In the two months since Dr. Sabine Brusilov and his ghostly lover Bart discovered the curious brass circlet while investigating a haunting in an apartment building, Sabine focused on recovering from his accident. Now, his health restored, his mind returns to the mystery of the circlet. Even a commission to appear on a television show can't distract him from its allure.After nearly two centuries of resistance, it takes an exorcism for Bart to come to terms with being a ghost…and learning that everything in the other realm isn't quite the way he had figured. As he grows more comfortable in the spirit plane, his abilities on the earthly plane evolve. Even though he feels the circlet's evil, he can't help but connect his growing strength with it.Life and death are two sides of the same coin, but the circlet blurs lines for both man and ghost. Somewhere in a small town in up-state New York are a librarian and a second grade teacher to whom I owe my life. That might be a touch dramatic, but it's nevertheless one hundred percent true.Because they taught me the joy of reading, of escaping into worlds crafted of words.Have you ever been nine years old and sure of nothing so much as that you don't belong? Looked at the world from behind glasses, and wondered why you don't fit?Then turn the page and see… there you are, running from Injun Joe in a dark graveyard; there you are fencing with Athos; there you are…beneath the deep blue sea- marveling at exotic creatures with Captain Nemo.I found myself between the pages of books, and that is why I write now, it's why I taught English and literature for so many years, and it's why my house contains more pounds of books than furniture.If I'd had my way, I'd have been a fencer…or a starship captain, or a lawyer, or a detective solving crimes. But instead, I am a writer, and that's the best thing in the world to be if you ask me, because as a writer, I can be all those things and more.If I hadn't learned to value the stories between the pages, who knows what would have happened? Certainly not college…teaching…or writing. Pulp Friction enters the Altered State for year three
