Can an earth-born woman evolve into godhood? Can dogs live to be two hundred years old? Katrina Denebola, central character in The Last Leap finds a dog by the name of Tantalus who purports to be two hundred years old shortly before she becomes aware of her destiny. Time is short when Katrina learns that she must evolve beyond her human body if she is to perform the impossible feat of saving some of Earth’s survivors, and her dilemma is compounded due to her memory loss and the ongoing challenge from Calvin Thomas, ex-priest.

            The origin of man is central to the plot of the book and is explored during Calvin Thomas’s tell-all session with Katrina. At this time he informs her that the Hybrids, the second race originating on planet Earth, are the infamous Grays.

            The Last Leap is a new age end-of-the-world fantasy that deals with the physical destruction of Earth due to mistreatment by its inhabitants. It also deals with the possibility of humankind rising to another level beyond its present physical one.

Jeanette Stark grew up in the South and graduated from a small liberal arts college that is located in the same county as her birthplace. She has worked as a substitute teacher, bank teller, and filled various positions in several libraries. For a brief time She worked as a secretary in a church. Her interests include people watching, bird watching, and astrology. Metaphysical works are at the top of her reading favorites but she enjoys nearly every genre. Among her concerns are the despoiling of the environment and the inhumane treatment of animals.

Stark currently lives in a small town in eastern North Carolina with her poet husband and two scaredy cats.

“The Hybrids if nothing else are a naturally suspicious lot, however, and as a result of this fault, Langor selected Crankor at the time of Edna and Butts’s first arrival on the planet to be their watchdog. Also, the Hybrids like to keep an accurate head count of any aliens on the surface of the Earth. I expect this to be due to their paranoia about the possibility of the Authorians sneaking back to mete out punishment for their misdeeds. Anyway, back to Edna and Butts, and their interference. They met your family before you were born, and it seems that Butts in particular took an unprecedented interest in you at a very early age. Perhaps, he even made you what you’ve become, but whichever way it occurred at the time he and Edna first began working with you, Crankor immediately reported the development to the Hybrids. The general consensus among the Hybrids was a ‘wait and see’ philosophy, since their interest in you might possibly be some kind of harmless experiment.

“Crankor with Blitz assisting, patiently watched and waited for more than three decades to see if the renegade Toltorians would have any success with developing your ‘divine potential,’” Thomas sneered, “before blowing the whistle to their Toltorian superiors. As you already know the development of a superhuman is the only subject that ever interests any of the Hybrids. During the time that Crankor was watching your development, there were many more Hybrids watching other human individuals for any indication that they might be manifesting any unusual evolutionary skills. Spying is mostly what the Hybrids are about and since time is nothing to them, they are consumed by it.

“A few weeks ago you suddenly disappeared and everyone was in a turmoil. The Hybrids wondered if they had been played for fools and Crankor found himself taking a lot of heat for letting you slip away. He wondered if Butts and Edna might possibly have been foolish enough to send you up to their large space transport. Of course that was before he started doing in-depth surveillance on Buttsfield and Edna. Up until that time he had relied mostly on visual contact and the monitoring of their daily activities, especially regarding their time spent with you.”

            Katrina felt as if she would go mad. She could feel the Hybrid Crankor looking into her mind, becoming one with her...but it was a memory. He was attempting to see who and what she really was. The images were making her nauseous to the point of losing control but she had to know what he had done to her. “No,” she silently screamed...she could not go further with this. She could not bear to see his face. There was nothing to do at this time but to accept that most of her memory was missing due to Crankor’s interference. Sweating profusely, she pulled back and began to focus on the words of Calvin Thomas again, feigning an air of detachment. The talkative priest was totally unaware of her conflicted state of mind.

“At first, when you disappeared he considered the possibility that Edna and Butts were aware of his scrutiny and had found a way to outsmart him. He didn’t know in the beginning that they were as distraught as he was over your disappearance. After continued surveillance of the two for a short time he came to understand that they had no idea where you had gone and were not trying to circumvent his watch over them. He continued his observance of them anyway, since he believed they would eventually lead him to you, although he was still unsure if you were really the one. Old Crankor is obviously not as clever or psychic as he pretends to be. Eh? Edna and Buttsfield finally did lead him to you in a sense but it was too late to stop your unfolding process which they had put into motion. I might add, however, that it was not too late for him to have Butts and Edna stopped, or rather decimated for their crime of interference.”

At this last bit of news Katrina felt a sharp pain stab deep inside her and wanted to cry aloud, but held still. Tantalus, however, had no such inhibitions and lifted his head with a loud howl. All the monks gathered inside the tent gasped in dread as Calvin Thomas threw back his head in laughter.

Most of her memories were gone but at least she had an idea now of who and what had caused their disappearance. Katrina knew without a doubt at this point that it was the Hybrids’ determination to get at her that had resulted in her memory loss, and not because Butts and Edna had pushed her too hard as they had theorized. Why Crankor’s attempt to merge with her mind had made her forget, she could not say, nor was it any longer important. She knew his intent had been to understand the skills and technology Butts and Edna were utilizing in order for her to dematerialize, and that his intrusion into her mind at the time of her first teleportation was the cause of her memory loss. She felt no anger toward the Hybrids at this revelation, only a will of steel to finish the assignment she intuited had been given to her by Buttsfield and Edna. “Success will be the ultimate revenge,” Katrina said to herself. And, had Calvin Thomas looked into her eyes at this moment he would have been dazzled, for her deep purple eyes were filled with light and streams of energy poured out from them.