Firenight
Firenight is a young adult literature/romance/adventure novel. It is the first novel in The Firenight Saga and is a love story that explores a young girl’s battle through depression, self-harm and self-destruction; juxtaposed against a backdrop of suspense and action.
In her battle against self-loathing, 17-year-old Sara Baines discovers an unlikely hero. Herself. Experiencing all the excitement of falling in love for the first time, she unearths an unimaginable adventure of forbidden passion with a courageous boy. Together they uncover a diabolical plan of murder, mystery and terror. When one of Sara’s friends becomes a victim of the sinister plot, Sara and her ally will risk everything to save her. Their heroic efforts unleash an intolerable hell of deception, action and destruction. Ultimately, Sara must discover the value in her own life if she is to save the lives of her friends… and the boy she loves!
Suicide is the third leading cause of death for young people aged 15 to 24. One teenage girl will face her own self-destruction. She will defy the odds... and start a war... that could destroy us all.
Synopsis
Every day, at least six Australians die from suicide and a further thirty people will attempt to take their own life. Over one in four young people experience serious depression every year. Young people all over the country are obliterated by the loss of hope and lack of understanding and find themselves propelled into a journey of self-discovery in a world drowning in darkness.
Sara Baines, a reserved seventeen-year-old high school student with an obsessive compulsion to clean, could not be further from such emotional turmoil. Her struggles extend to writing cohesive essays for English class, maintaining significance amongst her small group of girlfriends and worrying about her first kiss with a boy.
But when she discovers her mother engaged in a deceptive, year-long affair with another woman, Sara’s world disintegrates with a ferocious velocity she is not equipped to deal with and – like so many of her teenage peers – she spirals into self-loathing, medication and self-destructive ideation. Unable to find an absolution in the maelstrom, she “opts out” and decides to let a behemoth freight train complete her journey into absolute blackness.
It is on the train tracks, within a breath of death that she is saved from certain oblivion by Rumer, a raggedy stranger who inexplicably stops the train. Sara allows herself to be distracted from her own demise by the interloper who is without family or friend. Behind the torn clothes, curious detachment from society and his seemingly paranatural abilities, Sara discovers a kind and generous young man who empowers her with self-worth and impassioned strength.
As their alliance slowly intensifies and they share the thrill of forbidden love, so does the opposition from Helen Wexler, the woman Sara’s mother has been seeing for over a year – and the person Sara holds responsible for the destruction of her once-happy family. Sara and Helen are at polar opposites as to what is best for the Baines family. If Sara is to save her family and, ultimately herself, she must find a way to destroy this destructive influence.
Sara learns that Rumer has his own closet of secrets. He was forced to make an impossible choice between the life and death of his best friend; his decision plunging him into the alien world of prison. In a brutal storm, Rumer inadvertently escaped custody. Sara must deal with the reality that the man she is falling in love with is a prison escapee, sought by a determined detective who will stop at nothing to recapture his nemesis.
Under the constant threat of police capture and family opposition to their alliance, Sara and Rumer battle to find meaning in Rumer’s parakinetic abilities. Learning through Rumer’s sacrifices, Sara begins to realise that her life shares an entwined importance with the people she cares most about and that the lives of others depend on her very existence.
As the relationship between the forbidden lovers intensifies, the tumult in their world is amplified when Sara’s friend falls victim to a fiendish plot of unexplained disappearances. Sara’s resolve to save her friend’s life becomes a metaphor for her own existence, but what ultimate sacrifice will Sara need to make to substantiate her personal growth?
Sara uncovers the diabolical plans of a primordial cult responsible for the abduction of her friend. As Rumer initially resists the temptation to be any kind of hero, Sara defines her fight to preserve life at any cost by sacrificing her safety to defeat the sadistic group and save her friend. In turn, she discovers Helen Wexler – her nemesis and the destroyer of her family – is the primary player in the cruel and bloodthirsty coven.
Ultimately, Rumer joins forces with Sara to defeat the evil necromancers. Sara’s path of self-discovery completes when she destroys her enemy. She confronts her mother and accepts that her family will never be the lighthouse it once was – and she’s okay with that. She realises her hope – and the hope of others – doesn’t depend upon special abilities or popularity or what society expects her to be, but merely to be individual, to trust in herself and fight for what she believes is right.