NOVEL ABOUT SEVERE SCHIZOAFFECTIVE DISORDER
PST Pacific Standard Time 3/30/2006 05:02 AM GMT (TransWorldNews)
Greg Bauder's second novel, SELENE'S GUIDING LIGHT, deals with a new psychiatric diagnosis, Schizoaffective Disorder. It is a dual diagnosis with Paranoid -Schizophrenia and Manic-Depression occurring simultaneously. In the novel, Bauder's main character, Don, is hospitalized having lost almost total control of reality. He hears the voice of The Moon-Goddess, Selene, and undergoes a bizarre journey in his fantasy world which involves time-travel, shape-shifting, aliens, grandiose missions, terrifying ordeals and mysticism. When Don is brought back to reality he hangs on by the barest thread to it. He wanders the streets confused by the people who look like the beings on his fantasy planet, The New Earth. But, he climbs out of his clinical depression and once again retreats into the manic high of his often turnabout terrifying world. The novel shines light on the deeply disturbed mind of a Schizoaffective man and is validated since Bauder has had this horrifying illness for 28 years. Finally, the novel is a study of where reality ends and the paranormal begins and if there is any authenticity of a spiritual world. Bauder hints there might be such a world but through his semi-autobiographical character, Don, he poses questions and some surprising answers. The novel is richly descriptive and was written at The University Of British Columbia where Bauder earned a BA in English Literature after being very ill for two decades. It is published by Publish America.