The Story Project[1] in Portland, Oregon was created to promote the idea that, “The act of telling one's story has the ability to transform, heal and empower the storyteller.”

My friend Robin is a counselor, coordinator, facilitator and Director for this wonderful team whose aim is to help students forge their own strong identities.

Robin recently sent me this message after reading Bentari:

“Dear Tim, thank you so much for allowing me to read your splendid book, Bentari! You are a master of crafting just the right words. I read the last 50 pages when I was absolutely exhausted but couldn't put it down! What an accomplishment!”[2]

Thank you, Robin! Thanks for reading Bentari and for all your kind service for students.

In honor of The Story Project, please enjoy this paragraph from Bentari, Ch. 22 “The Majuscule.” This passage opens the final 50-pages that kept Robin from her rest!

No other man would see it. No one could tell that the rough red surface of that tall monolith was anything but weather worn and ancient; that nothing else save wind and rain and baking sun had worked odd patterns into the porous side of that enormous igneous rock. But to Bentari the thing called out. It cried. It sang. It gladdened his troubled heart. It loomed so large, so tall that he could never have missed it nor mistaken its meaning. The thing was like a majuscule, a great capital letter fully flourished and embellished as if by medieval monks upon a parchment scroll. It was the gorgeous letter “B”. He heard his ancestors call out to him from their ancestral home. “Badollet!” they sang.

Chapter 1 of Bentari is available for free in three entries posted on Oct. 5, 2013. Please enjoy the complete chapter (“The Calm”) by scrolling down or by following the link in the notes below.[3]

Buy Bentari and Fly! Bentari is also available at Amazon.com and on Kindle.

Please send e-mails to Tim@Bentari.com.

Image: The Story Project logo as seen on Facebook

[1] See and “Like” on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/#!/pdxthestoryproject

[2] See Tim Brown’s personal Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/#!/profile.php?id=100001298024755 and our Bentari page at: https://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Bentari/306800649422886

[3] See three entries beginning at: http://www.bentari.com/Blog/Entry.aspx?pid=276&bid=51&beid=947