THE TALISMAN &
THE WITCH’S CODE
Novella Two of Vanessa
Schierman PhD WITCH
BY Sandy Nathan
THE TALISMAN
1997
Vanessa sat at her dressing table, peering
into the looking glass. She couldn’t look that ugly.
But she did. She swiped her fingers over the creases at the corners of her
mouth, glancing at the pots of powder and cream on her vanity. She didn’t know
how to use them to improve her looks. Cosmetics wouldn’t be enough, even if she
did know how to use them.
She would never get what she longed for. Or
whom. He stood next to her in the framed photo on the dressing table.
Magnificent, startlingly handsome. Their image had appeared on the cover of NET WORTH Magazine the month before.
When she so magnanimously revealed to their
blundering reporter that she was the richest person
in the world, not Will Duane, as NET WORTH had
erroneously reported for twenty years, the magazine did a joint issue on the
two of them: the richest man and woman on the planet.
She sighed as she remembered the glory of the
photo shoot. They did it at Will’s house, of course. Vanessa didn’t tolerate
visitors at her estate. A chuckle escaped her, sounding more like a cackle than
she would have liked. Visitors didn’t tolerate the estate well, either, though
most of them came out of their hysterics soon after leaving.
Will’s estate was down the hill, in the
flatlands of Woodside. Wide open, oak-studded meadows framed the magnificent
modern masterpiece–his home. Sunlight flooded the gardens around the pool. The
photographers, a passel of them, shot away while Will smiled at her. Charming.
Irresistible. So amazingly sexy. Young people thought that those over sixty
were all but dead. Not so. Not Will, and certainly not her.
Will smiled and put his arm around her,
gazing into her eyes with his clarity and intelligence flaming. He had treated
her like a princess, as though she were his best friend.
That was definitely not what she wanted.
“You mean so much to me, Vanessa. If you hadn’t
taken me under your wing years ago, I’d still be a garbage collector’s son–or waste management contractor’s son–wondering why I couldn’t
get anywhere in the San Francisco Bay Area.” He smiled, making light of his
humble beginnings. “You showed me what really mattered in upper class
society–grammar and spelling.”
“And excellent table manners, as well as
proper pronunciation,” she added gleefully. “As well as entre
into the best clubs, and references–no, glowing endorsements–from those already
in power. Preferably at the high end of power.” She sniffed and raised her
head. Vanessa couldn't help being a snob.
The splendid day was almost ruined by a
foolish photographer. The magazine was on a tight time schedule for
publication, so the workers toiled in Will’s basement office, generating proofs
for them to approve then and there. She and Will had previously had legal
contracts drawn requiring their signed acceptance of images for publication.
Vanessa hadn’t had any photos published before this shoot, but she knew she’d
need legal protection if it ever happened.
“I had to Photoshop the shit out of that picture to make her look human,” a wretched
little dimple on a laptop whispered to her co-worker. The dimwit had no idea
how acute a witch’s hearing was. “I’d swear she was a witch,
but I didn’t think they came that ugly. Look, I put the final version on this
tablet.”
Vanessa stiffened and shot a hard look at the
vicious photographer. The girl’s hands flew to her throat. She began choking as
Vanessa grabbed the tablet from her hands.
“How do you make this work?” She shook the
unit and the picture covered the wall. “Oh. That is quite large.”
Vanessa had not been completely aware of what
Photoshop was, or what it could do. Photoshopping had worked miracles. The photographer
had apparently removed her head, tilted the chin down and moved the whole thing
back on her neck. She’d taken away the hump on Vanessa’s back. The protrusion
had grown year by year since the accident. Her horse had fallen on the hunt
field decades earlier. It ended the poor dear’s life and broke Vanessa’s back.
They couldn’t fix it in those days; she survived, but her head leaned forward,
looking like it might topple from her neck.
But that nasty sprite with the camera and
laptop had fixed all that, on paper anyway. The little snit, who was gasping
and holding her throat while Vanessa reviewed her handiwork, had smoothed the
ravines and craters of Vanessa’s face and tamed the protuberance of her chin.
She looked handsome, if not lovely. It was enough.
“Very nice. I approve it.” Vanessa handed the
tablet to the girl, releasing her spell. The child couldn’t speak, but Vanessa
did. “Haven’t you heard the saying, ‘If you can’t say something nice, don’t say
anything at all’? It’s most useful. You should try it for a while. In fact, you
will.”
Vanessa didn’t look at Will’s image at all.
No need–he would appear as he always did: magnificent. Glowing. Brilliant.
Tantalizing. White hair and dark blue eyes shimmering with intellect. She
glanced at the photo of the two of them on her vanity. Will was tall, even next
to her Photoshopped self.
Why didn’t he love her?
He never noticed her next to the perfect, if
vacuous, bimbos he “dated.” She sniffed, knowing full well what bimbo meant and the behavior that accompanied the
appellation. Would he love her if she looked and acted like that?
If she were beautiful, she’d still be as
smart as she was. Vanessa was a theoretical physicist, one of the best back in
the 1930s. She and Will had educated conversations about everything: stock
markets, the supply of money, the Federal reserve rate. They could even talk
about art and history. Will was an art collector and she had supervised her
family’s collections of treasures for ages. They spoke about modern political
history with vigor. Vanessa had lived far longer than she’d admit. She’d
participated in large chunks of modern history, knowing it firsthand. She and
Will had a crackling intellectual relationship. They enjoyed each other’s
company.
Why couldn’t he love her?
Because she was a hideous, terrifying old
witch who scared the crap out of most people, to use the popular parlance.
Of course, she hadn’t always been this way.
When she’d married Heinrich, she had been a
handsome woman. That was many years ago, long before the children and the pain
their tragic condition had brought her–and the pain her husband’s state had
brought as well. Heinrich had turned out to be mentally ill. The dazzle and
charm that won her heart was mania. His bipolar disorder could be wonderful on the
up side, but when his mood turned downward to depression, it was terrible for
her to witness and worse for him to live. She certainly hadn’t exercised due
diligence in researching her husband.
Why hadn’t she realized that she and a German
warlock whose name was virtually the same as hers might have genetic
incompatibilities? True, his family came from a different part of Germany than
hers: Heinrich von Schierman’s ancient brood hailed from the prosperous north
west of the German nation. Her direct ancestors had fled the old country
centuries before. Those who stayed in Germany were from the southeast around
the mountains near Switzerland.
But her name was Schierman and her father’s
name had been Heinrich Schierman and half of his male relatives bore the same
surname. Why didn’t she realize that her forbearers dropped the “von” in their
name to Americanize themselves and erase any ties to their aristocratic roots?
Because of passion, of course. The same reason empires rise and fall.
Vanessa Schierman had fallen madly in love
with and married Heinrich von Schierman, her distant cousin. Not distant
enough. Their children emerged so flawed, so ill. They had aged her as surely
as the passage of time. And then the accident left her bent, as she was.
Vanessa sat thoughtfully. Could she morph
back in time to look the way she had? Absolutely. Her PhD was not an idle
ornament hung behind her name. She’d kept up her experiments long after
retiring. In her home laboratory, she’d created things that the planet’s military
powers would kill to have. She had invented a way to go back to the self she’d
been before her marriage. She could go back to whatever time she wanted. Would
the rejuvenated Vanessa be lovely enough to tempt Will?
No. Even if she availed herself of the time-bending
means at her disposal, she still wouldn’t be a babe. Worse, she would end up in
the present, in 1998, her brain back in the time she took herself to, with no
memory of Will Duane whatsoever. She wouldn’t know what had happened between,
say, 1950 and now. The memories wouldn’t exist in her brain.
Even the platonic friendship that existed
between them would be gone. Will wouldn’t know who she was. And she’d think him
an old man.
She had to find another way.
The hallway outside her private rooms was
paneled in dark wood covered with ornate carvings. Swags of flowers and leaves
converged into opulent trusses of ribbons and bows––all wooden, yet all moving
as though kissed by a breeze. Bewitched, the carvings swayed and little things peeped forth. Small whittled animals, squirrels,
chipmunks, and a fox or two. A mahogany monkey that she had breathed to life
and set loose in the paneling when she was a child. And bats. Vanessa loved
bats. They awakened as she headed into the kitchen to greet its familiar human
denizens, Mrs. Marjory Naughton, her chief housekeeper and confidant, and Cook,
her cook. It was time for breakfast and coffee.
Brilliant sparkles of light cascaded onto the
landing and down the stairway. Her mother’s portrait was awake. Vanessa turned
and saw her mother rendered larger than life and magicked into seeming alive.
Her face was cold and regal and icily beautiful, brows arched, lips parted as
though about to bestow a curse. Her ruff wafted from her neck, opalescent and
pastel-colored with sparkles flying everywhere.
Vanessa’s teeth ground together. Her mother
had the gaudiest ruff of any witch she knew. It was beyond bad taste. But what
did you expect from Euro-trash floating around the continent on a charm and a
spell? Her father should have known better; he was the one with the bloodlines
and money.
Still, even dead and in a painting, her
mother commanded attention. Nothing could outshine her jeweled, beaded, and
spangled dress. It cast light like air-kisses, flashes cascading down the
landing and entry hall. The wand in her right hand was so flamboyant that it
made her clothes and ruff look chaste. Illuminated letters burst from it and
fell to the floor, spelling her name: Ophelia. Ophelia. Ophelia
drifted down to the painted carpet beneath her painted feet.
Vanessa studied the portrait. By coming alive
like this, her mother was surely trying to tell her something. What?
Ophelia Schierman’s left hand rested on her
chest. Above that, the talisman glowed.
The talisman! That was it! It worked subtly,
so that its target didn’t know it was operating.
Vanessa could cast a spell and Will would
idolize her even if she looked like a donkey. She could make
him do anything. Why not? If you can’t compel people to things against
their will, what was the use being a witch? She could magick Will into
submission and devotion, but that wasn’t what she wanted.
She wanted him to love her the way she loved
him: knowing his weaknesses and faults, his strengths and essential goodness
and kindness––most of which he hid behind a public display of rotten behavior
and foul temper. She knew who he really was, and loved all of him.
Beside the grossest enchantment, what could
make him love her the same way?
She could use the talisman to subtly charm
Will. Not bewitch him, but move the parts of his soul that cared for her to the
fore. Let Will’s own heart and soul come to her.
“I’ve got it!” Vanessa cried, bursting into
the kitchen.
“Wonderful, dear. Got what?” Mrs. Naughton
said. Cook merely handed her a mug of coffee.
“I’ll get the talisman. Then everything will
work out!”
“The talisman? What talisman?”
“The Blood Talisman. It’s mine. My mother
took it.”
“Where is it?”
“With my mother’s corpse––at the family
estate in Germany. I’m going there right now.”
“Oh! I’d better pack for you, Vanessa. How
long will you be gone?”
“Pish! I don’t need to pack. I’ll be gone as
long as it takes!”
Vanessa’s tailored ruff emerged from her neck
with a subtle sheen of black peau de soi, its jet
crystal beaded points glittering, but not emitting venom. Her wand appeared in
her hand, slightly bigger than perfectly tasteful, but just the way she liked
it. Vanessa raised her wand and disappeared.
“What is the Blood Talisman?” Mrs. Naughton
asked Cook. They looked at each other and then at the empty space where Vanessa
had stood.
2
HOME
The castle’s immense entry hall was darker
and more somber than she remembered. Of course, it had been eons since she’d
visited. Even so, the stillness was weird. The château perched on the edge of a
mountain, the kind of dwelling that exists only in the Alps. Huge and
impractical, the only reason that it hadn’t been converted into a tourist
attraction or hotel was that it was so terrifying that even tourists seeking
supernatural thrills wouldn’t chance it. In the valley below, the fortress’s
shadow dampened the spirits of all it touched. That and her family was loaded
and didn’t need to prostitute itself by entertaining paying guests.
But the stronghold had been a turbulent
hotbed of life–witches and warlocks weren’t the undead, after
all. They lived and needed servants. She was an only child, but her father’s
people reproduced like viruses, mutating just as fast. She had phalanxes of
cousins and once-twice-thrice removed necromancers calling her auntie. She was no one’s auntie, but answered to the term
when in the ancestral stronghold.
Where was everyone? Vanessa stood alone in
the vast stone-walled space. Even her breathing echoed. She looked around, up
and down, turned in a circle. Total disaster! No witch worth the name would
allow her home to deteriorate so. Ropes and tangles of cobwebs hung everywhere,
their eight-legged creators nowhere in sight.
“I’ll fix that.” She raised her wand and the
cobwebs formed braids, festoons, and dainty Germanic lace patterns. A swag of
spider silk draped the main entrance. “That’s much better. Spiders! Emerge!” A
few decrepit specimens appeared, legs broken, sheen gone.
“What has happened to you?”
The same that
happened to everything. Look around, came the
spiders’ silent response.
Vanessa looked around. Tapestries hung over
every stone of the wall not covered by ancestor portraits. They depicted the
family’s favorite subjects: the active subjugation of the working serfs and the
conquest of surrounding fiefdoms. The weavings depicted rape and pillage and
pogrom-type pursuits that made The Rape of the Sabine Women look
G-rated.
Normally, the figures on the tapestries acted
out what they were depicted as doing, predating large screen and X-rated TV by
centuries. Now, the weavings were still, their color dimmed by… something, as
well as the spider’s webs and dust coating their surfaces.
The same could be said of the ancestor
portraits. The figures hung limply in their frames, dejected, lifeless, and not
the all-conquering, never-daunted Schiermans she knew. Another thing: most of
the furniture and all of the silver and porcelain was missing. The hall was
truly empty. What had happened?
Fear shot through Vanessa. Had her relatives
pawned the Blood Talisman? She needed that; the crawling tapestries and
combatant portraits spelled home, but not her heart’s desire.
“Where is everyone?” Her ruff shot out. Her
wand filled her hand. They knew she needed to be
prepared. “Cousins! Nurse! Nanny! Where are you?” She turned slowly, noting the
despoliation of a castle that had endured for centuries. “What’s happened here?
“Where are my cousins? It’s Vanessa, come
from America. Where are you?”
After some time, she heard a rattling tap.
Someone was coming from the castle’s inner sanctum. Peering down a darkened
hallway, she saw an ancient figure tapping her way toward her. Using her wand as a cane!
“Cousin Viola! Why are you using your wand
like that? Stop, dear! It’s a travesty.” Vanessa was sufficiently shocked that
she forgot that she hated her cousin Viola. She looked so horrible, who
wouldn’t feel pity? “What’s happened?”
“Ah can’t say ah know. Who’re you?”
“I’m Vanessa Schierman, from California. You
know me. We’ve visited.”
The crone looked her up and down. “Ah daresay
you’ve done better than me. Been hard times here.”
“How?”
“Don’t know, dear. Expect a spell’s been cast
on me. Think ah’m the last living soul here. Think so.”
“Viola! You must remember! What has happened
to the castle and all the furniture? And the cousins?”
“All th’ fam’ly’s gone. ‘spect they sold the
swag to keep up the lifestyle. Designer this, couture that. Hard to be a witch
in modern times.”
“It went for clothes?” Vanessa
stepped back, truly shocked. Her skirt swayed forward, reminding her of her own
clothing. This dress was one of her favorites, floor length and completely
black with fine pleats and tucks, black lace trim, and obsidian buttons like
eyes. Custom made, of course, but by the villagers who lived behind the estate
house. Cost nothing.
“Oh, yeah. Y’ need t’ have top drawer clothes
and shoes. Handbags, of course. And posh entertaining. Couldn't do it here.”
The other witch raised her wrinkled face to indicate the doomsday hanging over
them.
“You could if you cleaned up
a bit. I entertain. I even had a wedding at my
house.”
“A wedding? Do people still get married?” A
demented giggle. “Of course they do. Ah forgot that our Adrianna and Laurenz
von Zadicus were married. But not here.”
“Where?”
“In Paris. At a fancy hotel. Took the last
silver candelabra to pay for it. They’re here. Somewhere. They’ll come out in a
while.” She looked up at the narrow gothic windows. A shadow of dim light
indicated their location. It was almost dark. “Sleep all day, awake all night.
Howling and carrying on.”
“Adrianna is here?” That was a blessing.
Adrianna was a level head and a smart one. A new breed of witch. Incorruptible.
“Who else is here?”
“No one; everyone with any life lit out.”
Vanessa cursed silently. “Well, I think I’ll
go wake her up.”
Viola’s eyes widened, fit to burst. “Oh, no.
Wouldn't do that. She’s with Laurenz, y’know. Newlywed.” Viola’s bulging eyes
took on a lascivious glint.
Vanessa certainly didn’t want to walk in on
her distant cousin in the raptures of the newly conjoined.
“Come in the kitchen with me, Cousin Vanessa.
Ah’ll make ye a cuppa.”
Since when did her relatives start talking
like Yorkshiremen? Vanessa followed her. They walked a long way, into a kitchen
that might have been cleaned in this century. Or not.
“What happened to the servants? You had a
whole village of them, just as I do.”
“Too lively for here. Lit out when Laurenz’s
family started coming by. Now it’s just me.”
Vanessa washed their cups, and the teakettle,
pot, and teaspoons. She wiped down the old stove and the table top and resisted
the urge to mop the floor. Viola was obviously very ill; she couldn't keep up.
But why not hire someone from town?
Curious as she was about the cause of the
degenerated state of the ancestral castle and finances, Vanessa had a mission:
get the Blood Talisman and go back home. She sipped tea, glancing at Viola
surreptitiously. Her third cousin twice-removed was just as unwilling to make
eye contact with her. Vanessa knew what she looked
like and couldn't blame her, but if the pot ever called the kettle… Viola was
no one to feel superior regarding looks.
“I’ve come to see everyone, of course, but I
do miss Mama so. I wanted to visit her crypt and bring her these…” Bring her
what? A bouquet of deadly nightshade leapt into Vanessa’s hand. Being a witch
was so useful. “A token of respect. Mama is still in the mausoleum, I suppose?
You haven’t found it necessary to pawn her remains to buy new shoes or
anything?”
The other witch made a disgusting snort.
“Pawn your mother? Like to see the bloke who’d try
that madness. She’s got a circle of demons around her. Good thing, too, because
Laurenz an’ them want that jewel on her throat. Covet it bad. But Ophelia’s as
much a witch dead as she was alive.”
Relief bathed Vanessa. She’d nip down to the
crypt, grab the jewel, and be off. Pity to miss seeing Adrianna, but she’d
undoubtedly enjoy her tryst with her new husband more than a cup of tea with
her “auntie.”
“Well, I don’t suppose I’ll have any problem.
The jewel is rightfully mine, as the female head of our line. I’ll just…” She
rose to leave when she spied an emaciated waif wearing an almost invisible
chemise in the doorway.
“Adrianna? Is that you?” The creature was
almost naked. “Viola, grab a table cloth or something to cover her. She’s lost
her clothes…”
“What?” the waif objected. “This is a Vermilini Couture gown.”
“Gown? It’s barely a handkerchief…” Vanessa
took the cloth Viola proffered and wrapped it around the urchin's shoulders.
“What happened to you? You were such a robust girl.” Now skin and bone, pale as
death, Adrianna had once sported thick glossy hair that curled and bounced. But
now nothing about her indicated any life within her. She kept her eyes down and
averted.
“Thin is in, auntie. You should know that.
Laurenz and I travel a great deal all over the world. We move in fashionable
circles. I have to look the part.”
“Well, society has changed a great deal since
I was a girl. A woman had to have recognizable boobs back then.” The other
witches recoiled at her words. “Boobs and an ass. You look like a drowned rat.”
Adrianna shot a look at her. Something about
it alarmed Vanessa, but the young witch turned away before she could puzzle it
out.
“One thing hasn’t changed,” the scrawny
duck’s wispy voice had an edge, a definite bite. “People of breeding have manners. They don’t ‘drop in’ uninvited and make judgments
about family and home. We haven’t seen you since your mother died, and you come
here, saying all these things…”
How did Adrianna hear her and Viola talking
closeted away in the ancient kitchen? Was the house bugged? That was likely.
Vanessa’s mansion certainly was. Was her witch’s hearing especially acute? Or
was she something else? A horrible thought was coming to Vanessa. The only
thing with better hearing than a witch was a…
“Oh my God!” She spun to the door. Another
wasted figure stood there, this one male with lank, dark hair. He wore trousers
like those popular in the 1800s and nothing else. His skin gleamed white and
his eyes flashed red.
“AAAAAAAA!” The war cry emerged from her with
no stops, no holding back. Her hair stood on end, mouth flashing her teeth.
Vanessa’s ruff jumped two feet from her neck, poison acid squirting from its
jeweled tips at the interloper. The poison alone should have killed him, but
her wand settled the matter conclusively.
Shooting from her hand, its handle formed a T,
or more correctly, a cross. The business end of the wand hit the stranger just
to the left of the breast bone, piercing his body at the heart. Before she
could even say, “How do you do, Laurenz? Welcome to the
family,” the rotter lay dead on the kitchen floor. Nothing like a stout
oak wand for offing vampires.
Viola and Adrianna stared at her, lips
retracting from their fangs and bloodshot eyes glinting ruby in the dim light.
The wand ejected itself from Laurenz’s chest and flung itself at Viola’s, finding
the same deadly perch. The older witch fell, black blood leaking from her
wound. Vanessa’s wand pulled itself from Viola’s body and hovered over
Adrianna.
Adrianna dropped to her knees, hissing. She
crawled toward Vanessa, hissing and threatening with her teeth. Before she got
very far, her body began to sway back and forth between her aunt and her
husband. Growing still, she wailed, “You killed
Laurenz. You killed my husband.”
Her grief didn’t last long; leaping to her
feet, Adrianna dropped the table cloth shielding her fragile body and pointed
at Vanessa. The older witch jerked back, feeling the curse and spell cast upon
her. Becoming a vampire hadn’t hurt her young relation’s witching ability one
bit.
“You killed my husband. You owe me.” The waif’s face was set and ugly. “You owe me
until the end of time.”
Sadly, that was true. It was the way of
witches.
* * *
GIVEAWAY
There's also 3 signed, print copies of Vanessa Schierman PhD WITCH up for grabs. It contains the
two stories from the HALLOWEENPALOOZA II and HALLOWEENPALOOZA III, plus the novella from this one.
To win: go to the
Official FB Event Page; find the post announcing today’s giveaway; and
comment, “I WANT TO WIN” in that post and you just might!!!
Anyone who would like a free print copy of Vanessa Schierman PhD WITCH to read and review pronto, contact me at sandy@sandynathan.com. The last free day is the 27th. Offer for free print is good until the 22nd!!!
AUTHOR BIO
I hope
you enjoy Vanessa Schierman PhD WITCH. Vanessa has
appeared in my other books, particularly In Love by
Christmas, but she’s never had a starring role. Wendy Potocki’s
Halloweenpalooza motivated me to give Vanessa her due. Wendy’s Halloween-themed
on-line festival for authors and readers of the macabre is unique. I love the
sheer wackiness of Halloween and applaud Wendy for creating an event around it.
In this book, I introduce you to a special
woman, who is entirely fictional, and entirely based on a woman I knew. Her
estate and world are parts of my youth. Only a veil of imagination separates
what I experienced as a child from the dark mansion on the mountain in this
tale.
I
was born to be a princess. I was a princess, for a
while. My parents overcame the poverty of their youth by becoming extremely
successful. My hometown was one of the most affluent places in the country.
Giant oaks, old mansions, and flashy cars surrounded me. I spent my time
showing horses and water-skiing behind my dad’s obscenely overpowered boat.
“The
Schierman estate” really exists. I discovered it while riding my horse through
the redwoods of the coastal range in the San Francisco Peninsula around 1960. I
was totally lost—fences were rare in those days—I rode around a bend in the
tall trees and ferns and found myself confronted by a magnificent, historic
mansion. Acres of emerald lawns and glorious evergreens ringed the ancient
structure. I’ve never forgotten that breathless moment. The grand house I found
wasn’t scary; it was beautiful and surprising and truly magical. The one in my
story was designed to terrify anyone who saw it.
Dr.
Vanessa Schierman is based on a real person, a very tall, gaunt, and extremely
wealthy woman with exquisite manners and enough kindness and love to stock the
planet. She wasn’t a witch, but she embodied Dr. Schierman’s ideas about taste
and decorum. And she was a direct descendent of a Robber Baron. Her family’s
bloodlines and influence reached far into the past. She defines a truly upper
class person to me.
My
life as a princess ended when a drunk driver ran into my father head-on in
1964, killing him. Not instantaneously, either. My dad’s death was the stuff of
horror movies.
My
old life vanished. All the horses, water-ski boats, and parties went Poof!
Through structures and systems I will not describe, I lived at a close to
poverty level income for a while. What happened in the coming years opened my
eyes. I’ve seen and lived the over-privileged existence I describe in my
novels. I’ve seen how ephemeral its rewards are and how it warps those who are
trapped by it. I’ve seen how it masks mental illness.
My
writing has a bite. My life has had a bite. Recovering from what happened to me
has taken many years. And I have recovered. What was legitimately mine came
back to me, along with the fruit of my own labor. If your life echoes mine, you
might like to see how I healed; it’s in my books. I write fiction so that I can
tell the truth without being sued.
Now
for my “regular bio”: I’ve been in school a very long time and have two
advanced degrees. I’ve had prestigious careers. My writing has won thirty
national awards and I am an Amazon bestselling author in a number of
categories. I’m very happily married; my husband and I have been together
forty-two years. I have three grown children and two grandchildren. We live on
our California horse ranch.
Also
by Sandy Nathan
FICTION
THE
BLOODSONG SERIES
(Bloodsong 1)
(Bloodsong 2)
(A Bloodsong Novella)
(Bloodsong 4)
Bloodsong Series, unnumbered:
Vanessa
Schierman PhD: WITCH
EARTH’S
END TRILOGY
(Earth’s End 1)
(Earth’s End 2)
(Earth’s End 3)
(Earth’s
End 1 to 3 in a single eBook)
NONFICTION
& CHILDREN’S LITERATURE
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can’t get anywhere else.
videos
videos
https://vimeo.com/187268392 HALLOWEEN FUN WITH BACKYARD FRIENDS. If you don’t have arachnophobia at the beginning of this, you will by the end.
And: https://vimeo.com/187279088 HALLOWEEN IS COMING–DON’T BE AFRAID. Produces fear of almost everything.
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