I have been bestowed with the honor from Rebecca at The Cadence Marketing Group asking if I would introduce everyone to a very talented, diverse and author who is getting great reviews on his latest book. And knowing that I have the most fantastic and fabulous visitors, of course, I said YES!. So, let’s give Mr. Steve O’Brien a CMash warm welcome!!!
O’Brien earned his juris doctorate from George Washington University Law School and served on the editorial board of The George Washington International Law Review. He has written commentaries and perspectives for prestigious publications such as The National Law Journal, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and many magazines. He currently serves as General Counsel for a global consulting company. O’Brien lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife Becky; they have two children.
Elijah’s Coin is his first novel.
Visit his site: http://www.aandnpublishing.com/blog
Over the years I have read all the horse racing novels, Dick Francis, William Murray, Stephen Dobyns, even Willie Shoemaker published a series of racetrack novels. I also spent quite a bit of time over the years at racetracks. For a period of time I owned some racehorses in partnership with a group of friends. We were unusually lucky to have a few good runners.
Okay, we were stupid lucky.
One is still among the all time money winners for Nebraska bred horses. Another broke three different track records at three different distances at three different racetracks. Try that one.
Another was a filly which, I guess, inspired part of the story of Bullet Work. We purchased a
Nebraska bred filly for the princely sum of $1200. She was not regally bred, but had the heart of
a champion. She won her first two races and we shipped her to Remington Park in Oklahoma City for a big
stakes race. Another undefeated filly was shipped in as well. She was a $500,000 Kentucky bred yearling named Remember the Day. Of course that horse was a huge betting favorite. Just like a Disney script, our little Nebraska bred filly stole the show, leading every step of the way at 15-1.
We were also fortunate to have Willie Shoemaker ride one of our horses when he was doing his
farewell tour prior to his retirement. That race didn’t come out as well as we’d hoped, but it was
still a thrill.
Bullet Work mixes in many of the lessons I learned about thoroughbreds and racing over the
years, but is an entirely fictional story–nothing autobiographical here. I tried to capture the
drama, the competition, the language, the relationships on the backside, and above all the love
the caregivers have for the animals.
No story is easy to write. In fact, I can easily say I worked on this novel off and on for decades. But despite the starts and stops, I truly enjoyed creating these characters and this story, because they are people, places and things I have known and enjoyed nearly all of my life.
For Dan Morgan it becomes personal when his precocious two-year-old filly is targeted. Dan befriends AJ Kaine, a lonely, “horse whispering” young man. AJ is a hotwalker, the lowest of jobs in the backside food chain. But AJ has a secret—perhaps a secret that can corner a killer. With AJ’s help, Dan must crack the extortion scheme or risk becoming the next victim.
