Breath Control

Bob Plumose is a life coach whose own life is out of control. After teaching his clients all day about how to solve their short-term crises, Bob comes home to one he can't fix: a shoplifting daughter, a hip hop thug son, and Jo, a wife who thinks of him as added income and not much else. One day Jo lays it on the line that Bob isn't pulling his weight anymore. She demands that he attend a seminar at The Arena, an EST-clone for losers who crave empowerment. A female instructor invites Bob to a special after-party "for the elite." Feeling a strong sexual vibe, Bob stumbles into an enticement with Charisma Curry, an artist/seductress who quickly takes him to bed. But he doesn't have sex as he knows it. What Charisma does literally takes his breath away - she introduces Bob to "Breath Play," a game of denying oxygen for sexual pleasure.

Frightened, guilty, but almost immediately addicted to this game, Bob suddenly has a secret life in a secret world of other players. It's not depravity that obsesses him but the discovery of being suspended between worlds, truth and lies, life and death. Bob's secret turns sinister when members of the elite of The Arena start dying off. Bob tries to blow the whistle, but the police won't listen. Bob has no one to turn to and nowhere to go - a dangerous predicament once he discovers that he's about to be the next casualty.


Genre: Mystery

"Gary S. Kadet is a bold innovator who's not afraid to look the devil in the eye." - Jon Land

"Startlingly extortionate prose." - Robin Moore

"Gary S. Kadet's writing is alternately hilarious and painfully insightful." - Philip Reed