Egyptian Lovers gathers three connected novellas in which desire reaches across death, reincarnation, and the supernatural histories buried beneath Egypt’s desert sands. Isabella Jordan links each romance to a different mystery—an archaeologist reunited with an immortal lover, a descendant investigating an eighty-year-old disappearance, and a reluctant traveler summoned by a sphinx through her dreams. The featured excerpt returns to Abydos in 1926, where an expedition leader’s sudden death and a strangely intimate desert wind signal that Emma Bonham has entered a story far older and more dangerous than the excavation she expected.

Dark Paranormal Romance

Date Published: July 31, 2026

Publisher: Changeling Press

Series: Egyptian Lover, Book 4

Format: Box Set

Edition: Second Edition

In the desert sands of Egypt, three lovers battle a maniacal curse. Only their love can save them.

Half vampire, half sphinx, Kahma roams the deserts of Egypt, praying for death -- until his lost love returns, reincarnated as archeologist Emma Bonham. But to fulfill the passion Kahma offers, Emma must part with her life.

Fascinated by the tale of Emma Bonham’s disappearance some eighty years ago, Carson Bonham comes to Egypt to unravel the mystery. But the bloody carnage of Karnak’s history has a way of repeating itself. The struggle to keep Carson alive will be a death defying act for the powerful vampire Sopdet.

Alexis Peters has no intention of returning to Egypt, until a mysterious dream lover promises endless pleasure if she will just return to him. Little does Alexis know she’s bound to her Egyptian savior, the legendary sphinx, Amenhotep…

Publisher's Note: Egyptian Lovers Box Set contains the previously released novellas Kahma, Sopdet, and Ardeth & Amenhotep.

Egyptian Lovers offers more than a single supernatural pairing. Its three-novella structure lets the central curse unfold across separate relationships, time periods, and forms of otherworldly connection. Reincarnation drives Kahma and Emma’s reunion, a family mystery draws Carson into Sopdet’s violent past, and a dream summons Alexis back toward Amenhotep. That changing perspective gives the collection room to examine how an ancient bond can appear as memory, investigation, temptation, or fate.

The historical setting also matters. The excerpt from Kahma opens at an Abydos expedition in November 1926, placing Emma’s first encounter with the supernatural amid archaeological ambition, isolation, and the practical dangers of desert travel. The result is an explicitly adult paranormal romance in which erotic attraction, expedition suspense, vampires, sphinx mythology, and a recurring threat are tightly intertwined.

This collection is best suited to adult romance readers who prefer supernatural relationships shaped by danger, sacrifice, and long histories rather than lighthearted courtship. The combination of vampires, sphinx mythology, reincarnated lovers, archaeological settings, multiple-partner themes, and explicit intimacy gives the series a distinct identity.

It may also appeal to those who enjoy connected novellas that can shift protagonists while continuing a larger mystery. The three stories approach the Egyptian Lover world from different angles, making the box set especially relevant to readers who like seeing one curse—and its consequences—develop across several romances.

Isabella Jordan is the alter ego of an otherwise stressed out web designer, programmer, and internet junkie. When she's not trying to perfect her own personal caffeine IV drip, she enjoys spending time with her family, doing volunteer work, and writing. She loves creating new stories of all kinds and chatting with readers and friends.

Isabella would love to hear from her readers!

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Egyptian Lovers is built around love that refuses to remain buried. Its immortals do not offer simple escape from death; their bonds demand return, recognition, and, in Kahma’s case, a devastating choice. By collecting the three previously released novellas in one volume, this edition allows the curse, mythology, and repeated collisions between past and present to be read as a continuous design.

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Uprising places a young woman between the privileges of her birth and the people suffering under her father’s policies. Set against the unrest of England in 1381, J.E. Rizzo’s novel follows Blanche Fitzjohn as an arranged marriage, an approaching revolt, and heightened senses she cannot fully explain force her to decide where her loyalties belong.

Uprising

J.E. Rizzo

Book One of the Fitzjohn Duology

Genre: Historical Fiction with Speculative and Romantic Elements

Date Published: September 1, 2026

Publisher: Literary Wanderlust

England, 1381 AD: Blanche Fitzjohn is an outcast in her small coastal village. Not only is she the illegitimate daughter of John of Gaunt, the man responsible for her neighbors’ over-taxation, but she possesses strange abilities: hearing sound from miles away and smelling people’s emotions.

She takes solace in her studies with the local wisewoman and in her friendship with Geoff, a groom at the local manor. Until the day Henry of Lancaster, Blanche’s half-brother, brings her news of an arranged marriage to Sir Thomas Prescott, Constable of the Tower of London. Although she smells cruelty on him, Blanche agrees to marry Thomas in the hopes that her influence may help better the lives of Geoff and all England’s villeins.

But soon, the peasants’ discontent turns to revolt. Though her heart is of the people, Blanche’s nobility makes her an enemy to the rebels. To save herself and Henry from the executioner’s ax, Blanche must use every power at her disposal, even those she once considered a curse.

Blanche’s position gives the political conflict an unusually personal shape. She is connected by blood to John of Gaunt and Henry of Lancaster, yet her friendships, sympathies, and daily life bind her to the villeins burdened by noble rule. The coming revolt therefore threatens her from both directions: the ruling class can use her as a political asset, while the rebels may judge her by the family name she cannot escape.

Her heightened hearing and ability to detect emotions through scent add a speculative dimension without removing the story from its medieval setting. Those senses expose cruelty that others can conceal, but they also overwhelm Blanche and mark her as different. Combined with an arranged marriage to a man she already distrusts, they turn questions of consent, duty, and self-preservation into central parts of the historical struggle.

Uprising is well matched to readers who enjoy historical fiction shaped by class conflict, contested loyalties, and women attempting to exercise agency within rigid social systems. The 1381 setting and Blanche’s connection to both the nobility and the villeins will particularly interest those drawn to stories that examine major political events through an intimate, character-centered perspective.

The novel should also appeal to readers comfortable with speculative abilities woven into a recognizable historical world. Blanche’s sensory gifts influence how she understands danger, attraction, and deception, while her relationship with Geoff introduces a romantic conflict divided by rank as sharply as the country itself.

J.E. Rizzo is a life-long history fanatic and writer of historical fiction, and her work can be found in Vanity Fair, The Boston Globe, The Guardian, The Tudor Times, Tudor Life Magazine, Scary Mommy, and Ultrarunning Magazine. Rizzo won Manuscript Academy’s Agent Choice Award in 2024, and her article Past and Precedence: Abortion Law in the Middle Ages and Its Use to Overturn Roe v. Wade won History Inquiry’s Medieval History Writing Challenge.

By day, Rizzo works in Human Resources—a field offering more than ample opportunity to observe the follies and fancies of humankind. Before her career in HR, Rizzo worked as an opera singer, a professional baker, and a dog walker. These days, when not writing she can be found running ultramarathons through the forests and mountains of New England, knitting, reading, sewing, baking, or performing any number of (what some might call) old-lady hobbies. She also keeps busing caring for her two children and forty-seven houseplants, making her husband carry heavy things and cook her gourmet meals, and rehabilitating her rescue dog and semi-feral ginger cat.

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Blanche’s greatest danger may not be choosing the wrong side, but discovering that neither side fully accepts her. Noble blood makes her suspect among the rebels, while illegitimacy and unusual abilities leave her vulnerable within the world of privilege. Her proposed marriage turns that divided identity into a binding political decision just as England’s social order begins to fracture.

The chapter excerpt sharpens that conflict by showing what duty would cost Blanche personally. Her closeness with Geoff, her desire for her father’s approval, and her awareness that consent is still hers to give pull her in incompatible directions. With the Peasants’ Revolt approaching and the first half of the Fitzjohn Duology opening on September 1, Uprising promises a story in which private choices carry consequences far beyond one household.

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A missing noblewoman, whispers of an illicit auction, and a vengeful enemy force Adrian Croft to confront two dangers at once in A Deadly Inferno Consumes. The sixth House of Croft mystery places its investigation inside London’s criminal underworld while raising the personal stakes for Adrian and Samantha, whose newborn daughter gives them more to protect—and more that can be used against them.

A Deadly Inferno Consumes

Sophie Barnes

House of Croft, Book 6

Genre: Murder Mystery Romance

Date Published: July 28, 2026

A chilling disappearance, a lethal enemy, and a family pushed to the brink…

When the Duke of Wrengate’s sister vanishes without a trace, suspicion swirls. Did she flee to escape a scandalous secret…or has she been abducted? Whispers lead to a treacherous underworld, where rumors of an illicit auction suggest a far more sinister fate: a woman trapped, drugged, and enslaved. Determined to save her, Adrian Croft and his valet, Murry, plunge into London’s darkest corners.

But Finn O’Leary, the Irishman bent on revenge, remains a threat that presents a difficult choice for Adrian: save Wrengate's sister or protect his family. With the recent birth of his daughter, he and his wife, Samantha, have more to lose than ever before. And as danger closes in, they must fight with everything they have. Not only for justice, but for their very survival.

A Deadly Inferno Consumes binds its mystery to a painful conflict of loyalties. Adrian cannot pursue the missing woman without risking the wife and infant daughter who now depend on him, yet abandoning the investigation could condemn another family to an unthinkable loss. That pressure gives the search a personal urgency beyond solving a disappearance.

The suspected auction also shifts the investigation away from drawing rooms and respectable society into a criminal network built on secrecy, coercion, and exploitation. Murry’s presence beside Adrian adds another layer to the inquiry, while Finn O’Leary’s continuing pursuit ensures that the danger is never limited to a single case. For readers following the House of Croft series, this installment brings an established enemy into direct conflict with Adrian’s changed life as a husband and father.

This release is suited to readers who prefer historical romance with an active mystery plot, recurring adversaries, and consequences that extend beyond the central couple. The search through London’s darker corners will appeal to those drawn to investigations involving hidden criminal enterprises, while Adrian’s impossible choice gives the story particular weight for readers invested in family loyalty and protective heroes.

Established House of Croft readers will find the strongest connection here, especially those following Adrian, Samantha, Murry, and the unresolved threat posed by Finn O’Leary. Newcomers interested in the premise can still expect a blend of danger, marital devotion, and historical suspense, though the continuing relationships and conflict make this sixth installment especially meaningful within the larger series.

USA TODAY bestselling author Sophie Barnes writes historical romance novels in which the characters break away from social expectations in their quest for happiness and love. Having written for Avon, an imprint of Harper Collins, her books have been published internationally in eight languages. With a fondness for travel, Sophie has lived in six countries, on three continents, and speaks English, Danish, French, Spanish, and Romanian with varying degrees of fluency. Ever the romantic, she married the same man three times—in three different countries and in three different dresses.

When she’s not busy dreaming up her next swoon worthy romance novel, Sophie enjoys spending time with her family, practicing yoga, baking, gardening, watching romantic comedies and, of course, reading.

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The most compelling element of A Deadly Inferno Consumes is the cost attached to every possible decision. Saving Wrengate’s sister may expose Adrian’s own family to Finn O’Leary, but retreat would leave a vulnerable woman in the hands of men who view her as property. That moral pressure, combined with the Crofts’ new responsibilities as parents, gives this release a sharper emotional edge than a mystery built around clues alone.

Sophie Barnes brings the House of Croft series to a dangerous crossroads on its July 28 release date. Readers who have followed Adrian and Samantha will see how marriage and parenthood have altered the risks they are willing to take—without weakening their determination to confront cruelty and pursue justice.

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St. Augusta College presents an immaculate union of art, theology, and devotion, but the order behind its iron gates begins to fracture when a troubled artist encounters the campus’s new priest. In Sacred Salvation, Casia Pickering brings religious conviction, creative compulsion, paranormal danger, and forbidden attraction into the same shadowed space. Father Sebastian Hardwicke may be the one person capable of quieting what is growing inside Emilia Trent, yet helping her could require him to confront the parts of St. Augusta—and himself—that piety has kept concealed.

Sacred Salvation

Part of Sins of the Sacred

Author: Casia Pickering

Genre: Dark Priest Romance

Father Sebastian has found a home in St. Augusta College. 

But when that home is threatened by a student, questions arise in his own beliefs. 

St. Augusta College is known for weaving the Arts with Theology. Within its iron gates lies a prestigious education that can drive a person mad. 

Father Sebastian Hardwicke is new to the position. Not once has his religious fervor been tested until he is sent to the cathedral on St. Augusta's campus. The school is not what he expected. Hymns and prayers echo within the cathedral, and the faculty are pious and helpful. Even the students held a reverence he had only experienced in seminary. On the outside, it is perfect. 

But a mask is still a mask, no matter how enticing. 

Emilia Trent has two goals in life: to convey true emotion into her art and to quiet the voices. But the voices have gotten louder, screaming and demanding that she keep painting. There is no freedom in her expression. With the new priest coming to campus, her urges grow to a point where she no longer knows who she is. There is an almost paranormal force growing inside her. 

There is only one person capable of holding the demon at bay- Father Sebastian Hardwicke. But will he choose to face the evil head-on or fall into the deep embrace of temptation? 

Part of Sins of the Sacred, a dark priest romance shared world series featuring eleven amazing authors.

St. Augusta’s polished religious culture gives the story a setting where appearances carry as much danger as the supernatural force troubling Emilia. Her paintings are not simply an artistic ambition; they are tied to voices that erode her sense of control, making creativity both refuge and threat. Sebastian’s role adds a second pressure point because the person best positioned to help her must weigh compassion against doctrine, suspicion, and temptation. That tension between belief and lived experience gives the romance a psychological and spiritual conflict that extends beyond forbidden attraction.

“I don't think there is a demon inside you,” Sebastian sighed, “that wasn't my intention-” 

“My father died when I was starting high school,” Emilia said. "He used to drive freight trucks at night. During one night, a nasty storm happened, and, well, it crashed. He was in the hospital for weeks until we couldn't keep him on life support.” 

“I'm so sorry,” Sebastian said. He looked off into the distance, as if heweres lost in his own thoughts. 

Emilia shrugged. “I've had depression ever since. My painting helps with it and so did a therapist when I had one, but it isn't because of my depression that I struggle.” 

“What is?” Sebastian asked. 

Emilia thought quietly. She glanced at Sebastian. Without the white collar pinned into his polo shirt, he'd look like any other well-dressed man. It was that and the type of shirt that seemed out of place with his jeans and glasses that he was constantly pushing back up the bridge of his nose. She wondered what made him choose the life he chose. 

Was he a believer, or was it pushed onto him by people around him? She remembered an argument she had with her mother about maybe joining the military to help pay for college. That was before the art contest and scholarship that got her into St. Augusta. As much as she stressed about being at the school, she wouldn't change her choices if she had the chance. But her knowledge about Father Arthur, Sister Rebecca, and Miranda would be for Sebastian. It may not be her responsibility, but it was something Emilia didn't want on her conscience. 

“I'd rather not talk about it,” she finally decided, shaking her head, “no offense, but I doubt you'd take my life experiences into consideration if I told you.” 

“What do you mean?” Sebastian's eyes furrowed in confusion. 

“Imagine being abused or having a bad relationship with a friend or something,” Emilia said, “can you do that?” 

Sebastian’s expression went still. It was as if he were seeing something from his past. A pang of guilt hit Emilia’s chest. If she had known he might’ve experienced something like what she was suggesting, she might not have said that. 

“Okay,” Sebastian whispered, “go on.” 

Emilia nodded. “Let’s say you told someone about that experience, but that person you told didn’t believe you because the person who abused you or the friend who was awful hasn’t shown that side of themselves to that person. Can you imagine how that feels?” 

“I can.” Sebastian’s voice was raspy and hard. He worked his jaw and rolled his head from side to side. 

A squirrel jumped from headstone to headstone as birds twittered. His cheeks were bulging from the collection of nuts. The leaves rustled as another autumn breeze brushed past. Emilia looked around at the quiet beauty of it all. 

Even the voices weren’t around. Emilia looked around, this time paying attention to every small detail. There was no fog or shadows. The only brightness that held her attention, aside from the slowly dying sun, was Sebastian. It was as if the cemetery was an oasis away from whatever plagued the campus. 

“That’s why I’m not ready to say anything,” Emilia said. "I don’t know if you’d believe me or not, but it’s not worth saying if we end up arguing.”

The Sins of the Sacred dark romance shared world series brings together standalone stories by multiple authors, each exploring the collision of faith and forbidden desire within religious settings. From medieval abbeys and dissolution-era monasteries to modern churches and theological colleges, priests, nuns, exorcists, and other religious figures face temptations that challenge their sacred vows. The series spans various time periods, incorporating paranormal elements including demon possession, angelic intervention, and exorcism that intensify conflicts between duty and desire. 

With diverse pairings including M/F, MM, F/F/F, and MFM configurations, each book delivers explicit romantic content while exploring themes of religious trauma, repression, and the struggle between devotion and forbidden longing. The series features omegaverse dynamics, second chance romance, and enemies-to-lovers tropes alongside darker explorations of possession, crisis of faith, and the psychological impact of religious structures. Designed for readers seeking taboo romance that examines the tension between sacred vows and human desire in emotionally complex narratives.

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Sacred Salvation is aimed at dark-romance readers comfortable with taboo relationships, religious conflict, explicit content, and paranormal menace. Its theological-college setting will particularly suit those who enjoy institutional secrets and communities whose polished surfaces conceal coercion or corruption. Emilia’s struggle with grief, depression, artistic compulsion, and the fear of not being believed also gives the story an emotional intensity likely to resonate with readers who prefer vulnerable characters confronting both supernatural and human threats.

Even though she claims she can write anything, the biography remains to be Casia’s arch-nemesis. Despite this, Casia has used her Writing degree to craft stories in over ten anthologies, maintained a book blog for more than a decade, and has begun to write novels. A multi-genre author, Casia Pickering, is incapable of keeping to one thing. Every story has a piece of her personality that she treasures and shares with her readers. She currently lives in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia with her biggest supporter and helper, her son, affectionately known as Bug. Previous works are under the name, Casia Courtier.

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The central danger in Sacred Salvation is not limited to a possible demon or a forbidden relationship. Emilia needs someone willing to believe what St. Augusta’s respectable exterior makes easy to dismiss, while Sebastian must decide how much of his faith depends on obedience and how much demands that he act. Their connection forms at the point where testimony, temptation, and spiritual authority collide, giving this dark romance a conflict rooted in trust as much as desire. 

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Rathuun: King of the Prairie places a buffalo—not a cowboy, scout, or settler—at the center of a western shaped by violent change. Rathuun survives the grizzly attack that kills his twin, only to grow into the animal every hunter wants to claim as wagons, telegraph lines, railroads, and rifles transform the plains around him. By giving its most dangerous frontier to the creature being pursued, David Fitz-Gerald approaches familiar western history from a strikingly different direction.

Rathuun: King of the Prairie
Author: David Fitz-Gerald

Frontier & Pioneer Western Fiction; US Historical Fiction; Action/Adventure

Date Published: March 20, 2026

With all the swagger of a classic western, a legendary buffalo claims his rightful place among the genre's most iconic heroes. 

Meet Rathuun. Born in an idyllic canyon, tragedy strikes on his first day. A grizzly bear scatters the herd, devours his twin, and leaves him to shiver and die. But the buffalo calf with a white spot on his chin survives. 

The plains are changing fast. Wagons roll west in endless streams. Telegraph wires stretch across the horizon. Locomotives scream down polished rails, slicing through the earth. Extinction seems imminent when everyone wants to kill the biggest buffalo on the prairie. 

Native people shoot arrows and drive herds over cliffs. Hide hunters slaughter millions. An obsessed buffalo assassin is determined to wipe them all out and change the world forever. There's an army of barking rifles, and they're all pointed at Rathuun. 

Will the hunters take Rathuun's head and leave his carcass to rot on the prairie? 

This sweeping epic thunders across the American West, taking listeners to unforgettable western landmarks. If you like classic westerns, thrilling action, and high-stakes historical adventures, grab your copy by the horns.

Welcome to the prairie!

Rathuun’s perspective changes the scale of the traditional western. Telegraph wires, locomotives, wagon traffic, and rifles are not merely signs of expansion here; they are forces closing in on a living creature whose survival has become inseparable from the fate of the prairie itself. The combination of an animal protagonist, a relentless pursuit, and a landscape undergoing permanent transformation gives the novel a distinctive tension. Its classic-western swagger remains intact, but the largest presence on the plains is also the one with the most to lose.

This novel is suited to western readers interested in the land and its wildlife as much as its human conflicts. The buffalo-centered viewpoint should also appeal to those who value survival stories, pursuit narratives, and historical fiction that examines westward expansion through its consequences. Readers drawn to large-scale action, changing frontier landscapes, and protagonists forced to endure overwhelming odds will find Rathuun’s struggle especially compelling.

David Fitz-Gerald writes frontier and pioneer western fiction from the wilds of western Vermont—about as far west as you can get without slipping into New York. 

Though he’s never wrangled beeves to market, Dave was a top hand on his grandfather’s dude ranch in the Adirondack Mountains… before he turned ten. He’s lived most of his life on dirt roads. Whenever he gets the chance, he travels west to recharge his spirit on the windswept prairies. 

He’s an Adirondack 46’er which means that he’s hiked to the top of every mountain in the park. In 2018, Dave completed the 1960s fitness craze by hiking 50 miles in one day. That’s one heck of a long walk, but not nearly as grueling as the iconic trails that he chases in his fiction. 

Even after all these years, Dave still has his head in the clouds like Ken from MY FRIEND FLICKA, and a quiet, self-reliant spirit like Sam from THE TRUMPET OF THE SWAN. That blend of wonder, heart, and spirit runs through the characters he portrays. His editor states he is “exceptionally good at creating real moments between characters”—and readers seem to agree. 

Dave’s breakthrough series, Ghosts Along the Oregon Trail won Chanticleer’s Grand Prize for Book Series. He’s now the author of nearly twenty novels and counting, and as long as there’s coffee in the kitchen, Dave will be plotting one adventurous story after another.

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Rathuun’s strongest hook is also its boldest choice: the legendary figure at the heart of this western is the buffalo being hunted. His fight to survive turns the advance of rails, wires, wagons, and rifles into an immediate threat rather than distant historical scenery. That shift in viewpoint gives the adventure both its momentum and its weight, inviting readers to see the changing prairie through the eyes of the creature who stands to lose it.

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Heaven’s Hope offers Maylin Cole exactly what she needs: distance from an abusive relationship, shelter for herself and her four-year-old daughter, and the possibility of beginning again. The refuge becomes more difficult to understand as its charismatic leader assigns angelic identities, controls access to the children, and recasts obedience as spiritual preparation. In Only Angels Have Blue Eyes, J. Todd Kingrea builds suspense around the moment when sanctuary begins to resemble captivity—and a mother realizes that questioning the rules may be the only way to save her child.

Only Angels Have Blue Eyes

Author: J. Todd Kingrea

Genre: Horror / Suspense

Date Published: 08-03-2026

Things are looking up for Maylin Cole and her 4-year-old daughter, Margo. Fleeing an abusive relationship, the private clinic Heaven’s Hope offers shelter and the promise of a new life. Led by the charismatic and beguiling Seraph Nakir, they learn a surprising truth: they’re actually angels who have lost their way.

Everyone has an angel name and is being prepared to ‘ascend’ when the time is right. Their angelic identities will play a significant role in aiding humanity when the world ends.

As the weeks pass, Maylin becomes accustomed to the peculiar confrontational therapy. The black curtains and bars on the windows no longer trouble her. The lack of privacy, mystifying theology, and strange rules become commonplace. She sees Margo less frequently since the children are kept in the basement.

The death of another patient awakens Maylin to dark secrets within the walls, and soon the horrifying truth about Nakir and Heaven’s Hope is revealed. Maylin must confront her insecurities, rediscover her individuality, and use her wits and resources if she hopes to save Margo and the other children.

Inspired by a true crime case, this slow-burn thriller roars to a pulse-pounding climax, reminding the reader to think independently, ask questions, and be careful who you trust.

The danger in Kingrea’s premise develops through coercion rather than immediate violence. Heaven’s Hope first appears to offer Maylin protection, but its closed environment gradually replaces safety with surveillance, dependence, and control. The clinic’s angelic language gives that manipulation a spiritual vocabulary, allowing troubling restrictions to be presented as preparation for a higher purpose.

Maylin’s relationship with Margo gives the suspense its emotional center. Every new rule becomes more threatening as access to her daughter decreases, and the separation of the children raises the stakes beyond Maylin’s own escape. Her challenge is not simply to uncover what Seraph Nakir is hiding, but to recover enough confidence in her own judgment to act against a system designed to make doubt feel like failure.

The true-crime inspiration adds another unsettling dimension. Rather than treating cult influence as an inexplicable form of evil, the story examines how charisma, isolation, invented theology, and repeated confrontation can make increasingly alarming conditions seem ordinary. That slow normalization is what gives the novel’s horror its psychological force.

Maylin stared at Nakir in disbelief. “I…I can’t do this.”

“Administer Uriel’s punishment. Now,” he replied.

Maylin looked at the man’s back as he knelt before the fireplace like a monk at an ancient altar. Then she looked back at Seraph Nakir. “No. N-no way…”

Nakir tilted his head, his dreadlocks falling to one side. He scowled at her. “The injury was against you,” he said. “So, it is only right that you be the one to dispense his punishment.”

She shook her head, eyes still wide, and thrust the poker toward Nakir.

He refused it. “You must, my daughter. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. His bruises for your bruises. Go ahead. Begin.”

“No, no—this isn’t right. It’s not—”

“Carry out the punishment!” Seraph Nakir bellowed, stepping forward to tower over her.

This novel is suited to readers drawn to psychological horror built around coercive control, cult dynamics, and closed communities. Its tension will appeal to those who prefer a gradual accumulation of disturbing details over immediate shocks, especially when ordinary routines begin to reveal how thoroughly a character’s freedom has been reduced.

Readers of domestic suspense may also connect with Maylin’s determination to protect Margo while rebuilding the independence an abusive relationship has already damaged. The book should be especially compelling for anyone interested in true-crime-inspired fiction, charismatic leaders, manufactured belief systems, and stories in which survival depends on recognizing manipulation before it becomes impossible to resist.

J. Todd Kingrea is the author of "With A Blighted Touch" and The Deiparian Saga ("The Witchfinder," "The Crimson Fathers," and "Bane of the Witch"). He has also authored two non-fiction books, two short stories, and role-playing game scenarios. When not writing, he enjoys collecting and watching movies, reading, and prowling through dusty old bookstores. He and his wife live in Galax, Virginia. 

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Only Angels Have Blue Eyes locates its most disturbing threat in the misuse of trust. Maylin arrives at Heaven’s Hope after one controlling relationship and slowly discovers that the refuge has created another, this time reinforced by communal rules, spiritual authority, and fear of losing access to her daughter.

That pattern gives the novel more than a sinister setting. It turns Maylin’s struggle to reclaim her judgment into the core of the story. Her escape depends on questioning the language she has been taught, recognizing what has been normalized around her, and choosing her own understanding of reality over the certainty offered by Seraph Nakir. For readers interested in the mechanics of manipulation as much as the danger it produces, this premise offers a particularly unsettling form of suspense.

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John Bliss begins with an uncomfortable proposition: much of what passes for personal conviction may be inherited habit, social imitation, or an assumption that has never been examined closely. The False Paradigms of Today and the Timeless Truth of Tomorrow develops that challenge through thirteen essays spanning progress, rationality, identity, science, morality, religion, history, mysticism, psychology, and philosophy. The result is a deliberately skeptical inquiry into how people construct their understanding of reality—and what might change when its foundations are reconsidered.

The False Paradigms of Today and the Timeless Truth of Tomorrow

Essays on Meaning

Author: John Bliss

Genre: Philosophy/Spirituality

Date Published: 10-01-2025

Publisher: Sketpika Press

Something’s missing in the world today, and maybe it’s been gone for centuries. The problem: most of us don’t have authentic beliefs or a clear path in life.

What do we believe? Whatever they told us to believe.

What do we do? Whatever other people are doing.

How many lies have we welcomed into our lives without having seriously analyzed them?

It’s the reason many of us feel empty inside—there’s nothing there but convenient mistruths, and at some level, we all know it. We then orient our lives based on these false beliefs, wasting our precious limited time among the living striving for goals that leave us ultimately unsatisfied.

The False Paradigms of Today and The Timeless Truth of Tomorrow by John Bliss takes a steak knife to these common delusions with 13 irreverent essays that rip and tear at the foundations of our collective worldview. Little is held sacred to Bliss.

The essays in Part 1: Your Understanding of Reality is More Fabricated Than You Think dispel our delusions one at a time, including:

• our mistaken belief in progress,
• our misplaced confidence in our own rational prowess,
• our loss of personal identity from group identification,
• our misplaced faith in science as a true representation of the world, and
• our morality: what it is and where exactly it comes from. 

After carving away these restrictive untruths, Part 2: An Exploration of Truth Across Historical, Mystical, and Philosophical Dimensions introduces a deeper understanding of humanity based on history, mysticism, psychology and philosophy. Some of the topics in Part 2 include:

• how our religions became second-rate pathways to God,
• our reliance on logic and how it warps our decision-making,
• how idealism can lead to mass murder and tyranny,
• the overriding importance of history, where we’ve been, where we are going and why,
• our immaterial connection to all people living and dead—Jung’s collective unconscious, Emerson’s Over-Soul, and Varro’s Soul of the World, and finally
• the bedrock assumption that we all got wrong. Switch this out, and everything changes.

The essays are filled with stories from history, including meetings of the apostles Paul and Peter with the Emperor Nero and Simon Magus the magician, the mystical transformation of Emmanuel Swedenborg, the nineteenth century German intellectual revolution, the establishment of three French religions worshipping not God but Reason and Humanity, the abdication of the World Teacher, and the genocide of the Tibetan culture.

The book is ideal for seekers of deeper meaning, arm-chair philosophers and historians, and those disillusioned with the emptiness of contemporary thought. Discover why your view of reality may be distorted—and how by changing the one assumption on which your entire world-view is based, everything shifts.

Bliss is not offering a conventional introduction to philosophy or a single argument developed from first page to last. His thirteen-essay structure allows him to question several pillars of contemporary thought separately, beginning with ideas about progress, reason, group identity, science, and morality before moving into history, religion, mysticism, and the nature of human connection.

The book’s distinguishing feature is the range of traditions placed in conversation with one another. Jung’s collective unconscious appears alongside Emerson’s Over-Soul and Varro’s Soul of the World, while historical episodes involving religious movements, intellectual revolutions, and political idealism become evidence in a broader examination of belief. That combination may be especially valuable to readers who prefer philosophical inquiry grounded in historical examples rather than abstract argument alone.

Its skeptical stance also matters. Bliss directs his scrutiny toward accepted authorities, collective assumptions, and even the reliability of individual understanding. Readers willing to encounter arguments that may challenge their own intellectual loyalties will find substantial material here for reflection, disagreement, and further investigation. 

This collection is suited to independent thinkers who enjoy testing inherited assumptions rather than accepting them at face value. Its subjects will speak particularly strongly to armchair philosophers, intellectually curious history readers, spiritual seekers dissatisfied with institutional answers, and readers interested in the points where psychology, mysticism, religion, and metaphysics overlap.

Those who appreciate assertive essayists may also respond to Bliss’s irreverent approach. The book is designed for readers comfortable with intellectual friction—people who regard disagreement as part of the reading experience and who are prepared to examine not only society’s prevailing ideas, but the beliefs organizing their own lives. 

John Bliss is a writer and thinker fixated on unraveling the mystery of our lives. He is at heart a skeptic, as very few authorities have provided answers that are believable. He distrusts groups of all kinds, as they are no smarter than individuals, who don't know half as much as they think they do. He even distrusts himself, as no human can understand reality.

Some of his major accomplishments include being kicked out of the National Honor Society and the CEO Round Table. He graduated with a bachelor's in History, and a masters degree in mechanical engineering. He founded and grew an engineering company and sold it after 25 years. And of course, he completed his book, The False Paradigms of Today and the Timeless Truth of Tomorrow, after 13 years of research, writing, and rewriting.

To this day, he continues to ask the big questions: Who are we? What’s truly important? How should we live our lives? On most days he thinks he has them figured out.

When he is not writing, he cuts wood and digs ditches. Bliss remains at large somewhere in the mountains of California. 

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The False Paradigms of Today and the Timeless Truth of Tomorrow asks its audience to become active participants rather than passive recipients. Bliss’s subjects are expansive, but the central concern is personal: which beliefs have been deliberately chosen, which have been absorbed without examination, and what consequences follow from building a life around them?

The collection’s historical range and unapologetically skeptical voice make it a fitting choice for readers who value books as instruments of inquiry. Agreement is not required for the essays to do their work. Their deeper invitation is to identify the assumptions beneath a worldview and decide whether those assumptions can withstand sustained attention.

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