The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – The Awakening Of Dan Hanley: Novel by Rita K. Hamilton

Episode Date: March 9, 2026

The Awakening Of Dan Hanley: Novel by Rita K. Hamilton https://www.amazon.com/Awakening-Dan-Hanley-Novel/dp/1418469599 To get his college degree as quickly as possible, twenty-one year old Dan needs to live with Margaret, an unknown distant relative. The elderly landlady claims she can communicate psychically with animals. Dan is dumbfounded. She doesn’t seem the weirdo type. She has to be a shyster, evil, or just plain crazy. To protect himself from the possibility of Margaret’s corrupting influence, he devises a plan. He will keep as much distance between them as their “work for room and board” arrangement will allow. A complicating factor is Laurie, the cute girl next door. Dan struggles to resist his attraction to her. He doesn’t have the time or money for romantic entanglements. Besides, he is convinced she has been brainwashed by Margaret. Then there is Bill Saxon, neighborhood thug, thief, and animal tormentor, who takes an instant dislike to Dan. Seventy pounds lighter than Bill and inexperienced at fist fighting, Dan knows he is no match for Bill. Additional issues center around the animals: Sobra, the timid Labrador; her mother, Lady; Petey, the parakeet; and the cats, Taylor, Katy, Princess, and Cherish. Each playa significant part in a life lesson for Dan.

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Opinions expressed by guests on the podcast are solely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the host or the Chris Voss show. Some guests of the show may be advertising on the podcast, but it's not endorsement or review of any kind. Today's featured author comes to us from Books to Lifemarketing.com.com. With expert publishing to strategic marketing, they help authors reach their audience and maximize their book success. Today, we're an amazing young lady on the show. We're going to be talking about her book that came out September 21st, 2014. called The Awakening of Don Hanley by Rita K. Hamilton. We're going to get into with her and find out some of the deets on her.

Amazing book, some of her stories of life, et cetera, et cetera. She's been a school librarian, a part-time church secretary, and a tutor for ESL, that's English as a second language students. She served on the board of the Home of Hope for Homeless Animals for several years, and she believes her true vocation has been that of a student, and seeker of the hidden realities behind life and purpose. She lives with her husband Howard of 54 years, two cats, buff and tuck,

and she volunteers the local museum to enjoy the life of a senior citizen. Welcome to the show. How are you? Okay. Rita, it's fun to have you on the show. Give us any dot-coms, website, social media. Where do you want people to find you on the interwhips? Rita Khamilton.com.

The website that's working to get up. So watch for that. There'll be a link on the Chris Voss show. So Rita, give us a 30,000. interview. What's inside your book? Okay, it's a story of a young man who promised he wants to go to college

but his mother doesn't want him to. She's very religious. She makes him promise to not change. And he can, you know, so he promises he won't let college change him. And in order to go, he stays with this

distant relative if he didn't even know he had in a room and board arrangement. And she's, she turns out to have a psychic gift of communicating with animals. And he, with his background and his promise, is, no, she's got to be a frog, or she's got to be crazy or something. And he tries to figure that out while he lives with her. That might be a little challenging if you're trying to figure out if someone is crazy or

why they're crazy if you're living with them. That sounds like one of those adventures. That's where the awakening comes in. That's where the what comes in? The awakening. The awakening, okay. It's kind of like an epiphany. Okay.

Yeah, that living with Margaret for several years, he does come to an awakening, maybe there's more to this than he thought. Oh, there's more. The awakening is kind of like a epiphany, it's slower. Epiphany is like, bam, all of a sudden, you know. And awakening is,

is more like slowly, gradually, you begin to see where the truth may be. Ah! And, you know, sometimes we do live in places where we assume one thing, and it takes us a while to see what's going on outside of our kind of box we build of belief systems. Is that kind of a good analogy of, you know, waking up and realizing maybe it's been right there before you the whole time? Yes, very much. In fact, I feel like people need to get out of a box sometimes. Nothing to do with the book in that sense, but the idea that, you know, you're raised in a family that you say,

I never want to be like my parents or I want to be or have the better marriage than my parents. If you don't do anything about it, you're going to automatically fall back into their patterns because you don't know anything else. Yeah, that's your blueprint you were raised with, and it's indelibly. stamped on you until you change it. So the way to change that is to open your mind and decide I'm going to learn. I'm going to learn a different way of being a parent. I'm going to learn a different way of what it takes to have a good marriage. And so that when I can get the opportunity, I will do it differently because I'll learn something differently. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting how those blueprints really map us out and shape our lives that we learn.

how it shapes our relationships with other people because what's the old line? I was starting to think of this yesterday. We seek the wound. We seek the teeth that match the wound. And it doesn't think of that effect. I mean, I'd be getting exactly right. We seek the teeth that matches the wound. And so what a lot of people do, and this is from psychology and I don't know that it's exact science,

put it that way, but a lot of times what we do is we try and recreate. the broken, damaged relationship our parents had, and we try and resolve it because we think we can we think we can fix it. But the problem is we're still carrying that damaged blueprint. And so we think we can fix it. The problem is usually the scenarios of why that relationship was broken was the problem, the people that were in it and the trauma or whatever their issues were from their blueprints. This is where generational trauma comes in. And and the problem is the format, right?

If I constantly hold a I don't know, a ballet out on a lake and all the ballet people keep drowning, the problem is the setting. I probably should hold it on a stage somewhere. You don't drown.

I mean, you have to change venues, basically, and you've got to get rid of your old bootprints and go to therapy and stuff. So what was the impetus that prompted you in writing this book? Was there a moment an aha moment that said, hey, I should write this book. First of all, it was not being around people enough to share some of my thoughts with.

And in a way, it's a memorial to my dog. The dog, sober in the book, was actually based on a real book, a dog, real dog. I kind of like, partly, that's the reason I named her the same is because it was kind of like an honor. our dog that I had lost a few years before. That's a wonderful homage. Yeah. The topics you cover in the book, was there something in your life? I mean, you mentioned something about you didn't feel like you were connecting people to expand on that a little bit more, if you would, please.

I just felt like nobody was interested. And I can remember in high school, for example, a bunch of those girls were sitting together. the girl started talking about who they thought was going all the way and stuff. And I wanted to yell at them. Who cares? Why don't we talk about something important? Like, why are we here? What's the purpose of life? Don't you think we'll be talking about those things? And I never said anything because I knew they wouldn't be interested. And so I always felt kind of alone a little bit. So in the book, I could share some of the some of the thoughts, but some of the things I've learned.

Yeah. Not everything, but... There you go. It's great that you were able to find a resource to share that with and everything. And, you know, a lot of people go through similar experiences. You know, they feel alienated by some groups and they're trying to find their place in life. Why do you call it a slice of life story, I guess? But it's not a John. It's not a mystery. It's not a love story, even though there's some live in it.

stuff, but it's a slice of Dan's life. All of us, we have certain points in our lives where events happen. That changes the future and changes our opinion about the past. And it's like just a slice of three years in his life. Okay. As far as the whole life. Now this character, Dan, is he the main character in this book? Who's the main character?

He kind of shares it with Margaret. Okay. Yeah. And Lori, the girl next door. But I would say Margaret, he learns all these things and Margaret tells him. And then he says, I don't know I want to believe her or not, you know, stuff. But so it's kind of a sharing, I think, of him and her. Ah.

Okay. And they're sharing room and board together. And he's suspicious that she may not be maybe the nice, person that she puts off to be? Is that a good? Right. He asked to, it turns out to be a distant relative. He, because of the financial problems, he needed a way to, you know, pay for room and

board. She didn't want to pay, rent her. She wanted someone new handyman skills. Someone could live in handyman's kind of. So that was the agreement because he had all these skills. he learned from his father, the handyman skills. Handyman skills are good. And with the book, I mean, you've put some different things in here.

What role do these animals play in teaching life lessons in your book? You've got, I guess there's a lavador, a parakeet, cats, and I think some dogs? Yeah, the lady. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. The mother dog, yeah. It's like each situation that he encounters with the animal, he learns something. Tyler, when he moved in, he didn't like cats.

My husband didn't like cats when we first got together. All he knew about him was what was on farm cats, you know, out in farm barn. But, yeah, with Tyler, who wound up setting on his desk with him while he studied, taught him the cats were okay you know he started Tyler would want attention when he stopped studying and he developed a kind of a relationship with Tyler from you know from just holding them and me yeah Tyler wanted to be petted and stuff so it's what I think with animals it's the situation that you find with them that you're in where you can learn you know or watch them you know learn different things.

Learning from animals. So they help tell us part of the story, I guess then. So some of the other characters in the story, I think there's a thief and different things. Any of those inspired from you from real life, maybe knowing people like that? Not that means, but I didn't know somebody who bragged about

if he saw a cat or dog alongside the road, he'd try to run it over. Wow. There's something wrong with people to do that. Yeah, there is. But he wasn't someone that was in my life all the time, but I knew him. And some of, you know, so you just add to that. But did get in the idea that he hated animals and he would torture him.

But behind that was this projecting, you know, people will blame someone or something because they can't face blaming the real issue like in him his father left his father deserted the family and took dogs with him and then

instead of you know instead of blaming his father for leaving him he you know it was like dad loved the dogs better than he loved me and then they used the animals as a substitute psychologically, you know, for, you know, for his dad.

Wow. With that. Now, you talk also in the book about cosmic consciousness. What's that about? And Margaret, I think, is the name of some of that in the book. Cosmic consciousness is almost an out-abody experience. you suddenly find yourself in connection with nature, in connection with other life, as if you are part of our nature, as if you are part of the tree or the part of the flowers. And it's almost, you know, you read about people who have near-death experiences, it's somewhat the same feeling.

It only lasts for a couple of seconds or a minute at the most, but it leaves you with this profound sense of being one with everything. Yeah, yeah. It's crazy. Have you ever had a near-death life experience? Not a near-death one, but I have had the cosmic conscious experience. Oh, really? Yeah.

Have you just one or more? Just one. What was it like to have that happen to you? And I guess it was impactful enough to put in the book. Yeah, it was actually, a retreat and a women's retreat and we were in wooded area and I was laying on the cot and I suddenly felt the trees and the trees around the camp and stuff and I felt the trees were actually feeling joy that I never thought about that but there was a joy in the nature of the in the trees

and I felt like I was part of the trees. Wow. Part of the trees. That's got to be interesting. The Conscious Awakening. So do you think you'll have more of those? Do you see yourself having more of those? Or is it kind of, is it kind of a random thing that happens to you? I don't know. There is another one I've been thinking about, but it's more of a essay type than it is a novel. Oh, okay. I'm kicking that around. So, Cosmic Consum, is it, is it sometimes cosmic consciousness is when you smoke that wacky tobacco? I never smoked it so I don't know Maybe some of that acid

I hear that's kind of fun Takes some weird places of mushroom Yeah, I always get afraid of it Yeah One time I smoked some paprika and got really high No, I'm just kidding, I just made that I had friends in high school They would smoke anything trying to get high

They smoked like broccoli and mint Really? They had some issues, let's put it that way I wouldn't think that would work Yeah, I was like, you know, I'm pretty sure that eons of humanity had gone before and discover what the best things are to smoke. And maybe trying to smoke broccoli isn't the best idea. And then they always be angry. They couldn't get high.

And you're just like, is broccoli. It's pretty much made to irritate President Bush, the senior, and anyone else who hates broccoli. What's the overall theme would you say of this book, the overall arching theme of what you want to maybe readers to learn or feel or experience? I would say a sense of oneness, like we're all connected, animal, a vegetable, we're all connected. That's the cosmic conscious spirit. You realize on some level we're all part of the same thing. And also, I would think overall theme would be stay open. Don't stay in a box.

stay open to learning new ideas and when they come your way. Mm-hmm. Yeah, keep an open mind and maybe also watch out for crazy people, maybe. Yeah. Maybe. That's my policy. That's my policy. With the book, what advice would you give about kindness, understanding, and personal growth?

Kindness, you get paid back. you know, money is mean to you, but if you respond in a kindness kind of way, protect it, they don't know what to do. You know, because it's like they expect you to come back at him in a mean way. Yeah. And so it kind of throws them for a loop sometimes. Yeah. My dad used to do this thing when people were mean to him.

He, and he would, he would, if he could put his arm around him or he could, you know, touch him on the shoulder or on the arm just to show that he cared. And he'd be like, hey, man, who hurt you? What happened, man? You were very angry. Let's talk about it. And they would break down into tears and start crying with him. It was interesting to watch.

And, you know, I mean, he really did care. He wasn't like, you know, just faking it to be to just be a jerk or anything. But, yeah. He's a perfect example. Yeah, he's a perfect example of maybe some of the best things you can do. to, you know, do all this. In terms of personal growth, I kind of feel like that's why we're on the earth,

that we're supposed to, like the earth is a giant schoolroom, and we're supposed to be learning as we're guided to different situations. Like job, you learn things from one job, you might learn other things for the family, hobbies and stuff, you might learn another set of lessons. But I kind of feel like,

and they're all lessons to help you know yourself better and know the universal spirit, God, or whatever you want to calm in your relationship. But every situation we find yourselves in, instead of saying, why this happened to me, it should be saying, what am I to learn from this? Yeah, what can I learn? Yeah. Lifelong learning is really important. You know, you do a lot of things.

You work at the, I think you said at the library, I think right now, with the library. Yeah. And a lot of things to help people. Are a lot of the things you espouse, you know, lifelong learning and stuff like that? Is that kind of the example of life you tend to lead? Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Yeah.

Always reading some novels, a lot of nonfiction. Yeah. A lot of nonfiction there. Do you have a favorite? Who were some of your inspirations for your book writing, maybe growing up, maybe when you started writing or reading? Was there any authors that were kind of your favorite? Geez, the problem is I've read too many. All of them. All of them.

I used to say that if I felt guided to read a book, if I didn't like most of it, but if there's just one page or chapter in the book that kind of, get home for me, then that's the reason I was supposed to read it, was that one particular section. Oh, but that's brilliant. You know, I have that on the show. There's a lot of people on the show, and I think I've had people ask me before. They've said, you know, you ever get tired of hearing maybe the same old thing, you know, from authors, you know, you know, a lot about leadership, you know, a lot about running businesses. They never get tired of hearing, you know, people talk about the same subjects. And I go, no, I don't, because when people come on my show,

Sometimes they have similar ideas or the same sort of end game they've gotten to, but sometimes they have a whole different perspective, an angle of looking at the issue. And that's where I really learn and grow. You know, I've read lots of books on leadership and I love the topic of leadership. But, you know, sometimes someone will come on and they have a different perspective or they have a different way of looking at it. And it really adds value to where you're like, wow, I never thought of it from that angle. and then you have a much more broader view you can take away with all that new data you've learned.

That's why I hope people take away from this book is, oh, I never thought about that one. That's a good analogy, even if you don't like the book, if you can learn one thing, you know, and a lot of cases there are things in life that we need to learn. And, you know, maybe we should be looking at those and saying, you know, what can I learn from this? Sometimes bad things happen to us, you know? and instead of, you know, throwing a pity party and boo-hoo and the world hates me and the universe is trying to destroy me and nothing goes my way and whatever sort of entitlement you may. I always love people say, I deserve love. I deserve good health.

I deserve to be successful. No, it's not the way the universe works. No one deserves shit. No, if anything, you're lucky if you get to stay alive for a while and you're just dodging meteors the whole time. It's the biggest survival game on TV. basically. I guess there's some aliens watching it somewhere on reality TV. Human reality TV. Tune in Thursday. But no, I'm glad that you know, you write about this stuff, you share it. What's the future hold for you? Are there any future books maybe coming out? Any series arriving from this?

Right now, like I said, there was, I haven't one, I'm thinking about writing. I haven't even started it. I want to see how this kind of goes first. Yeah, and it would be a nonfiction one. Oh. Yeah. What do you love about writing nonfiction? Writing or reading it. Both.

Go and give me both, if you would. You learn. I like the learning, you know, experiencing what other people have experienced. But then novels can do the same thing. A good novel, you can relate with the character. And I think reading, especially reading books, that are written from perspective as someone in another country and another culture can help you understand the world and see everybody as human.

Yeah. Yeah. These are important lessons to learn empathy for other people, the experience, you know, and when people don't have that, they tend to make a lot of assumptions. Sometimes they pick up racism or xenophobia, and they're afraid of the other. person, you know, because they don't understand them and they don't. And, you know, Abraham Lincoln had a great saying. And I think he was referring to it when he said it about a politician that was maybe in Congress or something that was bad-mouthing him. And he said, you know, I don't like that man.

And I'm going to get to know him and learn more about him. It's something that effect. I mean, I got in the quote exactly right. But basically, he knew that there was a reason he didn't like that person was because he felt alienated because he didn't know the person. And then, maybe by getting to know the person, understanding them more, their motives, their motivations, what they want to do with their lives, their dreams, their hopes and desires, you know. I mean, we're all human on this planet. I mean, everyone's, you know, most everyone's a parent. They love their children.

They want the best for their children, regardless of what country they live in or culture or ideological nature that they live in or political construct. You know, most people, they just want to do the same. They want to do some work, go home, spend time with their family. have little entertainment, you know, and try and enjoy their life as best they can. And that's all most people really want, you know. There's a lot of evil people in the world that make everyone look bad. But in reality, you know, I think most people behave that way.

What do you think? I think they're losing the purpose. I think if everybody looked at life and what they're going through with is what am I supposed to learn from this. And what is it teaching me about myself? And what does it teach me about another person, you know, in terms of filling their humanity? And what does it teach me about the overall energy that says the world? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, if more people would do that, they would learn and grow as opposed to just, you know, becoming stumped and hateful and angry and bitter and blaming the world for all their problems, you know. It really comes down to self-accountability. you have to be accountable for yourself. And if you don't learn from your mistakes, she'll just keep making the same ones over and over again. I've seen that pretty myself personally. Yeah, that's why I know when I was 10 years old,

I prayed that when I grew up, I wouldn't have a marriage like my parents. It was a really bad marriage. They left staying together 36 years, but I've been divorced. But when I got old enough to think about that I read everything I could find, Men are for Mars, women are for Venus, what it takes to communicate with sex, what, you know, what makes a good wife, what makes a good husband.

I read everything I could. I find people told me I was being picky, you know, but we've been married 54 years and we've been in October. So I didn't think something for hate. Congrats. Maybe, you know, you looked at the blueprint that you were given and said, we need to rewrite this and do it. it better and there are ways to do it. And, you know, that's when you break up generational trauma, so it's not passed down

for your family and the stuff and, you know, and a lot of that, just if it's unresolved, it just gets passed down and then your kids have to deal with it. But if you deliberately try to find a better way, you can break the pattern.

Break the pattern, folks. That's probably a good theme in the book, too. So as we go out, give us your final pitch out to the audience to pick up your book, to get to know you better reach out on your website when it's up and all that good stuff. A website is Readerkahamilton.com. And if you go on the website, you read a little bit about me, a little bit about the book,

and we'll be connected with a place where you can buy it. And I think it's a good read, and there are so much different ideas in there that people have never thought about before. And I honestly, some of them I never thought about it, I started writing it, and then these things would pop into my mind. Ah. Yeah.

Good stuff there. Well, Rita, it's been fun to have you on the show. Thank you for coming by. Oh, you're welcome. Great job. Thanks for on us for tuning in. Order of the book where Refined Books are sold. It's called The Awakening of Dan Hanley, a novel out September 21st, 20, or I'm sorry, 2004 by

Rita K. Hamilton. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe. We'll see you guys next. You've been listening to the most amazing, intelligent podcast ever made to improve your brain and your life. Warning. Consuming too much of the Chris Wall Show podcast can lead to people thinking you're smarter, younger, and irresistible sexy.

Consume in regularly moderated amounts. Consult a doctor for any resulting brain lead. All right there, Rita, great show. Great job.