Uvi Poznansky's Blog, page 27
August 14, 2021
A new audiobook: Pam of Babylon
Pam of Babylon When Jack has a heart attack on the train from Manhattan, his wife and two lovers discover secrets and lies, and each other.
For Long Islander Pam Smith, happily preparing for the return of her husband every Friday night is a way of life, until she receives a dreaded telephone call that will change everything, forever. Three very different women - a wife and two mistresses - gather at the deathbed of Jack Smith, the man that connects them all. As they grapple with their loss, they come to know one another, realizing that the man they all loved was not what he seemed to be. Can they discover the whole truth about Jack and make peace with it, or is their trust in him already too deeply shattered?
Written by:
Suzanne Jenkins
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Narrated by:
Marnye Young
Narrator of Pam of Babylon, Marnye holds a Master of Fine Arts from Yale School of Drama and, in addition to her experience on stage and screen, has been building an impressive career as a narrator. In 2018, she started her own audiobook production company called Audio Sorceress.Today, Marnye is an award-winning narrator and producer having recorded over 170 titles. Audio Sorceress, with an extensive global roster of narrators to complete projects for clients all over the world, has grown to a team of six, including engineers, a production coordinator, and a graphic designer and will be marking their 200th production in less than two years. Her company continues to partner with different publishers to produce their audiobooks including Dreamscape Media, Books Fluent, Breaking Night Press and more.
Watch the beautiful trailer :
Listen to the voice sample:
Suzanne Jenkins · Pam Of Babylon - First15
August 6, 2021
It is not a costume. This is your skin
For the third day in a row, one bird after another flew into my father’s tent and tore into the canvas. On the first day, the maidservants mended the tear. On the second day they let it be, saying that in their opinion, the increased air circulation would do him some good, perhaps even revive him. And on the third day, at the sight of one open tear after another, a whisper spread around the camp, saying that this could be nothing else but an omen. It was on the fourth day that my mother decided to go in and see the old man. By now she has sent away the maidservants, dismissed the guard and told me to stand near the entry, where the rope is double knotted over the peg of the tent, and prepare myself. I am itchy. The goatskin sleeve around my arm feels heavy and moist with sweat. It is as hairy as my twin brother Esav, perhaps even hairier. “Look at that sleeve,” she tells me. “It is not a costume. This is your skin. Feel it. Smell it. Say to yourself: My name is not Yankle. I am not me. I am bold, fierce, adventurous. I am my father’s favorite son. I am Esav.”I fix the fur hat on my head, wipe the sweat off my upper lip and try to tell myself, over and over, that this arm is no longer mine. It is his. I am him. As such, this is to be my lucky day. It has started well: My brother has been out of the way all morning, hunting somewhere up there, in the mountains. Meanwhile, the stew for my father’s meal has been dished into a plate and covered with a lid, ready to be carried in. This is more than a meal. It is a token, a love offering from the son he loves. The chosen one. In exchange, the old man is to give his blessing, at which time his power will diminish. And the son, the one he loves, will take his place, and replace him as the head of the family, inheriting all his possessions.The plot is ready, and my role, I repeat to myself, is well-rehearsed. Well, as well as can be. According to my mother, there is no time, and no need, really, for any more practice. Trying too hard, as you know, may be the best guaranty for failure. “Your father is blind. Fool him,” she says. “But do so, if you can, without resorting to lies.” To which I say, “How—”“Don’t you know?” she says, teasingly. “Think! What is the best, the most reliable way to deceive? It is this: Pay attention to what he needs, and then confirm that which he wants to believe, as if, Yankle, as if it were true.”
★ Love literary fiction? Treat yourself to a gift ★ A Favorite Son
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"It was beautifully written and flowed so well. I thoroughly enjoyed every second of it. The narrator was great and did a wonderful job with the voices and narration."Jenn F. Garcia, Audible listener
August 5, 2021
The only inheritance your Pa left us is a dream, the dream of you becoming famous one day
Over the mantle hung three formal family pictures. When Natasha came back from the kitchen I asked her about them. At once, her Mama cut in. “My daughter comes from a long line of musicians,” she said, in her heavy Russian accent.“Mama,” said the girl. “I can speak for myself.”I pointed at the first picture. “Who’s this?”“This,” said Natasha, “Is my great grandfather, the famous Abraham Horowitz, who graduated from the Kiev Conservatory at the turn of the century. He rose to stardom rapidly and toured from Moscow to Rostov-on-the-Don, where he was often paid with bread, butter and chocolate, rather than money, because these were tough times.”“And this?” “This is Joseph Horowitz, my grandfather. He aspired to become a violin player, but his hand was damaged for life, when the riffraff attacked him during a pogrom in Odessa. So instead he became a music teacher. Later, he developed a method, a unique method to memorize long passages of music, by practicing the notes back to front.”“And this,” she said, reaching up to touch the third picture, “this is my Papa, Benjamin Horowitz. When he came to the states he became a conductor. Meanwhile he took that method one step further. Instead of the traditional way of playing through the passage repeatedly, you would commit it to memory, or rather to your subconscious mind, by means of performing it every night before falling asleep—without holding the instrument in your hands.”“A spendthrift, that’s what he was,” Mrs. Horowitz blurted out all of a sudden.“Now, Mama, don’t start!” said the girl.“Who’s starting?” the older woman threw her hands in the air. “I’m already in the middle of talking!”“Then please, please stop—”“What, I’m not allowed to tell the truth? The only inheritance your Pa left us is a dream, the dream of you becoming famous one day, and oh yes, how could I forget, also a bunch of heavy loans on the house, without any means of paying them off.”“Why complain so much, Mama? It was fun for you, wasn’t it, while it lasted—”“Which wasn’t too long, the way he gambled away his money! By the time his illness started, we were already hopelessly in debt.”“Mama!”Undeterred, Mrs. Horowitz shook her head, which in turn shook her bird-nest style hairdo. “Years earlier,” she said, “before he asked me to marry him, everyone was so, so very impressed with his talent. They predicted such a bright future for him. Where are all of them now?”“But Mama,” said the girl, “what does the bright future he had in the past have to do with the present?”“It has everything to do with here and now. You,” said Mrs. Horowitz, turning upon me, “yes, I’m talking to you! What’s your idea of the future? What are you planning to make of yourself, young man?”
★ Love reading? Treat yourself to a love story ★ The Music of Us
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"I have read and listened to all of Poznansky’s work, but this book resonated more deeply with me than all the previous titles, which I truly enjoyed. I suppose it is because I am an inveterate romantic. I ached for the young, “flashback” characters to come together. I shouted at them to wake up and smell the coffee when they missed opportunities to get together, and I reveled in the sweet endings when they finally connected."Aaron P. Lazar, Audible listener
August 1, 2021
After a while you could breathe again, if you were so inclined. I was not.
I was not alone. I could sense another presence.
When at last I mustered the will to blow the gravel off my eyelids and force them open, the first thing I saw was sandals. Diamond-studded sandals, no less.
Never before had I seen such an elegant design in our village—not even at my own wedding some years back, when Job could still afford spoiling me. At the time he had been considered a good catch. Rich beyond belief, and as healthy as an ox, he had not been known for being blameless or righteous until much later. Some wicked fun we had! And to please me, he would pour coins into my purse—what a delightful jingle!—so I might buy the most exotic fabrics for my dresses, and the most expensive footwear, imported by Babylonian merchants traveling through the Kingdom of Edom on their way to Egypt.
How I had been pining lately for his attention, or—failing that—for the luxury of going on a shopping spree! It would have been a pleasant distraction from all my suffering.
If only I could go, one last time, and buy some brand-new designer clothes, or better yet, shoes...
But now, these sandals—right there at my eye level—were sleek, but also quite strange. Their tar-black, impossibly high heels were cutting with a twist into the freshly dug earth; which at once, seems to scare away a host of worms.
Naturally, I tried to squirm away—but could not move a muscle.
And look: inside these two contraptions were the ugliest feet I had ever seen. Toes crooked, nails spiked, with an irregular, cracked outer edge—yet they were painted quite liberally with some blood-red smear.
Sigh. I closed my eyes. Was this a joke, or a bad dream? With such a sloppy manicure, this bitch—whoever she was—must have been even more impatient than I ever was.
I wished that—for a spell—I could take a peek, just long enough to compare our feet. Mine, you see, are so much prettier! And what’s more, they had been cleaned the night before by the village women, washed once with water from the local well, and a second time with tears.
But now, even without casting a look I could tell, by the chill on my skin, that under this shroud my feet were utterly bare. No boots, no shoes, no sandals.
Which made me envy her.
Through the skin of my closed eyelids I could sense a sudden change. Blocking the sun, her shadow came crawling upon me, until suddenly it stopped. Which was when—with no warning, and no respect for the departed, either—she gripped my arm, rolled me aside and to my surprise, hopped in.
Unfortunately, there was no mistaking her smell. I used to think it was the dirt caking, layer after layer, on her bare feet. Yes, that must have explained it! But somehow it reeked even worse now, perhaps because these elegant straps of leather grazed into the dirt, peeling it from her heel. Oh hell, I croaked, wishing I could turn away.
Not now, go away, Leila.
I could hear the heavy flapping of her breast and at once, the ground under me shook. It opened—by God, the ground split open under her sharp, pointy heels, and scream! My hair was flying straight up, my jaw dropped open...
Within a second, the earthen walls grew immensely higher, they were vaulting over us and there we were—there in my grave—in a free fall—
Rising, somehow, to a shaky stand I popped my eyes open. Still, all I could see in the mounting darkness is the quick flash of her teeth. She bared them in a smile.
I turned my gaze away, noting the walls around us. I had seen an elevator once, when Job had taken me to a hotel, the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. He had booked the honeymoon suite up there at the very top, knowing it would impress a simple village girl like me. But now, this here was like no elevator I had ever seen before.
How can I begin to describe it to you? Space was tight. In distress I looked up—perhaps by force of habit—to cry, to say a prayer. Stones, torn roots, autumn leaves, most of them already rotten, even tiny lizards and worms were soaring over us in a big swirl, bouncing from time to time off the walls, and then being blown up and away with a big spit, straight off the top of this thing.
After a while you could breathe again, if you were so inclined. I was not. In the shadows, if you dared brush your fingers around you, you might feel the mud slipping upward along the walls as we went on falling.
★ Love Horror? Treat yourself to a thrill ★
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"This trilogy of short stories were a mesh of Twilight Zonish crazy that just made my day. The reveals were fun and unexpected. The narrator gave it that extra build-up to the 'aha.' "Dee, Audible listener
Mix of Romance and Thriller
Robert I. Katz grew up on Long Island, graduated from Columbia in 1974 with a degree in English, and not encouraged by the job prospects for English majors at the time, went on to medical school at Northwestern, where in addition to his medical degree, he acquired a life-long love of deep dish pizza. Robert is a prolific author of both science fiction and thrillers. I am thrilled to find his review for my thriller novel, Overkill.
Reviewed in the United States on July 30, 2021
Overkill is the second book in the series, “Ash Suspense Thrillers with a Dash of Romance,” by Uvi Poznansky, following Coma Confidential. In the first book, Ash had awakened from a coma after suffering an assault and a rape. In this book, trying to get her life in order, she leaves her California home to spend some time in a rented cottage in Clearwater, Florida. Early in the book, she meets Paul Gore, an obviously disturbed young man who seems fascinated with Ash, and she meets Timmy, a neighbor whose brother has recently vanished. Ash strikes up a friendship with Timmy’s mother, Tracy, and winds up accepting an offer to tutor Timmy and also to conduct him to school each morning, since Tracy, bereft at losing her older son, is extremely concerned about Timmy’s welfare.The book is well written. The characters are finely drawn and the plot makes sense, though it is somewhat predictable. Michael Morse, Ash’s boyfriend, who we met in the prior book, plays a small role. It’s a short book and easy to read and the very sad circumstances regarding what turns out to be a series of killings keeps the reader engrossed. I enjoyed Overkill and I’m looking forward seeing what the future holds for Michael and Ash.
July 28, 2021
A wonderful tale from a superb author
Enrico Grafitti5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful tale from a superb authorReviewed in the United States on July 28, 2021
Verified Purchase‘Marriage before Death’ by Uvi Poznansky is an outstanding tale that, whilst sad and tragic, contains the kernel of a hopeful outcome. The author cleverly places the readers in an extremely emotional moment in the life of the protagonists, just when all seems to take an irrevocable turn for the worse. Then she whisks us off to an earlier time, during World War II, where we can read about the extraordinary circumstances that cemented this special relationship. Although this book is part of a series, it stands up as a story that can be read even if, like me, you have not read any of the previous novels.The tale at the center of this story details an episode set in France during the war. It is a character-driven plot, related with intrigue and in a fast-paced style that will have readers turning pages as they are drawn into the events. The author not only creates some very convincing characters that carry her story forward, but also manages to imbue the pages with historic details and vivid description that easily place the reader in the scenes.
A wonderful tale from a superb author. Highly recommended.
July 26, 2021
We listened to this on our car trip and everyone was in agreement
Coma ConfidentialAsh Suspense Thrillers with a Dash of Romance, Book 1By: Uvi PoznanskyNarrated by: Heather Jane Hogan Intrigue Overall 5 out of 5 starsPerformance 5 out of 5 starsStory 5 out of 5 starsReviewed: 07-26-21
Captured and maintained our attention. We listened to this on our car trip and everyone was in agreement that the narrator has a great voice and did a good job with conveying different emotions and characters.
Story was well thought out and shared a very interesting view. Have been reading a few books about the electrical system in the USA being disrupted and the fallout. This book did not disappoint and definitely will look for more from this author.
July 25, 2021
I dragged myself up, somehow, with Ed laden on my back, his arms slung limply over my shoulders, his blood oozing around my neck
“Oh mon Dieu!” cried the nurse, as she came out to the top of the stairs under the massive portico. Gaping at me in astonishment, she clapped a hand over her head till the white cotton cap nearly flew off. Up to this moment she had been chatting, in quick, hushed tones, with a slender girl whose hair was covered. It was tucked into a red beret, which was tilted, a bit whimsically, over her forehead. Meanwhile I slogged laboriously toward the base of the stairs. Once there I stopped for a breath, then pricked up my ears—but unfortunately, I could barely catch a word. And even if I could, what I managed to remember of my high school French was such that I could barely make sense of it. At any other time I would have taken note of the elegant architecture of the Château de Bénouville. After all, it was built in the style of Greek temples, with an intention to express grandeur. And of course I would have taken note of that girl. From afar all I noticed, besides a sketchy impression of her figure, was that she hugged the nurse and handed her something, some large bundle wrapped in burlap and tied, in a disorderly manner, several times over with a thick rope. Then she streaked across my path, mounted her bike, and took off, waving. A moment later, her farewell cry had faded into the distance. “Au Revoir...” Why I failed to catch sight of her face is a mystery to me now. Perhaps it was because of a ray of morning sun, which slanted at that moment into my eyes, or else—because of exhaustion. I hated having to wince, which made everything around me seem a bit warped. Determined not to limp, I could now advance almost without aching. But the burden I carried kept pressing me down, and the first steps up the stairs were the most difficult. Cold drops of sweat formed on my forehead. Some of them started running down my face and into my eyes, stinging them. I dragged myself up, somehow, with Ed laden on my back, his arms slung limply over my shoulders, his blood oozing around my neck.
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"The story of how they survived such horrors is extraordinary. Also extraordinary is the author's deep and gorgeous writing, interweaving desperation with descriptions of 'beautiful light streaming from high-arched, stained glass windows, rattling in the duel between the German artillery and ours.'"
- J.A. Schneider, author of suspense and psychological thrillers
July 21, 2021
Talking about a small fortune, what about your little trunk, full of gold coins?
“Talking about a small fortune,” she counters, “what about your little trunk, full of gold coins?”“Being of a sound body and mind,” he says, “I spent it all.”“On what, in heaven’s name?”“What! On what, Becky? Here I go, heaping all those bracelets, all those nose rings on one woman, and one woman alone, only to find out, in the end, the real extent of her gratitude!”“Isaac my dear, you know well enough how grateful I am—”“Becky my dear,” he says, with a note of disdain. “What I know is this: Anyone else in my position would have at his disposal at least two or three legally registered wives, not to mention a respectably large harem, full of concubines—”Being a practical woman, she decides to ignore that. “Fine, then,” she says. “So now, dear: How about giving me some means of transportation? The rich women, I hear, those in the cities along the coast, in Ashdod and also in Ashkelon, they have started to buy new automobiles. And I, I live here in the desert but still, Isaac, I come from nobility, you know, from one of the richest families in the land.”“What kind of transportation?”“A camel, for instance,” she says. “Two humps, or more, as well as a driver or two, or more. And four leather saddles, the soft kind, of course. It would be but a small token, a token of prestige—”“For goodness sake,” he groans. “It’s a camel you’re talking about—not a Rolls Royce!”
★ Love literary fiction? Treat yourself to a gift ★A Favorite Son
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This was a lovely story written about a set of twins fighting for the birthright. Of course the one born first got it, and the second one spent his life jealous of it and finally tricked his brother out of it.
It was beautifully written and flowed so well. I thoroughly enjoyed every second of it. The narrator was great and did a wonderful job with the voices and narration.Jenn F. Garcia, Audible listener
July 19, 2021
Let evil recoil on those who slander me
To avoid being noticed, my spy must wait until nightfall to creep up there and take a look.
At last, the sun is setting. He climbs up the hill and within minutes, I lose sight of him.
The wait is long. I tremble as the chill intensifies. Saul has ample provisions of food, water, and warm clothing—but here in the wilderness, my men are cold and hungry. I am eager to sneak into their camp and wreak havoc on them, in revenge for all the hardship, all the misery we have been suffering lately.
Upon his return, the spy reports, “Good news! the king and his first in command, Abner son of Ner, are tired.”
“They are?” I ask. “How can you tell?”
“Saul starts yawning, and a second later, so does Abner. Any minute now, they’ll be fast asleep.”
“Where is Saul lying?”
“Up there, in the center of the camp, with his army around him.”
I glance at the serrated edge of the rocks, which rise against the blueish black heavens, and doubt enters my heart. Ghostly shapes loom before me out of the yawning hole of darkness. I imagine them to be a swarm of scaly lizards, slumbering fitfully around the king’s camp. In a snap, they may pounce upon the intruders, upon us.
The feeling is so daunting that it brings me to my knees.
“Hear my prayer, oh God,” I whisper. “Listen to me, listen to my words. Strangers are attacking me. Ruthless men seek my life.”
I sense the eyes of my fighters upon me. Have they heard me? If so, what is the impact of my words?
One by one they fall to their knees and press their hands together, which tells me one thing: there is a great power in prayer. I should use it more often. It works for me. It works better than any other skill I have used as an entertainer.
At the risk of having Saul detect where we are, I raise my voice, not only because my heart is hammering in me, it is bursting open—but also because my men must hear this, loud and clear. They must believe in our cause.
So with great fervor I come to a blast, “Let evil recoil on those who slander me.”
And my fighters echo me, word for word. “Let evil recoil on those who slander me.”
Then I stand up, and call two of them to my side: Ahimelek the Hittite and young Abishai.
I ask them, “Who’ll go down into the camp with me to Saul?”
“I’ll go with you,” says Abishai.
He is Joav’s brother, one of my three nephews, sons of my sister, Zeruiah, who has a reputation in Bethlehem as a strong, formidable woman. All the other men I know are known by their father’s name. Not so here: Abishai is his mother’s son.
And so, guided by nothing more than faint starlight, the two of us climb up the rocks to the enemy, to find Saul. Let evil recoil on those who slander me.
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"In this unorthodox and thoroughly entertaining story, Uvi Poznansky tells the early story of the biblical David and his time in the service of King Saul. Told by David himself, in his own words, the story peels away the gloss and glory recorded by the historians who wrote the Bible and reveals the main characters in this saga as he saw them, with all their warts and wantonness."Aurora Dawn, Audible reviewer
