Book Description:
Andrew Foster, a real estate developer in San Diego, is a man suddenly haunted by his past. Memories, like specters from his former life of sex, drugs and rock and roll have come crashing into his current world of business in this sunny coastal city. The ominous, repeated appearance of a black SUV at the beach where he meets his sister each week, has triggered fears that it’s payback time for a bad choice he made years ago.
To add to his frustrations, his hopes of a big breakthrough in the San Diego real estate market haven’t come to pass. He’s starting to wonder if his visions of success will ever come true when an investor offers to finance his dream project. Soon things start to fall into place for Andrew in business, life, and even love. He starts dating the beautiful and business-savvy Nicole but even with her at his side he can’t seem to shake the ghosts of his past. As the relationship with Nicole deepens, Andrew opens up to her about the many loves and adventures that have taken him from the crazy days of living in Big Sur and Joshua Tree to business success in San Diego. Her wise insights help him face the character flaws that have caused him to fail in his past relationships.
Rounding out his social life is his once-a-week task of assisting his sister with her nanny job watching a young boy named Chandler. They build sand castles on the beach and enjoy the beauty of nature together. But the now ominous weekly appearance of a strange car at the beach has awakened Andrew’s fears. Is the boy in danger? Or worse, has an enemy from Andrew’s past come seeking revenge and now Chandler’s caught in the middle?
A strange twist of events threatens to destroy Andrew’s dreams, but as he searches for answers, a sudden revelation offers hope of a future he never imagined.
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Book Review:
From the very first chapter Boy on the Beach captured my attention and left me eager to read more. As readers we are introduced to Andrew, the main character of the novel, in the midst of a chase. Andrew revs his engine around steep cliffs, with little more than a woman and a bag of money on the back of his motorcycle. Where are they going? Where did the money come from? Who are they attempting to run from and what type of bloody scene did they witness earlier that day?
The story is told primarily from Andrew’s point of view and it winds back and forth between incidents that occurred thirty-seven years ago and those that are occurring right now, in present day.
The main character is a troubled man with recurrent nightmares of his past. At night the ominous events of his life unfold before him in terrifying ways. Andrew believes that the actions of his former life reign over him. He believes his current misfortunes are a result of his previous choices.
At times he wonders if a curse may have been cast on him. Other times he thinks happiness is simply unattainable as karma is forcing him to pay for prior indiscretions and betrayals.
The author weaves a tapestry of events that mesh the past together with those occurring in present day. While the book begins with that risky motorcycle chase it isn’t until one of the last few chapters that we find out just what Andrew and the girl on the back of the bike were running from.
Between the pages of this novel readers learn a lot about Andrew. I was intrigued by my own desire to learn about a character that is not endearing. If you are like me you won’t cheer for Andrew, but nonetheless you want to find out what happened to him in the past and what will happen from this point forward.
Best of all this book concludes with a surprise ending that wraps up the story in a neat little bow.
R.D. Maddux has story telling in his blood. Since he was young he’s always loved a good tale. He’s been writing seriously since he was in high school and college. His novels range from Mystery and Intrigue to Sci-fi/fantasy. With Boy On The Beach he’s set the story in modern America, to be exact, on the West Coast of California. He’s a native of the golden state and has been a resident of San Diego since 1987. Before that he grew up in northern California and lived in the Sacramento Valley and Bay Area with sojourns in some of the beautiful parts of our state.Living in California for over 60 years he couldn’t help but watch the way things have changed in our culture and the impact this coast makes on the rest of America and the world. So even though Boy On The Beach is fiction, like most serious novels, it is not without a context and comment on issues we all face in our changing world. It takes place in real locations that are very familiar to him and its characters, which are fictional, no doubt have their counterparts in the real world. Boy On The Beach is a story of intrigue, suspense, revenge, love and redemption with flashbacks to the era when sex, drugs and rock and roll set our culture on it’s inevitable journey to our present day. This idea has been rattling around in his heart and mind for a decade and it’s finally coming to the page.Connect with the author: Website ~ Twitter ~ Facebook ~ Instagram