Storm by Kim Pritekel

Publisher:            P.D. Publishing


Merryn and Cara are two women on the run – on the run from the Black Death and from the brutal forces of King Edward III of England. Merryn is used to fighting for survival, whether as an orphan at the mercy of the nuns or as a thief on the road. Cara's existence was happier until the plague arrived. She lived quietly in a village with her mother and sister where her reputation as a healer was beginning to grow. Now, as the disease wipes out significant portions of the population, the women find themselves trying to survive on the road against roaming bandits, soldiers from the king who are scouring the countryside looking for new servants to replace the ones who have died or fled, and the constant threat of becoming ill themselves. 

Although Merryn is reluctant to take Cara with her at first, they quickly become dependent on each other. Society begins to break apart under the stresses of the time and tragedy separates Merryn from Cara. Merryn goes on to become a great warrior and leader of a mighty empire, but there is always a sadness in her that no one can reach until one day she is wounded in battle and someone comes into her life that may have a chance to heal all of her wounds.

Kim Pritekel knows how to tell a good story. Her characters are fully developed and believable. Cara is especially well drawn as a woman who has a gift that causes her to walk a fine line. She lives in a time where her natural talent for healing could have her branded as a witch by the Roman Catholic Church and she knows the danger that surrounds her, where she could be honored in one village and stoned in the next. 

Merryn represents the abject poverty of the majority of the English people of the 14th century who found themselves scratching out the merest of existences while the landed nobility lived in undeserved luxury. By setting the book in this period, Pritekel takes advantage of the dramatic changes caused by the bubonic plague and she shows the evidence of her research in her knowledge of the customs of the time. 

The social revolution that Merryn leads did in fact try to occur, but it failed, and that is the only true negative of the book. Pritekel alters real history. She sets her story in the reign of an actual king and gives him a fate that never occurred so that she can turn this into a Conqueror story. Events that never happened are manufactured. The true period is so rich in events and details that she could have written about that manufacturing events wasn't necessary, or she could have set it in an imaginary place without creating these distracting plot points. The inaccuracies in history probably will not bother the average reader however and certainly are not serious enough to keep anyone from reading what is otherwise a very good book. Read Storm and suspend reality for a while.

Lessons by Kim Pritekel

Publisher:                P. D. Publishing


There are certain stories that are repeated in literature, told again and again by different writers. What is it about one version that makes it stand out? Makes it more than the pat retelling of something that the reader is already familiar with? Since it can't be the story itself, it has to be the skill of the writer in drawing the reader in and causing her to want to know how this version ends. Lessons by Kim Pritekel is such a book.

Chase Marin is just beginning college, more of an escape from her family than a real interest in education. Many things are changing in Chase's life and she's feeling very uncomfortable trying to sort out what is causing them and, more importantly, how to react to them. Things seem to get a little easier when she discovers that the graduate student who is teaching one of her classes is an old friend from when she was much younger. 

Dagny Robertson is a few years older than Chase and was once her babysitter. She always seemed to understand the younger Chase when her family didn't and they reestablish their friendship based on the same kind of understanding for each other. As Chase moves through the process of establishing more mature relationships with her friends and family, Dagny becomes the stabilizer she can always turn to. The reader is allowed to follow them as they help each other through difficult situations and as they simply meet at the coffee shop to spend some time together. As time passes though, Chase comes to realize that her feelings for Dagny go beyond the hero worship she felt as a child and the friendship she feels as an adult. She's concerned about this because she isn't sure how Dagny perceives the relationship, so she has to hide her feelings. This is refreshing because the friendship is important enough to Chase that she's willing to suppress the desire for anything else to keep from threatening it.  As the story continues to unfold, the challenge for both Chase and Dagny will become to decide which is more important, the friendship which has become so crucial for both of them or a relationship that neither is certain she's ready for.

What makes Pritekel's book stand out is that she takes the time to develop her characters. They don't rush through a few pages making instant discoveries and proclaiming undying love for each other. More than once the story takes a turn that leaves its outcome in suspense.  The reader also gets to know these two women and their friends. They have lives that involve other people besides the two of them. 

Chase particularly is surrounded by a cast of well-developed characters. There is the childhood best friend who seems to be on a path of self destruction no matter what Chase does; the extremely religious roommate who appears to have nothing in common with Chase, but opens a new world of experiences to her and ultimately understands what is going on with Chase before she does herself; and the members of the band Chase performs with who give her a dimension beyond the relationship with Dagny. Dagny is not a monotone character either, but richly crafted for depth. The story is told from Chase's perspective though, so she is the more complete character.

Again, though, what makes this book interesting is the time the reader can take to get to know the characters. Anyone who has read many romances already has an idea of where the story is heading. It's how the book gets there that makes this one appealing. By the end of the book, Chase and Dagny are people you wish you really did know. Lessons is well worth reading in order to feel that experience.

1049 Club by Kim Pritekel

Publisher:                   P.D. Publishing

Think "Castaway" with six survivors instead of one.

On its way to Milan, Italy, Flight 1049 crashes into the Atlantic Ocean and it's believed that three passengers who are rescued right away are the only survivors.  Six people manage to make it to an island however – a famous author, a gay attorney, a bossy veterinarian, a teenager who thinks her mother died in the crash, the owner of a coffee bistro and a man who could not save his wife.  As they struggle to survive until someone can rescue them, the world believes they are all dead and moves on.  Everyone that is except the attorney's partner, who is convinced that he's still alive and rallies some of the family members to support him in continuing a search after the authorities give up.  Spending more than a year on the island will force the survivors to confront issues about themselves and the lives they left behind.  Rescue forces them to deal with who they have become.  The old saying, "You can't go home again" may be right.

Pritekel tells several stories in this book.  There is the story of how the people on the island interact with each other interspersed with the stories of their families and the different ways in which they cope with their grief.  The most interesting part of the book though is when the survivors return to their homes.  Their families have adapted to life without them and they have come home different people than when they left.  Each survivor struggles to bring his or her new life into sync with the old one and they aren't all successful.  That's refreshing because not every story has a happy ending.

This is a well told story.  Anyone familiar with the movie "Castaway" will see the obvious influence, but it's not the same story.  Pritekel doesn't mind writing a longer book, so the reader will have plenty of opportunity to get to know the characters, although some of the scenes could have been deleted without injuring the story.  There is one section where one character keeps a diary that seems totally unnecessary to the plot.  Anyone who wants a book that tells an engaging story and moves quickly enough that the length is easy to forget will want to join the 1049 Club.