Story By J. R. Kruze
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J. R. Kruze

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A Mind's Eye Reader
Updated at Mar 24, 2021, 19:36
Have you ever thought some very dangeous thoughts?  Ones that could destroy all life as you knew it? In these six stories by three authors, they do just that. Of course, fiction is safer than real life, so it's much easier to test things here. ...Or so we've been told. In these stories are ideas that will captivate, and excite you to new thoughts and ideas of your own. Because the universe we live in is just a hair's-breadth away from the fictional ones we create. If history is any judge, these authors may be writing are things that will be in our own present any time now. Of course, that's only if you think their thoughts through... A Short Story Anthology Containing: - One Thought, Then Gone by J. R. Kruze- The 95% Solution by S. H. Marpel- Falling by S. H. Marpel- Voices by J. R. Kruze- The Case of the Walkaway Blues by J. R. Kruze & S. H. Marpel- Keyboard in the Sky by R. L. Saunders Excerpt: (From "One Thought, Then Gone") I'D FIGURED IT ALL out by the first day as a high school sophomore. And I could care less. Because it wasn't real. None of it. Schooling was another trap built to "keep people safe." And get them ready to have a job and accept the rat-race, wage-slave mentality. Not that my parents or teachers or anyone else around could really understand what I was going through. They all just set it up as another "coming of age" drama that always played out. All the older siblings I inherited had made it through, somehow. In their own ways. The trick was - I knew they were all part of the same trap. I didn't belong here, that I knew. And I was here to keep me safe from something far darker and more sinister than going on welfare, or being homeless, or doing illegal drugs and going to jail. Something was out there much darker and more deadly than anything they could threaten me with. I could feel it in all my body from my bones to the lady parts that I was supposed to "think with" at this age. I didn't belong here. And it became more and more obvious the more I tried to "fit in" by attempting to work out the customs and morality they all had. All the "now-you're-supposed-to's" that they probably filed in a non-existent loose leaf binder we were all issued when we were born. The trick is that I wasn't born. I had no memory of it. And all the things they told me I liked to do when I was a kid - I didn't remember any of it. Because they were training me to just accept, just go along, just act on what they told me my memories were. And they showed me "movies" of when I was younger. Filmed on something called "Super 8" and then later it was on "video tape." All made up to just reinforce the programming I'd been given along with this body. Life wasn't real. Life just sucked. Boyfriends, fashions, put-downs, come-ons, sports, band, gym, everything. Sucked. Because it didn't make sense. And the more sense I tried to make out of it, the worse it got. Until I got a clue. The same day I met him... Scroll Up And Get Your Copy Now.
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A Romance Reader
Updated at Mar 8, 2021, 19:36
Being able to escape into the wonderful world of romance is always a pleasure. This set of short stories are an amusing way to find yourself into new worlds, with new lovers working out their difficulties and eventually end up with their happily-ever-after result. Some are ghosts, some introspective writers, some CIA-government types, a couple of futurists, some socially disadvantaged, and a young couple with hidden abilities. All in contemporary settings (for the most part) and perhaps something you can relate to (well, we can always want the superpowers, anyway.) Lose yourself in these worlds and become young at heart again with these short reads to fit into any schedule...
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When the Dreamer Dreamed
Updated at Apr 13, 2020, 18:00
Beware Your Dreams“Be careful what you water your dreams with. Water them with worry and fear and you will produce weeds that choke the life from your dream. Water them with optimism and solutions and you will cultivate success. Always be on the lookout for ways to turn a problem into an opportunity for success. Always be on the lookout for ways to nurture your dream.”~Lao Tse "The longer the night lasts, the more our dreams will be."~Chinese Proverb It all began in mid-air. A beautiful blue day, fluffy clouds with a hint of high wispy cirrus horse-tails above them. If it weren't for the fact that I was falling through the air it would have been a nice day to be alive. Just laying on my back, relaxed and falling to my certain end. Enjoying the ride, as it were. Wind buffeting all around as my body fell as fast as the air permitted it to move. Odd to see what my "last thoughts" would be. Always wondered about this particular ending. It's been a long time since I dreamed this way. Turning slightly, I saw my bed coming up - a small dot in the distance. So I wrestled my hand to pick out my small handbook and the other tightly grasped my pen. Writing carefully on a new blank page: "It all began in mid-air..." Then the bed hit. I sat up, in a cold sweat. The room was just as normal, no hole in the roof or anything. It was night, as usual - or early morning, the clock corrected me. Since the sheets were damp, I had no choice but to also change my drenched t-shirt. Sliding back in, I was comfortable enough for now... (from the first chapter) ***Paranomral Indiana Jones meets the Matrix*** ***A new author brings psychological magic into the fantasy genre.*** ***Hope for we who lived to see our nightmares in broad daylight.*** Get Your Copy Now. - - - - Short desc. Beware Your Dreams "The longer the night lasts, the more our dreams will be." ~Chinese Proverb It all began in mid-air. Just laying on my back, relaxed and falling to my certain end. Enjoying the ride, as it were. Wind buffeting all around as my body fell as fast as the air permitted it to move. Odd to see what my "last thoughts" would be. Always wondered about this particular ending. It's been a long time since I dreamed this way. Turning slightly, I saw my bed coming up - a small dot in the distance. So I wrestled my hand to pick out my small handbook and the other tightly grasped my pen. Writing carefully on a new blank page: "It all began in mid-air..." Then the bed hit. I sat up, in a cold sweat. The room was just as normal, no hole in the roof or anything. It was night, as usual - or early morning, the clock corrected me. Wasn't I to know what they planned for me this time? (From the first chapter.) ***A Paranomral Indiana Jones meets the Matrix*** Get Your Copy Now.
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Toward a New Dawn
Updated at Apr 13, 2020, 18:00
An Epic Road Trip and Fantastical Semi-Memoir Living life is nothing that any moron or better couldn't accomplish, even without setting one's mind to it. The trick is to do something with that life. Or live several at once, so that one could at least be a success in one of them.  Herbert, having endured his mid-life crisis with all the aplomb possibly available to him, now was set on making a new life for himself. This is his book.  Such a book has parallels with our own. That is life for you - it sneaks up on you and drops some odd segue or link into some other person's scene and then just nips away, as if it was mainlining pixie dust or some super-quantum Dune drug. Blue eyes and all.  You see, Herbert does live more than one life at once. Shackled to the mundane world of the Midwest warehouse laborer, he yet lives in worlds of extreme science, wild fantasy environments and incredibly sensuous surroundings. For Herbert reads books, surfs the Internet and has an overactive imagination.  But let's meet our hero...  - - - - Excerpt: Driving down Interstate 40 after leaving LA was a bit of a non-scene. Desert and highway didn't change that much after Barstow. Modern highways are built to be safe and wide in America. Deserts were designed by God to be hostile and unforgiving for any who broke down out there. Highways had the occasional road-side phone and also Patrol coming along. Deserts had cacti, dust and not much else.  Herbert. That's me. There's about 5 or 6 variations of that name, but only one I would answer to. Comes from being raised in a family of 10. You had to pick an identity and stick with it, or drown in the uncertain melange of other lives around you. This is my life, at least as I recall it. 40+ years old and leaving the known for the formerly known in order to make some sense of my life. Not that I was confused. But what I had been doing didn't make sense anymore, so I was now driving from LA, away from the nonsensical, toward the sensible.  Barstow itself hadn't changed much since I had been there some 20 years ago. I had gone to Vegas to get married and found that Barstow was an interesting rest stop. I was the only one with a license,and so was the elected driver. We took off late after work - two couples in one car, both seeking an instant marriage and abbreviated honeymoon on the way back. We had essentially 48 hours to pull the whole thing off. So, with the late start and nerves keeping me up the night before, lack of sleep started taking its toll after midnight. Pulled over by a trooper, who noticed the car was weaving. So we stopped in Barstow for a couple of hours - they went in and had some food, I slept (but first my wife-to-be and I "made out" in the front seat, just short of having sex - which was forbidden as part of the Center.  A rise in the highway brought my attention back to the current, swerving the heavy loaded rental truck to stay between the lines. Topping the slight rise, I saw only the black parallel bars of highway stretching again into the darkening desert, the sun behind me along with a tail wind, pushing me ever home and away from Center forever.  Center had been something which promised answers to all my many questions about how the universe operated. They said that you just had to follow their exact path and keep studying the books and lectures of their founder. One day, in an ever-increasing but gentle gradient, you would know Truth and this hope kept you going - along with the required annual celebrations you were required to attend where the official PR was read out by executives...
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