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Daniels is an elementary school teacher who longs for the respite provided by summer vacation. Escape from the wearisome routine is foremost on his mind. The lure of weaving the open roads while atop his motorcycle on a journey southward from Oregon through California and then eastbound proves alluring. Daniels feels truly free while riding. Despite his initial enthusiasm, a solitary feeling overwhelms him as he rides through the California desert. This is soon supplanted by awe and fear when he spots a UFO floating above his encampment. The close encounter is soon followed by strange phenomena that plague Daniels, such as pestilential invasions of insects, snakes, and cockroaches. The splendid beauty of nature has now become a nuisance to Daniels, threatening to take his sanity, if not his life.
Paranoia has never been more appreciable than in the plot of this intelligent mystery/thriller. The fragility of the mind is on full display as each predicament further unnerves Daniels. The possibility of being gaslit by his own thoughts brings him further to the brink of a complete nervous breakdown. The appeal of wanderlust has now been derailed by a gripping desire for normalcy. The author has cleverly juxtaposed the narrator and the reader to be Daniels’ sounding boards for his predicament and his responses to each one. Daniels is engaged in a stirring confrontation with nature and his fellow man that is readable down to its very last second. Elements of the supernatural combine with the idiosyncrasies of man to render a spirited tale.
RECOMMENDED by the US Review