Bluff by Lenore Skomal Review for Novel Publicity

"To the medical world, I was a host body, surviving only to bring a new life into the world. And while I wanted to die more than anything in the world, I never wanted this. No, I never wanted to cease to exist. This was the worst death of all.”

Jude Black lives in that in-between, twilight place teetering on death but clinging to life in order to bring her baby into this world. Only she knows the circumstances surrounding her mysterious fall off the bluff that landed her in the hospital being kept alive by medical intervention. Only she knows who the father of her baby is. In this poignantly crafted literary novel, the mystery unfolds and the suspense builds as the consequences of Jude’s decisions threaten to reveal everyone's deceptions, even her own. Bluff offers a sensitive look at essential questions such as the value of human life, the consciousness of those in a coma and the morality of terminating life support. At the core is the story of a tragically misunderstood woman who finds peace, acceptance, understanding and even love on her deathbed.

About the author: Lenore Skomal wants you to eat her books. Her passionate desire is to touch your heart, inspire you, and luxuriate in the world of the written word. She is an award-winning author with the single goal of resonating with others. Winner of multiple awards for blogging, literature, biography and humor, her catalogue spans many genres. With 30 years of writing experience, 18 books published, a daily blog and weekly newspaper column, the consistent themes in her work are the big issues of the human experience and adding depth and voice to the intricacies involved in living a multi-dimensional existence. She has won many Society of Professional Journalist awards, the Whidbey Island Writer's Conference honorable mention for best fiction, Writer's Digest 73rd Annual Fiction Contest, New York Public Library's Best Books for Teens 2003, and most recently, the 2012 Next Generation Indie Book Award for humor for “Burnt Toast.,” her first anthology of her award winning humor columns. From journalism, to literary fiction, to humor and biography, her writing is consistent, if not in genre, then in message. Connect with Lenore on her website, Facebook, GoodReads, or Twitter.

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My Thoughts:

Bluff is a story about a woman, Jude, who falls off a bluff and ends up with brain damage on life support. She is pregnant which really complicates things. The doctors have told Frances, Jude's best friend, that there is no hope of recovery but they want to keep Jude on life support until the fetus grows to term. Frances has hopes to be able to raise Jude's baby but there happens to be a sister that Jude has not seen for years who plans to take the baby to raise in Paris. Jude is able to go outside her body and see what is going on around her and the reader is able to find out what happened to Jude as a child with an alcoholic mother.

So while no one knows who the father of the baby is, the reader really does not find out until the very end. This is a very character driven story with many characters and side stories. There is Paul, the lawyer, his wife Mary Shannon, who is one of the nurses that takes care of Jude in the hospital. Frances and her husband, and finally Gay who is Jude's and April's mother. We find out that Jude is an organ donor and since she is in a Catholic hospital, this causes some moral issues because after the baby is born a team would be ready to harvest the organs and the church does not condone this. It all comes together nicely to tell a rather sad story as to what happened to Jude..Did she want to jump off the cliff or was it an accident? If Jude is a lesbian, who is the father of the baby?? This is a book that definitely has you thinking of the moral issues and the human mind...very well written...I am hoping that there will be a sequel..

I received this book for review and was not monetarily compensated for my review.