Love and Other Acts of Courage
A sweeping narrative of love, loss, courage, and a determined quest for justice.
What Inspired Me to Write this Novel
The First Thing
Years ago, while visiting Australia, I read a story that left me outraged about a freighter that collided with a yacht off the coast of New Zealand and then sailed away without attempting a rescue. Only one of the four people on the yacht that night survived.
I subsequently learned about the limited options available to that survivor to make the freighter crew pay for their incompetence in hitting the yacht and their inhumanity in leaving the scene without attempting a rescue. In real life a suit was filed and there was, eventually, a settlement. But the crew members were never held accountable for their heartlessness.
The Second Thing
I felt a similar outrage, mixed with astonishment, upon reading a report of a dive boat returning from a day cruise to the Great Barrier Reef minus two of its passengers. The boat crew failed to react to the extra shoes and bags left behind, and the bus driver didn’t seek a reason why he had two fewer passengers at the end of the day than at the beginning. Having been on such boats, if I were reading about this event as a piece of fiction, I would question its believability, which only goes to show that fact truly is often stranger than fiction is allowed to be.
Love and Other Acts of Courage is my alternate telling of these tragic stories, and since I’m in charge, this time there is accountability.
THE CHARACTERS
MAX GILDEA
A successful maritime attorney and bonsai enthusiast who reluctantly finds himself representing the only survivor of a yacht sinking. He’s reluctant because there are few legal options available for the case, and Max doesn’t like to lose.
SOPHIE SURIANO
As the only survivor when her family’s yacht is sunk by a freighter, Sophie craves the justice that her attorney assures her is an impossibility. But she was tough enough to survive the sinking of the Sylph and there’s no way she’s backing down now.
JAKE RUTHERFORD
An Australian journalist, and former dive master, who is every bit as tough as her name implies. She risks everything to give Sophie the accountability she craves and Max the a success he doesn’t expect.
THE SETTINGS
San Francisco, New Zealand, Australia
What Readers Are Saying
THE WISHING SHELF BOOK AWARDS 2015 – FINALIST
Romantic and well-written. I like learning new things and maritime law was a first for me. Lee Fullbright Author of The Angry Woman Suite
Love and Other Acts of Courage is a love story woven within an engaging mystery with twists and turns, believable villains, and enough tension to keep you turning pages. Dete Meserve Author of Good Sam
This novel is available in ELECTRONIC and PRINT editions from Amazon.
An AUDIO edition is coming soon.