"He’s a strong character with plenty of demons to fight"

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 8, 2023

Sometimes a book review comes in and leaves me feeling honored. This one did because of this part, "He’s a strong character with plenty of demons to fight," and it sums up a message I've been trying to send out to the universe about what having #PTSD is like. It is our own horror story, that's for sure but it is also part of a much bigger story. Supernatural forces not only saved us but help heal us if we know how to see them.

Readers' Favorite 5-star reviews

 

For immediate release:

Author's new book receives a warm literary welcome.

Readers' Favorite announces the review of the Fiction - Supernatural book "13th Minister Of Salem" by Kathie Costos, currently available at http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BNGD2273.

Readers' Favorite is one of the largest book review and award contest sites on the Internet. They have earned the respect of renowned publishers like Random House, Simon and Schuster, and Harper Collins, and have received the "Best Websites for Authors" and "Honoring Excellence" awards from the Association of Independent Authors. They are also fully accredited by the BBB (A+ rating), which is a rarity among Book Review and Book Award Contest companies.

"Reviewed By Anne-Marie Reynolds for Readers' Favorite

Kathie Costos continues her series with the 13th Minister of Salem: Ministers of the Mystery. Chris is now famous beyond anything he ever imagined and cannot go out

without a security detail. Death threats from Haman Cain’s cult abound after Chris took him down, and his books have brought him prominence that he doesn’t welcome. All he wants is a normal life, but something is coming that even he may not be able to stop. Planning his wedding and hoping for normality, Chris receives a warning from the Master, telling him his time may soon be up. What will transpire and can Chris ever live a normal life again?

Kathie Costos expands on Chris and his journey in 13th Minister of Salem and it is a great addition to a supernatural series filled with plenty of suspense. Chris’s growth has been solid throughout the series and that doesn’t change in this installment. He’s a strong character with plenty of demons to fight, and each battle takes a bit more out of him. The remaining role players are equally well-developed and are easy to relate to. This is not a story for the faint-hearted, nor is it for younger readers. It’s a dark tale, with adult scenes, and will send chills down your spine in places. Like the other books in the series, this is full of action, and it’s all go from the start. If you’ve read the rest of the series, you’ll love this book. It should not be regarded as a standalone as you will need the background from the first two books to understand this one."

You can learn more about Kathie Costos and "13th Minister Of Salem" at https://readersfavorite.com/book-review/13th-minister-of-salem where you can read reviews and the author’s biography, as well as connect with the author directly or through their website and social media pages.

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You can also find the 13th Minister Of Salem here at Books2Read for an ebook and print copy you can hold in your hands, turning pages for the twists and turns as well as what you don't expect will come next!

We have twists and turns we don't expect, but that's also how PTSD hits us. We don't expect the cause of it to happen and when it does, that is the first twist in our life. I view surviving as a supernatural force getting involved and saving me. Some view the inflictor of the trauma as coming from supernatural forces from the dark side. Sadder still is when the inflictor is seen as being sent by God to judge us and punish us. It sure as hell doesn't help heal us when we hear someone say they believe God only gives us what we can handle. They didn't just tell us they think what happened to us was sent by God, but in their minds, that's what they believe. Is that how they see us? Worthy of being a victim of what happened to us instead of seeing us as a survivor for a reason?

In the Ministers Of The Mystery series, I wanted to tell a story that most of us need to hear but never seem to have told to us. The first book, The Scribe Of Salem begins with the way surviving always does. With confusion, spiritual struggles, and losing hope. Things begin to change when we learn to trust others again and they try to help us. We learn from others that have been where we are until other people helped them.

The Visionary Of Salem picks up where The Scribe ended as lives are still changing with new challenges and a darker tone of the world around the characters. Instead of an invisible enemy to fight, there are real-life inflictors of trauma. Cults do battle as the inflictor goes after Chris and his secret society of master ministers fight more fiercely to take the inflictor down before he destroys Chris.

will sanity return to humanity in this country again

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 6, 2023

What still matters to all of us? That is the question all of us need to start asking before we begin to open up a conversation that all too often divide people. That happened to me today.

I came out of my doctor's office and another car like mine was parked next to it. A nice couple was standing outside of theirs and we started talking. Yes, I'm one of those people that talk to everyone and usually about a lot of things.

We talked about how much we love our Subaru Outbacks and how few miles we had on them. We talked about living in Rochester NH and how our neighbors were nice. We also talked about our fur babies.

The wife showed me her dogs and cats and I showed them Charlie. He went to the vet today and at only 3 months, he's already over 30 pounds.

We talked about our health issues and a lot of other things. Then we started to talk about how everything we talked about matters on a human level. We all felt that when people put politics above what really matters, we all lose. I know I've lost a lot of friends I thought I knew because their political ties mattered more to them than the bonds of friendship.

Our generation grew up with political topics that were banned from family gatherings. We were able to focus on what our lives were all about.

Sure we had different points of view, but no one focused on them unless it was to tell a joke and no one got bent out of shape because when that happened, there was always one of us to tell a better one. Then the topic was dropped because one joke led to another about something else.

Yes, I have a political point of view, just as most people do. The thing is, mine is not more valuable than your real life. When I post something political it is based on sharing thoughts that may help you see something differently. If you disagree, I love a good debate as long as it does not turn into personal attacks. We have to face that with too many people when they hear something they don't like, they turn it into an attack of the conversation killer labels. It makes the subject of the attack feel as if they just don't really matter to the attacker. I walk away from them and will not subject myself to that again. Life is too short to spend time with someone that hates what I think.

So, my question is, will sanity return to humanity in this country again, or has it gone too far? I'm still hoping for the best and after today, I know it is possible!

Today is no cause to celebrate independence

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 4, 2023

No one should be forced to surrender what they believe simply because I believe they are wrong! That was the premise of this nation. So how have we arrived, yet again, in a time and place where so many decided their religious freedom is the only one that the rest of us must live by?
 

"But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god." Thomas Jefferson

That is what Thomas Jefferson thought about the freedom of religion. Most of what was behind the 1st Amendment against establishing religion had a history lesson behind it. What happened when one group of "believers" was able to use what they believed to control those that believed differently was uncontrollable, they wanted to prevent it from happening again. That history lesson came from the Salem Witch Trials.

By the time the people of Salem came to their senses and issued a decree for a day of atonement on January 14, 1697,  200 had been arrested, tortured, and had everything taken from them. 19 of the accused were hung and one was crushed to death. Some died in jail before their trial. Some were exonerated and some simply escaped.

None of the accusers had to suffer anything other than accountability to God and the wrath of their neighbors.

“But our rulers can have authority over such natural rights only as we have submitted to them. The rights of conscience we never submitted, we could not submit. We are answerable for them to our God. The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. If it be said, his testimony in a court of justice cannot be relied on, reject it then, and be the stigma on him. Constraint may make him worse by making him a hypocrite, but it will never make him a truer man. It may fix him obstinately in his errors, but will not cure them. Reason and free enquiry are the only effectual agents against error.” ― Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia (GoodReads)

What your neighbor believes or does not believe is none of your business. That is what has made this country great. No one religious group was to have the power to rule over others ever again. 

In January 1693, the newly created Superior Court of Judicature began hearing the remaining witch trials. The judges could not accept spectral evidence and most of the remaining trials ended in acquittal. Phips pardoned the rest.

Enduring Lessons
In 1957, Massachusetts formally apologized for the events of 1692: “The General Court of Massachusetts declares its belief that such proceedings, even if lawful under the Province Charter and the law of Massachusetts as it then was, were and are shocking, and the result of a wave of popular hysterical fear of the Devil in the community…” The Massachusetts state legislature was still exonerating accused witches as recently as the early 2000s.

Today, the Salem Witch Trials continue to capture popular imagination. Less than 20 miles from Boston, Salem has turned its dark history into a thriving tourism industry, with witchcraft-themed shops, eateries, tours, and several museums.

The town commemorates the tragedy of that era with the Salem Witch Trial Memorial and has preserved many buildings and other historic sites associated with the trials, so future generations—and jurists—can learn how mass hysteria can lead to mass injustice. (New England Law)

What we are seeing today is people with the same attitude decided they should have the right to control everyone else because they claim to be "defending their rights" while at the same time, they seek to remove the rights of all others to enjoy the same freedom.

They seek to kill the religious freedom of all the people to believe as they see fit or choose to not believe at all. If we do nothing, we should never again celebrate July 4th with fireworks, parades, and festivities but should visit the graves of all those who paid the price for the freedoms we let die. Not just those that served in the military but those who died because they were persecuted because of what some believed. Civil rights leaders were murdered for standing up for freedom.

The freedom to choose if you worship and how you worship. 

The freedom to vote according to your choice instead of where you live because of some bizarre boundary line designed to control who you can vote for. 

The freedom to love, who you love and marry or don't marry. The right to live according to who you are inside instead of being judged as going against what "God created." It must have escaped their thoughts that God is spirit and not flesh and bones, meaning He created the souls and not bodies. It also must have escaped their thoughts that some people do not believe in God at all.

The freedom to choose to become parents and raise your children according to what you believe in. The freedom to choose to not become parents. The freedom to be able to get the reproductive healthcare that you need without having a politician decide if and when you get it because they don't want to protect your right to receive it.

The freedom to learn from history and not be controlled by those feeling uncomfortable with what actually happened. The freedom to read what books you want and the freedom to write what books you want, expressing your thoughts because you are free to do so.

The freedom to know you can go out in public, attend worship services, go shopping, see a movie or even drive your car without fear you are subjecting yourself to being shot. Freedom to send your children to school without fearing you may not see your child at the end of the day alive because someone was able to obtain a weapon designed to kill as many as possible as fast as possible.

When we allow one freedom to be taken from the majority by the minority, more will fall and we will fail to be the land of the free. 

 

"What if" something else happened at the same time?

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 1, 2023

Have you learned something happened and wondered "What if" something else happened at the same time? If you read the Ministers Of The Mystery Series, you might have begun to wonder more "what ifs" about a lot of other things.

13th Minister Of Salem Reviews

The question for me began when I was growing up near Salem. I can't tell you how many days I was there considering I lived in a city right next to it. I remembered going to the tourist area where the city blended the terrible history of the witchcraft trials with entertainment. Everywhere you look something terrible was turned into something profitable.

I would get sick to my stomach seeing families lining up to put their heads and hands in the stalks, smiling and laughing while someone took their picture. I always wondered if they thought about what the people of Salem endured that was behind what the tourists were enjoying? Did they ever think about them?

The Salem Witch Trials Memorial: Finding Humanity in Tragedy is a fabulous article to read.

Salem’s witch trials were the largest and deadliest in North American history. Over the course of a year and a half, nineteen people were hanged and one man was brutally tortured to death. Though popularly referred to as “the Salem witch trials,” accusations had spread throughout Essex County and beyond. In total, between 150 and 200 people were imprisoned, ranging in age from four to eighty-one years old. At least five died in jail, including the infant daughter of convicted Sarah Good.

None of the accused were “witches,” defined in the seventeenth century as one who had sold their soul to the devil. Instead, it was a crime often lodged against social outsiders within a community.

Had any of them been what they were accused of, there is no way in hell they would have allowed themselves to be captured and tortured, but that never dawned on the pious crowd screaming for their death. The amazing thing is, the only way to prove the accused were witches was if they survived attempts to kill them. Yet again, it never dawned on the mob that those they put to death must have in fact been innocent since they died. What if they noticed that fact?

What if the church folk claiming to follow Christ, making them Christians actually followed what He taught instead of what they wanted to do? What if they followed the scriptures instead of preachers spewing hatred and contempt? After all, they all had Bibles in their hands and could have read the holy words by themselves so they'd know what was in the pages they would never hear uttered in church.

Today it is almost as if those dark days have returned to haunt all of us. Some people claim their religious freedom is being attacked because they do not want others to have the same freedom to disagree with what they believe. Imagine that! If they want to be free to choose for themselves that would require all people to have that same right, but again, those seeking to control others, never see that simple fact.

If you have PTSD have you ever wondered "What if," something happened at the same time the life-changing event happened to you? What if someone was trying to prevent it? What if that voice in your head heard words from the supernatural world trying to warn you? What if after you survived there were more voices competing for your attention from that world only this time, the voices came from God and Satan at the same time?

The 13th Minister Of Salem is not about those standing in judgment during the witch trials. It is about a secret society trying to prevent evil from taking over again. It is about defeating evil by doing good and opening the eyes, hearts, and minds of people being tortured by the actions of others. It is about the horror of the events that cause #PTSD within us and the empowerment friends offer us by helping us.

All of the characters are survivors from different causes but the thing is, as they struggle to help the protagonist heal, more traumatic events find them just as their battles are coming to a head. Will they find victory over evil or will they fail to see the prophecy come true?

K.C. Finn for Readers' Favorite ***** Penned by Kathie Costos, 13th Minister Of Salem is a work in the supernatural horror, suspense, and gothic drama subgenres, forming the third installment in the Ministers Of The Mystery series. It is best suited to mature adult readers owing to its dark content and adult situations. In this profoundly intriguing continuation of the series, we find ourselves back with Chris as word of his achievements and talents has spread, but this only leads to more trouble for our hero. Trying to get married would be hard enough without the constant death threats from the cult of the now-defeated Haman Cain, let alone the Master’s warning that his end-time is drawing near.

Kathie Costos brings us back into the world of gothic suspense, deep drama, and a chilling thriller with a bang in this third installment in the series. I found myself deeply involved in Chris’s psychological storyline. We see the painfully realistic damage that his adventures, battles, and triumphs have left him with over the events of the first two novels. I felt his pain, isolation, and pressure deep in my soul; such is the efficacy of Costos’s intimate narrative, thought, and speech portrayal. The darkest elements of the work are also well-handled to avoid being gratuitous but remain chilling to the core. I recommend 13th Minister Of Salem to fans of the existing series as another accomplished paranormal chiller to devour.

Religious freedom payback thanks to SCOTUS?

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
June 30, 2023

After the ruling by the Supreme Court finding a web designer could not be forced to design a site that went against her religious beliefs, they proved that this case had nothing to do with the religious freedom of everyone but was limited to only those with the same beliefs they approve of.

The case was brought by a woman in Colorado. She was not hired to design a site for a gay couple. So what's the problem? She feared it could happen. OK, I guess but up until now, fear of something that may, or may not happen, doesn't seem to be grounds to end up in the Supreme Court.

What got me was this part.

Gorsuch said that a ruling against Smith would allow the government “to force all manner of artists, speechwriters, and others whose services involve speech to speak what they do not believe on pain of penalty.” For example, a gay website designer could be forced to design websites for an organization that advocates against same-sex marriage, he wrote. “Countless other creative professionals, too, could be forced to choose between remaining silent, producing speech that violates their beliefs, or speaking their minds and incurring sanctions for doing so.”

It seems to have escaped the "justices" that that was exactly what they have been preventing other people in this country from receiving the same protection because they did not choose what the majority wanted them to do. Not the majority of the people in this country but the majority of the 9 people that decide all the laws we all have to live by.

Want or need to end a pregnancy, then it should not be up to you to decide. It should be up to the state you live in to surrender your beliefs and choices to the whim of others when you should decide your own future for yourself.

Want your children to be raised according to what you believe is right for you? Nope sorry when they want prayers brought into schools no matter if you are raising your children to be "religious" or not.

Want them to be able to live their lives and make it home at the end of the day from school without being shot by someone they allowed to have an assault weapon? Out of luck there too since gun owners have more rights than your family.

Over and over again, we are reminded that this country is yet again returning to the times of religious persecution against anyone with beliefs those in power do not agree with. It is the Salem Witch Trails on steroids!

So will there be religious freedom payback removing all the restrictions from the rest of us and also living our own lives according to what we believe? Will we see equality the way the Founding Fathers envisioned following the witchcraft trials and gave us the right to make our own choices? I am no lawyer but it seems that good ones need to take cases to the Supreme Court based on the freedoms of all of us and not just the ones they agree with!

Kathie Costos author of The Scribe Of Salem, The Visionary Of Salem, and 13th Minister Of Salem