Stephanie Huffman

Joshua Samuel Brown

"Stephanie, if we're going to get serious I should tell you that Taiwan will always be the other woman." "You mean I have to share you with 23 million other people?" Stephanie has never been to Asia; Portland, Oregon seems to be a metropolis to this small-town girl. Josh has spent years living in Taiwan and plans to make that country his home once again. Several years later, they've packed a few essentials, given away everything else and are on a flight to Taipei. From five-star luxury to a hostel on an island that was once a penal colony, from the chaotic excitement of urban night markets to an isolated mountain village, Josh shows Stephanie the country that has claimed him. Hoping she'll fall in love with Taiwan and choose to live there with him, he's even chosen the place where he plans to propose to her. And then they visit a fortune-teller. Stephanie, plunged into a whirlwind exploration of Taiwan before she's even recovered from jet lag, is an artist faced with a nonstop barrage of sensory overload. She doesn't speak Chinese, she's on a gluten-free diet, and she's firmly rooted in Josh's itinerary, where there's no room for sitting still. Luckily she's a woman with a taste for adventure. Formosa Moon sets the bar for a whole new form of travel writing. Written in two voices, it gives the vivid impressions of a first-time Asia traveler and the deep-rooted knowledge of a man who is returning home. Stephanie's excitement, confusion, and delight combine with Josh's irreverent humor and carefully researched facts to create a travel memoir/travel guide that's cloaked in a quest for home. Josh has already found his but he knows Stephanie needs to find hers in her own way. And then there's that fortune-teller...

Formosa Moon

Can a New Age guru save his cult without losing his soul? Spinning Karma is the story of Rinpoche Edward Schwartz, reluctant figurehead of Mind of Pure Enlightenment (MOPE), a once-popular New Age group whose current membership has sunk to an all-time low. In an ill-conceived effort to bring the group and its teachings back into the limelight, Schwartz heads to Taiwan to film a fake "religious oppression" video - starring a group of clueless language students who believe that they're taking part in an English conversation class. The video goes viral and the scheme succeeds beyond Schwartz's wildest expectations, triggering a social-media-driven propaganda war between the United States and China that spins out of control. Before long, everybody from spiritual seekers in China and America, to an ambitious presidential contender, to the Chinese government wants a piece of MOPE ... and of Schwartz himself. Faced with the enormous karmic implications of his hoax, Schwartz repents. But is it too late? Can Schwartz save his group - and his neck - without losing his soul? Set in an exotic, untapped location, this offbeat East-Collides-With-West farce features characters and situations ripped straight from the headlines, mocking religious intolerance, the social media-driven news cycle, and the tumultuous relationship between America and China.

Joshua Samuel Brown

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