Trajan's Arch-Michael Williams

Trajan's Arch
Michael Williams
BlackWyrm,
www.blackwyrm.com
ISBN: 9780982714942

In 1992 in Lake Geneva, Gabriel Rackett sends a letter to Jasmine as he has no prospects, a sad commentary for someone nearing forty years old. He once showed promise as a novelist until the alcohol took it toll. However, he thinks back to 1968 when the Cardinals ran all over the National league.

In Louisville, he was thirteen playing baseball with his two best friends being Gino Robinson and Joey Hardy near the home of elderly lunatic Miss Vivian when her adult son Trajan Bell moved in with her. Curious about the newcomer, Gino tosses Joey’s glove into the yard; Gabe sneaks in to retrieve the mitt and meets Trajan. Later that same summer, as Joey befriends Beatles’ fans and Gino shop guys, Gabe feels alone except for Trajan and soon Jasmine.

As he creeps towards middle age while a bored college teacher, Gabe knows he failed at work, family, and life. Everything changes, just as it did when he went into Miss Vivian’s yard to get the glove; he obtains a strange manuscript written by Trajan. Gabe begins a trek home past and present with the dark “stigmata” imprinted on the palm of his hand from when as a teen he touched an incline put in the yard by Trajan.

This convoluted thriller is not an easy read yet grips the audience with a need to know who Trajan Bell is and what if anything did he do to Gabe. The story line includes eerie works besides Giacco Piano by Mr. Bell such as “Second Ephesians” and “The Isle Is Filled with Noyses” that add to the strangeness of the well written story line by adding more questions to the mystery of Trajan. With Gabe’s letters to Jasmine enabling the audience to look deeper at him, fans will wonder if he lost his mind when he was thirteen, as the ghosts that haunt him as he nears forty are either psychological or real. This is a memorable and unforgettable book.

Harriet Klausner