Can a beautiful young woman's native wit and uncommon intelligence overcome an overpowering and deep-seated guilt that is destroying her life? That's the central question of Magdalenes, the story of Sarah Beth LaBranche's fall, rise and eventual triumph.

When Sarah Beth rents a room from Annedette Cheramie and meets the regal Creole lady's grandson, Frank, her life is forever changed. Sarah Beth becomes Frank's nurse, accountant and research assistant. Collecting his bills, helping him with patients using the latest in Victorian medical treatments and seeking a cure for a blinding eye disease, she falls in love with him. Now her terrible secret must be kept from the two people she holds most dear—her mother and Frank. Ever fearful that Frank will discover the awful truth about her, Sarah Beth helps him battle the 1905 Yellow Fever Epidemic, fighting ignorance, corruption and bigotry in a heroic struggle to help Frank banish his own demons. But each victory brings Sarah Beth's secret closer to being discovered.

Magdalenes is not a typical romance, nor the usual medical thriller. Scrupulously researched, it blends the best elements of these genres into a compelling historical novel of tragedy, betrayal and redemption.

In 1945, tuberculosis was known as "the white plague" and was one of the world's leading causes of death. Victims were confined to sanatoriums under the control of state laws and not allowed to leave.

After she is diagnosed with tuberculosis, fourteen-year-old Betsy is taken from her home and forced to undergo treatment. For four years she remains in the hospital under punitive rules "more like a prison than most prisons." At the age of eighteen, faced with disfiguring surgery called thorcoplasty that will leave her with a caved-in chest, Betsy manages to escape from the hospital. With the help of new friends she bravely creates a covert life for herself.

Naively believing that nothing bad will happen, Betsy allows herself to be seduced by her first boyfriend. Her subsequent pregnancy causes her tuberculosis to flare anew, and she is forced to return to the hospital, where societal prejudices threaten her with the loss of her new baby. However, streptomycin and other new drugs finally cure the tuberculosis, and an unexpected romance ultimately transforms her life.

Based on author Sarah Taggart's own experiences, Taking the Cure is a reminder of tuberculosis's history and dangers.

In 1945, tuberculosis was known as "the white plague" and was one of the world's leading causes of death. Victims were confined to sanatoriums under the control of state laws and not allowed to leave.

After she is diagnosed with tuberculosis, fourteen-year-old Betsy is taken from her home and forced to undergo treatment. For four years she remains in the hospital under punitive rules "more like a prison than most prisons." At the age of eighteen, faced with disfiguring surgery called thorcoplasty that will leave her with a caved-in chest, Betsy manages to escape from the hospital. With the help of new friends she bravely creates a covert life for herself.

Naively believing that nothing bad will happen, Betsy allows herself to be seduced by her first boyfriend. Her subsequent pregnancy causes her tuberculosis to flare anew, and she is forced to return to the hospital, where societal prejudices threaten her with the loss of her new baby. However, streptomycin and other new drugs finally cure the tuberculosis, and an unexpected romance ultimately transforms her life.

Based on author Sarah Taggart's own experiences, Taking the Cure is a reminder of tuberculosis's history and dangers.

Blair Beebe, M.D. Medical lessons from Vietnam; what did we learn? Almost fifty years after the beginning of American involvement in the Vietnam War, we still remain embroiled in military actions that generate disease, disability, and death. Frontline physicians who were in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Vietnam faced the medical consequences of war every day. My new novel, Doc Lucas USN, based on real people and real events, brings the war down to a human scale, one person at a time. History gives us statistics and dates, but fiction helps us to better understand the meaning behind those facts. One of my old professors defined history as “lies we tell about dead people.” We understand more from reading Homer, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Margaret Mitchell, and Stephen Ambrose than we ever learned from dry history textbooks. Paradoxically, the truth comes out in fiction. During my time in Vietnam, and for many years after, I listened to stories from other physicians who served during the war and from naval aviators and marines who faced combat every day. I also heard different points of view from Vietnamese civilians who had come to America to escape the chaos after the war. Their eyewitness accounts are the true history, but unless someone writes them down, we lose them forever. Moreover, individual stories may have little meaning to us if they lack context. I’ve often heard both veterans and civilians say, “I don’t talk about my experiences, because anyone who wasn’t there could never understand how bad it was.” That’s why we need a novel to give us a complete account in an organized way. Each character and each scene moves the action to develop a central theme about the war. We want more than anecdotes. We want to understand the how and the why of the unfolding tragedy. Doc Lucas not only recounts the stories, he lives them. We feel his anxiety, his terror, and at times, his joy. When things go wrong, we know why, and we can feel his despair. In the good times, and there are many, we laugh along with him. In the end, Doc Lucas learns important lessons about himself and his values centered on human rights and the relief of suffering. He emerges from the war better equipped to take his place with stronger convictions about his role in his society.

Blair Beebe, M.D. Medical lessons from Vietnam; what did we learn? Almost fifty years after the beginning of American involvement in the Vietnam War, we still remain embroiled in military actions that generate disease, disability, and death. Frontline physicians who were in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Vietnam faced the medical consequences of war every day. My new novel, Doc Lucas USN, based on real people and real events, brings the war down to a human scale, one person at a time. History gives us statistics and dates, but fiction helps us to better understand the meaning behind those facts. One of my old professors defined history as “lies we tell about dead people.” We understand more from reading Homer, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Margaret Mitchell, and Stephen Ambrose than we ever learned from dry history textbooks. Paradoxically, the truth comes out in fiction. During my time in Vietnam, and for many years after, I listened to stories from other physicians who served during the war and from naval aviators and marines who faced combat every day. I also heard different points of view from Vietnamese civilians who had come to America to escape the chaos after the war. Their eyewitness accounts are the true history, but unless someone writes them down, we lose them forever. Moreover, individual stories may have little meaning to us if they lack context. I’ve often heard both veterans and civilians say, “I don’t talk about my experiences, because anyone who wasn’t there could never understand how bad it was.” That’s why we need a novel to give us a complete account in an organized way. Each character and each scene moves the action to develop a central theme about the war. We want more than anecdotes. We want to understand the how and the why of the unfolding tragedy. Doc Lucas not only recounts the stories, he lives them. We feel his anxiety, his terror, and at times, his joy. When things go wrong, we know why, and we can feel his despair. In the good times, and there are many, we laugh along with him. In the end, Doc Lucas learns important lessons about himself and his values centered on human rights and the relief of suffering. He emerges from the war better equipped to take his place with stronger convictions about his role in his society.

As former secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Dr. Peter Kelly knows that the new president-elect, Joseph Thorn, will continue the previous administration’s disastrous healthcare reform. He’s seen firsthand the terrible price the reform has cost families. His own son has become a victim of the new “affordable and practical” healthcare system. But even worse, Kelly realizes that it is his own original proposal that landed America in this tragic mess.

Ten years ago, Kelly only wanted to reduce suffering and move much-needed funds to where they would do the most good for patients instead of increasing the bottom lines of politicians and conglomerate healthcare industries. Instead, he helped create a dark monster that threatened to devour American health standards, and with the crooked administration adding to the plan, it only made things worse. Now, with the current administration on the verge of continuing the dramatic decline of American healthcare with a president whose power and ego climaxes even the most adulated world leaders, Kelly knows there are no options left. If the people of the great United States of America are to ever have quality healthcare again, Kelly must make a move that will change the course of history—if he has the guts to pull the trigger…

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As former secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Dr. Peter Kelly knows that the new president-elect, Joseph Thorn, will continue the previous administration’s disastrous healthcare reform. He’s seen firsthand the terrible price the reform has cost families. His own son has become a victim of the new “affordable and practical” healthcare system. But even worse, Kelly realizes that it is his own original proposal that landed America in this tragic mess.

Ten years ago, Kelly only wanted to reduce suffering and move much-needed funds to where they would do the most good for patients instead of increasing the bottom lines of politicians and conglomerate healthcare industries. Instead, he helped create a dark monster that threatened to devour American health standards, and with the crooked administration adding to the plan, it only made things worse. Now, with the current administration on the verge of continuing the dramatic decline of American healthcare with a president whose power and ego climaxes even the most adulated world leaders, Kelly knows there are no options left. If the people of the great United States of America are to ever have quality healthcare again, Kelly must make a move that will change the course of history—if he has the guts to pull the trigger…

Thirty years before Viagra, 44288, An Ohio Mental Patient and author of the amazing Quatrain, Some Die Mad, conceives of Viagro, a pill to help male erections which goes terribly wrong and wrecks (creates?) the life of a New York insurance company actuary called Millard Fillmore. We all never got to see Vincent Van Gogh pen some cartoons for the New Yorker but this is probably the next best thing. Prepare to fall off your sofa.

Thirty years before Viagra, 44288, An Ohio Mental Patient and author of the amazing Quatrain, Some Die Mad, conceives of Viagro, a pill to help male erections which goes terribly wrong and wrecks (creates?) the life of a New York insurance company actuary called Millard Fillmore. We all never got to see Vincent Van Gogh pen some cartoons for the New Yorker but this is probably the next best thing. Prepare to fall off your sofa.

HAVE YOU EVER RECEIVED HEALTHCARE TREATMENT FROM AN IDIOT?

While the stories contained in the current book are fictitious, the reader will quickly point to the stories and exclaim, "That happened to me" and "That idiot treated me."

WHY BUY THE BOOK?

Have you ever felt abused, victimized, or traumatized after receiving healtcare treatment?

Have you ever felt that your healthcare provider wasn't treating you as a real person?

The current book presents stories as though idiot healthcare providers would actually apply the lessons presented. Sample lessons include:

A job doing once is worth doing twice.
While the customer is always right, the patient is always wrong.
Attorneys are your friends.
When you control time, you control patients.
When in doubt, prescribe medicine.
Get to the source of all ailments; the patient's head.
Only you, as the healtcare provider, knows what is best for the patient.
Laughter is the best medicine, especially when you're laughing at the patient.
What a patient doesn't know, won't hurt them.
The current book provides humourous insight into the making of an idiot healthcare provider.

An injured derelict receives inadequate attention and dies in Milltown Hospital. He's found to be a Federal agent The hospital will be forced to close unless their emergency surgical care is improved. Trauma surgeon, Simeon Macdonald, joins their staff. He performs a life-saving, damage control operation in the Emergency Department on a severely injured truck driver but is crudely criticized by the chief of surgery. The trucker recovers and then surprisingly dies, the cause of death is not established. At the inquest improprieties with the trucker's wife are implied, resulting in criticism of Simeon's personal behavior. Simeon's previously thriving practice falls off. Due to severely reduced income, Simeon's wife decides to return to her former work running her family owned exotic car salesroom. She complains bitterly she's "tied to a loser" and demands separation with double indemnity life insurance in her name. Simeon's nurse has an accident while driving his car, found to be sabotaged. Further attempts on Simeon's life and further law suits raise the questions: Who wants Simeon dead? Will he lose his license to practice? Why was the Federal agent killed?

With a pistol tucked into his waistbelt, Simeon sets out to find the answers.

An injured derelict receives inadequate attention and dies in Milltown Hospital. He's found to be a Federal agent The hospital will be forced to close unless their emergency surgical care is improved. Trauma surgeon, Simeon Macdonald, joins their staff. He performs a life-saving, damage control operation in the Emergency Department on a severely injured truck driver but is crudely criticized by the chief of surgery. The trucker recovers and then surprisingly dies, the cause of death is not established. At the inquest improprieties with the trucker's wife are implied, resulting in criticism of Simeon's personal behavior. Simeon's previously thriving practice falls off. Due to severely reduced income, Simeon's wife decides to return to her former work running her family owned exotic car salesroom. She complains bitterly she's "tied to a loser" and demands separation with double indemnity life insurance in her name. Simeon's nurse has an accident while driving his car, found to be sabotaged. Further attempts on Simeon's life and further law suits raise the questions: Who wants Simeon dead? Will he lose his license to practice? Why was the Federal agent killed?

With a pistol tucked into his waistbelt, Simeon sets out to find the answers.

This is an Authors Guild BIP title. Please use Authors Guild BIP specs. Author bio on file. description: At the climax of an exciting Lamaze delivery, when Lee McLaren is born, one key question stuns all those present: Is Lee a girl or a boy? The answer is uncertain. As the parents and doctors deal with this challenge, they face major and irrevocable choices. Sharing the intense journey, readers achieve a stunning new understanding of the nature of our sexuality.

The Inner Circle is a fictional study of how profound differences in human character directly relate to our nation's contemporary culture, the intense division of thinking, the change in the middle class, and the movement of wealth to a select few. The lives that are portrayed here—the characters, the thought processes, and the personal values—are of two sharply differing groups of people. In their ethical, intellectual, and humane daily pursuit of their personal and professional lives, the Edwards and O'Hara families find themselves confronted by the narcissism, arrogance, pretentiousness, and power of the Van Guilder and Maxwell families. Within the character of the Edwards and O'Hara families, there is respect for science and objective analysis, for ethnic diversity, empathy for those less fortunate, and knowledge of the need for change in a country facing desperate challenges. In contrast, the Van Guilder and Maxwell families, along with their inner circle of powerful friends at exclusive Hickory Hill Country Club, devote their efforts to the perpetuation of a dominant and ruling wealthy entitled-elite class. Their every thought and word supports this distinction without regard for the country's pressing problems or the less fortunate. The vastly different thought processes and values of these two groups can only result in open conflict in any interaction—and the forthcoming clash will be considerable.