn’t get any better, I again blamed myself. I even blamed myself when he started abusing me. I blamed myself, I never blamed him, that too was my fault. He was right and I was wrong. In some silly way I thought, I must had done something to make him mad enough to hurt me. If I could only change, to be what he wanted me to be. If I could somehow be perfect, he’d love me again. If I could only make him see me and love me, like he did in the beginning. Things in our life would get back to normal, whatever normal is. It didn’t matter what I said or what I did to change myself. It didn’t change his feelings towards me. It only made him more angry and more violent. I knew in my heart, that I had been a good wife and a good person. I had been faithful throughout my marriage. I began to realize the problem didn’t lie with me, it was with him. He wasn’t the same person I fell in love with, he wasn’t even the same person I married. Years and money had made him cold and hard, I didn’t know him anymore. He was no longer the fun loving man, I once knew. »

Don’t copy this sample writing without my permission. It is subject to copyright © by the author. Thank you.

Donna Kshir

Everyone has a dream and sometimes dreams do come true. Being a writer and coming from a writers point of view it is hard to get noticed. I recently met a young, talented aspiring writer named Donna Kshir (Shear). Donna recently sent me a sample page of one of her fictional short stories titled Dear Diary.

I will give it a review very soon…stay tuned, folks:)

-Jason Crane, the Canadian writer, whose book Nucleus Metropolis I have reviewed a while ago, sent me another novel of his…I will be working on a review soon…

-Curtis Young, Dr Dre’s son, is determined to keep the legacy alive and is currently working on a mixtape. I will try to review a few tracks for you…

So stay tuned, folks, there are lots of interesting themes to come:)

Jason Crane is a Canadian writer. He was born in Hamilton, Ontario. He then moved to Vancouver, BC six years ago. Jason Crane does some editing work for Chris Walter of GFY Press in Vancouver. One of his poems will be published in the December issue of Forever Underground Magazine.

Jason is no stranger to the world of the music industry. He played in punk bands in Ontario, Life Like Jesus, Loser, Liquid Butterfly, Cheese Grater, just to name a few.

What the reader should know about Jason Crane is that this author has all qualities needed that make a good writer: an original and descriptive style combined with great suspense. Jason makes you feel and sent the atmosphere of the places he invites you in.
Ready for a further exploration of Jason Crane’s story? Ok, let’s go.

Nucleus Metropolis

Rock Bottom

While introducing you into Michael’s dirty apartment that is located in one of the worst Canadian neighborhoods, Jason Crane offers his readers some insight about the human condition.
Michael belongs to the poor working classes. He lives in one of the dirtiest, unfurnished apartments you could imagine. Dust, cockroaches, mildew, cobwebs, insects belong to the dirty and bad smelling landscape. Besides his sleeping bag and his eating utensils, Michael is totally deprived of material possessions.

Michael works overtime hours for a minimum wage job as a dishwasher. He fully hates his harsh and monotonous job, as well as his boss.

When you’re a poor blue collar worker, it is difficult to leave a world of poverty and misery. People who have already been through harsh situation might feel some sympathy for Jason’s hero. Overcrowded and bad smelling trains are part of the daily stressful situations. Disgusted by the combination of dirty sweat, piss and shit smells, Michael observes people and thinks about the human condition, over and over again.

Meeting Debbie at the club

When you belong to the poorest working classes and you really hate your job, when you feel there is no kind of escape from your misery, you try to find a way to get rid of your spleen. Michael wants to have a good time at a club called the Circus. Not necessarily sexual pleasure, but sipping on several beers and forgetting about his condition for a couple of hours.

Unfortunately, some encounters with people can be fatal to us. While he is about to leave the club, Michael suddenly notices a beautiful girl on the dance floor.
Debbie is a prostitute and a heroin addict. After spending a good time at the club, Debbie asks Michael to be her escort for the rest of the night. She asks him to come with her to a friends’ place. Michael accepts, because he is afraid never to see her again. Such beautiful girls don’t cross his road on a daily basis.
As they approach Debbie’s friend’s desolate and smelly place.

Drugs

« Drugs…Let them drugs control your body…let pills take control of your soul… let’s get high… » Bizarre, Drugs/ DJ PDog The First Metacarpal

The prostitute is looking for some pedophile guy called Slim…she keeps knocking at the door in an enraged effort to get this damn door opened. Since the beginning, Michael has a strange feeling about this disgusting environment. After multiple efforts from Debbie’s side, the door gets unlocked slowly…Slim, some strange muscled, reptile alike man appears at the door, takes the prostitute by the hair, pulls her into the apartment and leaves a speechless Michael at the door. Michael feels insecure in a stinky and unknown neighborhood…

The Slim reopens the door and lets Michael in. As he walks in, Michaels sees Debbie taking an heroine trip, the needle lying on the floor. The apartment could be described as the « addict’s paradise »: pills and white powder are everywhere. Dildos and group sex seem to be part of the game too.

Michael starts negotiating the price of a sexual act with his favorite prostitute.
After enjoying intercourse and slowly realizing the consequences of unprotected sex in this particular unsafe environment, Michael freaks out.

After introducing Michael to several of his fellow addicts, Slim reaches out a bag of cocaine and invites his new « friend » to take some of the powdery white substance. As the needle reaches his vein, Michael is far away, ready for a colorful and intense trip.

The author describes several of Michael’s trips with an amazing descriptive ability. He manages to bring you into an unfamiliar and strange atmosphere. The change of perception and feelings is progressive and Jason Crane transports you from one level to another, traveling through Michael’s brain. While the first trip is quite reassuring, the following trips turn into nightmares and reality is mixed up with a colorful fantasy world.

The drama starts when Michael discovers through his very confused mind that Debbie seems to be lifeless. While trying to share his concern with Slim, the evil pedophile puts him deeper into the world of drugs and Michael goes on tripping…again…

Slim having intercourse with Debbie’s cold dead body is a quite scary scene.

When he eventually emerges from his nightmare trip, Michael realizes that a Debbie’s dead body lies next to him…he is looking for an escape from this situation, but Slim catches him and there we go again: he stick another needle into Michael’s arm who sadly surrenders…

It is up to the reader to guess the end of the story.

A satire of the Canadian society

Not only does Jason Crane describe the world of Canadian neighborhoods and blue collar classes with an amazing precision, he also appeals to his readers’ intelligence and raises some philosophical questions like the meaning of life, God’s existence, human nature and points out the evil and vicious sides of a society of consumption

Jason Crane uses words like a painter draws colorful pictures. Each sentence describes places with an amazing sense of realness and adds some olfactive sensations to the dirty environment he invites his readers in.

If you are familiar with ghetto tales, I highly recommend you Jason Crane’s Nucleus Metropolis. It is the work of a talented writer who manages to captivate his reader from the beginning to the end.

You will be able to order Nucleus Metropolis here.