Author Joe L. Blevins: The Familiar

As an author of seven books my intent is always to write something suitable for adults and young adults to read. Adults need good books as well as young adults these days. As a teacher of ten years my own experience is that often people do not read enough in their younger years. Adults also want something good to read that provokes their interests. Often adults have fewer choices that interest them. The many distractions of modern life often takes away from people using their imagination and their natural sense of wonder about events and people that lived in the past. Our busy lives have often robbed us of some quiet time for ourselves. My experience in various reading programs has taught me that making something interesting and challenging to read took some time and much consideration.

The use of the English language in The Familiar is that of a person living in the seventeenth century with certain words shown in italics being listed in a glossary in the back of the book. The reader gets a sense of the times and the events. I did all the illustrations to add to the book to make the mystery and excitement grow. This adds to the adventure and the lure of the story. We learn about adventure, about several native cultures, and the new settlers coming to early America. It is about how people actually lived in a different time and place. Their lives are different in many ways but some of their basic struggles mirror our own. Times change but people’s characters do not. On top of this is a good scary story like you might hear over the campfire on a long winter’s evening. It is a scary story and an adventure as you see how a man coming to the New World to find riches only found more than he could bargain for. His life takes unexpected twists and turns as he goes to Salem to see if he can find work. Winston saves a drowning man to find himself put in prison for helping an escaped slave.

Prisoners from England are sent to the New World to work to build a fort on Long Island. He sent there to die since most men do not survive the harsh conditions in a rock quarry. A prison revolt happens and he helps stop the death of many men: prisoners and guards. He survives by writing letters for many people to their families. The corrupt warden has him work in his household to fix the records of his theft of food and money set to feed the prisoners. The warden is found out in his deception when an auditor comes. Winston gets a reprieve only to have his past haunt him as he goes back to find work. He fails terribly to provide for himself. He can only find work as a lowly grave digger. He falls down from scurvy that left him almost crippled. Willia helps him as she buries her brother Stephen. She helps him by giving him medicine from her apothecary where she collects herbs and native medicines to sell. She is a practicing witch with plans for Winston. Winston falls under the spell of a coven of witches to do their bidding. He becomes a “changed person” as he almost dies and he is buried. He emerges the grave to find that his life is not his own. He takes on the power of magic to free himself only to find that magic has made him a slave to its will. Willia congers up the spirit of a powerful warlock to assist them in their magic. This survivor of the Roanoke expedition turns the tables  to make them his slaves.

Lock your doors And say your prayers

For evil abounds

Everywhere!

The Familiar: A Gothic tale of terror