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    Three Days in Phoenix
    Three Days in Phoenix
    Three Days in Phoenix
    Ebook40 pages39 minutes

    Three Days in Phoenix

    By Vincent Gray

    ()

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    About this ebook

    After Dr Trevor Guzmán had packed his meagre belongings into the boot of his dark blue Ford Capri he bid farewell to Potchefstroom. On the road to Johannesburg he picked up a hitchhiker. Little did he know that his life was going to change in the most unimaginable way.Three Days in Phoenix seems to be on the surface a simple fictional narrative. It embodies a number of themes which have intrinsic poetic value. It involves a journey in which the destination changes, it involve identity formation and identity plasticity in which the possibility of identity transformation reaches the realm of the unanticipated. It deals with the mystery of religion and the magic of religion and it deals with religious conversion and the probabilities and uncertainties associated with conversion. But it also deals with the work of contingency in shaping lives in unexpected and unanticipated ways. It invites us to entertain possibilities which are life changing and liberating . It states that we are free or we can find meaningful kinds of real freedom in our unfreedom. Three Days in Phoenix, like Jonah in the belly of the fish, Phoenix transformed Trevor into a new person. Three Days in Phoenix is an unforgettable experience in the world of Magic Realism.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherVincent Gray
    Release dateNov 5, 2016
    ISBN9781370699100
    Three Days in Phoenix
    Author

    Vincent Gray

    As a son of a miner, I was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. I grew up in the East Rand mining town of Boksburg. I matriculated from Boksburg High School. After high school, I was conscripted into the South African Defence Force for compulsory national military service when I was 17 years old. After my military service, I went to the University of the Witwatersrand. After graduating with a BSc honours degree I worked for a short period for the Department of Agriculture in Potchefstroom as an agronomist. As an obligatory member of the South African Citizen Miltary Force, I was called up to do 3-month camps on the 'Border' which was the theatre of the so-called counter-insurgency 'Bush War'. In between postgraduate university studies I also worked as a wage clerk on the South African Railways and as a travelling chemical sales rep. In my career as an academic, I was a molecular biologist at the University of the Witwatersrand, where I lectured courses in microbiology, molecular biology, biotechnology and evolutionary biology. On the research side, I was involved in genomics, and plant and microbial biotechnology. I also conducted research into the genomics of strange and weird animals known as entomopathogenic nematodes. I retired in 2019, however, I am currently an honorary professor at the University of the Witwaterand and I also work as a research writing consultant for the University of Johannesburg.

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      Book preview

      Three Days in Phoenix - Vincent Gray

      Three Days in Phoenix

      By Vincent Gray

      Smashwords Edition 2016

      Copyright© 2016 Vincent Gray

      This book is a work of fiction. All the characters developed in this novel are fictional creations of the writer’s imagination and are not modelled on any real persons. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

      ISBN: 9781370699100

      Author Biography

      As a son of a miner, the author was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. He grew up in the East Rand mining town of Boksburg during the 1960s and matriculated from Boksburg High School. After high school, he was conscripted into the South African Defence Force (SADF) for compulsory national military service at the age of seventeen. On completion of his military service, he studied courses in Zoology, Botany and Microbiology at the University of the Witwatersrand. After graduating with a BSc honours degree he worked for a short period for the Department of Agriculture in Potchefstroom as an agronomist. Following the initial conscription into military service in the SADF, like all other white South African males of his generation, he was then drafted into one of the many South African Citizen Military Regiments. During the 1970s he was called up as a citizen-soldier to do three-month military camps on the 'Border' which was the operational theatre of the so-called counter-insurgency 'Bush War' during the Apartheid years. Before and in between university studies he also worked as a wage clerk on the South African Railways and as a travelling chemical sales representative. The author is now a retired professor whose career as an academic in the Biological Sciences has spanned a period of thirty-three years mainly at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. Before retirement, he lectured and carried out research in the field of molecular biology with a special interest in the molecular basis of evolution. He continues to pursue his interest in evolutionary biology. Other interests which the author pursues includes radical theology, philosophy and literature.

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      This book is dedicated to:

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      The Story

      I

      After Dr Trevor Guzmán had finished packing his meagre belongings into the boot of his dark blue Ford Capri, he returned to his old flat to make sure that nothing had been left behind, he then locked the flat door and returned the flat keys to the

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