A Dog Returns to Its Own

Months after banishing his demonic lover, Miriam, to the Abyss, Jacob Gottschalk travels into the frigid Canadian wilderness to rescue the corpses of his possessed stepdaughters and properly lay them to rest. The violent and insatiable Sophie lures him from the narrow way, however, and, blinded by his waning faith, he fails to detect the terrible secret she hides. His fortunes seemingly improve upon his arrival at New Oneida, an esoteric Christian settlement located in a pristine river valley. Its leader, Dr. Irinushka Zhukova, tempts Jacob with many beautiful vessels of spiritual purity and seeks to create in him a wellspring of the Holy Spirit.Hundreds of miles to the south, Miriam - newly paroled from the Abyss by an unexpectedly merciful God - searches Kaiser for Jacob. She discovers her paramour has fled the City but encounters Sarah, the nun hiding a precious secret of her own, and Darby, who teeters on the edge of sanity due to the brutal loss of her family. Together, in an unlikely and tenuous alliance, they flee Kaiser and its vicissitudes and journey north with a powerful new ally to find Jacob.Unbeknownst to them all, a greater spiritual storm stains the skies of their future and threatens all those who dwell upon the face of the earth. Facing a terrible new evil and the destruction of everyone he loves, a stoic Jacob holds on desperately to the words of Christ: "But the one who endures to the end, he shall be saved." Welcome to my collection of emotionally charged novels involving turbulent romantic relationships, the spiritual and supernatural realms and occasional forays into the mundane world. Dystopian settings are the norm though expect periodic time warps back to my favorite decade, the 1980s. Moral dilemmas abound, love is complex, lives are lost and living happily ever after always comes with a cost . . . if it is indeed possible at all."What I have written I have written." ~ Pontius Pilate, The Gospel of John 19:22. A dark and hard-edged horror-romance exploring themes of spirituality, romantic relationships and mental illness, the "A Dog Among Thorns" series chronicles a paranormal love triangle in a post-apocalyptic world. Miriam, a demon dispatched by her evil Master to the city of Kaiser, falls in love with the sinful Jacob Gottschalk, the married man she must tempt into committing suicide.