Published in 2020, this historical fiction novel is about an Israeli woman in the reserves of the Israeli Army. She comes to America to figure out her life by the help of her parents, and she meets an American Christian named Peter Mccloud. Throughout their time together, she asks herself questions about what it’s like to be Jewish. She struggles with deep questions from many different perspectives in her life. A bright light in her life reveals the truth to her to help make her the Jew that she was born to be.
Ebook for sale on Amazon:
Paperback book for sale on Amazon:
For Love and Honor: Nichols, John E: 9781706265993: Amazon.com: Books
Here’s an example of the book:
Chapter 1
Sigh, uttered from the distant night as the fireflies’ stood still in the sky and the whistling wind wooed the leaves on the earth. A pebble-filled driveway surrounded by grass and trees led to a stone house. A man sat on a wooden bench, upon a carefully-designed wooden porch, reading a paperback book. The man sighed once more, and took a break from his reading to behold the beautiful sight. Well, to any normal man, this would be paradise. Not Peter Mccloud; not this night. He leaned back on the bench, and reinvaded his book.
Sometimes, emotions get in the way of truth— He continued as he adjusted his glasses with his free hand, especially when there are so many of them to sort out.
“Ain’t that the truth!” he muttered.
After a slight silence, he continued reading, The heart’s like a library and each emotion is a book that needs to be put on a shelf. At least, it would be easier to do it that way, but emotions like to be thrown onto a pile.
He paused a moment of infuriating interruption by a fly buzzing around him. Peter swung at it with his free hand like a sword slicing the wind; he missed the fly and Peter’s fully brown, curly hair. The fly continued to buzz around him, and the annoyance of the sound disturbed Peter’s focus on the book. After escaping several swings of the hand, the fly landed on the inside of the book. Peter leered at the fly with a conniving grin. Smack! The fly had no chance. He opened to where he left off, wiped off the fly’s remains, and continued reading.
Self-expression is the method man uses to shelf these emotions: one at a time.
He stopped, and beheld the beautiful vision once again. Well, at least, he tried too. The moon shined radiantly in the night like a large firefly lighting the driveway. All Peter saw was a big ball of rock too rough to even roll in a bowling lane. He sighed once more, and decided to close the book. Are you not more valuable than many sparrows? Peter gazed the night once more searching the fireflies on earth and above the earth for the source of these words—or, maybe, for the answer. No avail… He shrugged his shoulders, opened the old screen door, and wandered into the house for bed—alone.
The sizzling sun rained down on the limestone buildings capped with a few kaduregel fields, satellite dishes, and lines of drying clothes. Men and women walked between the buildings on plastered-stone mosaic roads protected by shade provided for by the apartments and stores themselves. A flock of tourists, led by their guide, strolled in awe through the sha’ar tzion seemingly undisturbed by random shouting, merchants, and a young lady hastily walking toward the gate chatting on her cell phone.
“Akh eem,” The young lady sweetly yet firmly declared into her cell phone, “Kheeyavtee laavod.”
She walked slower under the stone gate for shade. She distanced herself from her cell phone, swung her brunette hair around like a model in a hair commercial, and placed the phone inside the wings of her hair.
“Yadatee. Yadatee. EEm…”
She paused gruelingly listening to her EEm with a small glimmer of hope to express a single thought. The young woman leaned against the wall watching the tourists strolling through the gate. She heard the sounds of cars honking in the distance, guides elaborating in perfect English nearby, and her EEm almost screaming in her ear in Hebrew. Razielah Bat-David just needed to stop the madness, and say something.
“EEm,” Razielah lifted her voice in hopes to silence her mother for a moment. “I will visit this weekend.”
Listening to her mother’s reply, she sighed then rolled her eyes as she explained, “Shabat; sof shavua: mah hahevdayl?”
Razielah rolled her eyes again: it was the only way of enduring the mother/daughter talk from her EEm. Even though she wasn’t actually listening to what was being said this time.
“Okay okay,” She concluded, “ahavah otakh, EEm, Ehyeh sham zot shavua.” Click. Her hair no longer protected the closed phone as Razielah returned the phone into a protected pocket of her I.D.F. pants she received from boot camp. It’s been three years since boot camp. She…liked the color of her pants, and wanted to keep them after her active service was over. Those pants held many memories—especially her krav maga training.
But, no Krav Maga training could counter the arguments of her EEm…nor her Av—for that matter. Leaning against a nearby wall, she took a deep breath as the footsteps of tourists flocked passed her with another guide. She was thirsty. Who wouldn’t be after being dry for so long in the baking heat of Old Jerusalem.
“What a day…” she uttered to herself as she reached into another pocket. She was feeling her pockets for something: silver shekels, paper shekels, something. Something she could use to quench her thirst. Thankfully for her, she found some kesafim in one of her back pockets. Breathing a sigh of relief, she picked up her hasty walk.
Suddenly, she ran into a man like a ram charging into a stone wall. The man tumbled backwards trying desperately to regain his balance—which he did. Razielah stilled herself a moment to look at the man that she almost tipped over. The man was much taller than she was, athletely built, and has naturally tan skin. It’s safe to say that he’s either Arab or Palestinian—possibly Lebanese. Razielah shook herself out of her daze, and reached out by saying: “Are you alright?”
“It’s nothing” The man replied with a grin on his face.
“At least, your teeth are intact” Razielah nervously responded.
“It’s nothing, Razielah” the man replied without a grin on his face.
“How do you know my name?” she reacted defensively,
“Your father.”
She was enraged by this stranger’s comment, but something about him was unusually gentle. She listened.
“I have a message for you: “Seek after a bright light, and you shall find redemption for your soul. You shall never thirst again.” The man said most seriously,
As the messenger finished, Razielah stood there dazed.
“My father sent you to look for me, and tell me that?”
“Yes.”
“My father doesn’t care about anything, but himself. He’s in the government building tending to his ‘flocks’.”
The messenger turned toward the gate that Razielah just marched into, and started walking.
“Answer me! Who sent you?!”
The stranger stopped and turned his head around to look her straight in the eyes. She saw something in him. It frightened her, yet intrigued her. The burning in his eyes and the gentleness of his manner told her that he was no terrorist. And, what astounded her more were the words he spoke before facing the old city and trolling in.
“Your Heavenly Father.”