Free Ghost Writer (Raven Maxim Book 1) by Tiana Laveen

was an author and screenwriter who happened to die, just as we all have to one day, end of story.”
    “It’s not the end of the story and it has everything to do with it. The guy was a prolific writer; countless movies have been made based on his work, Dad.”
    “I know.” Sloan looked casually back down at his book. “And they were all poor representations of his exertion. It’s rare when a movie can accurately capture and portray the power of a book. Some of these directors should be sued for defamation of a novel.”
    “Never mind all of that, my point is that he was an innovator, one of the few writers of his time to get such limelight and then, all of a sudden, he just went crazy and starved himself to death. That’s gotta be imprinted on this house! He loved this house, Dad. You’ve seen the magazine photos of him in it, all the parties he had, the celebrities that walked around in here. The good times were plenty and then it was all over… him alone, barricaded, wasting away. How can a man go from being the life of the party to a recluse who made not one more public appearance?”
    “Joel, none of that matters because there’s no such thing as ghosts and all of this energy business you’re talking about. When people die, that’s the end, okay? This is probably all my fault,” He rolled his eyes and removed his glasses, setting them down delicately onto the table. “I wish I would have talked you out of that liberal arts degree.” He sighed.
    “This has nothing to do with that!” The young man’s voice rose, echoing in the grandiose black and white kitchen with checkered tiles. A shiny red kettle sat on the stove as the room clinked and clanked, burping gas through tired pipes every so often. “You told me when I was a kid there was no such thing as the boogie man. You told me to stop crying and man up when I was afraid of getting my ass kicked at school. You don’t believe in anything, do you?!”
    A wave of guilt suddenly consumed him. He had in fact told Joel to man up countless times, and he hated that he’d sounded like his own father during those episodes, berating his son, trying to make him strong for a cruel, nasty world.
    “Joel.” He sighed, leaning lazily to the side of his chair. “What do you want me to say, huh? Okay, I’ll do what you want.” He threw up his hands, prepared to remedy this silly situation once and for all. “Yes, Joel, there’s an Easter Bunny in this world and it lives with Alice in Wonderland, fuckin’ her brains out and smoking reefer with the caterpillar. You better look now, before he hops away with all the red and blue pills!” He pointed ahead at the barren refrigerator as his gut bubbled with laughter.
    “Very funny.” Joel smirked. “But I’m serious and you know what I mean. You’ve always been cynical. Kinda strange considering what you write sounds so convincing.”
    “Fantasy books are lies, mere illusions… I live in the real world.” He poked his chest emphatically with his index finger. “What I write is just another part of me, a way to create something else, page by page, chapter after chapter.”
    “Yeah, it’s fiction, but they say in every fiction book there is some truth, a piece of the author. You write about God, about a Creator and spirits and aliens paying homage to higher intelligence than their own. Some of your books are far out there, but they hook the reader, Dad. They hook the reader ’cause on some level, even with all that stuff you write, you make them relate. You can’t write about God, about human creation, and not understand life and death. Life and death are blurs, running into one another like watercolors on paper. How can you separate the two so easily?”
    “Simple.” He leaned back and crossed his arms over his growling gut. “There is no proof that we hang around after we’re dead, Joel. If there were, a lot more people would see so called spirits. Instead, all we get is grainy film footage on