J. R. Rauschert

Professor Jon Schultz goes on a quest to uncover a past, long sequestered by family secrets and hidden scandals. As the estranged youngest son of a farmer, Jon has avoided visiting his relatives, burying himself in a career as a historian and his own griefs over the tragic deaths of his wife and small daughter seven years earlier. Having grown up with a reclusive, near hermit-like mother and a stoic, distant father, Jon at an early age discovered the world of books and the comforts of avoiding the hard realities of his childhood. Scholarships allowed him to leave home and sequester himself in the friendlier confines of the university. Earning multiple degrees, he immerses himself in the world of academia, which allows him to live in the impersonal past of historical characters not related to him. When he gets a call telling him his mother is dying, Jon, with some reluctance, returns to the farm to say good-by to the woman he barely knows. Arriving too late, he learns she has left clues that may reveal the reasons for her seclusive life. As he attempts to unravel the mystery of who she was, he hopes to understand the almost non-existent relationship with her which affected him so powerfully and kept him a shadow of himself. Only by understanding her can he find happiness, an elusive idea he had given up on when the two loves of his life, his wife and daughter, died in a grisly car accident he blames himself for. When Jon studies his mother's clues, clues only he can fathom, he attempts to decipher what caused her to become a recluse who ignored him and his siblings. His father, a distant and terse retired-seventy-nine-year-old, offers little in the way of explanation or support as Jon discovers even more notes and essays from his mother. Complicating his search is the possibility of love. On an early morning run, an unexpected fall brings him together with a former crush, reawakening possibilities for a relationship and a new hope to find happiness. As he balances solving the mystery of his mother and kindles hopes for returning hope to his future, Jon discovers secrets about his mother and his potential mate that threaten his sanity and future.

The Encounters is a series of stories about the connections people make. Each of us has many encounters, but some are more special than others. We fall in love, remember the past, or are haunted by a meeting. People are always seeking to grow, to learn, to discover. Some search for love. Some looking answers. All of us need to feel part of a group, or a tribe. We have wants: someone, hope, love, reasons to go on. Life doesn't always give us what we want, and not always what we need. The Encounters tell of the adventure of meeting others and risking part of the self to find the answers to living in a world where we want more than what we have. Amber Dreams is aa bar-restaurant, owned by a father who couldn't save his daughter from an accident. The tragedy cost him his marriage, and left him certain he could never find love. Match Point's protagonist is a tennis star jilted before a big tournament who pines for a reunion that cannot happen. Amen Point brings together two teens who have big dreams and who compete in the classroom. Meeting the title figure of Old Woman, a man learns much of his life, his future, and his destiny. These and other stories show the intrigue and the restlessness of humans as they yearn for fulfillment and happiness.