New Book Tells Dramatic True Tale of Survival

In her new book, PLAYING DEAD: A Memoir of Terror and Survival, Faison Ross tells her harrowing story of domestic abuse, fear, and ongoing paranoia. The book was published by WildBlue Press, Denver, and officially released this week.

The book takes readers through a shaky relationship with her high school sweetheart to a relationship that turned physically violent, ultimately leaving her at a roadside with a battered skull.
Faison Ross was born in San Francisco and grew up in San Diego. After marriage to her career Navy sailor, she lived in Florida and Japan. She now lives in West Hartford.
The abuse eventually escalated to the point where Faison Ross moved out with their children, believing her husband would help her financially and there would be an amicable divorce. That was never his plan. Stalking and threats began. Court injunctions, police warnings, and arrests didn't stop him.
He kidnapped her in front of the children, drove to a quiet street and beat her with a shovel, leaving her brutalized body in the rain.
"My only option is to play dead. Do not so much as twitch. Do not breathe,” she wrote. Doctors said she was fortunate to be alive.
“I wrote this book for the sole reason of hoping others will recognize sociopathic and abusive behavior when they see it,” Faison Ross said. “My goal is to save someone's life by reading my story.”
“I did not listen to my gut when my gut was screaming at me, extreme danger was ahead,” she said. “I wrongly believed domestic abuse was a black eye or broken bones, not years of verbal abuse. My marriage did not become physically violent until near the end but my ex-husband's volatile and dark side was only bubbling just under the surface and I did not recognize it.”
Using court and other documents, Faison Ross takes readers along on the manhunt that led to her husband’s violent capture. Police fired at him as he charged them with a knife. He ended up in the same hospital as Faison Ross.
Faison Ross notes in the book that despite increasing awareness of domestic violence, the epidemic continues. Nearly 20 people per minute are physically abused by an intimate partner in the United States, equating to more than 10 million men and women.
Her memoir also delves into her early years, raised by her mother, Barbara, an industrial engineer, and her father William Earl (Earle) Faison, a four-time all-star defensive-end for the San Diego Chargers. Her father occasionally worked in Hollywood, landing guest roles on The Six Million Dollar Man, the film Heaven Can Wait, among others.
Faison Ross converted to Judaism after her first child was born. She said, “Being Jewish was a completely natural calling for me. It was something I was always destined to do. I was completely at peace and somehow felt right at home. I belonged."
"The rabbi and all the congregants at the synagogue were always warm, friendly, and made me feel right at home,” she said. “They didn't care the least that I am an African American."
Faison Ross now lives in West Hartford, Connecticut, with her wife. She has worked as a program manager for a Connecticut educational non-profit since 2004. She has four children and a grandchild.

To purchase the book, click here: PLAYING DEAD: A Memoir of Terror and Survival.