The Leeds News
MOODY — Moody’s Doris Stanley Memorial Library will host author William Thornton for a book signing on Thursday, February 18, at 11 a.m.
Thornton, makes his fiction debut with “Brilliant Disguises,” the tale of a man who poses so well as a Christian that he fools everyone – everyone, that is, except for himself and the One he cannot escape from. In the process, he seemingly works miracles but cannot satisfy the hunger inside himself to find out who he really is.
Thornton, a Birmingham News reporter, covered Moody, Leeds, Springville and Argo for the paper from 2000 to 2007.
Thornton’s novel concerns the life of Cameron Leon, a newly-hired worker for the Forster Foundation, a world-wide charitable organization led by a reclusive billionaire. To get the job, Cameron has to join a church. However, Cameron, still mourning the recent death of his brother Peter, decides he will only pretend to “get saved.” In the process, he impersonates not only a Christian, but on occasion his brother. Cameron continues to receive tearful phone calls from Peter’s widow, Cecelia, who wants to hear her late husband’s voice. Cameron, a born mimic like his brother, flawlessly impersonates him but feels the need for a personal kind of cleansing. In the end, Cameron discovers not only how many faces he has, but how many there are among the people around him. In the end, he finds he has been impersonating someone – or Someone – all along.
According to Thornton, “Brilliant Disguises” grew from a longing to see the inner life of a Christian in a fictional setting. But the only way to make such a familiar setting appear unfamiliar to Christian readers was to have the story told by someone posing as one.
“Probably anyone who has attended an evangelical church, or any church for that matter, has a story ofsomeone who volunteers for everything, is there for every service, has been a model of prayer and devotion for what seems like generations. It could be the Sunday School director or the lady who helps out the kitchen or the organist. Then one Sunday, they come forward during the invitation and announce that they’ve never felt they were saved. I wondered how that could happen, and I figured it would help if we were dealing with a character who was a born mimic,” Thornton said.
By turns comic and probing, dark and daring, “Brilliant Disguises” is about trying to hide behind the Light, and seeing things as they really are.
Thornton is an award-winning writer who has been a newspaper reporter for the past 21 years. He teaches a Sunday School class and is a deacon in a Southern Baptist church. He also maintains a blog on Christian themes in secular and religious fiction and non-fiction. He lives in Alabama with his wife and daughter. Please visit him at the book's site at www.brilliantdisguises.com or follow his blog at brilliantdisguises.blogspot.com.
The book is available for purchase through Amazon.com or at www.brilliantdisguises.com.
