After a shocking courtroom tragedy, a disturbed Vietnam veteran and the vindictive judge who sent him to prison become an unlikely pair of time travelers in a chaotic multiverse. The fallen angel who rescues them wants to guide them to a radiant new life. But first they must return to the scene of a ghastly crime.
Billy Worster was a naïve teenager ill-prepared for the gruesome realities of war. The sole survivor of a deadly massacre in a Vietnamese jungle, he avoided certain death only because he ran away when the shooting started. Riddled with guilt, he comes home to a dusty Texas farm with post-traumatic stress disorder and the crazy notion that he can fly in and out of parallel worlds.
As Billy struggles with addiction and questions his sanity, he is arrested on a drug charge and ends up in the courtroom of Judge Madeline Johnston, a bitter old judge tormented by a dark secret surrounding her father’s death. She callously tosses Billy into prison, but when a greedy executor files a lawsuit to steal his inherited land, Billy is hauled back to her courtroom in chains, where a stunning twist of fate launches them into the sky on an odyssey of discovery and healing.
Spanning forty years from the jungles of Vietnam through infinite, parallel worlds, Rip the Sky examines how the power of forgiveness can lead us toward a better life, no matter how many worlds we may live in.
Notable Quotables from
Rip the Sky
by Mark Packard
“We must practice forgiveness each second of every minute, every minute of every hour, and every hour of every day until it becomes as natural as breathing.”
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“If there is a God in heaven, nothing must make him cry more than when greed attacks paradise and takes it for its own. And paradise is so easily taken because it is innocent and never fights back. It always turns the other cheek. It has to, to remain innocent.”
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“Fame and fortune can be destructive, leading you away from happiness, while suffering and introspection can lead you to it. Being up can be down, and being down can be up. Falling can be rising, and rising can be falling.”
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“I learned what my sword really was. My hate for myself was my sword. I picked up the sword every day and killed myself with it.”
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“For the first time, Billy suffered from grief that arose out of his love and his desire to avoid profound loss. War was pain. Addiction was pain. And now Billy knew that love was pain.”
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Thanks for sharing these quotes — they give really good insight into the story.
Thanks, Kristine!