I Stand Accused by Monica Frazier Anderson

I Stand Accused

Monica Frazier Anderson
TyMac Books, May 2007
$12.95 US, ISBN 097863781X

When the past comes back to haunt you…

Everyone has a past; some more traumatic than others. Sometimes there are certain aspects of our past that we would honestly rather forget. But at the most inopportune times, skeletons we believe are long buried, manage to break free of their ghostly abodes, and torment us with their secrets and sins. In, I Stand Accused by Monica Frazier Anderson, main character James Adams, finds himself haunted by youthful indiscretions that just won’t go away.

First, there’s the drama of his philandering father who spends all his time at a local strip club where he’s not just getting lap dances. When his father is savagely murdered, it’s anybody’s guess who did it and why. Then there are problems going on with several of his siblings, and a most embarrassing episode with his high school sweetheart, rocks his family’s foundation to it’s core. As soon as James graduates from high school, he shakes the hometown dust from his feet, ditches the East Texas twang, and becomes a successful ophthalmologist. He’s enjoying his new life very much when the past rears its ugly head and forces him to deal with a lot of unresolved issues once and for all!

When I read Ms. Anderson’s novel, When A Sistah’s Fed Up last year, I was impressed with her skills as a new writer. With the publication of I Stand Accused, her excellent writing skills are again realized even more. The telling of this story — with flashbacks to past and present occurences — is done so effortlessly that readers never feel confused by all that is going on in the story. Ms. Anderson also manges to realistically portray the small country town in East Texas where James and his family were raised right down to the dialect! With the exception that this novel did not have as much suspense as I would have liked, I Stand Accused is solidly written — engaging and entertaining! I definitely look forward to more literary endeavors from Monica Frazier Anderson.

--Renee Williams, All the Buzz