Chanticleer Book Reviews

Author: kasey-claytor

The 2025 Harvey Chute Spotlight for Business & Finance
Mastering Financial Success!

The Harvey Chute Awards for Business & Finance

In today’s rapidly evolving business landscape, financial literacy and strategic thinking have never been more crucial. From navigating investment complexities to building sustainable business models, professionals and entrepreneurs need reliable guidance to thrive. The Harvey Chute Awards for Business & Finance celebrate the exceptional works that provide this essential knowledge, recognizing authors who translate complex financial concepts into actionable insights that empower readers to take control of their economic futures.

Celebrating Our Grand Prize Winner!

We’re proud to celebrate our 2024 Harvey Chute Division Grand Prize Winner, Jacqui Clarke for her transformative guide Stop Worrying about Money. This comprehensive work goes beyond traditional financial advice to address the psychological and practical aspects of money management. Clarke, described as “Australia’s best-kept money secret,” delivers a holistic approach that helps readers clarify their values, set realistic goals, and build genuine financial security. Her book tackles everything from combating expense creep and avoiding common money traps to overcoming setbacks and mastering long-term planning, all while maintaining an accessible and encouraging tone.

What sets Stop Worrying about Money apart is its emphasis on financial literacy as a journey of self-awareness rather than merely a destination of wealth accumulation. As our review noted, Clarke “blends theoretical financial advice with pragmatic applications, incorporating real-life examples, case studies, and interactive exercises” that transform potentially dry subject matter into engaging and digestible content. The book addresses critical issues from building a trusted “finance village” of advisors to understanding the impact of financial decisions on personal relationships. Clarke will be invited to participate in a Chanticleer Author Interview, offering readers deeper insights into her expertise and approach to financial empowerment.

The Harvey Chute Awards recognize the full spectrum of business and finance literature, encompassing categories from traditional Finance and Investing & Money to contemporary essentials like Social Media, Technology Guides, and Communications. This comprehensive approach reflects the reality that modern business success requires mastery across multiple disciplines, whether you’re developing a Motivational framework, crafting Business Strategy, understanding Economics, or building Marketing expertise.

Explore All Business & Self-Help Divisions

The Harvey Chute Awards are part of Chanticleer’s comprehensive celebration of transformative non-fiction:
- Mind & Spirit Awards for Spirituality and Enlightenment: Spiritual growth, mindfulness, meditation, and personal enlightenment
- I&I Awards for How-To and Self-Help: Practical guides, self-improvement, skill development, and instructional works
The Doctor’s Voice
By Dr. Pietro Emanuele Garbelli

A Harvey Chute First Place Winner!

Dr. Pietro Emanuele Garbelli speaks out on serious professional issues faced by modern healthcare workers, in The Doctor’s Voice.

Doctors deal with overwhelming stress, leading to burnout, illness, many of them leaving the profession, and even a higher-than-average rate of suicide. The Covid19 pandemic both heightened and helped illuminate some of the causes of this stress, prompting author Garbelli to write this book as a set of advice for his colleagues and as advocacy for broader changes in hospitals and other healthcare systems.

Garbelli highlights a common disconnect in communication—administrators and higher-ups telling doctors what to do while those doctors don’t have much opportunity to bring up the problems they encounter day-to-day.

Read More Here

The Money Map
By Kasey J. Claytor

A Mind and Spirit First Place Winner!

“There is something magical about money—the way it appears and disappears, grows and shrinks, and, in a similar way of taming a hesitant wild horse, with calm assuredness and confidence, not only will you learn to control it, but you will find you can joyfully master it.” -Author Kasey J. Claytor

Claytor insists that every successful endeavor starts with an individual’s thinking and beliefs. She details this concept – and how to live with it in mind – in her new book, The Money Map: A Spiritual Guide for Financial Success.

From the onset of her business-oriented career, Claytor has drawn from her beliefs as she upholds financial success as a spiritual goal. In this volume, she takes the mystery out of money to show it as an extension of the mind, body, and spirit. Claytor ensures the beginning of an endearing journey toward clearer financial decision-making, investments, and goals by asking readers to identify the worries of their own ego and to eliminate unproductive ideas and actions.

Read More Here

Tax MythBusters
By Lily Tran

Tax MythBusters: Don’t Fall Prey to the Tax Misconceptions, compiled by tax professional Lily Tran with essays by other financial, tax, and accounting professionals, gives valuable insight into the myths of what can and cannot be claimed as a deduction for small businesses and entrepreneurs.

This work provides tips and strategies to optimize tax planning and make the most of available deductions. As the foreword reminds the reader, “Knowledge is power when it comes to taxes,” adding that gaining a better understanding of the tax rules and regulations will allow you to “make smart financial decisions and protect yourself from unnecessary risks.”

The essays that make up this work are short, succinct, and to the point about the pitfalls and challenges that face small business owners, framing these dangers as “myths.”

Read More Here

Reconfigurement
By E. Alan Fleischauer

Chanticleers 2022 Harvey Chute Grand Prize Winner!

A guide to achieving financial freedom in retirement, E. Alan Fleischauer’s bestseller Reconfigurement™ reveals a roadmap guided by the Mantra, “Navigate, Customize, and Thrive.”

Advances in medicine, nutrition, and longevity planning now offer unparalleled possibilities to live longer, higher-quality lives. However, looming over this rosy image is a genuine concern: the financial ramifications of a longer retirement term. More alarming is that a sizable portion of the American populace is not harnessing their 401(k) retirement plans.

In light of this scenario, can traditional investment programs with fraying safety nets, such as pensions, remain viable? Reconfigurement combines the emotional fulfillment of making retirement dreams a reality with practical guidance that rejects the notion of a set retirement age of 65. This work’s personal tales and sound financial guidance entice readers away from the constraints of traditional retirement approaches.

Read More Here

These reviews represent just a glimpse of the strategic insights and practical wisdom waiting to be discovered in today’s business and finance literature.

See the Chanticleer Difference for Yourself!

We’re excited about all the exceptional business and finance works we receive every year for both the CIBAs and for our Editorial Reviews. Throughout this year’s Harvey Chute Book Awards, we had the pleasure of promoting numerous outstanding titles as they advanced through our competition tiers. In a market flooded with millions of books, professional recognition cuts through the noise. The CIBAs provide ongoing promotion that maximizes your digital footprint and expands your readership through:
- High-traffic website features
- Social media promotion across established platforms
- Newsletter spotlights like this reaching thousands of industry professionals
- Long-tail marketing that continues promoting winners throughout the year
This is the journey from beginning to end for the CIBAs! Every list you make means more promotion for you and your work as each advancement tier is posted right here on our website, on our social media, and also out in our newsletter! Your book deserves to be discovered.

You wouldn’t hide a business! Don’t hide your book!

The business and finance market continues to demand fresh perspectives and proven strategies, with professionals, entrepreneurs, and individuals seeking guidance they can trust and implement. Whether your work provides innovative investment strategies, practical business solutions, cutting-edge technology insights, or foundational financial education, the Harvey Chute Awards provide the recognition and promotional platform your expertise deserves.

Business and finance literature has the unique power to transform lives, build wealth, and create sustainable success. From comprehensive guides that help readers master complex financial concepts to targeted strategies that solve specific business challenges, every expertly crafted work has the potential to become an essential resource. Don’t let your knowledge remain untapped! Enter the Harvey Chute Awards today and join the distinguished authors who’ve found their professional audience through Chanticleer!

Submit to the Harvey Chute Awards today! Deadline: September 30th

You know you want it…
September 8, 2025
The 2025 Journey Award Spotlight for Overcoming Adversity
The Courage to Transform Pain into Purpose

The Journey Awards Honor Stories of Resilience and Survival

The submissions for the 2025 Awards are underway, and Journey closes on August 31, 2025!

Some stories demand to be told, not because they’re easy to share, but because silence serves no one. The Journey Awards, Chanticleer’s oldest non-fiction division, honor the extraordinary courage it takes to transform personal trauma into powerful narrative, giving voice to experiences that too often remain hidden in shadows.

These are the memoirs that refuse to let suffering be meaningless, the true stories that illuminate paths forward for others walking similar roads, and the brave testimonies that demand society confront uncomfortable truths. When authors choose to share their most difficult journeys, they create lifelines for readers who need to know they’re not alone.

The Power of Survival Stories

Every Journey Award submission represents an act of tremendous courage. To transform trauma into narrative requires not just writing skill, but the strength to revisit painful experiences, the wisdom to find meaning in suffering, and the generosity to share hard-won insights with the world.

These stories matter because they break silence around experiences that too often remain hidden. They provide validation for survivors, education for supporters, and hope for those still struggling. When authors transform their most difficult experiences into compelling narrative, they perform a profound service—proving that healing is possible and that survival can become a form of advocacy.

Celebrating Our 2024 Grand Prize Winner!

We’re honored to recognize Kathryn Caraway, whose brave memoir Unfollow Me claimed the 2024 Journey Grand Prize by shining necessary light on the devastating crime of stalking. Writing under a pseudonym to protect her identity, Caraway documented three years of terror as she fought for survival against a stalker whose escalating crimes systematically destroyed her sense of safety. As she writes, “Each day is a fight to stay alive. Even while sleeping, you must be ready.”

Despite having her concerns dismissed by law enforcement and friends, Caraway refused to remain silent. She documented hundreds of incidents and ultimately transformed her nightmare into a powerful story that brings much-needed awareness to stalking as a serious crime. Unfollow Me demonstrates how the most difficult stories can become the most important ones—transforming one person’s fight for survival into practical guidance and hope for others. In addition to ongoing promotional features, Unfollow Me will be regularly promoted throughout the year and for the next five years in our upcoming Hall of Fame posts. Kathryn Caraway will also be invited to participate in a Chanticleer 10-Question Interview and receive continued recognition across our promotional platforms.

See Our Review here:

When you’re a target of stalking, “Each day is a fight to stay alive. Even while sleeping, you must be ready.” So reveals Kathryn Caraway in Unfollow Me, a spine-tingling true crime novel tracing a life shattered by severe stalking.

Although the author uses the pseudonym “Kathryn Caraway” throughout this novel to protect her identity, her harrowing tales of being the target of a stalker and fighting for her rights to freedom and safety are a testament to the real danger she was exposed to. Caraway’s experience creates a compelling story of one woman’s brave quest for justice against her torturer.

Kathryn emotionally, mentally, and physically falls apart at the hands of a violent, ubiquitous presence. Despite the severity of the crimes committed against her, Kathryn’s concerns are routinely dismissed as irrational and hysterical by law enforcement officials, lawyers, and even long-time friends.

Before a malicious intruder targets her, Kathryn is a beloved mother, a wonderful friend, and a confident employee. But after she is introduced to Todd, he begins to slowly strip her life from her control.

Read More Here

Categories That Honor Every Journey

The Journey Awards recognize that trauma takes many forms, and healing happens through many different paths:
- Overcoming Adversity – Personal Journey – Individual stories of resilience against overwhelming odds
- Dysfunctional Family/Siblings – Narratives exploring complex family dynamics and their lasting impact
- Societal/Class/Race Issues – Personal accounts of confronting systemic injustice and discrimination
- Personal Journeys/Experiences/PTSD – Stories of living with and healing from post-traumatic stress
- Drug Addiction – Memoirs of addiction, recovery, and the ongoing journey of sobriety
- Sexual Abuse – Brave testimonies of survival and healing from sexual trauma
- Childhood Trauma – Stories that give voice to experiences from our most vulnerable years
Each category represents not just a literary classification, but a community of survivors whose stories deserve recognition and readers who need to hear them.

Other August Non-Fiction Opportunities

The Journey Awards are part of Chanticleer’s comprehensive celebration of narrative non-fiction, all closing at the end of August:
- Hearten Awards – Uplifting non-fiction that inspires hope and positive action
- Nellie Bly Awards – Investigative journalism and exposé works that uncover truth
- Military & Front Line Awards – Stories of military service and front-line experiences
Looking ahead to September, our prescriptive non-fiction divisions offer opportunities for instructional and guidance works: Instruction and Insight (I&I), Harvey Chute, and Mind & Spirit Awards.

Looking at Journeys of Courage

Check out some of these powerful stories we’ve celebrated recently!

Guided
By Kirsten Throneberry

A 2024 Journey First Place Winner!

In her stunning memoir, Guided: Lost Love, Hidden Realms, and the Open Road, Kirsten Throneberry weaves together the highs and lows of a road trip packed with life wisdom, where she explores grief, spirituality, and rekindled hope.

Throneberry’s achingly vulnerable memoir splits its readers’ hearts and tenderly sews them back together.

In the aftermath of the devastating loss of her husband, Kirsten sells her home and takes her two small sons, two elderly pups, and eccentric mother on a year-long road trip around the United States in their new-to-them Bigfoot RV.

Encouraged by the same spirit guides whose earlier advice for her husband’s health left her broken and untrusting, Kirsten must learn to face the open road with an equally open heart and mind.

Read More Here

Dumb Girl
By Heidi Yewman

In this powerful and heart wrenching memoir Dumb Girl, Heidi Yewman confronts her past to turn the pain and shame of an abusive childhood into resilience and purposeful action. She connects with readers through her transformation and triumphantly advocates for change.

During the #MeToo Movement, Yewman attended a stage production of the well-known “Vagina Monologues.” When audience members were asked to stand if they’d been abused, Yewman felt ashamed about her past but also obligated to rise. It was there that she decided to write her story as a release from that lingering sense of guilt.

Yewman’s narrative takes us on an inspiring journey between her adulthood passion to advocate for gun control, and a traumatic childhood attempting to escape from a cycle of abuse.

Read More Here

Freeing Teresa
By Franke James, Teresa Heartchild and Billiam James

“Let me speak. Let me speak,” says Teresa Heartchild, a self-talk poet, writer, and disability activist with Down Syndrome in the epigraph of the memoir, Freeing Teresa: A True Story About My Sister and Me by Franke James.

And speak she does, freeing herself from the boundaries set by other family members and the healthcare system. “In this heart-wrenching audiobook, a cast of thirteen actors recount the journey of Teresa’s unfortunately common experience. She was a victim of unjust medical treatment and nonconsensual housing placement—both by the Ontario government and her immediate family members. Actor Jackie Blackmore plays Franke James, the author and environmental activist. Teresa is played by the U.S. star Lauren Potter, and Dayleigh Nelson plays James’s husband, Bill.

By elevating Teresa’s activist voice as a prominent feature in the story, Freeing Teresa reveals how injustice and ableism can tear a family apart—but also how courageous love and the decision to listen to those who have been marginalized serves to build unbreakable bonds.

Franke James writes, “It all began with the question, ‘Where will Teresa live?’” In Toronto, Ontario, Canada 2013, six siblings wondered how to care for their youngest sister with Down Syndrome following their father’s anticipated death. Unfortunately, as is too often the case, these conversations took place without the knowledge and input of those directly involved: Teresa and her caretaker father.

Read More Here

Finding The Light
By Kasey J. Claytor

Some stories are impossible to look away from, and from its very first sentence, Finding the Light, Navigating Dementia with My Son by Kasey J. Claytor proves itself one of them. “…when my 49-year-old son, Justin, was first diagnosed with a form of early-onset dementia, I was stunned.” Without hesitation, the book draws readers into a saga of family, illness, and resilience.

Although a memoir, Finding the Light is in many ways an instructional text, too. Readers don’t need similar medical situations to draw from Claytor’s lessons of improvement. The conversational, approachable writing style serves this purpose well.

Although it’s in chronological order, this is an unconventional, modern text.

Traditional scene-based paragraphs are offset by poetry, informative sidebars, and even the full text of letters sent throughout Justin’s illness. Claytor deftly shifts between these sections, building a cohesive narrative from which readers can easily learn.

The past is vibrant and immediate: Claytor chronicles events in rich yet simple prose as Justin falls deeper into frontotemporal dementia, or FTD.

Read More Here

These works demonstrate how personal narrative can transform individual suffering into universal understanding and hope.

See the Chanticleer Difference for Yourself!

We’re honored to receive the courageous stories that authors trust us with each year. The Chanticleer International Book Awards offers an incredible $30,000 in cash, prizes, and promotion across all divisions!

The Journey Awards provide more than literary recognition—they offer validation that your story matters, that your survival has meaning, and that your courage to speak deserves to be heard. Whether you’re sharing your own journey or amplifying the voices of others, these awards celebrate the transformative power of truth-telling.

Your Story Matters

To every author considering sharing their journey: your courage to transform pain into purpose serves a vital function in our world. Your story may be the one that helps another survivor realize they’re not alone, that shows a supporter how to help, or that opens society’s eyes to injustices that must be addressed.

The courage to share your journey deserves recognition—the deadline is August 31, 2025!

Submit to the Journey Awards today and help us honor the transformative power of survival stories!
July 21, 2025
The Chanticleer Cover Design CCDAs Non-Fiction First Place and Grand Prize Winners for 2024!

The Cover Design Awards recognizes emerging new talent and outstanding works in every genre. The Grand Prize Winner, Genét Simone’s book, Teaching in The Dark will be promoted for years to come in our annual Hall of Fame article, as well as be featured on the Cover Design contest page year ’round!

The best part about being a Chanticleer Int’l Book Award Winner is the love and attention you get all year ‘round!

The 2024 CCDA Winners were announced at the 2025 Chanticleer Authors Conference in April, and you can see the official winners post here!

Join us in celebrating the very first group of First Place CCDA Winners for Non-Fiction!

Anne Gately – Sunburnt: A Memoir of sun, surf and skin cancer

Also a 2024 Journey First Place Winner!

Australians love the sun – our outdoor lifestyle is part our trademark appeal. It’s also the reason that every thirty minutes someone is diagnosed with melanoma. Why skin cancer is called Australia’s National Cancer, and two out of three Australians are likely to be diagnosed with it before turning 70.

After living an average Aussie life playing sport, spending languid days on the beach, and falling in love with ocean swimming, Anne Gately received unwelcome news. She had Stage IV melanoma.

Yet Anne is one of the lucky ones. After a dire prognosis, she dug deep to face the clear and present prospect of death, head-on. In Sunburnt, her revealing memoir, Anne recounts the emotions and challenges of her life-saving immunotherapy treatment under the care of Professor Georgina Long to come through the other side.

Not only has Anne survived, she is issuing a clarion call for a change to the bronzed Aussie culture. In Sunburnt Anne combines a nostalgic view of a charmed Aussie childhood, a jolting review of Australia’s sun-worshipping norms, and enough scientific research to encourage us all to redefine our relationship with the sun.

Find it Locally and on Amazon!

Marianna Marlowe – Portrait of a Feminist

Through braided memories that flash against the present day, Portrait of a Feminist depicts the evolution of Marianna Marlowe’s identity as a biracial and multicultural woman—from her childhood in California, Peru, and Ecuador to her adulthood as an academic, a wife, and a mother.

How does the inner life of a feminist develop? How does a writer observe the world around her and kindle, from her earliest memories, a flame attuned to the unjust?

With writing that is simultaneously wise and shimmering, nuanced and direct, Marlowe confronts her own experiences with the hallmarks of patriarchy. Interweaving stories of life as the child of a Catholic Peruvian mother and an atheist American father in a family that lived many years abroad, she examines realities familiar to so many of us—unequal marriages, class structures, misogynist literature, and patriarchal religion. Portrait of a Feminist explores the essential questions of feminism in our time: What does it look like to live in defense of feminism? How should feminism be evolving today?

From Chanticleer:

Marianne Marlowe’s memoir, Portrait of a Feminist, reveals the evolution of her feminism through a collection of thought-provoking essays.

“I would say, if it were possible, I was born a feminist” is at the heart of Marlowe’s story. She relates to this defining identity throughout years spent in Peru, California, and Ecuador, where she navigates childhood, marriage, motherhood, and a professional career.

The section titles reflect periods in Marlowe’s life that correspond to nature’s rhythms— “Seeds Planted”, “The Growing Years”, “Maturation”, and “Harvesting”—and maintain strong connections between her thematically-linked experiences.

As a Peruvian American woman, Marlowe navigates the concepts of gender, race, and culture from a personal and critical point of view.

Read More Here

Find it Locally and on Amazon!

Linda M. Lockwood – Sky Ranch: Reared in The High Country

At the age of eight, Linda Lockwood moves with her family to an isolated ranch in eastern Washington State. Within two years, she’s patrolling the ranch on horseback alongside her border collie—herding sheep, killing rattlesnakes, and defending the ranch’s livestock from coyotes, bears, and even trespassing hunters—and working tirelessly to realize her dream of training horses. But her most daunting challenge is one hard work can’t overcome: her mother is descending into madness. And Linda’s deepest fear is that she might inherit the schizophrenia that threatens to dismantle her family.

At age twenty-five, Linda marries, but the joy of her first pregnancy is darkened by her mother’s suicide. Then she endures a painful miscarriage and the death of her beloved grandmother, traumatic events that send her back in time to the births and deaths of animals—domesticated and wild—that she loved in childhood. Eventually, her own family grows, but her happiness is haunted by questions people have tiptoed around all her life. How did her mother become schizophrenic? What did she endure as a patient in 1960s mental hospitals? Might Linda and even her children be next to battle that catastrophic mental disorder? Driven by the courage and will she sharpened as a rancher, Linda vows to find out.

Find it Locally and on Amazon!

Kathryn Caraway – Unfollow Me

Also the 2024 Journey Grand Prize and a Clue First Place Winner!

This book about the author’s harrowing experience with a stalker is not yet released, but we are excited to see it come out and see her story get told. To find more information see the authors website kathryncaraway.com or her advocacy project at unfollowme.com

This book also releases on Kickstarter soon, along with a fictional thriller sequel where the victim gets her revenge! Follow it here: The Unfollow Me Duet by Kathryn Caraway — Kickstarter

Kasey Claytor – Finding the Light: Navigating Dementia with My Son

What happens when a younger person gets dementia and becomes filled with peace?

Finding the Light is a poignant memoir about a mother’s journey caring for her son with a terminal form of early-onset dementia, Frontotemporal Degeneration, or FTD. From the overwhelming tasks that must be done to ultimately sharing the meaningful insights that can be gained in this experience, you can’t come away without being deeply moved.

Claytor shares ways to lessen the toll of caregiving with stress-reducing methods and options for self-care, financial tips, and suggestions for good estate planning.

But most importantly, her message is about developing a way to instill a sense of well-being in dementia sufferers and their caregivers.
When Kasey Claytor found out that her 49-year-old son had Frontotemporal Degeneration, her world came crashing down…

Finally grappling with this situation head-on, she set out to learn everything she could about this devastating condition and create an environment around her son that would hopefully give him a sense of well-being despite the odds.

From Chanticleer:

Some stories are impossible to look away from, and from its very first sentence, Finding the Light, Navigating Dementia with My Son by Kasey J. Claytor proves itself one of them. “…when my 49-year-old son, Justin, was first diagnosed with a form of early-onset dementia, I was stunned.” Without hesitation, the book draws readers into a saga of family, illness, and resilience.

Although a memoir, Finding the Light is in many ways an instructional text, too. Readers don’t need similar medical situations to draw from Claytor’s lessons of improvement. The conversational, approachable writing style serves this purpose well.

Although it’s in chronological order, this is an unconventional, modern text.

Traditional scene-based paragraphs are offset by poetry, informative sidebars, and even the full text of letters sent throughout Justin’s illness. Claytor deftly shifts between these sections, building a cohesive narrative from which readers can easily learn.

Read More Here

Find it Locally and on Amazon!

And now, the first ever GRAND PRIZE WINNERS in Non-Fiction for the Chanticleer Cover Design Awards!

Genét Simone- Teaching in the Dark

Also a 2024 Hearten First Place Winner!

A young teacher buys a one-way ticket to Shishmaref, Alaska. Within minutes of landing, she finds herself dealing with unexpected, rustic accommodations, and the culture shock of living in a remote Iñuit community. She relies on her courage, resilience, and wit while enduring freezing temperatures, power outages, loneliness, and first-year teacher anxieties and missteps, but eventually realizes that those challenges pale in comparison to the life lessons she learns about the heart of teaching—lessons from her students, their culture, and their community, on the vast, windy landscape at the edge of the Chukchi Sea.

From Chanticleer:

How does place shape who we are—and who we’ll become? In this memoir, Teaching in the Dark, Genét Simone puts that question to the test by recounting her first year as a teacher.

The initial year of teaching is never an easy feat, but for Simone it was especially challenging, and transformative. She spent it with Native students in the remote island village of Shishmaref, on the Arctic edge of Alaska—no small wonder the school year became an unforgettable one.

Today, Simone has decades of teaching experience to draw upon. Yet, in this memoir she rarely employs her present voice to reflect on the past. Instead, the narrator remains in the moment: a young and inexperienced Simone, who only knows that she feels destined to be a teacher. When she signs up for the Shishmaref teaching job, she doesn’t even realize that it’s on an island.

Read More Here

Find it Locally and on Amazon!

Thank you for joining us to celebrate the 2024 Cover Design First Place and Grand Prize Winners!

Your book can join the Tiers of Achievement, but only if you submit to the Chanticleer Int’l Book Awards!

Got a great Fiction Book? The 2025 Cover Design Awards are open through the end of July!

Note: Late submissions are accepted until the dates change on the website!

Submit to the Cover Design Awards Today!

July 9, 2025
The LIGHT of GRACE: Journeys of an Angel by Kasey Claytor – an epic spiritual journey

“The Light of Grace” by Kasey Claytor begins at the end of Grace’s final material/physical life on earth. She transcends into her angelic form and following a life review, Sophia, her former guardian angel, introduces Grace to the new charges she is to guide.

During her new role as guard and guide for people assigned to her, Grace continues to evolve. Her charges each live during vastly different time periods on earth. Mumbie, a woman, lives in primitive earth times. Garth, a Christian male, lives in the middle ages. Arnina lives in the technological age of the twenty-first century. Alistair lives in the twenty-ninth century, described as the salubrious Light Age.

In a surprising twist, the omnipotent narrator introduces himself by writing “And of course there is me. I am not a physical being, but I have been…”. The story teller describes the lives of each of these characters, from birth through life’s experiences until death, including their relationships and sufferings amidst supernatural guidance from Grace. To provide each character with visible and palpable loyalty and unconditional love, a canine spirit takes a physical form and stays by each one’s side.

Edifying dissertations give readers a smorgasbord of spiritual precepts combining multiple teachings and explanations from both Biblical and Eastern sages. Readers who enjoy the writings of Deepak Chopra or Wayne Dyer will find Grace’s metaphysical journey enlightening as it spans thousands of years both into the past and into the future.

The characters’ universal life situations trigger recognition of universal truths as they struggle to deal with war, death, love, hate, loss, drug use, jealousy, lust for power, success, failure, self- incrimination, torment, deep love, compassion, peace, and joy. Sufferings are portrayed as necessary stepping stones for the evolution of souls with the spiritual guidance of angels whose main tools are unconditional love and the absence of judgment, trusting that everything is what it must be.

You may want to gather with others to explore and discuss your observations as you accompany Grace and her special emissary, Aelfraed, on Grace’s spiritual journey crossing planes of existence and enduring trials and tribulations revealed through each character’s telling. The characters’ lives are vividly portrayed via the settings, lifestyles, and beliefs of the eras in which they live.

The Light of Grace: Journeys of an Angel by Kasey Claytor will make an excellent selection for book clubs interested in reading and discussing works that are spiritually and metaphysically oriented. It also will be a compelling read for anyone seeking answers to the mysteries of life, death, and what lies beyond.

June 7, 2016