Stand Alone Sunday, My Pick 1-8-17: The Beyond Experience

Standalone Sunday is a meme created by Megan at BookslayerReads. Where each Sunday you feature a book that is a standalone (not a part of a series) that you really like and would recommend to others. (Visit the BookSlayerReads page for more info).

 

I chose this book because it’s something that I wouldn’t usually read, yet I still absolutely loved it!  I happened to stumble onto The Beyond Experience in a round about way through an automated direct message on Twitter.  Michael Reid Jr., the author ,actually called me out on some random careless detached response.  I admired his bold tenacity and decided that anyone who is that real on social media, and not just a butt-kisser to make fake friends, might actually be worth looking into. To be completely honest, I cracked the book open not expecting much. I didn’t make it three pages in before I was completely in AWW at the writing style.  I was sucked right in, hooked by the nose and there was no turning back.  I couldn’t put the dang book down for three days.

HERE IS MY REVIEW:

The Beyond Experience by Michael Reid Jr. is a beautifully written passageway between Medical Science and Spiritual Beliefs. The way this author was able to take two opposing and even somewhat controversial convictions and braid them together into a believable work of art is phenomenal. Sy-fi of this nature isn’t usually my forte and neither is Medical anything really, but thanks to this book I may just be converted. It’s easy to follow and even the terminology is placed in just the right places, so that it isn’t tedious or confusing at all. In other words it still makes sense, which is very refreshing.
I’ll get to some very important aspects (or what felt the most important to me). The pace and flow of The Beyond Experience is perfect and the characters are very well developed. I actually felt attached to the people which is rare for me. I was able to experience their emotions on a very real level, and I felt that the shocks and secrets were so intricately placed throughout that it consistently kept my anticipation rolling.
This book is full of lies, secrets, and betrayal, but it’s also jam packed with love, obsession, passion, dedication, inspiration, and even yes even humor. Calling it well rounded would be an understatement.
Kudos Michael Reid Jr. I am now your fan!! This book was beautiful, I loved it!

 

Connect with the Author and learn more about his writing here: michaelreidjr.com

DESCRIPTION:

A suspenseful and emotional journey which reveals something we all secretly wish for; an answer to the question: “what if I could visit the afterlife?”

Dr. Lewis had always found a way to hide his deepest secrets: the abuse as a child, the loss of his fiancé, the reasons why he rejected the lucrative offer from Harvard. But, when Kyle, his lab assistant, convinces him to push the limits of the drugs he’d spent a decade perfecting, his lies begin to unravel.

Kyle’s emotional events during treatment forced him to believe it was an event on another plane of life, a spiritual experience at its highest echelon. Thousands of people all over the world were experiencing similar events to Kyle’s, claiming they’d been to heaven. However, Dr. Lewis disagreed, and spent countless hours searching for a neural pathway within the brain itself as the source of the augmented reality.

More secrets, lies, and love drive the two close friends apart, beginning a cascade of events that point Dr. Lewis toward entering The Beyond Experience himself. He fought the treatment for nearly two decades, convinced his terrifying past would confront him. What he experiences becomes far more world shattering than he’d ever imagined possible, but will finally give him the answer to why his fiancé, Lily, had spoken her haunting final words: “forgive me.”