Attention! Summer Specials!

ATTENTION!

 

ALL SUMMER LONG

I'LL BE HAVING WEEKEND 99-CENT SPECIALS ON MY EBOOKS!

WATCH THIS SPACE TO LEARN WHICH TITLE

IS BEING FEATURED THIS WEEK!

 

MAY 23-26

MONSTER IS IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER (novella)

PURCHASE FROM AMAZON, AMAZON UK, 
SMASHWORDS, BARNES & NOBLE,

AND OTHER ONLINE EBOOKSELLERS
ALSO ON SCRIBD

 

 

SYNOPSIS

"In this dark and edgy first-contact story, a team of anthropologists discovers a species of truly bizarre intelligent lifeforms called the Kal. The team consists of the leader, an experienced, highly respected female Professor of Xenoanthropology and Linguistics; a young female biomedical specialist; and a still younger male, an expert in alien artifacts. Each team member reacts in a different way to the Kal, building toward a disturbing climax and a conclusion with an unsettling twist of perspective."

 

AUTHOR'S COMMENT

This was the first book I wrote after I recommenced writing in the year 2000.  I had just bought my first computer and it made writing so much easier!  I had a very bizarre dream -- something that could have been terrifying, but instead it conveyed an aura of peace and light and provoked only curiosity and wonder.  I jumped out of bed and rushed to the computer and wrote down the dream before I could forget it, and I knew immediately that I had to write a story based on it.  "Monster Is in the Eye of the Beholder" was the result.  It was also the first piece I published when I began self-publishing, because it was short and made a good learning object.

 

 

EXTRACTS FROM REVIEWS

 

"Lorinda J. Taylor's imaginative and entertaining science-fiction novella, Monster Is in the Eye of the Beholder, reminded this reader of Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow (1996). Both works are first-contact stories that turn on what happens when human beings, acting with best intentions, behave in ways that cause catastrophic damage. Doria Russell and Taylor both explore the nature of good and evil, cultural difference, and prejudice, and both choose to tell their stories, for the most part, in framed flashbacks." -- Jack A. Urquhart

 

"I literally said 'Wow' out loud when I finished this book! Before I started it I had thought it was going to be a bit hard going, but it wasn't at all, it was very readable. I sat down on a Sunday afternoon thinking I would make a start reading the first few pages, but as it turned out I couldn't put it down and read it in one sitting. It's shocking and compelling, and has a moral message, but it's one that feels incidental rather than the story being contrived to bring out the moral point.
I've never read anything quite like this and it's not a story I'm going to forget in a hurry." -- Vanessa-Jane Chapman

 

"Stylistically, the work evokes what I would call "classic SF" writing and pacing. The early works of Ursula K. LeGuin come most prominently to mind--something like The Left Hand of Darkness." -- Athena Brigitte [Katherine Anthony]

 

"The Kal are among the most innovative and unexpected aliens I have ever encountered in sci-fi. None the less, this is not "gadget fiction"; as is generally the case with the best science fiction tales, it's the human side of the story which takes center stage, and that story is both believable and moving.
Get it, and read it -- you won't regret it! (And you won't forget it, either, not for a very long time!)" -- Christian Daddy [Stephen Lawrence]