"Beautiful and beguiling. A stunning debut from an author to watch."
Richard E. Rock Author of Deep Level and Frenzy Island.
"Suspension takes on a double meaning in this clever story of a woman caught between worlds. This intriguing blend of time travel, the paranormal, and romance comes to life through Christians’ vivid cast of well-drawn characters. Christians has added an imaginative and unique spin on time travel, taking Carla Thompson on a journey like no other."
JP McLean, award-winning author of Blood Mark
Suspension
(Time Binder)
by Andrea Faye
*****
‘Dreams are often strange’ – a near credible fantasy.
Time travel fantasies succeed best when the characters involved are realistically defined before the credibility challenge is introduced. Andrea understands that factor and opens her tale with verismo style – Preparing the reader with a near visual life-quasi-death transition, Andrea succeeds in creating a story that involves as well as entertains.
A remarkably fine debut, this book – thankfully – is the first in a series called Time Binder. Andrea Faye Christians steps onto the literary stage with assurance with this skillfully created novel. Highly recommended.
Grady Harp
GoodReads.com
"Engaging, thought-provoking, and highly creative, author Andrea Faye Christians’ “Suspension (Time Binder)” is a must-read novel for Summer 2022! The surreal reality that Carla finds herself in and the amazing cast of characters she meets along the way showcase the connectivity of our world and those within it, and made for such an intriguing story. If you haven’t yet, be sure to grab your copy today!"
Rating: 10/10
Author Anthony Avina
Completing a first novel is a wonderful accomplishment for author and publisher! In this highly competitive category with 60 entries, I ranked this book #4 my list of the top ten. The writing is lyrical, and the author paints realistic images with carefully selected wording. The storyline is creative and intriguing. The protagonist, Carla, is dead. But she still hovers nearby as medical personnel confirm the obvious.
Feeling lonely, her persona wanders onto the Clifton Suspension Bridge, which is suspended on both ends over a gorge. Children who pass by seem to "see" her, and Carla oddly feels alive. She revisits the bridge and meets a man then a girl who can see her. The girl is looking frantically for help. They approach a fatal accident, and Carla realizes that her companion, Sabrina, is the dead person. As the story unfolds, the two meet a psychic who tells of a man she saw as a child and relates her family's story. Matilda says that she and Carla are Dream Walkers who can pass between the physical and spiritual worlds. But Carla will not find solace until she faces unfinished business in her lifetime. Carla and Sabrina return to the bridge and encounter the eighteenth-century engineer who designed and built it. Brunel introduces himself as the gatekeeper of the portal. Carla leads Sabrina through it to help her find closure.
Carla's spirit returns to the bridge feeling stuck, suspended between two worlds. Brunel tells his own story and leads Carla and others through the portal into other worlds. Plot twists keep the reader engaged with questions as the characters debate life, death, and the hereafter. Since the author is Welsh, her punctuation and grammar choices are her own.
Ms. Christians, please continue to write novels!
Placed 4th. in - Benjamin Franklin Awards™ 2023
Best New Voice: Fiction
In Suspension by Andrea Faye Christians, life becomes more interesting after death…at least for Dream Walkers.
Thirty-one-year-old Bristol resident Carla is suddenly tasked with bringing lost spirits into the light-after-death she never believed in until she…well, died. Other spirits and a real, live medium insist upon her fulfilling her destiny but, ever the skeptic, Carla, probes and finds clues about what she is as one adventure whips into another. Can this ghost help others and herself to pass into the beyond?
Captivating prose and enriching dialogue precipitously suspend reader belief in a story projecting an existence beyond death. The choices and actions of the characters lighten the shadow of the grave subject matter; mortality and morality can feel burdensome, but Suspension by Andrea Faye Christians renders them palatable through a focus on Carla’s experience as a spirit steeped in fate.
Non-linear time promises hours of intriguing mysteries in this first installment of the Time Binder series.
Thanks,
Book Excellence Team