**Richard Heady’s debut novel The Embudo Virus published by Terra Nova Books in February 2021**

About the Book

For computer scientist Rob Clarke, the days are becoming increasingly uneasy at the Embudo Population Institute as its recently hired director pushes forward on a new contraceptive virus designed to limit human reproduction. But with the hiring of Melinda Lanier, a beautiful new researcher who seems able to manipulate both his body and his mind, his troubles suddenly turn physical as well.

As they work together, Melinda steers Rob’s attention toward the thin dividing line between science and magic, and urges him to embrace the godlike powers that come from crossing it. With their relationship growing closer, he becomes increasingly isolated—first gradually, and then suddenly—from everything in his world but work and Melinda.

Her control over him continues to grow, her power undeniable, culminating in a magical flight through the night sky to a strange and terrifying ritual in a mysterious mountain cavern. Afterward, the scientist in Rob seeks out answers, slowly uncovering the reality of his experience and realizing the age-old sexual powers that have made him a victim of Melinda and her world. And then. . . .

The Embudo Institute remains. Its dark work of reducing population for the good of humanity goes on. Just keep doing your job, Rob is told. But knowing what he does now, what future can he choose?

Available now.

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About Richard Heady

Richard Heady was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and lived there through high school, with the exception of a year in Manila, the Philippines, and a half year in Honolulu, during sabbatical leaves of his professor father. He attended Kalamazoo College and Western Michigan University, and graduated with a major in philosophy and a minor in English literature. For the next ten years, in several cities, he worked the kind of jobs his degree opened up for him: bookstore clerk, line worker in an auto assembly plant, cab driver, teacher’s aide in an elementary school, dishwasher, garbage man, psychiatric hospital aide, truck loader in a grocery warehouse, and emergency communications worker at a Red Cross branch. Between jobs he traveled through the U.S., Mexico, and Europe. While living for a dozen years in Philadelphia he earned a graduate degree in computer science from Temple University, which led to work in pattern recognition, image processing, machine learning, and database management for biomedical research – work he left behind after twenty years to write fiction.

His short stories have appeared in Carve Magazine, The Best of Carve Magazine, and Aethlon.

“Confluence and Divergence,” (.pdf) published in Carve Magazine, November 2002, and Bestof Carve Magazine, Volume 3, 2002.

“AKA,” (.pdf) published in Carve Magazine, March 2004.

“Two Man Game,” (.pdf) published in Aethlon: The Journal of Sport Literature, Fall 2004.

The Embudo Virus is Richard’s first novel.

Blog

Zoom Book Launch Video

On January 21 Terra Nova Books hosted a Zoom book launch event for The Embudo Virus, which was recorded and can now be viewed on Youtube. During the event I talked about how the book developed, read its opening pages, and answered questions about it. If you didn’t attend, or would like to access the …

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About The Embudo Virus

To begin with, the virus in the book is not the sort of virus we have all been forced to deal with this past year; it is a biologically engineered contraceptive virus. As the back cover says, “For computer scientist Rob Clarke, the days are becoming increasingly uneasy at the Embudo Population Institute as its recently …

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The Embudo Population Institute

“Through the institute’s glass doors, you enter a small vestibule with solid walls to each side. A second set of doors, which are locked, separates you from a receptionist at a circular desk, and she buzzes you into the lobby. Four leather chairs surround a dark wood table on which brochures are fanned in display.You …

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