In My Mailbox (#8)

In My Mailbox is a weekly meme hosted by Kristi, The Story Siren.  This meme was began so we could all share what books we received the previous week ... whether it was in the mail, from the library or what we bought at a store.

Zan-Gah: A Prehistoric Adventure by Allan Richard Shickman - Pressed by love for his brother and a bad conscience, the hero undertakes a quest which leads to captivity, conflict, love, and triumph.  In three years, Zan-Gah passes from an uncertain boyhood to a tried and proven manhood and a role of leadership among his people.

Zan-Gah and the Beautiful Country by Allan Richard Shickman - The volcanic turbulence that shakes Dael's mind carries him to vicious extremes.  Is is Zan's task to calm his brother and lead him away from thoughts both destructive and self-destructive.  But even the paradise of the Beautiful Country will not erase them.

The Big Show Stopper by Ken Dalton - Brady Blackstone, America's richest and favorite concert performer, dies in a tragic accident while Bear and Flo, along with thousands of northern Nevada's music lovers, look on in horror.

However, before Bear can maneuver Flo back to their apartment to complete her birthday celebration, they stumble across a clue that makes them question if Brady's death was an accident.

In The Big Show Stopper, Pinky, a sleazy but successful defence attorney, and Bear, a street-wise ex bartender, mix madness with mayhem as you meet Brady's less than grieving widow - a trigger-happy Carson City cop named Ice Conner - travel in first-class luxury with Pinky as he follows a questionable lead to an exotic location and suffer with Flo in Bear's pick up while they drive to another of America's armpit locations where they discover Brady Blackstone's killer.

Borneo Tom, In Story and Sketch: Love, Travel and Jungle Family in Tropical Asia by Tom McLaughlin - A different kind of book? Yup!  I'm science teacher Tom McLaughlin who left the States and moved to Malaysian Borneo, traveled, fell in love, married a local girl, and, despite a vasectomy, is now the proud father of a son.  But the book is much more than that. My biology interests have been reflected in stories about pandas, orangutans and naturalist Alfred Wallace.

The culture of the Malay world is sensitively portrayed in parts about a reunion with my Peace Corps family of years ago and my courting and subsequent village marriage.  Personal family relations inform about travel with my youngest daughter to the hinterlands, reunification with my oldest daughter after a bitter divorce and our travels together. The girls even went  to Bali with us on my honeymoon!

The book is humorously yet sensitively written as Suriani (my wife) and I track orangutans, swim with jellyfish and walk the rim of a volcano. I even dance naked in an earthquake!

To add to the merriment, each section is illustrated by a caricature sketch of our adventures. Drawn by Borneo artist, Niki, they add poignancy and humor.

Happy Reading! =)