A Morning with Thomas Equels

***Please note: This event will take place at the Books & Books in Coral Gables at 265 Aragon Ave. Tickets are FREE and books will be available for purchase at the event. Want your copy early or can't make it in-person?

A hypnotic narrative that twists through both light and dark as journaling therapy unlocks the troubled memories of a lonely veteran.
Haunted by the death of his son in infancy and the love of his life many years later, Jake Montgomery grudgingly agrees to a form of "journal therapy" that allows him to expose and confront the sharp, insistent pain that he regularly buries with rage and scotch and television. As he writes, secrets tightly bound within him gradually unwind--first in racially segregated Ocala, Florida, in the 1950s, where his best childhood friend was a Puerto Rican jockey, then in Ireland, when a summer as a stable apprentice ushers in a new and all-consuming passion.
Jake relives his experiments with free love in the 1960s, and is embroiled once more in choices of life and death on the battlefields of Vietnam, and later, as undercover intelligence officer in the countries of Eastern Europe. What begins as a journey chronicling youthful discovery spirals swiftly into spaces where loss overwhelms and the path chosen is one of ruthlessness and revenge. It is the birth, life, and death of a special horse that gives Jake a sense of purpose in his desperate search for a reason to carry on.

Thomas Kenwood Equels, MS, JD, was knighted in the Equestrian Order of Saint Gregory the Great by Pope Benedict in 2012. For decades he has bred and trained winning Thoroughbred racehorses and champion Paso Fino horses on his farm in Ocala, Florida. He has ridden PasoFinos born on his farm to numerous championships including an International Grand Championship at the prestigious USEF sanctioned Spectrum International. Acombat-wounded Vietnam veteran, combat pilot and instructor pilot, Equels wast wice awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) for heroism while participating in aerial combat, as well as the Purple Heart. He is a black belt in karate and was named one of the Florida Black Belt Association's "FourSeason Tour" champions, as well as a National Sport Karate Association (NASKA) National Champion. As a lawyer, Equels received numerous federal and state awards for his high-impact pro bono work in civil rights, poverty law, and social justice cases. For over three decades he represented foreign states on an international basis, as well as the State of Florida.

Host or Publisher Books & Books