Showing results by author "A. L. Mengel" in All Categories

Do you want to live forever? Ever since Jacob Benjamin touched his dead grandmother's cheek while she lay in her coffin, he has had a fascination with death. The mystery of the grave and what lies beyond it became a lifetime quest for the young man. His Master's Degree thesis project explores the decades-abandoned Waxley Mortuary, sitting in ruins. His research partners join him on a journey through life and legacy, but Jacob discovers there is still activity inside the dilapidated walls of Waxley. Jacob realizes that there is one figure standing between him and his legacy, salvation, and redemption: The Mortician.

When a mysterious ballet theatre surfaces in Paris, people are drawn to the stage productions with a magnetic force. Captivated dancers hastily audition for the grand creations with a sheer disregard for the terror which is rumored to reside within the theatre. A sense of dread permeates the company as the lines between illusion and reality are obscured, when one of the performers is thought to be a "danseur de la crypt", a nefarious villain who carries out justice for the immortals.

They awoke in deep space on a ship they had never known...in a time which seemed distant. They were exploring. The vast, the infinite, the mysterious. The cosmos. But they each shared a mental gap. A psychological disconnect. How had they gotten there? What were their origins? They are assigned the same mission and explore together.

The immortals have suffered a near total annihilation throughout the world; from Miami to Paris, Cairo and Sri Lanka; throughout time and history; from ancient Biblical times, towards the Renaissance, the Dark Ages, and Modern-Day cosmopolitan cities. The immortals were dying. A gifted girl loses her parents in close succession and fights with God in between visits from the Devil. As a woman, she leaves home and discovers Vaudeville in Paris, and "la passion de la vanite".

It's far into the future. The Earth's rotation has stopped and the sun is dying. The oceans have shifted towards the poles, flooding all of the cities to the North. The cities in the South have been punished with a blistering, relentless sun in a vast, dry, deserted landscape. The survivors have learned to adapt to months of deadly heat, living in darkness beneath the Earth. A scout comes unexpectedly to the colony - near death, he spends his first days in a coma, as rumors surface of a "habitable zone". As supplies near depletion, the colonists argue - who will journey to the zone? And what message is the scout trying to deliver?

The story begins in Paris. Pedro, a struggling artist from Madrid, stands at the Louvre, studying the Mona Lisa, ignoring the crowds of tourists as the painted woman calls to him. As the museum closes, he finally breaks his trance. He realizes that Da Vinci’s masterpiece could be a translation of love; yet there was only desire in Pedro’s heart