Ryan Coughlin, writer of "Right Handed Lefty" ... We all have baggage. Real friends help carry it.
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An Introduction to Right Handed Lefty
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comments (9397)
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Right Handed Lefty is a book about Ellis Sayre who was thought of as “very different”. Ellis is a twelve-year-old orphan who lived in Native America. It is the year 1983 in Boscobel, Wisconsin, also known as the southwestern corner of the state, the driftless area. A few years ago, Ellis’s adoptive parents lost a son and welcomed Ellis into their home to deal with their grief of their lost child. Ellis and his two friends, George, and Mason, witnessed a murder by a local kingpin while they were stealing a day-old bread for a friend in need. Ellis reported it to the local authorities where he was shown away, as they believed it was a made-up story. The boys ran to Grandad’s Bluff in La Crosse (WI, beside the Mississippi River) as they were trapped and feared for their lives. Two stories merge in Right Handed Lefty, the stories of a World War II Veteran and an orphaned Native American during the early 1800’s, are weaved to bring Ellis Sayre’s roots to light…
Enjoy an excerpt from the 18th chapter…
Ellis lay awake, adrenaline pumping wildly. He, for once in his life, was sure of something. Danger loomed, Marty deserted him, and Suzanne’s words played repeatedly in his head. “You were a mistake.” It was time to leave.
He waited for the right opportunity to make a clean escape. Marty hadn’t yet come back. That is, if he planned on returning.
Unexpectedly, Ellis fell asleep. His dreamland was a black, timeless abyss.
In his dream, Ellis felt the devil’s presence. His spun around to tell where it was, but all he saw was empty darkness. In pitch black, all you can see is what you feel, and Ellis felt, with complete certainty, the devil at his back. So he ran. The blackness was interrupted by flickering light. The switch flipped on, off, on, off. Ellis reached top speed, his feet felt light, through the flashes all he saw was a shadowy blur. He had to have created distance by now, but then there he was, the devil, directly in front of him. Through the blinking light, Ellis could see the faceless giant as he smiled widely, laughed maniacally. The devil loved the smell of fear. The beast choked on his own laughter. Ellis ran. He hit the brakes and turned a corner to get away, only to bump back into him. The devil pushed Ellis in another direction. Thanks for the help, devil. Ellis moved lightning fast. Somehow, his inner-warrior felt no fear. He was sure he’d escape the evil maze.
Again, Ellis thought he was in the clear. And that’s when the mouth filled with rows of razor sharp teeth appeared. The white, perforated blades were red-stained. The laughter was louder, more personalized. The faceless monster’s mouth chomped, teeth ready to mangle whatever entered. Ellis realized he was strapped to a conveyor belt that fed into the blood-thirsty mouth. The gateway grew larger. The razors chomped at a slow, torturous pace. Ellis fought. His inner-warrior cried out, but to no avail. His feet were about to enter the mouth.
Ellis woke up sweating profusely. It was hard to tell how much time had passed. He wasn’t sure if Marty had returned or not. He turned to his alarm clock. It was midnight. He hadn’t slept long.
Ellis put his head back down on his pillow, caught his breath. While he stared at the dark lit ceiling, all he could see were Old Man Schaefer’s eyes that glared back at him. Ellis couldn’t catch his breath. Not with those eyes that felt like two strong hands as they clenched Ellis’s neck.
The devil’s eyes smiled. Ellis could hear the laughter. Tonight’s the night.
Without any concern for noise control, Ellis got out of bed, put on a pair of jeans and a plain black t-shirt. He snagged a solid navy blue hooded sweatshirt from his closet. Without thought, he emptied his piggy bank and put the cash and coin in his pockets; it was everything he had.
Right Handed Lefty is available to buy for your Kindle or e-reader from Amazon now. Click here to be part of the adventure.
Driftless Area
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comments (3036)
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This was scrapped as an introduction from Right Handed Lefty. My wife said, "it reads like an encyclopedia." A good friend and fellow author said, "Dude, get to th real story." Both were good advice, so I chucked it...
Thousands of years ago, after dinosaurs and before people, continent-sized glaciers carved sections of Earth's outer layer like pressed bulldozer blades, flattening the Northern United States. The slow-moving mass loosened silt, clay, and gravel on the planet's crust--known as drift. The massaged dirt became tillable farm land, suitable for crops and sustainable whole grain. Enough to feed millions of Holstein cows and a world's worth of dairy products.
All of the Midwest was mowed by the ice sheets, except in one unusual spot the Driftless Area. Its Karst landscape remained awkward and unpredictable; filled with caves, sinkholes, and streams that disappeared into the ground. The permeable rock had tall, rough ridges divided by deep, narrow valleys--called coulees--that seemed to stop abruptly, as if the valleys changed their mind about where they were headed.
Although some of the Driftless Area was in Minnesota, Eastern Iowa, and the tip of Northwestern Illinois, the bulk of it was in Southwestern Wisconsin. It was a sanctified anomaly. Innocent. Unwashed and beautiful.
Theories for the rare pocket were debated, with as much reason to believe that God shielded the area as there was for any scientific reason.
Attracted to the untapped natural resources, Native Americans settled there. Of these, Dakotas and Iowans from the Sioux race, along with some Ho-Chunk tribes were some of the indigenous peoples that decided to stay. They occupied the land without the need to coexist; they were self-segregated by nature's way, not man's design.
But like all good, peaceful, unspoken treaties, a collapse was only a matter of time. In the 1600's French explorers, such as Jean Nicolet and, thirty years later, teenage translator Louis Joliet and Jesuit Father Jacques Marquette, espied a new pathway that went deeper into unchartered parts of the fresh American landmass--Michigan and Wisconsin.
This led to an established infrastructure that connected Montreal to the Mississippi River. Nicolet, Joliet, and Marquette were explorers and missionaries that sought discovery and religious transformation; but subsequent waves of feisty settlers, free-ranging profiteers, and military men came in droves to capitalize on fur trade and lead mines.
Times had changed. Peace was left hanging in the balance. In the East, soldiers from fledgling Colonial United States of America battled traveled British fighters, jockeying to take land and gain troops however possible. They closed in on the Driftless Area. Its pureness was dirtied by an influx of displaced hostile-minded tribes, eager settlers, and military men all competing for position, power, and survival.
The once hallowed land was smeared by modern times.
Right Handed Lefty
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comments (3196)
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It's happening. A book I started in 2014 (started over in 2015) will be published digitally on August 8th and on paperback a month or so after that. It's called Right Handed Lefty. Tagline: "We all have baggage. Real friends help you carry it."
It's 1983 in Boscobel, Wisconsin, in the southwestern corner of the state, known as the Driftless Area. Ellis Sayre is different. He's a twelve year old orphaned Native American. His adoptive parents lost a son a few years ago and welcomed him to deal with their grief. While stealing day-old bread for a friend in need, Ellis and his two best friends--George and Mason--witness a murder by a local kingpin. Authorities disagree with their story. They call it made up. The boys are trapped, worried for their lives, sending them on a flight to Grandad Bluff in La Crosse, WI, along the Mississippi River. Two peripheral stories about Ellis Abbot--a World War II veteran, and Two Right Feet--an orphaned Native American during early 1800's, are entwined to unearth Ellis Sayre's roots. They combine to tell the truth.
