Lee Barwood

Please welcome today's guest blogger, Karina Fabian. Karina has written a fascinating book about what the realities in the life of a telepath might bring -- mental illness, loss of control, even commitment to a mental facility -- rather than the facile picture we often have of what a telepath might endure. And that's all in addition to the troubles that result when Deryl, the telepath, is sought out by an alien race trying to survive.

But make no mistake: Mind Over Mind, the first volume in the Mind Over Mind trilogy, will draw you in on the first page -- review will follow later this week. In the meantime, please enjoy Karina's guest post, and leave a comment -- or ask a question!

I stand in the middle of huge, boisterous crowd, the din pressing down on me. I can hear every voiced thought--no matter if it’s a whisper or a scream. Desire and disappointment, logic and emotion, fear and exultation--they crowd in on me, demanding my attention. His debt; her depression. She hates her parents; he looks at his newborn with so much hope. I wish the noise would beat me numb, but just as I think the cacophony might reach white noise, something new and piercing catches me by surprise. There are no pills to ease the pain; no meditation to drown out the noise, and no way to get everyone to shut up.
Sound fun? This is no mosh pit or subway scene; this is the everyday experience of Deryl "Ydrel" Stephens, my telepath in Mind Over Mind. Only, Deryl isn't hearing all this--he's experiencing it all, along with the emotions, visions and intensity of the person actually thinking the thoughts. It's not been cool or exciting or fun. Rather, he has faced a daily grind of trying to remember who he is while fighting off the impulses others think about, but never act upon. An orphan who's been shipped off to boarding school by his aunt and uncle, you can imagine the luck he's had convincing everyone that he's the victim of uncontrollable telepathy.
Writers have often told tales where psychic powers are desirable, or at worst, annoyances that have affected the psychic's personal life, but would we really be able to deal with it? How easily would the mind adapt to this new and totally foreign ability? Would it be like an unused muscle, that heals and gets stronger with time, or the toothache that cannot be ignored and makes life miserable?
For Deryl, telepathy was the toothache that led to insanity and attempted suicide; once he was committed, he had some help in learning control, but then it became the muscle used wrong. Only after a talented intern decides to do something different and pretend to believe in him and help him learn to control his abilities, does Deryl get on the road to a normal life. Of course, "normal" is a relative term when psychic aliens are also trying to use him as a pawn in their interplanetary war--but that's another topic.
I hope you'll check out Mind Over Mind and follow Deryl on his road to recovery and independence. It's not fun to be psychic--but it is fun to read about them.