Yvonne
He occupied a region of consciousness somewhere on the edge of sleep – but not quite. He was still aware. A jumble of disconnected thoughts swirled inside his head. He could make no sense of them and it maddened him.
In the depths of the night he lay in his bed, cognisant of the sounds around him that prevented him from succumbing to sleep. He cursed silently. There was the quiet tick-tock from the alarm clock on his bedside table. The soft, audible breath of his wife sleeping beside him. The sound of his own heart beating. They melded together in the darkness, tormenting him. He could feel his anger rising. The battle to quiet his mind was futile.
With these sounds was another, more pervasive sound – the rhythmic hum that came from a pump in the hall just outside. It delivered oxygen into the adjacent bedroom via a long, thin tube connected to a port on the pump’s surface, along the polished timber floorboards of the hallway and through the doorway of the bedroom where it terminated at the soft plastic prongs of the nasal cannula that sat just under the nostrils of the petite figure who lay in the bed.
It was a young woman. It was his daughter.
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I can relate and sympathize totally with this person, in his inability to sleep, despite being bone weary. To lay there for most of the night, listening to the over accentuated sounds, which are almost invisible during daylight hours, becoming more and more angry, hot and bothered and ultimately upset, really doesn’t set me up well for the day ahead – especially when I feel myself finally able to drop off to sleep, just as the alarm goes off and it is time to get up!
I would certainly find it almost impossible to sleep, if you added into the equation the sound of the oxygen pump, keeping my daughter alive! A little like having a new baby, I would always have one ear open for the slightest change to the ‘norm’ and I would probably still need to keep checking that she was breathing and that there was no fault with the life support equipment!
Definitely an emotional opening passage on so many levels, but then I would expect nothing else from author Dean Mayes 🙂
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This is a pretty intense beginning. I wonder if the author can hold that feeling throughout the whole book.
Hi Elizabeth,
If you check out my ‘Favourites’ list over at Goodreads, you will see that both of Dean Mayes previous novels are there. The stories are as diverse, as they are intriguing and Dean did a great job of holding my interest, right until the very last page.
Dean is also involved in the medical profession and whilst his area of expertise is pediatrics rather than organ transplant surgery, surely some of that inside knowledge and informed contacts, must have paid off!
Thanks for taking the time to comment, I always appreciate your visits 🙂
This one does sound very good Yvonne, as I mentioned before this topic of organ donors interests me!
That scene is an intense one and sadly one that hits close to home for me this time around as my son was hospitalized last year for nine days. Lack of sleep during a time like that is not even the worst of a parents troubles. And the noises of the machines, like torture.
Like you say, ‘A little like having a new baby”. That is very true as you keep vigil and watch every moment.
Well, now I’ve gone and depressed the mood here, sorry! All is well here now and I am very grateful for that.
I hope you enjoy the book, it sounds intense and like it can be a roller coaster ride of a read.
Hi Naida,
I also have a keen interest in organ donation and transplant operations, as my SIL has undergone two kidney transplants, including a live donation from her husband, my brother. A close friend has also undergone a heart valve transplant, a procedure which hubbie may have to undergo at some future date. To do my ‘bit’ right now, I have signed my organ donation card and joined the register, although I am hoping that the governments future aim, to introduce an opt out system for organ donation, is actioned sooner rather than later.
The mere thought of having to sit vigil by a hospital bed, fills me (someone who has never had an overnight stay in hospital) with dread. Add to that, the sound of all those machines and I would be a nervous wreck in no time. If those machines were then installed in a sick room at home, I have no idea how I would cope … I guess you just do?
I guess this is going to be a story of ups and downs, with ultimately some disturbing and emotional scenes … tissues at the ready I suspect 🙂
This sounds like a very emotional read. I can definitely relate to that bone weary feeling. I’ll be interested to hear how this book is as a whole.
Hi Katherine,
I am definitely in that bone weary mode right now … After a very busy and hectic day, I arrived home with the intention of checking out comments on my post and perhaps responding to most of them.
Alas ‘the best laid plans etc. etc … After establishing that my sister-in-law probably has recurring pneumonia and sounded very ill, I decided that there would be just enough time to do a towel wash, before getting dinner … No! not to be. After completing the wash cycle, I automatically set the spin function going, only to think that the house was falling down and to be almost gassed by the fumes, as the washing machine caught fire.
So now I only have time to reply to one or two of the lovely comments I have received, safe in the knowledge that I won’t be starting on this very emotionally charged story, for a week or so yet! Those first lines don’t tell the whole story, although they do set the scene nicely, so I shall be eagerly waiting to turn the pages 🙂
Have a great weekend!
What a dramatic opening! I’d have to keep reading to find out more about his daughter and how he manages to cope. Sounds like a good story.
My Friday post features The Reluctant Midwife.
Hi Sandra,
I’m not really sure just how I thought this book would open, however I did get a bit of a surprise about those dramatic, intense and very descriptive first few lines. I don’t think I was prepared to be quite that shocked, so soon and had anticipated that things might not have been so bad for the daughter yet! I wonder if I shall need the tissues on hand when I start reading the book for real 🙂
Thanks for taking the time to check out today’s post. I always appreciate your comments. Have a good weekend 🙂
This book sounds very good and I put it on my wish list when you mentioned it before. The beginning lines are just as engrossing as I would expect and they add to my desire to read it at some point!
I began the third book in Lindsey Davis’s Flavia Albia series last night. Here are the opening lines of Deadly Election:
“Never hold an auction in July. In Rome, who’s around then? People who can escape will have fled to rural retreats in cooler parts of Italy. The rest are on their deathbeds or have stayed here to avoid relatives.”
Hi Kelly,
Dean definitely has the knack of grabbing the reader with the very first line of his books and not letting them go until the very last word – by which time they really don’t want to leave the story at all!
It sounds as though the Romans, even back then, had their policy in place for avoiding the searing summer heat. It always amazes me, the number of Brits who supposedly go to other European countries to live, only to spend every summer living back here in England, as it is just too hot in the new country they have adopted as home!
I need to know just what busines Flavia’s family is involved in, where a body can be so well hidden and auctions are held in the middle of summer.
This probably isn’t a series for me, although it does sound so very good and thanks for sharing your first lines this week 🙂
I know that I am coming to this discussion quite late but, in fact I am coming to it in time to advise thqt, after a lengthy delay, I can announce that The Recipient will be released on May 1st, 2016.
The delay to our initial October release came about because we signed with an international distributor and one of the conditions of that signing was that we would have to hold over the release to fit in with their schedule.
I have just released a trailer which is live over at my official website and I’ll be posting links to interviews and reviews (or ‘pre’views) in support of the new release date.
Thanks to Yvonne (once again) for her continued support of my work.
Dean Mayes (author).
Hi Dean,
I guess you must be pleased that ‘The Recipient’ is now going to go international, but on the other hand, the delay in publishing must have been agonising for you.
I actually now, don’t feel quite so bad about my delay in reading and reviewing ‘The Recipient’, although of course there has already been some very positive responses to the couple of promotional posts I have published … which is great!
Things here have been so crazy and hectic, that sadly my blogging and reviewing schedule has been thrown out of the window! Now that I know I am still in with a chance of not letting you down completely, I shall make sure that ‘The Recipient’ is next up on my list … Promise!
If at any time, you should feel like contributing any copy for a guest post, then please feel free to drop me an email and I can organise a spot over at ‘Meet The Authors’ … I would love to host you 🙂
Good Luck 🙂
Yvonne I would LOVE to contribute! I’ve been putting together a portfolio of articles for the express purpose of guest posting so let’s indeed set something up.
May 1st still seems like a long time away but it is, in fact, scarily close. I would love to read your thoughts on the novel.
If you’d like, I can provide you with the print ready version that went off to the printer this week.