Song of the Vagabond Bird

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 Mercer University Press, September, 2014

When he arrives on Neal’s Island to begin 10 days of intensive group therapy to treat his obsession for a woman he cannot forget, he brings with him the pseudonym of Bloodworth.

Pseudonyms are a requirement to participate in Dr. Carson X. Willingham’s unconventional and often bizarre seminars – a deliberate lie to inspire the search for a needed truth.

What he discovers is an island of ghosts, an island of intense, but fragile, relationships founded on deceit, and, yet, an island strangely harboring the yearned-for promise of healing.

The same is true for Barkeep, Menlo, Max, and Godsick -- his fellow members in the seminar, each with his own pseudonym and each suffering his own agony because of a relationship with a woman.

Vastly different as individuals, yet suffering the same crippling malady of obsession, the five are not prepared for the antics of Carson X. Willingham. He is maverick and madman, a brilliant investigator of his subjects, a mesmerizing performer, and either a genius or a charlatan with a rare gift of persuasion.

Willingham is also a man with his own demons, caused by his own history of obsession.It is in this environment that Bloodworth finds himself faced with the delicate question of honesty as he tries to free the memory of his Kalee, and begin his new journey into the uncertainty of what might be.

Song of the Vagabond Bird - June Read of the Month