What is important in life

Thank you to Carl Sundholm for this very thoughtful review of my book. I’m grateful for this feedback and all who have purchased my book and taken the time to write a review. All profits are going to help rescue dogs.

One of the best books I have read – Great potential for a movie, if done with the right people!, March 1, 2015

By

Charles Sundholm

Verified Purchase(What’s this?)

This review is from: His Name was Ben (Paperback)

Paulette Mahurin is an emerging award-winning author who should be on the “must read” list of those in-the-know. Her second book, “His Name Was Ben,” is a very rare, significant and insightful short story that uses a real life inspired story of facing immanent death from terminal cancer to teach what is important in life. This is an extraordinarily compelling short story, written in a way that quickly engrosses the reader in the characters’ experience of dealing with a terminal illness, which left me thinking about important questions about what death teaches about how life should be lived. Most people avoid thinking about death until someone near or dear to them dies, or when they are themselves face the prospect of their own death. The young rarely give much thought to the certainty of their eventual death, because their hopes and plans for the future loom on the horizon or because they are so engrossed in the present moment that thoughts do not turn to their future mortality. But as one lives life, and one’s contemporaries begin to pass away, the thoughts of many shift to the increasing proximity of their own eventual death, and coming to terms with it. This process of is accelerated with those who learn that they are living on “borrowed time” due to a terminal disease. And so this story of “His Name Was Ben” is told from the viewpoint of Sara, a thoughtful and insightful person who is facing the prospect of immanent death while being treated for terminal cancer. By chance, she meets she meets Ben, a fellow cancer patient who is traveling the same road and is facing similar issues. Together they work with one another in the attempt to gain the inner peace with which to face death by understanding and coming to terms with the issues, people, and insecurities that beset them during their lives. How they do this, the insights they gain, and the choices they make, are invaluable lessons for those whose consciousness has evolved to the point of realizing that such wisdom should be used to enrich our lives now, well before we face our eventual death.

All Amazon.com Reviews for His Name Was Ben: http://www.amazon.com/His-Name-was-Paulette-Mahurin/product-reviews/0692264698/ref=pr_all_summary_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending Just received word that I was nominated by a group of over 5,000 members of Amazon Reviewers as their #1 Author. This is quite an honor: RECENT REVIEW FOR THE PERSECUTION OF MILDRED DUNLAP:

5 stars Really liked it

ByKathryn L. Knowlton “retired teach”on June 26, 2015

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Well written and enjoyable

5 stars Riveting Read!

ByKev’s Great Indie Authors “KC”on April 14, 2015

Format: Kindle Edition

What a marvelous riveting read! The story really grabs the reader. I found myself expecting the worst for Mildred and Edra and actually dreading the ending. I’ll say no more as I don’t want to spoil it for others like myself who have never been familiar with the history behind the story. It’s not the kind of thing I normally read and I absolutely loved it!

ALL AMAZON.COM REVIEWS FOR THE PERSECUTION OF MILDRED DUNLAP:

http://www.amazon.com/Persecution-Mildred-Dunlap-Paulette-Mahurin-ebook/product-reviews/B008K9DV4U/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

GOODREADS RECENT REVIEWS:

Darmie Orem‘s review

Apr 16, 15

5 of 5 stars

Read in April, 2015

His Name was Ben Author: Paulette Mahurin Rating: 5***** Summary:How many times do I have to relive this? Blinking away tears, she moved her hand under the sheet into her nightie, to rough wrinkles and edges of scar tissue that had failed to heal in normal time because of infection, delaying chemo and radiation treatment…. Scheduled on a journey of death and quietly praying for miracles that would expand her existence, life suddenly became significant. In her aspiration to escape mortality, she met the right man, another cancer patient, who brought her the contentment her life has never for once experienced. However, the story of true love soon ended. A twosome became single, but not without rebuilding the broken. The story His Name Was Ben, takes place in some areas in U.S, and Ojai California where beautiful Sara Philips, a nurse practitioner and a divorcee lives by herself in the same city with (a cold mother, a father with a heart problem and a schizophrenic brother. Sara lives a tough life, and experienced a number of problems: Henry who dumps her, three years into their marriage, for a metaphysical cult he is involved in and makes her she shied away from sentimental investments with men. A mother with sickening attitude that can’t offer her daughter sincere comfort when dilemmas hits hard, ridicule because of a schizophrenic brother, and an abuse from the same brother which snatched away memory of a sweet childhood and plague the future with nightmares. As Sara’s treatment continues at UCLA with Doctor Zimmerman, we soon see in the story that Sara meets Michael Gottilieban attorney who works at NASA, and a fellow cancer patient. Intrigued by Ben’s good looks and situation, what Sara has successfully kept blocked for so many years begins creeping back in, one dream, one image, and one memory at a time—the pieces of a puzzle that has not yet formed a whole picture. But, entertaining the idea of receiving affirmation from Ben that she is still attractive is a balm. And wanting to feel normal, she continues to obsess over Ben. When Sara is encouraged by her close friend Ellen to tell Ben of her feelings, she’s reluctant. But she soon gathers the confidence to tell him and he blocks her flirtation. Ben’s mind is set in a fixed direction, and that is to concentrate on his treatment and only that. After a little while, Ben swings from his determination to stay the course with his treatment and not get involved with any woman. He gradually takes to Sara. And the feelings the two of them couldn’t think is for real becomes the best thing that ever happens to the two of them. While Sara is experiencing encouraging changes from the ongoing approved cancer studies in UCLA, Ben’s health deteriorates. In spite the challenges, Ben and Sara gets married. And seven weeks after, Ben lost his life to the terminal illness. He dies, resolving the emotional trauma Sara has been hiding from her entire life. He dies leaving her a mended and fulfilled woman. Writing style: The writing style of the author is luxuriant. She used glowing descriptions and really paint clear picture of every event that went down in the novel in the most engrossing way. The novel flows like story told from the author to the readers without uncertainties. The parallel stories developed in the greatest fascinating forms. The author’s messages of life’s tests, liberation, love and fulfillment are clear and powerful in the middle of the story and at the end of it. She gave Sara a much fulfilled ending. She provides us with the value to be hopeful no matter what befalls us in life. My thoughts:His Name was Ben, is a sumptuous true story. Sometimes fate would try to discourage us from reaching fulfillment in life by deriding us with all sort of tests, but this story leads me to believe that a person would always find exciting ending no matter the situations which reduces his chance of a fulfilled life. The rest of us should encourage ourselves, repair our broken faith that we can never find extraordinary fulfillment because of the hindrances we have presently to the flow of exciting happenings in our lives.After tempestuous days, triumph stands by those that have faith in happy ending.

ALL GOODREADS REVIEWS FOR HIS NAME WAS BEN:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23255291-his-name-was-ben#other_reviews