Death after Kyoto (2017)
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/Death-After-Kyoto-Carlos-Aleman/dp/154666937X
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0721RP2TZ
Emily Patrick is a twenty four year old woman who travels to Kyoto and experiences reverse culture shock when she returns to the US and misses the warm social customs of the Japanese. Feeling lost, she slips into despair until taking a day off from work to attend the opening of Art Basel in Miami Beach. She meets the eccentric artist, Simeon Susluv, who invites her to a gathering of like-minded people. The next day, she is found dead in a park lying within a circle of pages ripped out of her drawing book.
Detectives Ryan Salter and Kim Ramos arrive at the scene of the murder. Although there’s not a trace of physical evidence, they find enough information on her phone to know that Simeon Suslov was one of the last people to see Emily Patrick alive. The detectives go to an Art Basel event Suslov is scheduled to be at and question him. They discover that Emily had been accepted into a society of secretive individuals that meet to tell each other Japanese ghost stories…
The perfect book if you’re into mysteries, Japanese ghost stories, secret societies, decadent detectives, ASMR, cyber-stalkers, eccentrics and twisted justice!
Imagining: Beyond Purpose & Creativity (2016)
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1540580423
Kindle e-book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N4599YN
The how-to book on life for creative people. A practical guide for overcoming creative block, self-doubt, plus encouragement and strategies to live by.
Happy That It’s Not True (2013, Aignos Publishing)
Formerly, As Happy As Ling (Finalist, International Latino Book Awards)
Paperback: http://www.amazon.com/Happy-That-Its-Not-True/dp/0986023396/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/Happy-That-Its-Not-True-ebook/dp/B00P4LKXES
Reviews: https://www.amazon.com/Happy-That-Its-Not-True-ebook/dp/B00P4LKXES#customerReviews
A Cuban rafter is telling a story to seven other men as they drift out at sea. Only what seems like a story is actually his glimpse into a parallel existence. Many years unfold in the storytelling as the balseros cling to life in the rough seas. Cara, the young artist, grows up to become a troubled teenager, and her brother, Alex, develops into a genius with a weight problem. Their, uncle, Diego, agrees to let them move in for the summer after a family crisis. As Diego inspires and motivates Cara and Alex, he falls in love with an emotionally unavailable coworker.
The storyteller does not reveal all that he knows about lives of Diego, Cara and Alex. But in his telling of the story, he tries to make sense of his own life and the erotic writings of the most mysterious person of all, his wife.
Meanwhile, in the parallel existence, the opposite of everything is true.
This is an instant classic that immediately makes artist turned author Carlos Aleman the next big thing in literature. He has a natural ability that few authors with decades of experience can match.” –Jonathan Marcantoni (The Feast of San Sebastian)
“…a surprising, heartfelt, emotional literary debut.” –Chris Campanioni (Going Down)
“Readers will fall in love with the poetic narrative, the memorable characters and the twists and turns of a most tantalizing story.” –The Latina Book Club
Nuno (2014, Aignos Publishing)
Paperback: http://www.amazon.com/Nuno-Carlos-Alem%C3%A1n/dp/0990432246
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/Nuno-Carlos-Alem-n-ebook/dp/B01MG2BH2V
Reviews: https://www.amazon.com/Nuno-Carlos-Alem-n-ebook/dp/B01MG2BH2V#customerReviews
“Born as he was, the son of a suicidal policeman and a self-destructive woman of ill-repute, Nuno arrived in the world with a capable heart and a mind ready to explore the mysteries of life. Nuno is evidence that the human experience can never be untangled from the unfurling of history, that we are all creatures of our time even though time can never define us. Though our quarrelling natures visit travesties upon the world, we also accept, as Nuno does, that our capacity to connect will ripple outward enriching all who would recognize the infinite within an action. In the juxtaposition of our ferocious capacity for violence and the limitless potential of our capacity for love, Nuno embodies the paradox of the human experience, that our momentary existance is an artifact of eternity. Through Nuno -in his discovery of love and through his crucible as a political prisoner in communist Cuba- we, the lucky readers who have discovered this tale, are given a chronicle of one man’s discovery of both the timeliness and timelessness of the human experience and the healing balm love provides even in the darkest crises of the soul.” —Zachary Oliver
I picked up this book a few weeks ago with the intent to read it as soon as my classes were over. It took a couple days but yesterday I finally had the chance to crack it open. I read it in a day. I spent the night trying to come up with the words that could sufficiently describe what I read and the emotions that siezed me while I sat for hours in my room completely enraptured by one of the greatest love stories I have ever read. I fear that even with all my hours of contemplation on what this review would hold, all my pondering would be inadequate in fully projecting to you the splendor held between both covers of Nuno. Influences of authors like Neruda, and Marquez come to mind, within its proses full of love, despair, and hope, but interestingly it is authors Thich Nhat Hanh and the Dalai Lama that are most reminiscent due to the wisdom and insight of life Carlos infuses within the story in a way that is both subtle and eye opening. There were times I felt I was reading a soundtrack to a movie, the words as notes undulating, taking me with it on a melodious journey from hope to despair to wonderment. It is as if the author has poured his soul, intact, beautifully, in a book and it is a gift to all of us. One we should treasure and one I will share most certainly with others, for it would be a great loss for a story so exquisitely written to ebb into obscurity.” —Suset Marcantoni
Prodigal Pup (2015) by Jean Aleman
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/Prodigal-Pup-Mrs-Jean-Aleman/dp/1517523176
Reuben has everything a dog could ever want but he is not satisfied with what his master has given him. So he sets off in search of adventure. Along the way he runs into an unscrupulous dog who is not what he seems. Will Reuben be taken in by his new friend or will he come to his senses?
