"Terrific twists and turns and great suspense. Dynamic, interesting characters. This a good book."--Writer's Digest
"A spellbinding page-turner."-Greater Niagara Newspapers
“Paradigm is a fresh and very entertaining concept interwoven with believable characters. The reader will find him or herself identifying, wondering what he or she would do given the same situation.”—Tami Brady, TCM Reviews
April, 2006
The New Must-Read Thriller
"Readers will enjoy becoming involved in the plot of this beautifully written suspense novel. Paradigm is very entertaining and your time will be well rewarded. I highly recommend it."--Review-Books, reviewed by Cheryl McCann
Another Book Review:..
"Award-winning suspense author Diane J. Newton’s “Paradigm” is a skillfully crafted read that will keep adults and young adults glued to the pages. As with
Diane J. Newton is pleased to present...
Paradigm Published by Aventine Press LLC, ISBN: 1-59330-245-2 200 Pages, retail price $12.95 See Bookstore page for Beach Read Discounts!
About the Book: Little Danny Manning is an adorable angel whose startling abilities are veiled in secrecy. When the boy disappears, detective Tony Favata catches the case. With no clues, a distracted partner and a frenzied media feasting on wild tales, sorting the guilty from the innocent isn't easy. Danny's frantic mother claims to be a clueless victim, but is she complicit? A deadbeat dad, a deranged granny, a prickly pediatrician, a scheming research scientist and a sinister cabal with deep pockets and scary proclivities all come under suspicion. Tony decides the truth is obvious, but can he prove it?
An excerpt from this book...
Little Danny Manning munched on the last of his Cheerios, reached out, and let go of his spoon. It hovered in the air precisely over the center of his cereal bowl and then began to rotate. The spoon and the bowl rose, glided across the kitchen, slowed, descended and made a gentle landing in the kitchen sink.
His mother, Kate, put one hand on her hip and asked as lightly as she could, "What was that supposed to be?"
"A helicopter," Danny squealed, his bright smile filled with delight.
"Honey," Kate said, "when I asked you to put your bowl in the sink, I meant for you to walk it over there. We've talked about this a thousand times, love. You shouldn't abuse your abilities like that."
Blue eyes sparkling through long lashes, the four-year-old explained, "But it's no fun that way, Mom."
"Of course it isn't," Kate murmured.
She could easily have added, I give up, but held her tongue as always. In her heart, she knew Danny's feelings would be hurt by the remark and, the truth was, she'd never do such a cruel thing. Danny needed her patience, love and guidance more with each passing day.
Kate sighed, took one last look around the tiny sun-dappled kitchen and scooped Danny out of his chair. "Come on, buddy. We have to hurry."
She took his hand in hers, grabbed her purse from the countertop and headed for the garage. Their destination was the University at
In the beginning, she had agreed that Danny's extraordinary talents needed to be tested and explored. She'd thought it was in Danny's best interest to understand his abilities in order for him to become comfortable with them. Now, Kate also knew Danny needed to learn restraint. He needed guidelines regarding when and why he should put his startling works on display. Her son was highly telekinetic and slightly telepathic.
To her dismay, Doctor Ethan Hawthorn, Danny's guru and head of the
She'd actually begun to wonder whether Doctor Hawthorn was using deliberate permissiveness as a ploy to garner Danny's favor, which then cast Kate in the roll of boring nag.
She could hardly blame little Danny for being confused. He loved going to the center where, in a safe, controlled environment, he was encouraged to make all kinds of wonderful and fun things happen. Of late, he was having a hard time understanding why Kate continually asked him to refrain from such activity while they were in the car or at home. No matter how many ways she tried to explain, Danny was simply too young and too innocent to know the difference between using his abilities within the protections of the lab and playing with them free-form-style in the dangerous outside world.
Kate's experiences with the consequence of Danny's flights of fancy had often been harrowing. The child was capable of making anything fly, alone or in concert; toys, canned goods, even furniture. Unfortunately, all it took for disaster to strike was an inattentive moment. Upon distraction, the objects he was manipulating would suddenly plummet, or worse, zoom off in unpredictable directions. Luckily, Danny had so far avoided injury due to falling debris. As his mother, Kate had learned to duck, dodge and dive for cover with all the grace and precision of a professional athlete.
The drive to the research center took five minutes. Kate wove her way through the maze of parking lots that dotted the heavily wooded university campus resolved to find a way to make Doctor Hawthorn understand the hazards she and Danny faced when they were on their own.
She eased her SUV into a parking space, opened the side passenger door and engaged Danny in an expected and welcomed game of tickle. When she gingerly plucked him from his car seat, he asked, "Are you mad at Doctor Hawthorn, Mom?"
Kate stifled another sigh as she realized that Danny had picked up her stormy thoughts. "No baby, I'm not mad at him. I just need to speak with him for a few minutes. Okay?"
The brightness of Danny's angelic face faded slightly and his large blue eyes pinched with what Kate sensed was further confusion.
"I like Doctor Hawthorn," he said with affection.
Kate ruffled his curly blond hair and smiled in spite of her misgivings. "I know you do, sweetie."
She tried to block what she was thinking from Danny's mind as she walked him through several security checkpoints, gave a slight nod to Mr. Adams, the daytime guard, then continued through the futuristic polished-chrome hallways of the research facility.
Wide glass doors opened with a pneumatic whisper, and Kate watched with trepidation as Danny excitedly ran ahead to greet his valued playmates. Each was a graduate student in neurology or psychiatry. All of these research assistants treated Danny with kindness, a few with fondness, but Kate suppressed a shudder; from their perspective, Danny was nothing more than a prized lab rat. The incongruity of her son's life hit her with almost physical force.
Kate straightened her spine, shook her head and walked with determination to a huge, U-shaped central desk. Its various color video monitors and blinking numeric and graphic displays had always reminded Kate of a starship control console. She felt like a troublesome alien, as she asked, "Is Doctor Hawthorn available?"
The attending technician, Annie, was a tall, spectacularly beautiful redhead who made a lie of the term computer nerd. Alarm flashed in her green eyes. "Is there something wrong with Danny?"
Kate was tempted to say there might be very soon if she couldn't convince Hawthorn to take her concerns seriously, but held back. Instead, she shook her head rather more ambiguously than a moment ago and answered, "No. Danny's fine. I'd simply like to speak to Dr. Hawthorn this morning rather than waiting for my briefing this afternoon."
My briefing. Kate almost choked on the words and found herself blinking back tears. Couldn't Hawthorn refer to their daily meetings as progress reports or activity updates, any term even slightly more personal than briefings? For God's sake, they talked each day about her son, not a scientific experiment.
Kate felt Annie's eyes boring into her own and knew that this emotional display would go into her daily report. Danny wasn't the only person the researchers monitored. With an act of will based on a mother's protective instincts, Kate took a deep breath and said as forcefully as her small voice would allow, "Please page him for me, now."
With a withering look of annoyance, Annie answered, "Wait here."
Doctor Ethan Hawthorn was in the
He heard someone call his name, and realized from the raised tone, it probably wasn't the first time. Sorely irritated at the interruption, but disinclined to admit that, he asked evenly, "Yes?"
Annie's voice oozed reverence and admiration as she answered, "I'm sorry to disturb you, Doctor. It's Mrs. Manning again. She insists on speaking to you."
Hawthorn muttered, "That insufferable woman," then normalized his voice and replied, "She must have forgotten that we're running a test this morning. Oh well, tell her I'll be with her as soon as I finish this checklist." He waved a clipboard laden with a thick stack of notations. "It may take twenty minutes or so. Please apologize to her for the delay."
When Annie backed out of the door, he perched on the edge of the retractable MRI table and tossed the checklist aside. He had finished going over it fifteen minutes before.
Silently cursing, he stared off into the glassed-in control room wondering what new and thoroughly inane prattle he might have to endure from the Manning woman today. She had always been a pest, her very presence at the center akin to dealing with a three-year-old during a very long car trip. When? What? Why? How? The dolt's questions were as endless as they were banal. She had no conception of the astounding significance of his research or the importance of her son's unique abilities.
However, he asked himself, what else could one expect from a near midget who had wasted a perfectly acceptable IQ on a simple Master's degree in statistics and applied math? When he'd first met her, she was working as an actuary, a number cruncher, for a major insurance company. Although lucrative, the job was just as tedious as the woman.
He yearned for the day when the vexatious young mother would, at long last, be exposed as unfit to raise a gifted child. With the nitwit finally excised from his research facility, and from Danny's life, Hawthorn was sure it would be easier to remedy his second problem; reversing the court ordered privacy agreement, which shrouded all of Danny Manning's records in secrecy.
Hawthorn shook his head at such idiocy. His research was gathering dust in a vault when it should be heralded worldwide as the largest leap ever made in neuroscience.