CAN A FOUR YEAR-OLD BOY STOP HIS MOTHER FROM BEING BEATEN TO DEATH?

CAN A FOUR YEAR-OLD BOY STOP HIS MOTHER FROM BEING BEATEN TO DEATH?

by author Réal Laplaine

Society today tends to put a spin on kids, treating them as incapable of real responsibility, decision-making or other mature qualities which are normally accorded to the upper teen bracket. But I beg to differ – where I grew up in Canada, we were shooting guns by the time we were six or seven, hauling hay, milking cows, and generally treated with the attitude of “pull your weight son”. Nobody had this idea that we were incapable of anything – and it actually helped to accelerate a more mature mindset – I think. Others may disagree, of course.

So the question at the outset of this article – can a four year old boy step in and stop his own drunken father from beating his mother to death?  It’s not a moot question really. Maybe it doesn’t happen to 9/10ths of kids today, and maybe those kids grow up with relative calm and peace, but there are a portion of us who had to face violence, hate and conflict as a normal part of our lives; living in conflicted homes. I know when I was five, I had to stop a man, four times my size, from sexually assaulting someone, and later, in spite of repeated beatings and abuses from him, I figured out a way to get him out of my life, for good.  I was five at the time – and certainly I knew the difference between right and wrong, survival and death, and I was smart enough (or possibly not so smart) to go up against a man who could crush my arm with one hand (he did that too). Maturity is not necessarily equivalent to body age – it’s a state of mind. I know that goes up against some pet theories, but there is plenty of evidence to support that statement.

In my new book, INTRUSION: A KEENO ACTION NOVEL, the star figure of this new novel action series, Keeno McCole, is forced to step in, and dramatically stop his father from killing his own mother.  This catalyzes the young McCole on a road to fight against crime, and eventually lands him as the head of the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) Anti-Terrorism branch. This first novel, takes the reader on a wild action-thrill ride from Toronto to Vancouver, the barren Canadian northland, into America, China and back. Working hand-in-hand with America’s Homeland Security, to battle a threat to both nations, Keeno McCole and his team go up against a horrendous terrorist plot from within, one, which if not stopped, would actually change freedom as we know it, across the world.

INTRUSION: A KEENO ACTION NOVEL, is being published 15 October 2011, through Asteroid Publishing www.asteroidpublishing.ca and will be available in Chapters-Indigo stores, and other indie stores in Canada, as well as through www.amazon.com, www.barnesandnoble.com and www.chapters.indigo.ca

For more about author Réal Laplaine and his other books, go to www.reallaplaine.com or his blog at www.reallaplaine.wordpress.com