Catatonia is a penetrating examination of the idea of freedom in the 21st century. Deeply-imagined characters are brought to vivid life with an unrelenting pace that leaves readers breathless. As one reviewer said: "This is is not a light read, but if you strap in, get ready to do some soul searching. It's a spiritual mediation on the human condition intertwined with a religious psychological thriller. Fast paced and deeply moving, with flawed, and well fleshed out characters. Very interesting book." When twenty-something Bella Benfont received the text with the Manifesto attached, she thought it was complete and utter nonsense and exactly what she needed If she had simply deleted it, none of what happened would have happened. Her chance encounter with the Manifesto’s author, Nicholas Shelley, standing on a sidewalk in the pouring rain, drenched and frozen in a catatonic fit, would have been nothing more than a passing oddity. She would never have been both frightened and intrigued by his claim in the Manifesto to be the avatar of a new freedom based on the absolute autonomy of the individual will. He is the “Apex of the Evolution of the Individual”. She would never have given her brother, Richard, the Manifesto to read and so he would never have descended into a nihilistic lunacy. She would never have been drawn into the conflict between Nicholas and his uncle, the vile ex-con, Ben Shelley, who with his partners, Art Gross and William “Shiney” Shine, are scheming for a big payday from Nicholas’s rich parents. She would not have been attacked and nearly raped by Nicholas. She should have deleted it but she didn’t and now everything that happened is her fault.