Introduction
Captured Heiress is a novel of passion and greed, the story of schemers who play a
dangerous game for big stakes. It is a tale of lust - lust for power, money, and sex, set against a panoramic background of our contemporary society in which values change so rapidly that many people find it difficult to cope with the ever-accelerating forces that surround us.
In this modern adventure, the author makes generous use of symbolism to ask the reader some rather-searching questions. He illustrates the use of sex in the grasp for power syndrome and indirectly asks what, after all, is morality? For example, if power itself is moral, can the use of sex to obtain it be considered immoral? Or, is the suppression of sex more moral than human sexuality itself? Was William Harmon's rigid upbringing of his daughter harmful to Debby? These are just some of the probing questions that the author poses here.
The characters are realistically drawn, to the degree that the author wished to portray them. Psychology casebooks are filled with case histories of girls raised under strict Puritan sexual ethics who turn to uninhibited sexual activity and even prostitution as soon as they mature. We see this rebellion syndrome in the character of Deborah Harmon here. Her half-brother, Matthew Harmon, is a classic case of a man suffering what analysts often refer to as the "power psychosis." Harold Sorenson represents the increasing number of opportunists in our contemporary society. William Harmon is the "old-line" traditionalist, perhaps the Victorian purist, who tries to impose his belief and will on others—even after death.
As these characters come together we see the friction resulting from counter-purposes, which the author uses as a device to illustrate the current war raging in our society about the various forms of morality. The parallel to recent events in our society is unmistakable. At the very height of the greatest power and money scandal in America's history, a government agency, the Supreme Court, handed down a decision designed to impose Victorian Puritanism on the sexual tastes of Americans. A number of critics commented on what they called the "American Paradox" in which sexual portrayal is considered immoral while the naked lust and greed for power is openly indulged in by a number of leaders in our nation.
In Captured Heiress, the author underlines this striking paradox concerning morality and openly ridicules the strange set of values Americans have seemingly adopted. Some critics will undoubtedly take exception to his stated premise, but many of us will see ourselves for what we are and perhaps take steps to "put everything together" as Deborah Harmon finally does in this novel.
The publisher sincerely hopes that in addition to providing entertaining reading, Captured Heiress also stimulates some serious thought. This is an openly erotic novel, aimed satirically at our often-confused and contradictory concept of morality. In effect, the author is asking us if it isn't time we sat down to establish some rational values in the swirling vortex of the storm of change lashing at our society.
There are winners and losers in this fast-moving adventure, and the author leaves it up to the reader to decide who wins and who loses. Which are the forces of right? And who wins a moral victory? The answers to these questions will provoke both interest and thought. And isn't that one purpose of literature?
THE PUBLISHER