A journey home reveals more than John could ever have imagined secrets, loss, and the surprising power of redemption.

After years of service, John Furst settled into a low-key bureaucratic post within the US military, coordinating funeral arrangements for soldiers. With a loving woman in his corner, and a punchy work crew he enjoys, he could ride this thing out to retirement. Then a call comes in. His father’s cracking voice informs John that his disliked elder brother has suddenly died.

John must journey home to face the questions around his drug-addicted brother’s death, the conflicted family members who remain, and his own ghosts haunting through four generations of small-town minds. Drawing on patience, drinking, laughter, tears, and screams, John and his estranged family face tragic loss, and he learns that while before his life once seemed secure, it now appears held in place by stagnation.

While crossing a bridge to work one morning after the funeral, John decides to take a leap unforeseen.

Join John on his transformative journey as he navigates the complexities of family, love, and self-discovery. Discover the power of second chances and the resilience of the human spirit in a story that will tug at your heartstrings and leave you pondering the choices that define us all.

The Home I Left is a gripping tale that reminds us that, sometimes, it’s the journey back that leads us forward. $3.99 on Kindle.

After being laid off from his job at a prestigious consulting firm, Dean decides to embark on a journey across East Africa with his younger brother. Unknowingly, they travel into bandit territory where a medical emergency forces them to choose between their safety and their health.

Inspired by true events, The Watermelon King follows the journey of two brothers as they backpack across one of East Africa’s most inhospitable regions. As they endure endless days of difficult travel, a series of short stories written by their father begins to uncover their inherent desire for adventure and their connection to the past. Along the way they begin to understand the beauty and frustration of life in Africa. Free on Kindle.

THE DUZY HOUSE OF MOURNING is the compelling story of a young woman who survived an unthinkable accident the night she was born, an accident that claimed the life of her father, and forever altered her mother who sustained a traumatic brain injury.

The book opens 22 years later. January Duzinski has been raised by her Polish paternal grandparents and works as an embalmer in their mortuary. She’s a bit of an introvert, completely comfortable with the dead, completely brilliant (like her mother was) at the piano. And she has a very conflicted relationship with her non-verbal, disabled mother, Claire.

But January’s life is about to veer off its course with the arrival of one Oscar Thibodeau—attorney for her maternal grandmother, Rose Winston, a woman January has never met, a woman who is suddenly deceased. It seems there is a Steinway concert grand piano up for grabs…and anything else that might interest January.

Thus begins January’s reluctant journey into the incredible life of her mother. Through Claire’s diaries January is introduced to a strong, savvy, confident, enormously talented girl who disinherited herself from the wealth and trappings of a life she did not want. January is also made privy to a firsthand account of her parents’ love story, and the price Claire paid to be with her Polish undertaker. For the first time, January meets the father she has only known through her Duzinski grandparents. $0.99 on Kindle.

Magnolia Song is the explosive saga of two Memphis families whose intertwined fates spiral out of control over four generations of heartbreak and renewal. It’s a rollicking gallop of a novel, a stampede over rough terrain, where the absurd leavens a yeasty mix of sin, sacrifice, and redemption, imbuing the least of the characters with an irrepressible dignity.

“It’s not often that a tale this breathtaking manages to sweep up in its headlong trajectory such a gallery of complex, authentic, and utterly mad characters. Nor is it often that such a swift, page-turning narrative can touch such depths and achieve such wisdom along the way. In J. Robert Towery’s Magnolia Song, the South is a carnival of comedy, danger, and heartbreak. The book is a flat-out wonder.” — Steve Stern

“The first comparison that came to mind when I read Magnolia Song was Balzac. We almost never see novels of whole societies anymore, but this is one on a grand scale. The full complexity of the new South isn’t well understood, even by the people who live there—it’s too new, too big. Yet here it is, widescreen. More than breadth, Magnolia Song has depth. Its interweaving stories are all rooted in a philosophic consciousness of history, particularly in its treatment of race relations. On that delicate subject this novel embodies both a cool distance and a compassionate intimacy. When hatred appears, as it must, it hits with a jolt. As for plain old story, this is one of those novels that grabs you and doesn’t let go.” — Thomas McNamee Free on Kindle.