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Author Searle shares candid recollections of his childhood and the visions, sometimes nightmares, arising during that period, as he slowly absorbs their meanings and revelations. When he was young, his mother took him to amusement parks in Denver, Colorado, where he experienced terrifying but very real trances evoked by rides and displays, memories of which persisted and influenced him throughout his life. An encounter with a psychic witch foretold the twists and turns of his future, while visits to a haunted house provided fascination amid its fears. A precarious roller-coaster ride revealed the beauty of the larger world while evoking visions of a giant tarantula.
These etheric encounters became a continuing theme for the author as he observed the maladjustments of his birth family. The only true father he cites was his grandfather Sam, who instilled in him strong moral beliefs. But Sam was murdered by a drug-addicted uncle, another trauma that Searle had to absorb and overcome. A great-uncle, Carl, offered a positive example when he was nearly burned to death but survived that "Hell" and became "a miracle"—though many considered Carl to be a genuinely alien being. Searle's protective mother, who battled her own distresses, always encouraged him to persevere, so despite his undeniably chaotic upbringing, infused with bizarre, otherworldly encounters, Searle would rise to a well-ordered adulthood, inspired, perhaps, by the wisdom of his unearthly overseers and evidenced in this dramatic composition.
Searle, who holds a liberal arts degree and a master's degree in nonprofit management, has had a varied career, including roles in banking and government. He is an avid photographer and helpfully provides portraits of the family members portrayed in his narrative. He designates this work as the first of three, and his readers will doubtless happily anticipate his further familial and philosophical ruminations.
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