Searching for Lydia - B.H. Arias - book review

Searching for Lydia - by B.H. Arias - book review

I just finished re-read Searching for Lydia (Life, love, deployments, and ghosts) - B.H. Arias first ebook, published in 2012 - a wonderful contemporary book for adults with an absolutely amazing story about searching for own sweet tempting addictive madness, a "particular brand of romantic insanity" - ghosts, life, love, war deployments, and romance, walking the reader thru an extraordinary range of emotions.

As a first read, I couldn't put it down, I was really impressed with such a wonderful and complex epic covering paramount topics in a perfect style, and I am looking forward to more of Lydia's adventure.

Searching for Lydia - B.H. Arias - Photo Amazon

I loved the entire story and all those random thoughts developed during several deployments of an American civilian to Iraq and Afghanistan, the mental journey thru different era, places, civilizations; the human personalities knowledge and understanding; family intense love and turmoil; the other journey within the self (in and out) while triggering all our senses beyond the realm of human imagination.

The more or less conscious desire that exists in any individual to be the other sex; the constant wanders about the self; sort of daring edges to insanity and challenging things in a sort of masochist way (mental and friendly - simply searching for truth!!!) eventually to verify own limits, endurance and how much one can take in a lifetime.

The ups and downs, the dreams and illusions (be them openly expressed or hidden - both so valuable, especially under certain conditions); and loved the escapes in and out own self; in and out one's regular environment.

And utmost I appreciated the fact that this ghost-war-life-love-romance short novel story - either as part of fiction or as part of nowadays strange reality - shown certain pieces of truth with no hypocrisy (at least this is what I understood from it at the bottom line).

In a world full of miserable and hypocritical rules, weird attitudes, and rotten characters, B.H. Arias' story was so simple but terribly vivid and intense, including even touching poems of leisure moments, addressed to average persons (even if they were made amazing references and walk the reader thru history, arts, politics, etc in such a friendly way), "talking bluntly" about mundane and real things (family, work, budgeting, etc, etc), straightforward and open-minded... yet in a romantic way!

So, dear reader, make a special treat to yourself - no matter if Valentine's Day, Halloween, or Army Memorial Day, and read this fascinating and totally captivating book!

You'll feel ghosts around, love and passion, genuine human feelings, and much more!

At the end of the story you'll find yourself with a large smile, eventually dreaming of your own friendly ghost, but completely refreshed and in such a great mood - a different person simply awakens to life aware of his/ her own reality, able to take advantage of it and be happy! : )

Enjoy reading Searching for Lydia! : )

It's a free ebook! : )

"'Searching for Lydia" book is available on Apple iBooks, Diesel ebooks, Sony ebooks, and Barnes and Noble.

"Lydia" is the name given by the author for his apparent Post Traumatic Stress Disorder/ PTSD that may have been occurred after too many years of deployments in war zones around the world.

"The word 'romance,' according to the dictionary, means excitement, adventure, and something extremely real. Romance should last a lifetime."

"I am a northeastern US transplant to the south, from NJ to Ga. I am an aspiring writer, former Marine, a refrigeration mechanic, an environmentalist, I have worked all kinds of odd jobs to make ends meet, pot washer, oil rig, commercial airport fuel, sold cars (hated it), the waiter in a mom and pop Chinese restaurant (loved it)."

I am a man who has traveled the world while working as a contractor in some of the worst places in the world, from Haiti, to Iraq and Afghanistan (so nice, I did Afghanistan twice). I have been on holiday to some of the most beautiful places and every place I write about I have seen first hand. Norway, Sweden, Monaco, Italy, Canada, Croatia, Japan, Thailand, Uzbekistan; all over the lower 48 states, Mexico and South America.

Once in a place called Howz-e-Madad, I met a very small Afghan Lieutenant Colonel who used to be Mujahedeen and fighting the Russians. I needed some information from his command about the environmental situation at the base. He commanded so much respect from everyone. He invited me to lunch and a meal was cooked on the spot for us, as if from nowhere by some lower grade soldiers. Rice with mutton and the incredible round Afghan Bread called Naan. I also met an equally incredible Afghan-American woman interpreter who went out on missions all the time. She is a tiny lady, barely five feet tall, yet, I think the men were afraid of her!

The book is loosely based on a true story, a trip through one man's descent into insanity as he attempts to come to grips with the gorgeous ghost who has invaded his mind and will not let him go. A tale told in a loosely connected poetic, and romantic style during several deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan in diary-like vignettes as the author struggles to define this Love, wrapped within the folds of a paranormal romance."

Thank you, Brian, my special friend!

I am a passionate reader - love fiction literature, classical books - covering a wide range of topics, and see how the author managed to express words that come out in such an amazing combination, and raise a plethora of thoughts, wonders, and feelings, while taking the chance to travel to another dimension of the human mind, and eventually get a bit more inner enlightenment!

I always enjoy reading at my own pace and discover things as they'll get revealed.

And if I really fall with a book, complex, informative, thoughtfully written, and feel comfortable, I can easily become addicted to it or the author's style, then I start looking for all issues from the same author, becoming "thirsty" for next one... this happened to me with "Searching for Lydia" - fall in love from the first page!

So, if you'll like B.H. Arias first e-book released --- crazy-realistic-war-love-ghosts story (the ghosts from within and the other ones, partly imaginary ones - it whole depends by perceptions-knowledge-perspectives) --- be happy, he has a second and a third book due out this year! : )

Ok, now go fix a big cup of coffee and start an awesome epic journey with "Searching for Lydia"! :))

Lydia will take good care of you! She is already there!: ))

"Romance like a ghost escapes touching; it is always where you are not, not where you are.

The interview or conversation was prose at the time, but it is poetry in the memory."

This is a book written about soldiers, a tribute to military men and women in US service in combat areas, army soldiers, US troops, soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, American contractors in Afghanistan or other war zones, American civilians in Afghanistan war, and veterans, their constant risk exposure, daily efforts to survive, dreams and odd way (sometimes) to build a sort of parallel life simply to survive and still be sane.

To me, "Searching for Lydia", is partly a paranormal romance book - a ghost story, partly a soldiers story able to lift up any person's mood but especially American soldiers mental stage while in the war area, to support troops' morale, as well as their families stamina to resist while their husbands or wives, brothers or sisters, mothers or fathers are deployed in a combat area at thousand miles away, knowing nothing (in real-time) about them, haunted by worries and desperation, finding themselves to the edge of losing trust and confidence, taking wrong decisions, even if a long-lasting couple connected by special boundaries throughout the years...

This is an amazing short contemporary romance novel, including poetry and philosophy, but with a dynamic narration, touching various topics of interest, a perfect read for an open-minded individual, high intellectual as well as for an average person.

Searching for Lydia is a sensitive fiction war romance book for adults, partly a war love story or war romance book, partly a ghost romance novel, perfectly suitable for action movies scenario as well as for "Harlequin romance" collection.

Searching for Lydia - B.H. Arias book review Quotes from the book:

"The thing about a spirit is that they cannot come into your consciousness unless you invite it."

"We can see and hear each other and interact with each other, we can even touch each other, but the one difference is the way that weather reaches her."

"So is this a ghost story? No, this is a love story which just happens to involve a ghost. So who is Lydia? She is the one I have been searching for, for so long. That elusive condition of a relationship that evades me at every step I take. Yet she is the muse that I have been searching for all these years."

"I think this is simply people wanting to sell books, because let's face it, sex sells well, and the only other thing that sells as good as sex is evil possession, spirits and ghosts."

"I have been researching Lydia's origins, from Scandinavia to Minnesota. She was born in or around 1900 and died sometime past 2000."

"I have been in this alternate world for as long as I can remember, walking outside the place that is called normal."

"Apparently, I need a presence, a ghost in my MIND."

"I have been getting angrier and angrier, and there doesn't seem to be a place in sight to put this anger, and so I put it in this writing. (I bet some people here wish they had a Lydia.) I am putting it down on paper and just to get it out seems to be therapeutic and yet there is an underlying craziness brewing just under the surface."

"No it's not so bad with her here. Perhaps this is precisely what this world is sorely lacking. Perhaps this cutesy, wholesome, wonderful, fairy tale reality is exactly what this world needs."

Many women may think that Romance is dead, but I strongly believe that Romance is alive and flourishing, like spring flowers.

Also, I consider that most women (no matter the age, profession, social status, religion, likes and dislikes) wish to have some romance in their life, and perhaps what they do not know is that it has its path and season to blossom, so, they do not have to get disappointed and think it's dead, but believe in it and enjoying when the time comes.

And after reading "Searching for Lydia", despite the story with lots of turmoils, my belief in Romance got reborn!: )

"This thought makes me miss a bowl I had when I was doing some time on a Romanian Army base here, very few Americans, and so we had to eat in the Romanian kitchen.

Okay, kitchens here in a war zone are, shall we say, not up to too many standards that are expected in the 'civilized world'." - B.H. Arias quote from Searching for Lydia e-book.