PRO CONNECT
Reiter
Born in a common house, in a common land, during a common time, Reiter was issued to the world in the same manner as any other notion of life. Born of circumstance and perspective, he came to see life from a standpoint most might label askew (but let’s not get him started on labels). It was through this angle of vision that his mind opened up to the limitless possibilities of thought and existence.
Since our first act is to covet, Reiter’s train of thought was detoured to mythology and how such fantastic stories were used to explain scientific fact. That is where his abilities were first applied; the battle that rages between Atlas and Hercules continues to this day. The Moon moves closer to the Earth and then further away, depending on who is winning the contest. It is a simple beginning, perhaps, but a beginning nonetheless and one that ushered other stories that grew along with the young man, encompassing greater scope and depth.
What some called it daydreaming, he called a work in progress. There is a universe out there, full of theory and definition – waiting for its story to be told. It holds comedy, tragedy, adventure, mystery, horror, action and intrigue. Reiter is but one of its storytellers!
... but alas, Reiter is but one voice in the mind of ...
G. Russell Gaynor
The World According to Garp was perhaps the first sign to a troubled young man that his life might very well be okay. It was incredibly reassuring to see that a young man from such a deeply interesting background can find his niche in life. G. Russell Gaynor was not nearly as challenged as T. S. Garp but until the revelation of the character, relatively speaking Russell was the weirdest kid on his block. His father, a career United States Navy man, taught him how to stand up to face the most challenging aspects of life including the unknown. His mother, a nurse and a technician for the U.S Geological Survey, taught him how to love and how to understand.
Russell was 5 when he found that people should be responsible for what they say when he had to write a story to back up his claim to his grandmother that he could do better in his sleep than the black and white movie he had watched. He handed two notebook pads to his grandmother who then agreed with his opinion. That was indeed the beginning!
In the beginning, it was mostly stories about super heroes and the stuff of comic books. Then came the works of Alexandre Dumas and the ideal of romantic heroes. Now there was a need to make women swoon and men weep and poetry was discovered and written. Russell was 12 when he went to his first play, which revealed a love for the stage and was 14 when role-playing games filled his head with the adventures of steel and sorcery. This all concluded with the love of the story and its affect on the audience.
Although life defies understanding, Russell has set about the challenge of teaching through his stories, in small baby steps, the lessons of love and life he has come to treasure since learning so much through the viewpoints of others.
It will always be the opinion of those who receive art to measure its worth, but to date Russell has penned six books, twenty-five screenplays, two plays, over 2 scores of poems and a role-playing game system. This too is only a beginning!
“'A venturesome sci-fi/fantasy novel for readers who really want their action set where no man has gone before.'”
– Kirkus Reviews
Banished by his superpowered kin, a resourceful young man aims to transcend space and time to save at least three civilizations in Reiter’s debut novel.
Long ago, the gray-and-blue-skinned Malgovi race, fighting a losing interstellar battle with the savage BroSohnti, suddenly developed the “iro-form”—the astounding ability to manipulate energy and light, giving rise to talents ranging from telepathy to death rays. Malgovi gifted with iro defeated the BroSohnti but consequently became a cruel, arrogant upper class in their own society. Dungias, born into Malgovi nobility, has no iro-form but compensates with sharp wits, Iron Man–type technology and martial arts athleticism. However, he’s still a despised, bullied outcast, even after his strategies help his ungrateful, iro-gifted younger brother win a major iro competition. Banished for his daring, Dungias is taken in by Nugar, one of the Vinthur, a mystic people once closely allied to the Malgovi. Nugar believes that Dungias is the foretold “Star Chaser” who could restore honor, justice and harmony to the various sundered races. Barely keeping ahead of iro-equipped assassins sent by corrupt Malgovi and offended Vinthur, Dungias sweats out the Yoda-like Nugar’s deadly lessons in space-Zen, until he becomes a “Traveler” who can commune with godlike, transdimensional beings. As if this vast, intrigue-ridden universe were not enough, Reiter skillfully embeds a parallel, more opaque plotline about a timeless spirit of malice called Baron Nomed who’s reborn into the human race. He renews his rivalry with a blind immortal named Freund who isn’t above taking a few million lives as collateral damage. The two storylines merge near the denouement—one resolved, the other maddeningly sans closure, promising a hefty continuation of this formidable epic. Usually, when a writer weighs a sci-fi manuscript down with imaginary alien jargon, it can be smegging annoying. But Reiter’s long, sprawling, ambitious construct makes the steep learning curve worth the trouble. Baron Nomed’s name (“demon” backward) is the only groaner in a novel that’s otherwise rich in clever wordplay and verbal invention. (The chapter headings even quote a wide range of beings, from fictional alien sages to Sun Tzu to Tupac Shakur.) Overall, readers will find this an impressively convoluted, dimension-hopping, mixed martial arts mind-stretcher.
A venturesome sci-fi/fantasy novel for readers who really want their action set where no man has gone before.
Pub Date:
Page count: 609pp
Publisher: Dog Ear Publisher
Review Posted Online: July 9, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2014
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