This anthology contains inspirational stories and poems, written by members of The Thursday Book Club. This group of women share a common interest in authors in the genre of "New Thought" and spiritual awakening. Inspired to write their own book, they put together this collection of the experiences they've had, truths they've learned and the wisdom they've gained from their journeys.

Stories, Experiences, Truth and Wisdom

Religion & Spirituality

The Thursday Book Group

New Age & Spirituality

New Friends Publishing

A self-described ragweed, Darl Reynolds never should have amounted to anything. As the son of a coal miner and the fifth of seven children, he grew up during the Great Depression in the impoverished community of Monday, Ohio, a tiny "worked out" coal-mining town that collectively owned just one phone. Luxuries like indoor plumbing or a decent pair of tennis shoes were as foreign to him as the state's bustling cities just a few dozen miles away. The son of a mother who suffered from manic depression and a father who spent most of his free time on a bar stool, he was left to fend for himself. Like the ubiquitous ragweed, which thrives on neglect, growing beside highways and in dusty back alleys, Darl somehow overcame his impoverished childhood and slowly discovered an inner resolve that served him his entire life. From the stifling bowels of the U.S.S. Brown, where he was crowned "oil king" during World War II, to the sweltering cabins of the steam locomotives that hauled freight for the Pennsylvania Railroad, Darl not only persevered; he flourished. He converted a high school education into a pair of college degrees at Ohio University and eventually went into business for himself as the owner and operator of several state-of-the-art nursing homes in Ohio. But even a ragweed faces hard times. In the span of a few short years, Darl weathered a divorce, lost his only son to cancer, and, although innocent of wrongdoing, was indicted and convicted of Medicaid fraud. During that bleak stretch, he was reminded once again that in this life change is the only thing constant. As someone who had written his master's degree thesis on the diesel locomotive engine and its effects on the railroad operating crafts, Darl knew well what it meant to reinvent himself. Now, in the twilight of his long life, he has slowed down long enough to recount the adventures of one Ohio-bred ragweed.

Standing Firm: One Man's Journey from Poverty to Stability

Biographies & Memoirs

Reynolds, Darl E.

Memoirs

In life, everyone climbs mountains. Jala A. McKenzie-Burns shares her story, Climbing Life’s Mountains, which explores the many challenges that faced her from birth. As a biracial child, she was left in the hospital, then placed into foster care. Her education began from the time she was born through the reactions and events around her. Her education continued with the teachings of the Civil Rights Movement, watching the Civil Rights’ marches on television and listening to the I-Have-a-Dream speech on the radio. Her early lessons taught her to stand up for her beliefs and soon paid off. After being adopted by an African-American family, she faced many confrontations from both white and black children. Along the way, she realized she was a female. Through her service in the U.S. Marine Corps, working in politics, gaining a college education, marrying a woman she loved, and raising their child, she tried to hide her feminine desires, but the pain never stopped at not being able to express who she really was. According to society, she was supposed to live her life as a male. While she participated in many activities to fight her inner conflict, she couldn’t force a square peg into a round hole. When she shared her gender conflict with her adoptive mother, her mother kicked her out of her life. In her book, Jala discusses her full transition experience so that she can help others with their gender-identity conflict. During her transition, she fell into a deep depression. With this illness, she practiced many unhealthy coping mechanisms. During a major portion of her life, she had yearned to find her biological mother. After many attempts, she was finally reunited with her biological mother and sister. Years later, after reconnecting with both her biological and adoptive families, she began to overcome depression. She shares her story of depression, believing that if she can overcome it, so can others. She combines her autobiography and insights about gender identity transition with interviews from family members, other transgender females, and a psychologist who specializes in Gender Identity Disorder. In the section called “Adoption and Finding My Biological Family,” she includes three special interviews. First, her adoptive brother, Derrick, is a highly successful individual who graduated from Princeton University. He shares their experiences of growing up together. Second, Karen, her biological sister, tells of her experience as being one of four siblings who were taken by the state of Georgia. And third, Patricia, the only child out of all six siblings who was raised by her biological family, tells of the pain she encountered, knowing her siblings were out there. Jala and her siblings share the steps they took to find their biological families. The story explores times of laughter and times of tears, hoping to help others overcome their personal challenges.

Climbing Life's Mountains: Overcoming Challenges of Biracial Birth, Adoption, Gender Identity, and Depression

McKenzie-Burns, Jala A.

Community & Culture

Not your average detective novel, Who Killed Newsboy Clemmons? is part mystery, part chronicle, and part philosophical exposition—a humorous-yet-introspective look at the colorful world of its hero, John “Stick” LeMaster, PI. A former baseball star whose All-American career was cut short by a drunk driver, LeMaster has stockpiled wisdom the hard way, thanks to a stint in the Marines, several years as a private investigator, and a short-lived marriage that has left him hopelessly in love with a woman he can’t save, much less have. The story opens with LeMaster, in his late thirties and fresh off a trip to the Far East, discovering the dead body of Jimmy “Newsboy” Clemmons amongst the baggage in an airport carousel. The gruesome sight is one LeMaster won’t forget anytime soon: Newsboy’s killers propped his eyelids open with toothpicks, decorated his chest with a machete, and left a Post-it note especially for the PI. Welcome home, Stick, the note reads. This one’s for you. Newsboy, a friend and former grifter and bookie turned community organizer, had been instrumental in turning around the Torch, his inner-city neighborhood. As LeMaster searches for clues, the detective is forced to walk a tightrope between paranoia and swagger, between past and present, between his personal feelings and his professional duty. A character in his own right, LeMaster is surrounded by outsized one-offs. There’s Arnie “Red” Ruby, a Newsboy contemporary who grew up a grifter before cleaning up his act. There’s Eeno Criosci, aka Nikki the Mad Romanian, a staunch anti-Communist who cut his teeth as a freedom fighter in the Solidarity uprisings before emigrating to America. There’s Freddie “Sniffer” Winston, a former world-class swimmer with two Olympic medals and a nose so potent, courtesy of reconstructive surgery after a fiery auto accident, that he’s become a “resource” for the CIA. And of course, there’s South City itself, a bustling metropolis on the Atlantic seaboard with enough mobsters, con artists, and double-crossers to make the Big Apple look drab in comparison. It’s those closest to LeMaster, however, who ultimately lead him to Newsboy’s killers. Leslie, his ex-wife locked away in an institution after suffering a breakdown, acts as LeMaster’s constant muse, the first person he thinks of when he wakes and the last person to enter his mind when he drifts off to sleep. Her Aunt Margaret, perhaps the only person as devoted to Leslie as LeMaster himself, keeps the thread alive between the detective and the love of his life, offering hope, resolve, and ever-elusive perspective. Also in the detective’s corner: SCPD Lieutenant Ernesto Chavez, an old pro with brooding good looks, a steely gaze, and a solid equilibrium; Maury Stern, LeMaster’s self-proclaimed “Jersey Shrink,” a psychologist whose mantra—grow up—gently sustains the detective; Hamilton Justice “Hammy” Squires, an incredibly successful and much revered business titan who always makes time for LeMaster and is always encouraging; and Danny Bryant, highschool chum, best man at his wedding, a former Marine who LeMaster saved during one harrowing afternoon in a minefield in Afghanistan, earning a Purple Heart and Silver Star in the process. Finally, there’s Newsboy’s family: Dolores, his lovely widowed wife, and JP, his nineteen-year-old son. The two, acting on the high regard Newsboy always had for LeMaster, take the detective into their confidence. A combination of good detective work and not-so-lucky breaks leads LeMaster to Newsboy’s killer, but the detective unwittingly walks into a perfectly orchestrated setup at an abandoned power substation, a setup designed to put him six feet under while paving the way for a new Don in South City. Only then, surrounded and outgunned, face-to-face with Newsboy’s killer, does he learn who has his back—and who would stick a shiv in it.

Who Killed "Newsboy" Clemmons?: A Stick LeMaster, PI, Mystery

Mystery, Thriller & Suspense

Brown, Eldon

Ring Jr., Carl E.

Mystery

What did a thirteen-year-old boy think of Lake Havasu City when he first arrived in 1965? BORING! Why Rick Kingsbury’s parents dragged him, his brother, and his sister to a town with less than 800 people, he had no idea. Living in a thirty-foot camp trailer with no running water and no electricity for the first year was no fun; neither was attending school with fifty students that year. Join Rick as he watches the town struggle and grow, adding new businesses, homes, and families faster than he can imagine. Through good times and bad, Rick comes to realize the early residents are as hardy as the pioneers who came across the plains in wagons a hundred years earlier. As he struggles to find his identity in a town as unique and different as each of its residents, not only will Rick’s stories make you laugh, they’ll take you back to your own youth.

Livin' at the End of Old 95: Lake Havasu Before the Bridge

Kingsbury, Rick

When a meteor crashes to earth near Roswell, New Mexico, in the summer of 1947, one boy's life is changed forever. Simon Cole, a 12-year-old Boy Scout, is on a rock-hunting expedition when the fireball screeches overhead and slams into the ground just beyond the horizon. Simon hikes with the rest of Troop 32 to the crash site the next morning, and together they make a shocking discovery.  What happens next, though, vanishes from Simon's memory. Only a pair of grainy black and white photographs-taken by Simon at the crash site-preserves the truth about a vast government cover-up that will claim the lives of many. The two photos, filed away as part of Project Genesis, survive decades of intrigue, all the while finding their way into the hands of Attorney General Bobby Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, and Marilyn's nosey, Bible-toting next-door neighbor, among others.  In the summer of 2011, Simon Cole, now a U.S. senator nearing retirement, has been researching 1947, what he calls "the lost year," in the hopes of finally discovering what happened. He receives help from a ragtag group of survivors, including Roger Smith, a mortician who was pronounced mad in 1947 for telling the truth and was locked away in an asylum; Number Four, a former government operative, now in his last days, hoping to absolve his guilty conscience; Carol Snow, an abductee who discovers a secret facility near Groom Lake, Nevada, and the time-manipulating "Hub" that powers it; and Andrew Jackson, a Vietnam vet willing to put his life on the line for humanity.  After Senator Cole's own secretary returns the photos to him, she helps close the loop. She also teaches him something about his quest. The past belongs squarely in the past. The future is what matters.

In the Beginning: Project Genesis

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Woodrick, Duke

Science Fiction

Emma's Deliverance

Romance

Vance, Susan

Romantic Suspense

A secret discussion…A chilling silence in the car…A confusing day at school…A surprise trip to court... Denise’s happy teenage life with her loving aunt and uncle suddenly turns to dread when a judge orders her to return to the home to her cold mother so that her mother can receive child support from her father. Filled with fear and anxiety, Denise is forced to pack her things and move into her drunken stepfather’s house where she faces a growing nightmare that eventually leads to despair and her desire to take her life. Denise shares the story of her resolve to appear to be a normal, happy teenager while struggling inside to hold on to her faith in God and find the strength to gain control over herself and her life. Through the help of her vivid imagination and her talent for expressing herself in poetry, she finds a way to move beyond the horrors while she hides behind Two Sides of a Smile.

Two Sides of a Smile

Green, Tabitha

The world stands on the brink of nuclear war. In the name of the People, corrupt, self-serving bureaucrats take charge of America. The American Constitution is ignored and suppressed. Organized religions are banned and threatened with deportation. Unsurpassed genetic advancements prepare the way for a superior population. Ethnic groups are targeted for nationwide cleansing. Mandatory immunizations secretly control female fertility. Enter the CITIZENS' ADVOCATES A powerful nonprofit public service organization with a mission to better the lives of the average citizens through policy proposals and legal advocacy. On the surface, they appear squeaky clean. Underneath, a sinister plot unfolds that threatens the welfare and liberty of the entire world. Within this milieu.... -A Supreme Court Justice risks his career when he openly attacks Congress to protect the American Constitution. -An ex-CIA agent performs the dirty work to keep the public image of a scheming political organization spotless. -A powerful U.S. Senator, groomed to be the next President, enforces absolute censorship and incarcerates his dissenters for subversive activities. -A young genetic scientist puts his life on the line when he dips into hidden government internet files that expose the truth. Will the truth come to light before it is too late?

Citizens' Advocates

Literature & Fiction

Thayer, John

Genre Fiction

What happens when a quiet geek tosses a half-dozen lab mice into a crowd of girls at a hockey game? Will the trauma of being squeezed between two 250-pound women in the back seat of a car ruin one shy teenager’s life? And how does he use the idea to prosper later in life? Will God seek revenge on an eighth-grader who lies about wanting to become a priest in order to avoid responsibility for his behavior? Do you know what “hop a car” means? Have you ever seen a “church key”?To find these answers and more, join LAURENCE DUNN as he takes you back in time on a humorous adventure to his childhood. A rollicking good time will bring back fond memories for those who lived in the Fifties. For those born later, the stories will teach you something interesting about the past. It’s ugly, but funny.

Ugly . . . But Funny

Dunn, Laurence

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