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The Cycle of Kindness, written by Guild member, Nathaniel Allenby, is the first of a what the author hopes will be a series of memoirs about his travels across the globe.

Book 1 covers Allenby’s bike adventures across Europe. His best friend, Dan, inspires their trip. The two begin traveling in Denmark. After biking extensively, a female joins them who pairs up with Dan. Allenby tires of being left shut out most of the time, and decides to travel on his own.  

During the entire trip, Allenby travels without funds. He survives by hunting through trash bins near restaurants. Most days they cycle a hundred miles, so they need a lot of calories. When times become desperate, they knock on doors and plead for help using a card to translate their request. Sometimes people are generous, sometimes not.

For a while they travel with protesters who picket dirty electric plants. Allenby helps to take over a warehouse to create a place for parties for the group. Soon, Dan and Allenby decide to continue their travels. From time to time, they stay at counter-culture communities where they work in return for food and lodgings. These experiences uplift the author and give him a sense of purpose.

Dan is informed that his mother is very ill. He returns to the States to find his mom is healthy. She tricked him to coming home. For a while, the female companion pairs up with the author. They seem to be in love, but she leaves for home too.

Allenby travels alone up steep climbs and endures freezing weather at night. At times, he finds places to stay, mostly in urban areas, where he finds couch-surfing opportunities online. In the end, he finds traveling too lonely. His father sends him a one-way ticket home.

Over the journey, Allenby changes from being an immature, live-in-the-moment, distrusting young man, to a leader who does acts of kindness, and fights for a cleaner, healthier planet.

At the end of Book 1, Allenby has returned to the United States, disheartened that he had not traveled as far as he had originally planned. I’m glad to hear he, over the years, continued to take trips throughout the United States, as well as to Peru, New Zealand, Australia, Fiji, and Zimbabweand. I look forward to reading about his other adventures.

Nathaniel Allenby is a visual artist, travel photographer, circus entertainer, and author. Born on a farm in Aurora, Oregon, he embarked on a life-changing journey in 2006, cycling 28,000 miles across ten countries and thirty U.S. states.

Allenby’s art and photography reflect his global journey, featuring geometric designs, ancient symbols, and stunning nature scenes captured from unique perspectives. As the founder of Cirque Quirk, he inspires audiences through educational performances, blending skillful juggling, stilt walking, and motivational storytelling.

A true visionary, he channels his extraordinary experiences into art and entertainment, sharing a message of resilience, creativity, and the enduring power of kindness.

In a dark world, where people work in a coal mine, food, health care, masks against coal dust, and adequate clothing are not provided regularly to workers. Abe tries to save another worker and is lifted from the level of worker to that of a doctor. His quality of life vastly improves: three meals a day, a uniform, an office, his own bedroom ….

The job is a farce. Abe lacks the skills and his supply of medicine and first aid is insufficient. He is only a pharmacist. A patient is brought in who has multiple wounds in his chest. Abe, using supplies he has been given, covers the wounds with band aids, then sends the patient to the hospital.

A woman comes to be treated for headaches, probably because she is malnourished. Abe falls into a relationship with her. She becomes pregnant. Though he doesn’t always eat the food he is given, he doesn’t provide nourishment to his lover.

A guard offers Abe a chance to escape but clarifies the opportunity is only offered to Abe. Nor can he take a second person, least of all his girlfriend. If he accepts the offer, will it be legitimate? More importantly, will Abe stay at the work camp to give his lover a chance to survive under impossible conditions?

I recommend Lee’s writings. His stories usually have more than one interpretation. Often, he makes social commentary. This story is no exception. Travis gives the reader space to reflect to grasp each story’s meaning on a deeper level. Give it to friends as gifts and enjoy discussing what they think the stories mean.

Congratulations!

Guild member, Alex Kecskes, has released The Search for Dr. Noble, a sequel to the Healer novel.

Wanting to be with her husband, Rene leaps into Charles’s arms as he is involuntarily swept forward five hundred years into the future. Charles’s time machine is not able to carry two passengers.

Rene is left alone in the past and Charles finds himself temporarily stuck five hundred years in the future. The time machine has malfunctioned and takes weeks to repair.

Rene’s daughter, Rose, has been living in Paris and working with Madame Marie Currie during World War I. The telegraph is down. With no way to reach Rose, Rene, who lives in California, feels she must know that her daughter is safe. In case Charles ever returns, she leaves a note telling where she has gone. Her trip is long.

Finding Rose is safe, Rene joins Rose and Madame Marie Currie in medical research. But an accident exposes mother and daughter to radiation. Dying slow, agonizing deaths, they are sailing home when they give up hope and prepare to jump off the ship.

Will Charles reach Rose and Rene in time to save them with healing technology from the future? The Search for Dr. Noble is a blend of fantasy and historical romance that takes the reader on an often enchanting and other times gripping journey through time as well as across oceans and continents in the 1920s.

We see the author’s vision of a future that includes humans living on the other planets in our solar system.

Alex A. Kecskes is a regular contributor to several national and international print and online magazines. He has written on a wide variety of topics, including health, medical, science, technology, and environmental issues. He immigrated to America when he was five, going through Ellis Island with his nurse mother and artist father. He served in the US Marines and is a graduate of California State University at Long Beach. He lives in Scripps Ranch, San Diego, CA. He has two sons and three grandchildren. He is currently working on his third novel.

Wanjiru Warama, a resident of La Mesa, CA has released a new memoir, The Native Daughter. The author tells stories of her family, the community, and her growing years in Kenya during the mid-1900s.

Warama shares her and her siblings’ memories and insights with compassion and depth. Family dynamics as well as social forces all come into play in her book. Her stories also shed light on the struggles of Kenyan farmworkers and rural populations under the British colonial rule, especially during the Mau Mau rebellion where her family was moved three times to camps.

Native Daughter is compelling and astonishingly positive given the abject poverty under which the author and her family members suffered.

Wanjirũ Warama is a Kenyan-American biographical and historical nonfiction author born who was raised in Kenya during a time of profound cultural and political change. She later immigrated to California, where she continued her education and built a life shaped by resilience, curiosity, and the power of story.

Born and raised on a British colonial farm, Wanjiru is the daughter of peasant laborers who had no formal education. Her writing is deeply shaped by this unique upbringing, her travels across all seven continents, and her journey as an immigrant in the United States. Warama’s eight books preserve the lived experiences of ordinary people whose histories rarely reach the page.

Having grown up in a home without books, Wanjiru understands the transformative power of education. Her own high school struggles—marked by poverty and resilience—are the subject of her upcoming memoir. She believes education is the most powerful tool for breaking free from the dehumanizing grip of poverty.

An active philanthropist and advocate for literacy, Wanjiru is a lifetime member of the Friends of the San Diego Public Library, the Rotary Club, and the San Diego Writers and Editors Guild.

San Diego resident, Cynthia R. Gould, has released her second novel. The picture book provides a charming and hopeful story about a homeless cat who is picked up and put in a shelter to then be adopted.

Coincidentally, I happen to be looking for a cat from rescue agencies. Gould has given me information, hope and determination to adopt my own homeless animal.

I recommend this book for children of all ages, including parents.

Gould grew up in New Mexico. At the age of four she learned how to read Little Golden Books. She now collects them.

After earning a B.A. in English at Grand Canyon College (now University), Gould relocated to San Diego where she worked for and retired from San Diego County. She’s been married for 42 years, and has a 37-year-old daughter. Her time is occupied, of course, by writing. Her goal is to have parents and children bond through reading. Her first book,

New Guild member and psychotherapist, Susan Black Allen has released her debut book of poetry – some are in free verse, some in more traditional structures.

Allen’s wit and emotional passion fill her gems. She covers many topics --- nature, sex and relationships, pets, her losses, and moments of pleasure. Other times, she seems to see and feel the world as others do --- some of whom may have been patients of hers.

Many of the poems caused me to ponder matters more deeply. Others made me feel surprising emotions. The poems are to be cherished and enjoy over and over. I highly recommend this book if you like poetry or even if you don’t.

Allen’s first poetry collection, The Best Sex I Never Had: Secrets and Solace of a Psychotherapist, was published by Legacy Publications in 2025. She has published essays and poems on mental health and parenting in The Boston Sunday Globe Magazine, for the non-profit, "This is My Brave," and in The San Diego Poetry Annual.

A Boston transplant, San Diego is now one of the top loves of her life. Allen is rather fond of her daughter Emmy, and fiancé Mark, too.

At the January 17 New Year's Celebration, members were invited to read their 50-word extensions of one of six first sentences. Below are some of the stories they read.

It was bound to happen sooner or later. I hope they’ll have a few days of happiness before the past starts to catch up with them. Maybe she’ll never find the farewell letter I sent. Maybe he’ll never locate the gun.

--Jinny Batterson

I can’t go, not without Alex. I would be a distraction. People who know what happened might politely avoid me so they don’t have to mention him. But people who don’t know might ask me or someone else. It wouldn’t be fair to the newlyweds.

--Sandra Yeaman

It's not my wedding. I don't know the bride or the groom. Some floozy at the bar tonight asked me to go with her. It's a big wedding, she said. The booze is free. She told me she slept with the groom once. That was her big mistake.

--Corey Lynn Fayman

“And you forgot to tell me something?” The champagne flute slipped out of Allison's hand.

“I know,” Michael approached; his crisp tuxedo, long strides – handsome as ever, melting her in his embrace he whispered, “I just didn't want to upset you, but my mom invited my ex-!”

--Terry Bell

Packing books and old sneakers in the honeymoon suitcase was weird enough, but the wedding gown? Ha! I earned that shit by spending a lifetime in fitting rooms. Its simplicity fits any occasion, especially when the sharp kitchen scissors cut it short. Speaking of sharp, those scissors will come in handy.

--Zoe Ghahremani

There we were. No land in sight. And no paddle.
Our boat looked like it was sitting on an enormous sheet of glass.
The silence was deafening.
The only thought I had was: What. The. Fuck.

--Mardie Schroeder

I looked ahead at my daughter, cringed. I’d pushed too hard. I can do 15 miles a day with a full pack but her swimmer’s feet aren’t used to long days on trail. I also hadn’t accounted for the rock scramble of Pennsylvania before the nauseatingly humid slap of Maryland.

--Jessica Brodkin Webb

We stowed the canoes as the rain poured. We pitched the tents in record time, and I unrolled the garbage bags, ripping head and armholes. Tentbound, the girls cried, soaking wet. I dry shaved my legs, told scary stories, and woke with friends.

--Christina Buffington

My bobber twitched. It dipped again. Three seconds later, it submerged, pulled down by the striking bass. I jerked the pole, setting the hook. The fish ran. I reeled up the slack when it paused. Four times we repeated before I saw the flash of silver. I grabbed my net.

--Erik Martin

I’ll keep it that way. It’s said, if two people know a secret, it’s no longer a secret. So … You really wish to know what happened to her, eh? Well … Wish all you want. I’ll never tell.

--Bob Riffenburgh

I heard them fighting. Then, a scream. Later, silence. I watched from my window as he dragged the heavy trash bag across the garden and to his car. When he leaves, I'll follow. They say I'm only twelve. But I'm strong, and my bike is fast. What could go wrong?

--Marcia Buompensiero

And I'm not telling. Suffice it to say that she has never participated in legalizing a marriage, and her parents named her Robert--nickname Bobby--at birth. Bobby Salazar.

--Rachel

And I can't tell you because Mr. Brown mustn't find out where she is. That Narcissist shriveled the amazing Nancy Adams into an insecure, terrified couch cushion he sat on.

She's still scared to stand up to him. But a powerful, courageous first step is escaping his filthy claws.

--Margaret Harmon

That’s because Mrs. Brown is not her real name and all the others that knew are dead.

I mean, everyone knew she disappeared, but those who knew her real identity and what happened to her are dead.

To the general public, Mrs. Brown was a sweet little old lady who loved to read and who could be counted on to sub for the weekly scripture study class at church.

You’d think I should be afraid for my life, or that I might have something to do with the others' deaths--IF Mrs. Brown is still alive.

But that would be telling, and she is my mom.

--Audrey Walz

“Follow me children.” We walked through the dark forest, past the pond and headed downhill toward the old barn. “Don’t be afraid,” I said, as we entered the barn: “Mrs. Brown and her six kittens.”

--David Walz

She was the neighborhood grandma. She’d spend afternoons on her porch bench basking in the sunlight and watching the neighborhood children play hopscotch and Double Dutch. Sometimes, she’d even join in. The children would shout, “Go Grandma, go Grandma, go.”

One day, the bench she’d sit on, cracked in half.

--ShuJen Walker

He kept giving me dry food. Every day. No gravy.

No apology. I nudged the bowl. I whined.

I watched plates pass untouched. No scraps, ever.

I watched patiently, salivating.

One morning, he tasted my breakfast instead.

The vet said it was his heart.

I got chicken that night.

--Jerry Strayve

That matched my mood. I sat on the bed caressing the fully loaded Ruger LCP Max cradled on my lap. As my mind swirled with conflicting emotions, hate, love, grief, I closed my eyes imagining pulling the trigger. Then, I heard my father's footsteps on the stairs.

--Sandra Stahl

… If only my life were that simple. If only seeing Charlie last night meant that the storm would rage and bluster for a while and then move on. Problem solved. Simple. But no. In my world, the storms build and wind rages in the searing light of day.

--Paul Banks

There was no possibility of taking a walk as billowing Santa Ana winds careened fiery embers into the ravenous blackness. Nevertheless, thirteen-year-old Rachel donned her Superwoman Halloween costume and stepped outside.

Overwhemed by her tactile sensibility, she stared into the starless heavens and shouted: “I’m coming for you, Dad!”

--Larry Edwards

They lied. Stories arrive like rain—unannounced. Then vanish.
Stranded in California with a suitcase meant for one year that stretched decades, voices returned:
Peasant workers whose labor fed a nation that never learned their stories.
If these stories remain unread, the world has not yet made room.

--Wanjiru Warama

She was broken, hopeless, lost.
A deep desperation within her spirit.
It would take an act of GOD to give
her freedom from destruction.
She looked up from the bottom of
the grave and heard His voice calling,
"Come to Me"---That was GOD!

--Marie DiMercurio

A miracle. Yes. I was locked up in that body for years. Now I am free. Yes, the first human soul transplanted to a new body.

Now I am running free. I want to weep with joy. Oh look, a fire hydrant. I lift my leg. I really got to pee.

--David Walz

But Harriet knew she could save the mission--and her life--if she could only get to the computer.

The Russian major kept pacing across the flagstones, his boots like the ticking of a clock. If he said yes, she had at least one chance in hell.

The man stopped pacing.

"Well?" she asked.

The major turned and scowled. "No."

--Rick Peterson

I’ve always known that. Most people don’t, but I do.

I’ve lived in Centerville my whole life. Olive moved here with her mother when we were both twelve. In that golden summer we were inseparable. That’s when she told me she didn’t really think she was a girl.

--Jeff Mason

She follows me everywhere. She ruins dinners. She makes people uncomfortable.

I’ve tried ignoring her. I’ve tried removing her. I pleaded quietly, I argued loudly, nothing worked.

Then the bartender asked why I was yelling at my drink and pulled my martini away, the olive still staring at me.

--Jerry Strayve

She always wants to added. She’s wishy washy when it comes to choosing gin or vodka. She likes to have fun. Shaken not stirred, she doesn’t care. Just don’t say with a twist anywhere near her. She’ll feel left out.

--Janet Travers

There’s something about Oliver. They said it couldn’t be done, but the wedding is tomorrow. Who cares? I’m the only one who knows what happened to Mrs. Brown. It was a dark and stormy night. First the wind stopped, then water became very still. A flash of lightening showed…

--Zoe Ghahremani

Fourteen SDWEG members, plus the Guild itself, were among the local San Diego authors featured in the San Diego Public Library’s 60th Local Author Showcase on Saturday, January 24. Several Board members attended the event which featured Dean Nelson, a former Odin Award recipient as the speaker. 

If you missed the event, you can see all the books with information about the authors on the Library’s 2025 Local Library Showcase website.

Guild members represented among the exhibits include Connie Bennett, Susan Black Allen, M. Lee Buompensiero, Richard Carrico, and Corey Lynn Fayman. Their book covers appear above.

Other Guild members represented at the Showcase include Cynthia Gould, Cary Lowe, Erik Martin, Tamara Merrill, and Richad Opper. Their book covers appear above.

In addition to the Guild’s anthology, books by R.H. Riffenburgh, Patricia Santana, JR Strayve JR, and Thomas WIng round out the Guild’s representation in the Showcase.

Featured speaker Dean Nelson, also represented at the showcase with his book Talking to Writers based on his experience interviewing writers at the Point Loma Writers Conference by the Sea, encouraged all participants to keep writing or to start writing. Next year we’d like to see more Guild members represented at this, the longest running event of its kind in the US.

Irish Secrets and Lies by Guild member, Debbie Wastling, is part of The Sutherland Scandals, a historical series about a family that rises from poverty. In Irish Secrets and Lies, the main character, Martha Lowery, is the daughter of a nonworking alcoholic father and mother whose health is broken from having too many children too often.

Martha works two jobs. Her main one is as a cook and gifted baker. She tries to act as a mother figure to her younger siblings but, one day her father, in a drunken stupor, tries to rape Martha. The next day she finds another place to live. Being hard working and likable, a friend offers the nineteen-year-old girl a temporary place to stay.

At the same time, Martha is swept off her feet by John Benjamin (JB) Sutherland, by whom she becomes pregnant. When her condition becomes apparent, her employer wants to sack her. Fortunately, her friend allows Martha to stay on permanently, saving Martha from a much harder life. Also, a statement of her great character, JB really cares about Martha; however, he drags his feet about getting married.

Despite Martha’s lack of education, she is able to read recipes and quick to learn new skills. Will JB marry her and help raise his children? Will he succeed at starting his dream job as a pub owner? More important, how will the character, who overshadows another book in the Sutherland Scandals, affect Martha and her family members? Her first born, from a young age, lacked empathy and refused to conform to social and physical limits. 

For history lovers, this book gives the reader a sense of what life was when women had the right to own property but there still was no birth control for women so women often died when they had numerous children too often.