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Description of Vaccine Nation:

Dani North is a filmmaker who just won at the Tribeca Film Festival for her documentary, The Drugging of Our Children, a film critical of the pharmaceutical industry. When she is handed “whistleblower” evidence about the U.S. vaccination program, she has to keep herself alive long enough to expose it before a megalomaniacal pharmaceutical company CEO can have her killed.

Accolade:

Thrill Ride – 5 out of 5 Stars

This is my first of this author’s books, and it won’t be my last. Not only is it a great thriller, but it has well rounded characters and it makes you think about some issues that concern us all. The heroine, Dani, hates the drug companies and by the end of the book, gives you reason to at least question them too.

But enough about that for now. First and foremost, this is a great thriller. It starts off with a jarring bang, with a murder, and moves quickly from there. The pace keeps you on the edge of your seat and the suspense starts to build as well. Dani is on the run from the police and a murderer, which keeps you breathless in spurts. When the author lets you get a breather, he starts building the suspense. What’s Dani been handed by the man who was killed? A garden-variety memory drive, but what’s on it? She figures out that the murderer, or whoever he’s working for, knows what it is and wants it back. That means she needs to figure out what’s on it. In stages, she starts to. You get all prickly in the hairs on the back of your neck, wondering what it is as well, then see the murderer, and his boss, a drug company CEO, closing in. She starts to figure it out, but will she do it in time?

The plot includes some twists that you can’t possibly be prepared for, great action, searing suspense, and stop-you-in-your-tracks surprises at the end.

But, as I said earlier, it also makes you think. Why are we drugging up our kids with anti-depressants and ADHD pills that Big Pharma is foisting on us without questioning it? How come our babies are getting shot up with so many vaccines? What kind of junk is in them? Why isn’t our government letting the drug companies be held responsible for any side effects and damage they create (hard to believe, but true)? Do the drug companies really care about our health, or are they just out to sell us high-profit-margin products like any other profit-oriented business?

Amazon Reader Reviews:

Vaccine Nation currently has a reader review rating of 5 stars from 5 reviews. Read the reviews here.

An excerpt from Vaccine Nation:

Chapter 1

Dani North walked down West End Avenue toward the Mercer School, her son Gabe at her side.  The air was cold and fresh.  Minutes earlier, crossing Broadway, she’d seen tulips on the median, and the leaves on the maple trees were ready to pop.  Now, scents of spring—wet earth and hyacinths in window boxes—were apparent.  She yawned, bone tired from the hectic weeks of the Tribeca Film Festival wearing her down on top of work and the daily routine of single-parenting a preteen.  Tired or not, she was on a high and Gabe walked close enough that she thought to take his hand.  That is, if he’d let me. She reminded herself it was perfectly normal for a nine-year-old not to want his mom to hold his hand anymore.  Normal. What would those morons at Division of Youth and Family Services in New Jersey say about that?  Probably still call him ADHD and drug him up.  She’d love to run DYFS into the ground, along with their partners in crime, the pharmaceutical industry.  Legalized drug pushers.

Leave it, she told herself.  Channel the anger into something productive.  That made her smile.  She had, and well.  It was starting to feel real that The Drugging of Our Children, her latest film, had won best documentary at Tribeca last night.  That channeled anger was doing some good, getting the word out.  Educating parents about their choices, ones she hadn’t been aware of for Gabe.  Who knew?  If she had, she might never have lost that three-year nightmare of lawsuits with DYFS in Hackensack.  It forced her to accept mandatory drugging of Gabe, because otherwise the court would have taken him from her.

She looked over at Gabe now.  Chin high, proud of how he looked in his Ralph Lauren blue blazer, gray pants and white oxford button-down, school tie snugged up against his neck.  Only his black Vans betrayed his age.  Yes, normal. Thanks in part to Dr. O.

Gabe caught her looking at him.  “Now that you won, you gonna get a bonus and turn the electric back on?”

“You mean ‘going to’ and ‘electricity.’”  She thought about the last two weeks of burning candles at night.  She’d put off the electric bill in order to scrape up Gabe’s tuition for this semester at Mercer.  “Besides, we were camping, remember?”

“C’mon, Mom, that worked on me when I was like five years old.  I’m not a kid anymore.”

“Yes, you are.”

Gabe thought for a second.  “All right, but I’m not stupid.”

“No, I’m not getting a bonus,” Dani said, running a hand over Gabe’s hair, “but I get paid today and we’ll be back to normal.  Lights and TV.”

“Next time I’m telling Nanny.  She’ll pay it.”

“Do that and you can forget about TV until you’re eighteen.”

They reached the corner diagonally across West End from the entrance to Mercer.  “Leave me here,” Gabe said, looking away from her.

Dani didn’t respond, just grabbed his shirtsleeve between her fingers and started across the street.  He pulled out of her grasp and increased his pace.  Dani saw Damien Richardson on the opposite corner as they approached.  He stood looking at the half dozen kids grouped around the entrance to Mercer, tentative.  She knew the bigger boys picked on Damien.  She felt a tug at her heart.  “Morning, Damien,” she called.

Damien turned to them.  His face brightened and he smiled.  “Hi, Mrs. North.  What’s up Gabe?”

“Come on, Damien,” Dani whispered when she reached him.  “I’ll walk you in.”

Ten minutes later she crossed 79^th Street toward Broadway, her mind buzzing with last night’s triumph and her upcoming day.  She pulled her BlackBerry out of her pocket, checked the screen.  8:10. Enough time to get through her voicemails and emails before Dr. Maguire, the researcher from Pharma International, showed up.  Now she wondered again what his agenda was, why he was so anxious and secretive about the meeting.  But it was something important—at least to Maguire.  She’d been calling him for weeks, coaxing him into an interview for the new documentary on autism she was just beginning.  She’d been referred to Maguire by his friend, John McCloskey, the KellerDorne Pharmaceutical technician who’d served as whistleblower on KellerDorne’s painkiller, Myriad, after patients who took it started dropping dead from heart attacks.  Dani’s interview of McCloskey published in the Crusador was well after McCloskey went public, but somehow it managed to electrify the issue.  As a result, the contributions had flowed into Dr. Orlovski to fund the documentaries he produced, including Dani’s The Drugging of Our Children.

Maybe Maguire needed to get something off his chest, too.  Dani picked up her pace.  Her BlackBerry rang and her breath caught in her throat when she saw Mom’s number on the screen.  How could she forget?  Dad.

“Hi, Mom.  How are you doing?”

“Okay.”  She paused.  “You know what day it is, don’t you?”

Dani’s mind automatically did the math.  She’d been twenty-two.  Seven years.  “Of course.”  She stopped walking and leaned over the BlackBerry as if sheltering her words from passersby.  She said, “Each year I think about him constantly during this day.  Sometimes it seems like . . .” her voice trailed off.

“I miss him more each year, too,” Mom said.  Her voice was steady, like she’d steeled herself to get through the day.

“When’s his Mass?”

“One o’clock.”

Dani didn’t respond right away.  “I can’t make it this year.”

“I know, sweetie.  I just wanted to hear your voice.  I knew you weren’t coming.  You had a big day yesterday.  Congratulations.  I’m sure lots of people want to talk to you.”

“It’s not that.  I’m just jammed with the usual stuff.  Will you light a candle for me?”

“Sure.  I’ll speak to you later.  Gabe okay?”

“He’s great.  Maybe we’ll get out this weekend.  How’s Jack?”

“The same.”  Dani felt her hand muscles tense around the BlackBerry.

“Anything going on?”

“The usual.  He was out most of the night, couldn’t get up for work.”

“I’ll get out there this weekend,” Dani said.  They signed off.  She continued walking, feeling guilty.  Lisa and George lived far enough away that they never made Dad’s Mass.  And Jack was high half the time, so it was like she was alone even if he came with her.  At least Mom could count on Dani.  Or so she thought.  This was the second year in a row Dani would miss Dad’s Mass.  It hurt.  Particularly knowing how devout a Catholic Mom was, how much Mom wanted Dani to experience her faith the way she did.  She sighed and kept walking, thinking she’d find a way to make it up to Mom, feeling unworthy.

Dani reached the entrance to Dr. Yuri Orlovski’s office at 79^th and Broadway.  A half dozen patients already sat in the waiting room when she stepped through the door.  She paused to wave at Carla behind the reception desk, who mouthed “Congratulations.”  Dani nodded and smiled, then headed up the steep, 20 steps to her office.  By the time she reached the top, she reflected as she usually did, What would I do without Dr. O? It was the best job she’d ever had, even aside from him rescuing Gabe a year ago from Child Protective Services, New York’s equivalent of New Jersey’s DYFS.  Dr. O’s homeopathic remedies and detoxification had purged Gabe’s body of the mercury and other poisons that Dr. O maintained were largely caused by vaccines.  And he certified as an MD that Gabe’s ADHD was “cured.”  That got Gabe off Child Protective Services’ list and off mandatory ADHD medications to attend public school.  This year she’d scrounged up enough to afford to get him into Mercer.

And now she ran the nonmedical practice side of Dr. O’s mini-empire, as he jokingly called it.  But it was no joke.  It was a flourishing Internet business of whole food based vitamins; health-related DVDs and books; and healthy lifestyle products like juicers and water filters.  And a good portion of the profits funded Dr. O’s real passion: the documentaries on health issues that Dani produced and directed, the only thing—except, of course for Gabe—that got her out of bed every morning.

Her colleagues, Richard Kaminsky, Jason Waite and Seth Weinstein stood talking near the entrance to Dr. O’s Vitamin Shop when Dani got to the top of the steps.  Richard started applauding and the others joined in.  She stood, cringing from embarrassment, yet secretly relishing the recognition.  They walked over and greeted her with hugs.

“I knew you’d do it,” Richard said.

“Absolutely,” Ralph said.

They were joined by a half dozen others, including Kaitlin Drake, her editor.  Dani was gradually overcome by an odd sensation of discomfort.  She recalled how she’d wilted under the spotlight when asked to say a few words on accepting her award last night.  It made her feel as if her colleagues would think she was undeserving of their praise if they’d seen her frozen with panic.  She’d wanted to say something about creating a film that spoke her truth, and that of thousands of other mothers, but she was unable to utter more than “Thank you,” in front of 2,000 people.

It took Dani another ten minutes to reach her desk.  She booted up her computer and started going through her emails.  Eighty-four today.  Oof. The usual: mothers with no money and sick children, desperate to see Dr. O.  Many she was counseling on vitamins and remedies.  A few like Jennifer Knox: a mother with an autistic child who Dani had interviewed for her new documentary, who needed to vent to someone who understood, keep her from going crazy.  Finally, a number of congratulatory wishes.  Then her voicemails.  Thirty-six, more of the same. One was from James, at first congratulating her, next a little pathetic and finally lecturing her about not throwing away five years.  As she neared the end of her voicemails she heard his voice again, and feeling nothing at all—rather than angry or impatient—deleted the message without listening to it.  That one probably hammered at James’ constant theme: commitment.  After she finished with her voicemails she checked her blog: 3,748 pageviews yesterday, about 50% more than usual. She wrote a quick blog post thanking her supporters and urging them to continue to spread the word on Drugging and it’s message, looked at the time—8:58—then sat back in her chair to wait for Dr. Maguire.

Vaccine Nation is available for purchase at:

Amazon Kindle for $2.99

Paperback for $7.98

Connect with David Lender:

Website: http://www.davidlender.net/

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