The Hard Times
by Russell Scott
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Pub Date Sep 01 2015 | Archive Date Feb 25 2016
Description
The Hard Times is, first and foremost, a novel about how men love. It focuses not on simple lust nor affection, but the complex web of expectations, loyalty, duty, and desire that define the society of men, how they love women, how they love their families, and how they bind themselves to one another in friendship and in war.
Taken from the news, declassified CIA documents, and the author’s personal experiences in Africa and Namibia, it is a fictional story superimposed on what’s actually happening in the diamond trade, today, where international politics and industry, play a strange game of hide and seek with illegal stones.
It begins in Mississippi. Ray Moffett is an ER doc, and Ray is facing an abyss. When his best friend and former boss comes into the ER dead, just six weeks after his retirement party, Ray finds himself searching for meaning in his own life. All Ray has left is his work. Work, punctuated only by the occasional round of golf. That’s all he can see stretching between him and his own trip to the grave if something doesn’t change.
A chance meeting with an African hunting guide, Fritz Dietrich, shows Ray a second chance to live the adventures he’d dreamed of as a boy. Dreams that were fueled by books written by men like Hemmingway, Ruark, and Capstick. Unfortunately, Fritz isn’t exactly what he seems.
Ray finds himself hunting desert oryx in the Namib with Fritz, both men trapped. Fritz must kill Ray and use his papers to smuggle illegal diamonds. For Ray to get home alive, he’s going to have to kill Fritz and then, somehow find his way out of the most hostile desert on the face of the earth.
Advance Praise
“It was wonderful. At last, a doctor that tells us what it is that he knows that we don’t know, and it’s a page-turner. I loved it. Hurrah!”
~ Ellen Gilchrist, winner of the American Book Award
“Scott gives us a look at the way men love, told from perspectives we rarely see by an author intimately familiar with his subjects. The Hard Times propels the reader forward with its intensity while remaining both literate and profound.”
~ Winston Groom, author of Forrest Gump
“Every physician is an observer and chronicler of the human condition...and then a few doctors also happen to be great storytellers. Scott fills that description. The Hard Times does not fit in any niche category...not strictly a crime novel, not a medical drama, nor simply a wonderful study in characters and emotions...Somehow it manages to be all these things and to come straight from the heart of a healing soul.”
~ Dwalia South M.D., author of Una Voce
“With The Hard Times, Russell Scott has written a luminous novel that casts a penetrating light on men and the things and the people they love. Moving with skill and deftness from the rich lushness of Mississippi to the terrifyingly beautiful Namibian dessert it is that increasingly rare art form – a book that offers a moving and penetrating glimpse into a man’s soul. I loved it from beginning to end.”
~ Deborah Johnson, author of The Secret of Magic
Marketing Plan
For a full press kit or to contact the author for an interview, email Angelle at angelle@jkscommunications.com
Available Editions
| EDITION | Hardcover |
| ISBN | 9780985267131 |
| PRICE | $25.00 (USD) |
Average rating from 10 members
Featured Reviews
Susan H, Reviewer
I wish to thank Netgalley and the publishers for the opportunity to review this book.
Life wasn't fair and death even less so. Charlie Lee didn't have time to make plans, hell he had only retired 6 weeks ago and now he was going to die without any goodbyes. His mind drifted, he saw 3 men, one he felt he knew and the other two travelled together from far away............ Manfred Dietrich has a loving wife, a son he adores, a brother he virtually brought up, a couple of hundred million dollars worth of black market African diamonds and a mass on his lung. Decisions have to be made to ensure his family are left wanting for nothing and there is nothing he won't do to achieve this.
Ray doesn't have to worry about loved ones. His best friend Charlie is dead, his marriage is in shreds and his lover never left her husband for him. He only has work and golf. It's time to take control do things for himself, learn to shoot and go on a hunt.
This is a novel about how men deal with feelings and responsibility but it is not just a book for men. Although the novel begins in America it moves to Africa where the vivid descriptions of the red desert, characters and hunts made it into a beautiful motion picture in my mind. I especially like the encounter of Ray and the lions. Shivers ran up and down my spine and I can still see the unblinking eyes of the young male.
I think the planning of this book has been exceptional. For every action in this book there is an opposite. A sudden death, a long illness, losing everything, gaining wealth, abusing trust and having your trust abused. There is one statement in the book that sums this all up. "You have to do what's best for your own. The lions didn't have any feelings about it, they just did what they had to, to protect their own" Highly recommended.
Polly K, Reviewer
Ray Moffett's life is hit with change: the death of a fellow doctor (who is also his best friend) and the death of his marriage. As a result of these crises, he travels to Namibia on safari. Not an experienced hunter, he falls in with a pair of brothers with ulterior motives and is challenged on many levels. An interesting exploration of love and life, this makes for a satisfying read. Recommended.
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