Front & Center

Front & Center Leadership…A Brief Synopsis

Learn the personal branding skills that help leaders build authority, influence, and credibility in their business and life.

Do you want to learn how good leaders become great communicators, remarkable speakers, and impactful relationship builders?

Front & Center Leadership looks at leadership from a personal branding perspective and gives you the roadmap to step up and stand out. No one is going to do it for you, but with the right plan, you can take ownership of your personal development, growth opportunities, and career advancement.

Brandon is a former Coca-Cola and Apple advertising executive with over twenty years of experience at Madison Avenue advertising agencies advising top FORTUNE 100 companies on brand strategy. In 2018, he launched the Brands On Brands podcast, which is consistently ranked as a top five branding podcast on Apple Podcasts.

This book leads you step-by-step through the personal branding process. In this book you will learn:
– How to overcome the Middle of the Pack Mentality
– The nine steps of The Personal Branding Framework with activity guides for each step
-How to leverage Creating Content to build your authority
– The secrets to Building Community and influence through networking, partnering, and public speaking
– How to start Making an Impact that creates value for the people around you
– The actions that matter to Escape the Sea of Sameness
– How to get past what’s stopping you – The Paradox of Routine

This book also shares The Four Laws of Front & Center Leadership which show you what work to prioritize, how to take action every day, and how to keep moving forward.

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Consciousness is All there Is by Dr. Tony Nader

Consciousness Is All There Is: How Understanding and Experiencing Consciousness Will Transform Your Life…A Brief Synopsis

Dr. Tony Nader, a renowned Vedic scholar and neuroscientist, offers a direct path to peace for ourselves and our world that anyone can obtain—simply by delving into our own Consciousness. Dr. Nader provides the methods, tools, and guidance for connecting with our authentic inner nature and understanding how Consciousness is the essence of all existence.

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Cargo Hold 4

Cargo Hold 4…A Brief Synopsis

Five years into a multi-decade deep space mission, a team of eight scientists—four women, four men—explore a dwarf planet near the Kuiper Belt, loading soil samples, rocks and artifacts onto their spaceship, Gretel. Inadvertently, they bring aboard a stowaway, an unseen entity which has grown exponentially in a very short time, and is trying desperately to escape from Cargo Hold 4.

The ungodly howling, hammering and screeching coming from the hold on Gretel becomes unbearable, affecting the crew’s sleep and work cycles, and threatens the integrity of the ship itself. Captain Desna knows they must take action to survive, but is unsure how to get the alien life form off the ship. To learn more about the disruptive organism, she decides to execute a dangerous spacewalk. However, she is the only one small enough to enter the exterior purge vent leading into Cargo Hold 4.

Battling her cumbersome spacesuit within the claustrophobic vent tube, and running low on oxygen, Desna finally manages to edge herself close enough to the small intake opening to glimpse their unwelcome visitor … and can’t get her mind to accept what her eyes are seeing.

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Involuntarious

Involuntarius…A Brief Synopsis

It is the 26th day of October. In the year of our Lady Miraberis 1988. Or is it Lord Vehemens?

Civility amongst two societies is hanging by a thread after the love that united a God, and a Goddess is irreversibly shattered. For centuries, Congregatio and Involuntarius rival to be the top religion. One uses faith to indoctrinate the masses with its belief, Mirata. The other has been reduced and forced to live in the shadows to shelter its creed, Vehementis. Between supernatural beings and ancient relics, war remains at bay. But, has it always been that way?

After finding his mother dead and witnessing the execution of his father two days later, Ellis Cattivo is unwillingly vowing his life to Involuntarius. The appearance of Ellis within the secret society is controversial, setting in motion a chain of fateful events. With foes that appear to be friends, Ellis is down on his luck yet again. From inexplicable intuitions and visions, enter Spadices, a fierce young woman that thwarts Ellis’ demise and redirects him on the rightful path. Together, they unsuspectingly dive into the machinations of the wicked, steadily realizing that Congregatio and Involuntarius are corrupted from within. Their violent journey initiates endless questions, ultimately steering them to origins that threaten to change the face of the universe.

Sometimes, truths can hurt more than lies.

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Star Maker

Star Maker…A Brief Synopsis

Fall in Love with Rock and Romance on the Sunset Strip

Dive into the electric allure of the 1980s rock scene with Star Maker. Meet Kit McKenna, a bright-eyed entertainment attorney on a mission to conquer the music world. But when she meets the charismatic Sully Fox, frontman of Gypsy Tango, everything changes.

Experience the Spark
Sully’s raw talent and undeniable charm capture Kit’s heart. Together, they navigate the treacherous waves of fame, passion, and music. With each other’s support, they seem unstoppable, but the glittering lights of success bring shadows of doubt. Can their love survive the trials of stardom?

A Tale of Love, Dreams, and Rock ‘n’ Roll
From the heady highs of love to the heart-wrenching choices of fame, Kit and Sully’s journey is a whirlwind of emotion and music. If you love a good rock ‘n’ roll drama, get ready to be swept off your feet with Star Maker.

Discover the Heartbeat of the Sunset Strip
Don’t miss this mesmerizing story of ambition, love, and rock ‘n’ roll. Will Kit and Sully’s love be the anchor they need, or will the music industry’s merciless nature be too much for them?

Star Maker—Where Love and Music Collide

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Thomas Rocket and the Goober Patrol

Tommy Rocket and the Goober Patrol…A Brief Synopsis

When Nate Turner, a more or less average, well-intentioned 10-year-old, receives via robot-helicopter an encoded invitation from the secluded, anti-social, and enigmatic child prodigy, Tommy Rocket, promising free Doritos, Twinkies, and adventure, he simply can’t resist. Tommy’s gift for making gadgets and robots further fascinates Nate, most especially Tommy’s Goober Patrol, a small group of robots possessing the Prometheus Chip, the sentience-granting and epoch-marking invention of Tommy’s father. Nonetheless, whether helping Tommy hunt down a supposed rogue robot, instigating a war between the bully gangs, or spying on the community with Tommy’s network of robot-cams, Nate begins to have regrets in ever joining Tommy in his mischievous games and intrigues.

However, when the two young spies and hunters find themselves becoming the espied and hunted, by someone or something capable of murder, something the boys do not understand, they cease their games and squabbling to unravel the secret of their mysterious and sinister stalker. Who—or even what—is he, and why is he so interested in Tommy’s father and his fabulous Prometheus Chip? Is it for mere industrial espionage or something much darker? Together, the boys must use their individual strengths, along with the help of Tommy’s marvelous robots, to solve the mystery of their unknown and murderous antagonist, a mystery whose outcome holds the key to the continued survival of the human race itself.

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Broken Pencils

Broken Pencils… A Brief Synopsis

Jonah Tarver, a troubled Oakland teenager grappling with his parents’ troubled marriage, his own mental disorder, and the weight of his best friend’s death, embarks on a desperate quest to find meaning in life. On his eighteenth birthday, coinciding with his Senior prom, Jonah, along with his girlfriend Taniesha, his best friend Trevon, and a group of peers, spirals into a night of reckless indulgence in drugs and alcohol in the vibrant city of San Francisco. As tensions escalate and emotions run high, Jonah finds himself thrust into a gripping twelve-hour journey through the dark underbelly of San Francisco’s nightlife, forever altering his perception of the world. Will Jonah uncover the purpose he so desperately seeks, or will he discover that life, like broken pencils, may have no point?

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V Life Cover

V-Life: So It Begins (Sugar Bernstein RV-Living Vampire Series, Book 1)… A Brief Synopsis

Undead friends can be the family you choose. (You just can’t invite them to the bat mitzvah.) Fangs out. This is Sugar Bernstein’s new now. A former New York ad woman and nobody’s fool, this freshly minted vampire is avoiding loved ones by driving the country alone in a luxury camper van. (“Luxury” and “camper van” seem mutually exclusive concepts when your routine involves a sewage hose.) If all that’s not enough, her man is dead; an evil, blood-sucking she-creature is on her tail; and an entire Jewish family is on her case. It’s a lot.

With no guidance, Sugar is struggling to learn as much as possible about the rules of undead existence. She’s dusting off the oldest and most authoritative vampire books and movies, and testing the truth of it all by trial and error. Sunlight good or sunlight bad? Enhanced senses or just over imagination? Animal blood or human blood—is there really a difference? (Spoiler Alert: Yes.) And when it comes to life with no obvious end, how the hell do you finance it? (So much for early retirement.)

In her travels, Sugar finds help in surprising places—like beneath the neon signage of the Moonglow chain of RV parks—each with a secret section designated “V-parking.” And there’s even an app for that. Seems that Sugar is not the only “V” who feels #VanLife is a smart way to go. At Moonglow, Sugar feels like she can let down her guard enough to allow in some fellow travelers. But making friends is dangerous business when an infamous and evil vampire bitch is hunting you down. Opening your heart can have deadly consequences.

Will Sugar outrun evil? Will she take a chance on love when her previous encounters ended in murder? Will she make it to her niece’s bat mitzvah without causing the synagogue to explode? In her shoes, what would you do?

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Bittersweet Fruit

Bittersweet Fruit…ABrief Synopsis

“The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck is said to be the story of a family. Comment.”

That was the challenge put to author William LeRoy on a high school exam. Now, over sixty years later, LeRoy — still stumped by questions leading to questions — assigns to Maximo Morgan the private dickery task of doping out multiple Grapes mysteries left dangling”

Formatted as a combination of fact and fiction, which is which in the famous book? Are chapters billed as history really apochryphal, ad/or those seemingly imagined in truth documentary?

Who, if any particular people, were the models for the “Joad Family” that made the arduous trek from the Oklahoma Dust Bowl to the verdant vineyards of California so dramatically depicted in The Grapes of Wrath?

Did “Tom Joad” escape capture after attempting to flee a muder charge for the killing of a thug hired by landowners to bust unionization of migrant “Okie” workers?

And was it Steinbeck who came up with the narrative for which he was awarded the 1940 Pulitzer Prize for Literature, or would his attributed authorship be rightly called “a classic smash-and-grab: celebrated California author steals the material of unknown Oklahoma writer”?

Finally, on the 85th anniversary of the publication of Grapes, William LeRoy — thanks to somewhat helpful gumshoing by Maximo Morga a/k/a The Fat Man — is now able to comment.

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Pigs in Paradise

Pigs in Paradise…A Brief Synopsis

When Blaise gives birth to Lizzy, the “red calf” on a farm in Israel, the masses flock to witness the miracle that will usher the return of the Messiah or his arrival, and with him, the end of the world. When the promise of the end comes to an end, the red calf blemished, and no longer worthy of blood-letting sacrifice, the faithful the world over are crestfallen. By this time, two evangelical ministers, as representatives of a megachurch in America, witness the events.

Meanwhile, Pope Benevolent absolves the Jews, sings karaoke with Rabbi Ratzinger, and the Berkshire boar and Messiah, Boris, is served at the last supper. Not to be outdone, the Protestant ministers hold a nativity pageant, and just before the animals embark aboard a ship for America, Mel the mule becomes Pope Magnificent, with white linen cassock, pectoral cross, and papal red leather slippers.

Once in America, the animals are transported across the country to Wichita, Kansas in time for a Passion-Play parade. When they arrive at their final destination, a barn on a Christian farm, seven television monitors, tuned to 24/7 church sermons, are juxtaposed with scenes from a barn, a real circus. After a while, and no longer able to take anymore, they chase Mel from the barn, and Stanley, Manly Stanley, the black Belgian stallion of legend (wink, wink), kicks out the TV monitors for a moment of silence, giving peace a chance if only for a moment.

 

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