Gene's Books

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My latest novel, 38 Roads, is a story that that those born in the years following Word War2, and coming of age in mid-1960s and early 1970s, owe it to themselves to read. Detailing the times and travels of Sean Morgan, a young man adrift in America after Woodstock and the collapse of the Counterculture, 38 Roads does for the Baby Boomers what Jack Kerouac’s On the Road did for his generation. With language that is at times humorous, tragic, encouraging, sad, sometimes all of these at the same time, Sean Morgan’s young life and adventures roll out on the page like a fast moving car does on an endless highway.
The third and final volume of my Raines Family Trilogy, Emmitt at Love, is a 21st century Fitzgerald-esque take on love, loss, repentance, and redemption, as experienced by Emmitt Raines, a writer, in the last quarter of the 20th Century. Emmitt’s journey begins on the banks of the New River, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and from there outward to the rocky coasts of the New England Maritime, the lights of Paris, the smoother waters of the Cote D’Azur, and finally to the far western Pacific shores of California. Over the course of time, and his travels, Emmitt Raines finally learns what it takes, and means, to love another person. Not only that, but he learns how to love his long dead father, a man he never knew, as well as how to love himself.

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Raines in the Day, published by All Things That Matter Press in 2021, is a novel that can be read on its own or as the second volume in the Raines Family Trilogy, which began with Men Without Hate. With the state of Florida for a backdrop, the novel chronicles one man’s life as it unfolds through the first half of the 20th century. Rich with the bittersweet gifts of life and infused with the beauty of the sea and the outdoors, Raines in the Day details John Raines's journey through loss, love, and healing. With appeal to readers of Patrick Smith’s A Land Remembered and Richard Powell’s I Take This Land, John Raines’ story is a portrait of a man grappling with inner and outer changes, struggling to understand his own heart, and fighting to move beyond the losses and limitations of his past.

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Published by All Things That Matter Press in 2016, Men Without Hate is the story of two men inextricably linked by family and irrevocably changed by war. Juxtaposing two quintessentially American coming-of-age tales—and two iconic American wars, the Civil War and World War II—the stories of Lewis and Hilton Raines also offer reflect on the nature of family legacy, healing, and survival. With the world embattled by war and terrorism, the novel’s central question—how do some men’s souls survive the horror of war while others’ minds are destroyed by it?—has resonance for us all.


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