Review: KILLING KATE by Alex Lake

CMash January 31, 2017 Leave a Comment

KILLING KATE by Alex Lake
Published by Harper Collins
Publication Date: Oct. 6, 2016
ISBN-10: 000819971X
ISBN-13: 978-0008199715
Pages: 416
Review Copy From: Harper Collins
Edition: ARC PB
My Rating: 5

Synopsis:
From the author of ebook No. 1 bestseller and Sunday Times top ten bestseller AFTER ANNA.

A serial killer is stalking your home town.

He has a type: all his victims look the same.

And they all look like you.

Kate returns from a post break-up holiday with her girlfriends to news of a serial killer in her home town – and his victims all look like her.

It could, of course, be a simple coincidence.

Or maybe not.

She becomes convinced she is being watched, followed even. Is she next? And could her mild-mannered ex-boyfriend really be a deranged murderer?

Or is the truth something far more sinister?

My Thoughts and Opinion:

Kate Armstrong, is on vacation with 2 of 3 of her closest friends, having just ended a 10 year relationship with her boyfriend. They say it’s a small world, when she meets Mike, also on vacation and come to find out, lives very close to her.

On returning home, the news is not good. There’s a possible serial killer, and what’s even scarier, the victims all look like Kate.

A chilling read! I thought I knew who the murderer was, keyword thought. The ending was one that I didn’t see coming! A thrilling novel that will keep you on the edge of your seat!

REVIEW DISCLAIMER
This blog was founded on the premise to write honest reviews, to the best of my ability, no matter who from, where from and/or how the book was obtained, and will continue to do so, even if it is through PICT or PBP.
DISCLAIMER
I received a copy of this book, at no charge to me, in exchange for my honest review.
No items that I receive are ever sold…they are kept by me, or given to family and/or friends.
ADDENDUM
I do not have any affiliation with Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. I am an IndieBound affiliate. I am providing link(s) solely for visitors that may be interested in purchasing this Book/EBook.

Book Review

Review: THE LAST INNOCENT HOUR by Barbara Taylor Sissel

CMash January 20, 2017 Leave a Comment

THE LAST INNOCENT HOUR by Barbara Taylor Sissel
Publication Date: November 21, 2011
ASIN: B006BG77RG
Pages: 186
Review Copy From: Personal Pick
Edition: Kindle
My Rating: 5

Synopsis (via GR):
Something twisted is stalking the Cunningham family. It lurks at the periphery of Beth’s vision. Her husband Charlie can’t help, if she could even remember him; he’s doing time for a murder he didn’t commit. The small child Beth was found with, whom she doesn’t know either, was taken to foster care. There isn’t much time now. If Beth doesn’t recall the hideous events that stole her memory soon, the killer will strike again, and someone else will die.

My Thoughts and Opinion:

I am a big fan of this author, having read many of her books, FAULTLINES, CROOKED LITTLE LIES, SAFE KEEPING, EVIDENCE OF LIFE, THE VOLUNTEER, and THE NINTH STEP. Recently I was going through my Kindle and found that I had this title and I hadn’t read it. How I missed that is beyond me.

Beth Clayton Cunningham returns to her family’s farm at her mother’s request after being away for many years due to an incident with and secrets about her stepfather. Her, her husband and daughter arrive and old feelings and emotions come to the surface.

Her mother now admits that the stepfather married her for the money and land and knows she has made a big mistake. She does not know that this scam goes way beyond her stepfather. Elected officials and the police also want and need this farm. But why?

When greed, money and mental instability are overwhelming, murders seem to be piling up. Can her stepfather be stopped before he hurts her daughter? But how to protect her when Beth has an injury that renders her with amnesia not even knowing her own name. And her husband is charged with the murder of her mother.

Another page turner by Ms. Sissel. The characters are totally relatable. The story flows and I found myself saying “just one more chapter!”

If you have not read anything by this author, I highly recommend any of her books. I’m sure you won’t be disappointed!

REVIEW DISCLAIMER
This blog was founded on the premise to write honest reviews, to the best of my ability, no matter who from, where from and/or how the book was obtained, and will continue to do so, even if it is through PICT or PBP.
DISCLAIMER
I received a copy of this book, at no charge to me, in exchange for my honest review.
No items that I receive are ever sold…they are kept by me, or given to family and/or friends.
ADDENDUM
I do not have any affiliation with Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. I am an IndieBound affiliate. I am providing link(s) solely for visitors that may be interested in purchasing this Book/EBook.

Book Review

Review: BEHIND HER EYES by Sarah Pinborough

CMash January 17, 2017 1 Comment

BEHIND HER EYES bySarah Pinborough
Published by Flatiron Books
Publication Date: Expected Jan. 31, 2017
ISBN:13: 9781250111173
Pages: 320
Review Copy From: Publisher
Edition: ARC TPB
My Rating: 5

Synopsis:
Louise is a single mom, a secretary, stuck in a modern-day rut. On a rare night out, she meets a man in a bar and sparks fly. Though he leaves after they kiss, she’s thrilled she finally connected with someone.

When Louise arrives at work on Monday, she meets her new boss, David. The man from the bar. The very married man from the bar…who says the kiss was a terrible mistake but who still can’t keep his eyes off Louise.

And then Louise bumps into Adele, who’s new to town and in need of a friend, but she also just happens to be married to David. David and Adele look like the picture-perfect husband and wife, but then why is David so controlling, and why is Adele so scared of him?

As Louise is drawn into David and Adele’s orbit, she uncovers more puzzling questions than answers. The only thing that is crystal clear is that something in this marriage is very, very wrong, but Louise can’t guess how wrong―and how far a person might go to protect their marriage’s secrets.

My Thoughts and Opinion:

My head is still reeling from the ending!!!! So much so that I had to read the last few pages a couple of times!

A psychological thriller that I couldn’t put down and reading into the wee hours.

Adele and David Martin are “starting over” due to past secrets. And in a chance meeting, Louise meets David in a bar and shares an intimate kiss, before she realizes that he is her new boss. Louise also meets Adele and befriends her but can this friendship continue since there has been a betrayal?

Louise soon finds out that David and Adele’s secrets are very dark and tries to get to the bottom of it especially since she feels love for both of them.

There is so much more to this story but I don’t want to include any spoilers.

Do I recommend this read? Hell yes!!!!!

Book Review, The Story Plant

Reviews ~ 2 Christmas Novellas by Steven Manchester

CMash December 20, 2016 1 Comment

A CHRISTMAS WISH by Steven Manchester
Published by Fiction Studio Books, LLC
Publication Date: June 1, 2015
ASIN: B00Y7KNEXE
Pages: 91
Review Copy From: The Story Plant
Edition: Kindle
My Rating: 5

Synopsis: (via GR)

In this heartwarming holiday story, Steven Manchester, author of the #1 Kindle bestseller TWELVE MONTHS, takes us into the world of three of his characters from his novel GOODNIGHT, BRIAN (January 2013). Steph is on a search for truth in her heart as she faces the prospect of real love for the first time. Brian is out to enjoy his favorite season in a way that doctors never thought he could. And at the center of it all is their grandmother, affectionately known as Mama, a woman of remarkable commitment and charity who knows something very important about making Christmas wishes come true.

This brief, beautiful tale captures the promise of the holidays and the longing we all have for the magic of the season.

My Thoughts and Opinion:

Wanting to read a couple of Christmas stories this week, who better to read than one of my favorite authors, Steven Manchester. This is the Prequel to GOOD NIGHT, BRIAN, which I read in 2013.

Mr. Manchester, in 91 pages, warms the reader’s heart with the wise wisdom of MaMa, Angela DiMartino, the Italian matriarch. Mama is sensing that something is bothering her granddaughter during this holiday season. And with her infinite experience, knowledge and unconditional love teaches Stephanie the greatest gift of all.

Steve Manchester delivers another emotional read that will leave the reader thankful for Mama and her insight. I felt like I was going home, to have the chance, to see my own grandmother again.

Beautifully written!

THE THURSDAY NIGHT CLUB by Steven Manchester
Published by Fiction Studio Books
Publication Date: June 1, 2015
ASIN: B00Y7KNNJY
Pages: 144
Review Copy From: The Story Plant
Edition: Kindle
My Rating: 5

Synopsis: (via GR)
Five college friends, three men and two women, have been getting together every Thursday night to share humble meals and an abundance of laughter. But when tragedy takes one of them, leaving the others to question the fairness of life, the Thursday Night Club decides to embark on a contest in the memory of the generous spirit of their fallen brother. The objective of the contest is simple: whoever performs the kindest deed by Christmas night wins the pot – four quarters. And there are only two conditions: the benevolent deed must be anonymous, and it cannot cost a single penny to pull off.

As the four friends undertake the contest, the healing begins and they become inspired beyond their expectations. There might be a winner in this competition, but it is very clear there will be no losers.

A story of Christmas spirit that will strike a chord in your heart any time of year, The Thursday Night Club will make you look at the holiday season in new ways.

My Thoughts and Opinion:

Five friends, in their senior year in college, meet every Thursday night, sitting on Izzy and Ava’s porch playing cards, talking, teasing each other and making 25¢ bets. Then a fatal accident changes them forever. Jesse was always doing good deeds but never spoke of them. So to honor their friend, they make another 25¢ bet. By Christmas, each of the remaining four needs to complete the kindest deed in Jesse’s memory.

A touching story of friendship, love and the realization that altruistic acts will affect them as much, or more than the people they help.

Heartwarming! A lesson for us all. Steve Manchester is the master at writing about emotions and feelings!

I highly recommend this novella, not only at Christmas but year round!.

Book Review, Giveaway, Partners In Crime Tours, Showcase

THE FANTASTIC BOOK OF EVERYBODY’S SECRETS by Sophie Hannah (Review, Showcase & Giveaway) ~ PICT Presents

CMash December 15, 2016 Leave a Comment

The Fantastic Book of Everybody’s Secrets

by Sophie Hannah

on Tour November 1 – December 17, 2016

The Fantastic Book of Everybody's Secrets by Sophie Hannah

A collection of ingenious suspense stories from one of today’s most acclaimed novelists in the genre. Everybody has their secrets, and in Sophie Hannah’s fantastic stories the curtains positively twitch with them. Who, for instance, is the hooded figure hiding in the bushes outside a young man’s house? Why does the same stranger keep appearing in the background of a family’s holiday photographs? What makes a woman stand mesmerised by two children in a school playground, children she’s never met but whose names she knows well? And which secret results in a former literary festival director sorting soiled laundry in a shabby hotel? All will be revealed…but at a cost. As Sophie Hannah uncovers the dark obsessions and strange longings behind the most ordinary relationships, life will never seem quite the same again.

MY REVIEW

4 stars

This was a “new to me” author so I thought I would start off with this book. Glad I did because I now want to read more by Ms. Hannah.

THE FANTASTIC BOOK OF EVERYBODY’S SECRETS is a compilation of 10 short stories.

Did you ever wish you could read someone’s mind? To see what they are really thinking. This book does just that.

Like Friendly Amid The Haters, where a very passive agressive timid woman has murderous thoughts. Another was The Nursery Bear where a woman has conflicting thoughts about a neigbor and The Tub where the reader gets a look into their inner most thoughts.

Some of the stories left the reader wanting more, other stories having the reader wondering what exactly was going on.

A quick read, that is a bit eerie, and because of that, the pages kept turning.

Book Details:

Genre: Short Stories, Thriller
Published by: Witness Impulse
Publication Date: October 11th 2016
Number of Pages: 120
ISBN: 0062562096 (ISBN13: 9780062562098)
Purchase Links: Amazon 🔗 Barnes & Noble 🔗 Goodreads 🔗

Sophie Hannah

Learn More:

Sophie Hannah is the New York Times-bestselling author of numerous psychological thrillers, which have been published in 27 countries and adapted for television, as well as The Monogram Murders, the first Hercule Poirot novel authorized by the estate of Agatha Christie.

Catch Up with Sophie Hannah on her Website 🔗, Twitter 🔗, or Facebook 🔗

Tour Participants:

Giveaway:

This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours for Sophie Hannah and Witness Impulse. There will be 5 US winners of one (1) eBook copy of The Fantastic Book of Everybody’s Secrets by Sophie Hannah. The giveaway begins on November 1st and runs through January 2nd, 2017.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Get More Great Reads at Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours

Book Review, Giveaway, Interview, Partners In Crime Tours, Showcase

ESCAPE VELOCITY by Susan Wolfe (Review, Interview, & Giveaway ~ PICT Presents

CMash November 30, 2016 1 Comment

Escape Velocity

by Susan Wolfe

on Tour November 1 – December 31, 2016

Synopsis:

Escape Velocity by Susan Wolfe

When does the Con become the Artist?

Georgia Griffin has just arrived in Silicon Valley from Piney, Arkansas on very bald tires, having firmly rejected her beloved father’s life as a con artist. Her father is in jail and a certain minister is hugging her mother for Jesus while eyeing Georgia’s little sister, Katie-Ann. Georgia desperately needs to keep her new job as paralegal for Lumina Software so she can provide a California haven for her sister before it’s too late.

While she’s still living in her car, Georgia realizes that incompetence and self-dealing have a death grip on her new company. She decides to adapt her extensive con artist training—just once—to clean up the company. But success is seductive. Soon Georgia is an avid paralegal by day and a masterful con artist by night, using increasingly bold gambits designed to salvage Lumina Software. Then she steps into the shadow of a real crime and must decide: Will she risk her job, the roof over her sister’s head, and perhaps her very soul?

MY REVIEW

4 stars

This author was “new to me”, but after reading the synopsis, I knew I had to read this title.

The book starts with a Prologue of 2 men discussing the past and mentioning each other’s name. One has done time, for a crime they were both involved with many years ago and now feels, that since the other person has done well in life, that he is owed in terms of monies. However, this meeting ends badly with one of them being murdered.

Chapter One, we meet Georgia Griffin, a very intuitive paralegal interviewing for a major company, Lumina Software. She needs this job since she is now responsible for her younger sister. Georgia has to go legitimate, after working in the family business running cons on “easy marks” after her father is incarcerated.

She learns quickly and becomes an asset to the company. However, there are some occasions and incidents where she feels a little con job will only help her position and some of her co-workers.

As I continued reading, I could not figure out what the Prologue had to do with the story, since those names mentioned in the Prologue, were never mentioned again. Until……..

And then it all comes together. She realizes that she is not the only one who knows how to run a con, and now she is in the middle of a con that has been going on for 30 years and another murder may happen, if she doesn’t stop it.

ESCAPE VELOCITY is a very entertaining read!

Book Details:

Genre: Thriller / Suspense
Published by: Steelkilt Press
Publication Date: October 4th 2016
Number of Pages: 432
ISBN: 0997211717 (ISBN13: 9780997211719)
Purchase Links: Amazon 🔗, Barnes & Noble 🔗, & Goodreads 🔗

Read an excerpt:

Georgia followed the bouncing ponytail into a silent conference room with an immense black table. She perched on the edge of a fancy leather chair, quietly sniffed the air, and followed the scent to a tray of food on a side table: rows of colorful ripe fruit, cheerful little pots of yogurt, a tray of meat and cheese alongside glistening rolls. They hadn’t mentioned it would be a lunch interview. She’d have to pace herself and not look greedy. Her empty stomach contracted in anticipation as she politely declined the offer of coffee.

“He’ll be with you in a moment,” the woman said. “Oh, sorry, let me get this out of here.”

She scooped up the food and carried it from the room, leaving only a scent of pineapple hovering in the air.

Well. Good riddance. The last thing Georgia needed was to get all gorged and sleepy right before an interview.

And this could be the interview. This could be the interview that landed the job that allowed her to bring Katie-Ann to California until her father got out of prison. Too bad her resume was sort of bare, but the economy was finally picking up and she only needed one solid foothold. It didn’t matter how many jobs she hadn’t gotten. What mattered was the one she did get, and this could be that one. So what if it had been more than three weeks since her last interview? That just meant she should make this one count.

As she moved her forearm slowly across the mahogany, she could see her pale skin reflected off the glistening finish. Sure was quiet in here. You couldn’t hear anything of the big company that was supposedly operating at breakneck speed just outside the walls. Fast-paced was what they called themselves. Self-starter is what she was supposed to be. Well, she was a self-starter. How else had she gotten here? All the way from Piney, Arkansas, to Silicon Valley on bald tires, a million miles from the sound of Mama’s sniffling, the acrid smell of her bright pink nail polish.

Georgia wasn’t wearing any makeup at all. The woman with the bobbing ponytail had on perfect makeup that made her skin look like a baby’s butt. Which was great if you also knew how to avoid making yourself a magnet for perverts, but Georgia hoped she could hold her own around here without makeup. Tall and lanky and fast-moving, like a colt, her father said. (He should know, he’d boarded enough of them.) She wasn’t an athlete, exactly, but definitely a runner. Dark pinstripe
pantsuit from the Now and Again shop up in Palo Alto, scratchy at the back of her neck. Blueberry-colored eyes against pale, freckled skin, shiny black hair in a blunt bob as even as her dull scissors could chew through it. A smile so wide it sometimes startled people, seemed to give the fleeting impression she was unhinged. Careful with the smile. Enthusiastic, but not alarming.

The guy coming to interview her was late. She could have peed after all. This big San Jose industrial park was confusing, with boxy cement buildings that all looked exactly alike. Set back from the street behind gigantic parking lots full of glinting cars so it was impossible to see any street numbers, making it clear they couldn’t care less whether a newcomer found her way. She’d ended up having to run in her heels just to get to the lobby on time.

Could she get to the john now? She squeezed her shoulder blades tightly and stretched the back of her neck away from the scratchy suit coat. The silence was making her jumpy. She left her resume on the polished table and opened the door just enough to look out.

The woman with the ponytail was nowhere to be seen. In fact, Georgia couldn’t see a living soul. She took a couple of tentative steps into the hall. What if the interviewer showed up before she got back? Screw it. With a last look around the vacant executive area, she darted down the hallway.
The hall opened abruptly into an area crammed with battle-gray, fabric cubicles that created a maze the size of a football field. Had she wandered into a different company? The only thing the two areas had in common was that here, too, it was quiet. People must really be concentrating. Either that, or they’d had a bomb scare and nobody had bothered to tell her.

She was relieved to see a bald head appear above the fabric wall a few cubes down like a Jurassic Park dinosaur. (Now, that was quite an image. Did she feel that out of place around here?) She heard a printer spitting out copies somewhere in the distance as she headed toward the dinosaur, rounded a corner and stopped cold.

An unattended donut was resting on the work surface just inside one of the cubes. Barely even inside the cube, less than a foot away, almost as if it had been set down and forgotten by some passerby.

The plate slapped down in a hurry, its edge sticking out precariously beyond the edge of the work surface. Yesterday’s donut, perhaps, abandoned, stale.

But no, the donut was still puffy and golden, with minuscule cracks in that shiny sugar glaze. A donut still wafting the faintest scent of the fat it had been fried in. She could almost feel her lips touching the tender surface as her teeth . . .

Had she whimpered out loud? She glanced both ways along the still-deserted hall and then returned her gaze to the donut resting on its lightly grease-stained white paper plate. Pretending to wonder if the cube was occupied, she leaned her head in and called a faint “hello?” resting her hand lightly on the work surface, a finger touching the paper plate. Staring straight ahead, she floated her fingers across the surface and up, until her palm was hovering just above the donut’s sticky surface. One quick grab . . .

“May I help you?” intoned a male voice.

Georgia snatched her hand back like the donut was a rattlesnake.

She turned and found herself face to face with the Jurassic Park dinosaur, who was looking distinctly human and downright suspicious. He looked past her and surveyed the vacant cube before resting his skeptical gaze on her most winsome smile.

“Oh, hi!” she said brightly. “I’m here for an interview, and I was hoping you could point me toward the restroom?”

“And you thought it might be in here?”

“Well no, but I thought a person . . .”

“Follow me, please.”

She heard her Arkansas twang vibrating the air between them as he led her down the hall a few yards, pointed a stern finger and said, “In there.” He crossed his arms, and she felt the heat of his disapproving gaze on her back as she pushed through the heavy door into the privacy on the other side.

Now, that was just downright mortifying. Caught in the act of stealing a donut? A donut?? If he told somebody . . . She cupped her palm over her closed eyes and dragged it slowly down until it covered her mouth.

Of course, she hadn’t actually taken the donut, so what precisely had the guy seen? A woman standing at the edge of an empty cube, leaning her head in politely to look for someone. He probably hadn’t noticed the donut, and even if he had he’d never imagine how desperately she wanted it. He’d probably had steak and gravy for breakfast, and thought a hungry person in Silicon Valley was as rare as a Jurassic Park dinosaur. If anything, he probably thought she was casing the empty cube for something valuable. Which was ridiculous, because what could a cube contain that was as valuable as a job?

But if he thought it was true, he might be waiting for her just outside the door with a security guard, planning to march her out of the building and away from this rare and essential person who could actually give her a job. Busted because of a donut.

The face that looked back from the mirror above the sink was staring at a firing squad as Georgia held her icy hands under the hot water.

But then the stare turned defiant.

She hadn’t driven all the way from Arkansas to live in her car and get this job interview just to become distracted at the critical moment by some prissy, no-account donut police. Who did he think he was? It wasn’t even his donut, and anyway, he wasn’t doing the hiring. Her only task at this moment was to deliver the interview of a lifetime and get this job.

She squared her shoulders, practiced her smile in the mirror two or three times and strode with her head erect back along the deserted corridor to the interview room.

The man who entered the conference room five minutes later had the stiff-backed posture and shorn hair of a military man. He was well over six feet tall, lean, in his late forties, wearing neatly rolled blue chambray shirtsleeves and a bright yellow bow tie. As he shook her hand and sat opposite her, she saw that his stubble of hair was red and his eyes were a muted green. Fellow Irishman, maybe. Could she forge some connection from that?

“I’m Ken Madigan, the General Counsel here. Are you Georgia Griffin?”

“Yes, sir, I am.” She offered her carefully calibrated, not-alarming smile.

“Appreciate you coming in today. Sorry to keep you waiting.” He tapped a green folder with her name on the tab. “I’ve read your resume, so I won’t ask you to repeat it. As you know, we have a key job to fill after quite a hiring freeze. Let’s start with what’s important to you in your next job.”

“Well, sir, I just got my paralegal certificate, and I’m looking for the opportunity to put my learning and judgment to use. I intend to prove that I can make a real difference to my company, and then I’d like to advance.”

His smile was encouraging. “Advance to what?”

This was a variant of the ‘five years’ question, and she answered confidently. “In five years I’d still like to be in the legal department, but I want to have learned everything there is to know about the other parts of the company, too. My goal is to become, well, indispensable.”

“Is anything else important?” Those gray-green eyes were watching her with mild interest. She decided to take a chance and expose a tiny bit of her peculiar background to personalize this interview.

“Well, sir, I’m eager to get started, because I need to make enough money to get my baby sister here just as soon as I can make a place for her.”

His raised his eyebrows slightly. “And how old is she?”

“Fifteen, sir, and needing a better future than the one she’s got. I need to move pretty fast on that one.”

“I see. Now tell me about your work experience.” Which was where these interviews generally died. She shoved her cold hands between her thighs and the chair.

“I don’t have a lot of glamorous experience, sir. I cleaned houses and worked as a waitress at the WhistleStop to get myself through school. And the whole time I was growing up I helped my father look after the horses he was boarding. In fact, he got so busy with his second job for a while that I just took over the horses myself. Horses are expensive, delicate animals, and things can go wrong in a heartbeat. With me in charge, our horses did fine.”

“Okay, great.” He ran his palm over his stubble of hair, considering. “Now tell me what kind of people you like to work with.” Not one follow-up question about her experience. Did he think there was nothing worth talking about? Just focus on the question.

“The main thing is I want to work with smart people who like to do things right the first time. And people who just, you know, have common sense.”

“I see. And what kind of people bug you?” This interviewer wasn’t talking much, which made it hard to tell what impression she was making. A bead of sweat trickled between her shoulder blades.

“Well, I don’t much like hypocrites.” Which unfortunately eliminated about half the human race, but she wouldn’t mention that. He waited. “And I don’t like people who can’t or won’t do their jobs.” She stopped there, in spite of his continued silence. No need to mention pedophiles, or that nasty prison guard who’d backed her against the wall on the catwalk. That probably wasn’t what Ken Madigan had in mind.

“Thank you.” He tapped his pen on her resume. “Now I’d like you to describe yourself with three adjectives.”

Was this guy jerking her chain? He didn’t much look like he’d jerk anybody’s chain, but what did adjectives have to do with job qualifications? Maybe he was politely passing the time because he’d already decided not to hire her.

“Well,” she said, glancing into the corner, “I guess I would say I’m effective. Quick at sizing up a situation.” She paused. “And then I’m trying to decide between ‘inventive’ and ‘tough.’”

“Okay, I’ll give you both. Inventive and tough. Tell me about a time you were quick at sizing up a situation.” This didn’t feel like the other interviews she’d done. Not only were the questions weird, but he seemed to be listening to her so closely. She couldn’t recall ever being listened to quite like this.

To her astonishment she said exactly what came into her head. “Well, like this one. I can already tell that you’re a kind person who cares about the people who work for you. I think you’re pretty smart, and you listen with a capital L. You might have a problem standing up to people who aren’t as smart or above board as you are, though. That could be holding you back some.”

Ken Madigan’s eyebrows were suddenly up near his hairline. Why on earth was she spilling her insights about him to him? Too many weeks of isolation? Was it hunger? She should have taken that coffee after all, if only to dump plenty of sugar in it. Or was it something about him, that earnest-looking bow tie maybe, that made her idiotically want to be understood? Whatever it was, she’d blown the interview. Good thing she wasn’t the sort of weakling who cried.

So move it along and get out of there. She dropped her forehead into her hand. “God, I can’t believe I just said all that. You probably don’t have any flaws at all, sir, and if you do it isn’t my place to notice them. I guess I need another adjective.”

“Which would be . . . ?”

“Blunt.”

He lowered one eyebrow slightly. “Let’s say ‘forthright.’ And I won’t need an example.”

“You know what, though?” There was nothing left to lose, really, and she was curious. “I’m not this ‘forthright’ with everybody. A lot of people must just talk to you.”

“They do,” he acknowledged with a single nod, his eyebrows resuming their natural location. “It’s an accident of birth. But they usually don’t say anything this interesting.” He sounded amused. Could she salvage this?

“Well, I’m completely embarrassed I got so personal.”

“You shouldn’t be. I’m impressed with your insight.”

“Really? Then maybe you see what I mean about being quick.”

He laughed. “I believe I do.”

“I mean, I can be quick about other things, too. Quick to see a problem starting up. Sometimes quick to see what’ll solve it. Like when my father had to go away and I saw we’d have to sell the stable to pay the taxes . . .” Blah blah blah, there she went again. She resisted clapping her hand over her mouth. Was she trying to lose this job?

The woman with the bouncy ponytail stuck her head in. “I’m so sorry, but Roy would like to see you in his office right away. And your next appointment is already downstairs.” She handed him another green folder. The tab said ‘Sarah Millchamp.’ “I’m going to lunch, but I’ll have Maggie go down for her in ten minutes. She’ll be in here whenever you’re ready.”

“Thanks, Nikki,” he said, turning back to Georgia. “Unfortunately, it looks like our time’s about up. Do you have a question for me before we stop?”

Sixty seconds left to make an impression. “I saw your stock’s been going up. Do you think it’s going up for the right reasons?”

There went his eyebrows again, and this time his mouth seemed to be restraining a smile. “Not entirely, no, as a matter of fact.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Do you have an opinion about improvements that would make your growth more sustainable?”

He allowed his smile to expand. “I have many opinions, and a small amount of real insight. Might be difficult to discuss right now . . .”

She held a hand up. “Oh, I understand. But do you think a paralegal could help make a difference?”
“A solid paralegal could make a big difference.”

“I’d like to know more about the issues, sir, but they’re probably confidential, and anyway, I know you have to leave.” She leaned forward, preparing to stand up.

“You’re a surprising person, Ms. Griffin, and an interesting one. I’ve enjoyed our conversation.”
Like he enjoyed a circus freak, probably. She made her smile humble. “Thank you.”

“If it’s all right with you, I’d like to have somebody from Human Resources give you a call in the next day or two.”

Was he serious? “That would be fine.”

“If we decide to work together, could you start pretty quickly?”

The goal now was to leave without saying anything else stupid. “I’m sure I can meet your requirements.”

As he walked her out to the elevator he lowered his voice. “You know, Ms. Griffin, you’re an intuitive person, and you might have some insights about the Human Resources people you’re about to meet . . .”

She held up her palm. “Don’t worry, sir. If I do, I’ll keep my mouth shut.”

“Excellent. Great talking to you. Drive safely, now,” he called as the elevator door closed between them.

Thank God that interview was finished. In another five minutes she’d have told him anything, she’d have told him about Robbie. Drive safely? What a cornball. But she must have said something right. He gave her that tip about getting past the Human Resources people, which meant he must like her. Landing a first job with her resume was like trying to freeze fire, but this time at least she had a chance.

Her stomach cramped with hunger as she emerged into the lobby and saw a woman in her mid-thirties glancing through a magazine. Tailored suit, precision-cut blond hair, leather case laid neatly across her lap. Completely professional, and she had ten years’ experience on Georgia at least. No. No way. Georgia walked briskly over to the woman and stood between her and the receptionist.

“Ms. Millchamp?” she said quietly, extending her hand.

The woman stood up and smiled. “Sarah Millchamp. Nice to meet you. I know I’m early.”

“I’m Misty. So sorry to tell you this, but Mr. Madigan’s been called out of town unexpectedly. He’s headed for the airport now.”

“Oh!” The poised Ms. Millchamp quickly regained her composure. “That’s too bad. But of course I understand.”

“Thank you for being so understanding. This literally happened ten minutes ago, and I’m completely flustered. I know he wants to meet you. Are you parked out here? At least let me walk you to your car.”

She put a sisterly hand against Ms. Millchamp’s elbow and began steering her toward the exit. “Tell you what, can I call you to reschedule as soon as Mr. Madigan gets back? Maybe you two can have lunch. Just don’t take that job at Google in the meantime.”

“Google?”

“Now, don’t pretend you haven’t heard about the job at Google. In Brad Dormond’s department? They’re our worst nightmare when it comes to competing for good people.” The air in the parking lot mingled the spicy scent of eucalyptus with the smell of rancid engine grease, and her stomach lurched. “So, see over there? That’s the entrance to the freeway. Bye now. I’ll call you soon.”

Georgia waved as Sarah Millchamp backed her car out. Then she hurried back inside to the receptionist.

“Hi,” she said. “That lady, Ms. Millchamp? She just let me know she has a migraine and will call to reschedule. Will you let Maggie know?”

The receptionist nodded and picked up her phone. “That’s too bad.”

“Isn’t it, though?”

Done and dusted, as Gramma Griffin would say.

She still might not get the job, of course, she reminded herself as she pulled onto the freeway, nibbling a half-eaten dinner roll she’d squirreled away in the crack between her passenger seat cushions the night before. She’d gotten this far once before. And she didn’t have to get it. She had another dozen resumes out, and one of those might still lead to something. Her cousin at Apple had turned out to be more useless than a well dug in a river, but that didn’t mean she was desperate. If she continued sleeping in her car most nights her money could last for another five weeks. And Lumina Software might not be a great job, anyway. Ken Madigan probably just interviewed well. That’s probably all it was.

Author Bio:

Susan Wolfe is a lawyer with a B.A. from the University of Chicago and a law degree from Stanford University. After four years of practicing law full time, she bailed out and wrote the best-selling novel, The Last Billable Hour, which won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel. She returned to law for another sixteen years, first as a criminal defense attorney and then as an in-house lawyer for Silicon Valley high-tech companies. Born and raised in San Bernardino, California, she now lives in Palo Alto, California, with her husband, Ralph DeVoe. Her new novel, Escape Velocity, will be published in October of 2016.

Q&A with Susan Wolfe

Welcome!

Do you draw from personal experiences and/or current events?
Both of my books are firmly grounded in my career as a Silicon Valley lawyer. I want my readers to experience the inner workings of a Silicon Valley law firm (in The Last Billable Hour, my Edgar Award winning mystery) and then the inner workings of a high-tech corporation (in Escape Velocity, my new Silicon Valley thriller.) This includes the politics, the banter, the in-fighting, and even the speech patterns of the different characters, along with some authentic crises the organizations might face. I hope I convey a powerful sense of place, because I don’t think the books could be set anywhere else.

Do you start with the conclusion and plot in reverse or start from the beginning and see where the story line brings you?
I seem to start with an atmosphere/environment and a point of view about that environment. Then I conceive a main character to guide the reader through the story, and then I write the first chapters until I can hear the main character’s internal voice. I can’t make any progress with the plot until I’ve done those things.

By the time I have the character’s internal voice, I already have certain vivid scenes in mind. At that point I get a pad of giant graph paper (my husband is a physicist, so we have this stuff lying around) make a post-it note for each must-have scene, and position it on the graph paper more or less where I imagine it will be. I also have some idea of how the story will end up, meaning I know whether my main character(s) are going to succeed or fail in their quest(s) and how I expect the character to change (or not change) by the end of the story.

Then I go to work on the plot. I start with the last chapter, think about what needs to happen to get the characters there, and then conceive a scene that will lead to that last chapter. Then I do the same with the next-to-last chapter and continue backwards until I feel I have an outline of the whole story. The plot is the spine of the book, from which I will hang these post-it scenes that make the characters bump up against each other in ways that reveal who they are.

Plotting is the hardest part of my planning process. Once I can see this whole cause-and-effect spine of the story, I can get down to business drafting the actual chapters.

Are any of your characters based on you or people that you know?
I think convincing characters are always “based on” the author herself or people she knows, because the author consults her personal beliefs about human nature to determine how her character will behave in a given situation. For example, in the opening scene of Escape Velocity, Georgia Griffin tricks a competitor in order to land a job she desperately needs. That doesn’t mean I would personally behave that way, or even that I know somebody who actually behaved that way. Part of the fun of writing (and reading) is having characters do things I might want to do, and can imagine doing, but wouldn’t actually do myself.

So is Georgia “based on” me or other people I know? Yes, because she issues from my own impulses and desires and beliefs about human nature. But then I transform her with my imagination.

One note: In the short time Georgia, has been out in public, I have had two different acquaintances recount doing something very similar to what Georgia does in that opening chapter. I love that. It tells me I my beliefs about human nature were on track!

Your routine when writing? Any idiosyncrasies?
I have a pretty specific writing routine which I love.

I get up at 5:30, then “commute” four blocks to Peets Coffee at 5:50 or so, then return home and go straight into my writing room, which is my converted free-standing garage. This is how I signal my transition from home to work, and I suppose it could be considered an idiosyncrasy. I commuted every day for thirty-odd years and it did signal the transition, so I’ve just kept it up.

I try to start writing by 6:15 and do three 90-minute sessions each morning. (Some flexibility if I’m in the middle of a great scene.) On my two breaks between sessions I go for a jog, do a 20-minute meditation, eat and shower. Then I’m done for the day at 12:45 or 1. In the afternoons I try to be sure to see at least one friend to balance the solitude of writing, and then do everything else that needs to get done just to live my life: errands, reading, planning social events, hanging out with my two cats.

Tell us why we should read this book
From the early feedback I’ve gotten, people appreciate this book for several different reasons: 1) They like my quirky main character, Georgia Griffin, and want to find out if she’ll succeed or fail; 2) They love to see some extremely annoying people they’ve had to put up with at work get their just deserts; 3) They like learning what it’s like to work in a Silicon Valley high tech company; and/or 4) they think it is “wickedly hilarious” as one of my reviewers so kindly said. I do think the book operates on several levels, and hope readers can enjoy all these aspects of the book at once.

Who are some of your favorite authors?
My favorite living authors:

Hilary Mantel (the Thomas Cromwell Wolf Hall trilogy, or it will be a trilogy if we ever get that third book!)

Donna Tartt (The Goldfinch is one of my great reads of all time)

Ian McEwan (best ever author of literary creepy!)

Haruki Murakami (What’s not to love about Colonel Sanders come to life and talking cats?)

Tana French (I own every book in hardback because my daughter and I must read them immediately)

For my favorite authors of all time I would add:

William Faulkner (Thomas Sutpen of Absalom! Absalom! is to me one the great characters in all of literature)

Herman Melville (Love the whale!)

Jane Austen (Emma particularly)

Gustave Flaubert (I always root for Emma Bovary and hope it will come out differently)

Virginia Woolf (She made me determined to be a writer.)

What are you reading now?
I am now and for the foreseeable future reading the 1100-page Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. (My book group is fearless!) He might get added to my favorite authors, but I won’t know until I finish.

My next books will be: Tana French’s new book The Trespasser (my daughter is already ahead of me on this one); Ian McEwan’s new book Nutshell; and Memento Mori by Muriel Spark.

Are you working on your next novel? Can you tell us a little about it?
My next novel is set in San Bernardino, California. San Bernardino was a working-class town when I grew up in it, and is now the second poorest large city in the country (after Detroit.)

The story begins when my protagonist is at the vet for a routine visit with his cat. A woman brings in a cat that has been badly mistreated and then races out the door before anybody can ask her about it. The terror in the woman’s eyes triggers memories from the protagonist’s childhood, and he is convinced the person who hurt the cat is an imminent danger to people as well. He decides to right an old wrong by finding the wrongdoer before it’s too late.

He manages to enlist the (somewhat skeptical) help of an animal control person and a forensics person in his unorthodox effort, because both of them have strong personal reasons for becoming involved. We now have four people (including the wrongdoer) who all badly want to succeed with conflicting goals in a race against the clock.

Your novel will be a movie. Who would you cast?
Fun to think about!

Saoirse Ronan or Nina Arianda for Georgia

Kyle Chandler or Matt Damon for Ken Madigan

Alec Baldwin or John Hurd or Timothy Spall for CEO

Anna Gunn or Tilda Swinton for HR person

Favorite leisure activity/hobby?
Theater! I’m heading to NYC in a few days to see four plays and an opera in a week. Favorite plays ever: Sweeny Todd, Amadeus, Doubt, Book of Mormon, Hamilton, Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 in the same day.

Favorite meal?
My favorite meal is from Trattoria Garga in Florence:

Bruschetta with Oven-roasted tomatoes

Pasta Magnifico (thin fettuccine with citrus zest)

Giant very rare Florentine steak

Chocolate tart

If you and a friend share the pasta and steak you will still have plenty. And if I had to keep it simple, I could make a whole meal of just the chocolate tart. Fun fact: I wrote to the owner, Sharon Gargani, and persuaded her to send me the tart recipe. I now make this tart myself!

Thank you for stopping by CMash Reads

P.S. That Chocolate Tart sounds delicious, but then, anything that has chocolate in it is my downfall. CMR

Catch Up with Susan Wolfe on her Website 🔗, on Twitter 🔗, and on Facebook 🔗!

Tour Participants:

Stop by the other hosts as well for excerpts, guest posts, interviews, reviews, and, of course, more great giveaways!

Join In on the Giveaway!

This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours for Author Guide and Susan Wolfe. There will be 1 US winner of one (1) $50 Amazon.com giftcard AND 5 US winners of one (1) eBook copy of Escape Velocity by Susan Wolfe. The giveaway begins on October 31st and runs through January 7th, 2017.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Get More Great Reads at Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours

REVIEW DISCLAIMER

This blog was founded on the premise to write honest reviews, to the best of my ability, no matter who from, where from and/or how the book was obtained, and will continue to do so, even if it is through PICT or PBP.

DISCLAIMER

I received a copy of this book, at no charge to me, in exchange for my honest review.

No items that I receive are ever sold…they are kept by me, or given to family and/or friends.

ADDENDUM

I do not have any affiliation with Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. I am an IndieBound affiliate. I am providing link(s) solely for visitors that may be interested in purchasing this Book/EBook.

Book Review, Giveaway, Partners In Crime Tours, Showcase

SKIN OF TATTOOS by Christina Hoag (Review, Showcase & Giveaway) PICT PRESENTS

CMash November 23, 2016 2 Comments

Skin of Tattoos

by Christina Hoag

on Tour October 17 – November 24, 2016

Synopsis:

Skin of Tattoos by Christina Hoag Los Angeles homeboy Magdaleno is paroled from prison after serving time on a gun possession frameup by a rival, Rico, who takes over as gang shotcaller in Mags’s absence. Mags promises himself and his Salvadoran immigrant family a fresh start, but he can’t find either the decent job or the respect he craves from his parents and his firefighter brother, who look at him as a disappointment. Moreover, Rico, under pressure to earn money to free the Cyco Lokos’ jailed top leader and eager to exert his authority over his rival-turned-underling, isn’t about to let Mags get out of his reach. Ultimately, Mags’s desire for revenge and respect pushes him to make a decision that ensnares him in a world seeded with deceit and betrayal, where the only escape from rules that carry a heavy price for transgression is sacrifice.

Kirkus Review:

Hoag tells the story of a gang member’s attempts to flee his life of crime in this debut novel.

After 26 months in prison, 20-year-old Magdaleno “Mags” Argueta knows he can’t go back to his previous life as a member of the Cyco Lokos, one of Los Angeles’ most notorious Salvadoran street gangs. He’s hoping his time served will earn him veteran status, allowing him to walk away without repercussions. Unfortunately, his crew is now under the command of his chief rival, Rico, who’s less than sympathetic to his aspirations to go straight. What’s more, the only jobs available to a tatted-up ex-con like Mags are demeaning, such as passing out fliers on the sidewalk while dressed as a clown. At home, his family relationships remain strained: his mother sees him as a disappointment, his father as a source of shame, and his fireman brother makes him look irresponsible by comparison. His sister, Lissy, still treats him with affection, but he’s heard rumors that she’s hooked up with a member of a rival gang. Despite his pledges to stay out of trouble, Mags finds that no one believes he’s up to the task. His parole officer tells him, “The life’s not going to let you go so easy.” As hard as that is to hear, Mags knows that it might be the truth. Hoag is a talented writer, summoning Mags’ world on the page with remarkable empathy and detail: “The sidewalks were crammed like a giant flea market—people selling jeans, pots and pans, plastic bags of mango slices….Everything looked familiar and strange at the same time, old and new, I belonged and I didn’t.” Despite a story that feels a bit well-trod, none of the characters seem hastily constructed or come off as clichés. Their pressures and motivations are clearly stated and genuinely felt, and readers will quickly become invested in Mags and his confrontation with an uncertain future. A sense of melodrama flares toward the end as events start to feel less realistic and a little more heightened and Hollywood-ish. But the overall experience is surprisingly nuanced and wholly enjoyable.

A well-crafted, engaging novel about an ex-con trying to break free.

MY REVIEW

4 stars

We have all seen on TV, read about and/or heard about gangs in today’s society but Ms. Hoag brings us inside the gritty world of gangs with SKIN OF TATTOOS.

Magdaleno, aka Mags, has just been released from jail, after taking the fall for one of his “homies” from the Cyko Lokos gang, which he is a part of. But this time it will be different. He is ready to leave the gang life but soon realizes it’s harder to leave than it was to join. Is death the only way out?

A compelling, and at times chilling, tale of the inner workings of what it is to be entrenched in a gang lifestyle. The “codes”, the rules, the crimes and even the betrayals.

Ms. Hoag has written a truly extensive and intensive story that will have you turning the pages.

Book Details:

Genre: Literary Crime
Published by: Martin Brown Publishing
Publication Date: September 2016
Number of Pages: 267
ISBN: 9871937070663

Get Your Copy of Skin of Tattoos on Amazon ⇗, Barnes & Noble ⇗, & add it to your Goodreads ⇗ list.

Read an excerpt:

“Ay yo, homes!” A familiar voice sliced through the bustle. “Mags!”

I twirled faster than a ballet dancer, my stomach clenching. Fuck. It was him. Rico. Slashing across the street aiming the shopping bag in his hand at me. His baggy shorts slung so low the waistband of his boxers showed. Socks, white as fluorescent light, pulled neatly to his knees. Ink flowing out of the arms and neck of his plaid shirt. Exactly how he looked the last time I saw him.

The memory of that day bore down on me. We were kicking it at a street corner, and Rico was bragging about how he shot a trey-eight into the ceiling of a liquor store he was jacking, and the storeowner pissed his pants. As he was talking, he took the .38 out of his waistband in a live re-enactment, and I just had to take the piece, feeling its cold weight in my hand for just a second or two before handing it back to Rico. That second or two cost me twenty-six months of my freedom.

When Tweety yelled “five-o,” Rico took off like an Olympic sprinter. I never even saw him throw down the cuete. I had no reason to run. As Morales was giving me his routine hassle, he kicked the edge of a bush behind me. Then he crouched down. When he straightened, he was dangling the piece with a pen hooked through its trigger guard. He busted me on possession of a firearm. It got worse. They matched the cuete to the robbery, and my fucking prints were the only clear ones on it. I had no alibi. The fact was, I was doing a drop with Chivas to the big jefe that night.

Lissy signed a statement saying I was watching TV with her at home that night, but nobody believed her, seeing as she had said that before when I got busted. I couldn’t drop Rico’s name or I’d have a green light on me as a snitch. My P.D. told me to take the D.A.’s deal even though the storeowner couldn’t positively identify me in a lineup. I took the hit for possession, and they dropped the robbery, as well as the ADW charge, which they tacked on since “I” waved the piece around and shot it during the robbery. Like I would ever pull such a dumbass move.

Rico threw his arm around me. A thick gold chain shone around his neck. I had a cord with an orange arrow slung around mine.

“Ese.” My voice had as much life as a three-day-old soda.

I never knew if he dropped that thirty-eight by accident, as he said, or if he saw his chance to set me up. I kinda figured the latter. Someday, somehow, I’d get him to admit the truth to me.

“I thought that was you. But I said to myself, ‘Mags, in that fuckin pendejada? Couldn’t be.’ But I looked again and *simón,* it was. Whatup with this shit?” He flicked the red nose ball. I caught his wrist in midair and stared him down in his swamp eyes. “Easy, fool,” he said.

I dropped his wrist. “Just making a few bones.”

“I heard you was back. We been waiting for you at the garaje, but you ain’t showed up.” Rico drilled my eyes. “You avoiding your homies or what?”

The ball was itching my nose like an oversized mosquito bite. “I got parole and all that. I just wanted to get set up first.”

“I figured you needed a couple days to get readjusted, get some pussy.” He shook his head. “But damn, this shit?” He shook his head. “You ready to get crazy again?”

“Keeping it lo pro, Rico.”

Rico studied me. I suddenly glimpsed myself in his eyes—I had become a small brown man.

Author Bio:

Christina Hoag is a novelist in Los Angeles,. She is the author of “Girl on the Brink” (Fire and Ice YA/Melange Books, August 2016,) a YA romantic thriller about an abusive relationship, and “Skin of Tattoos “(Martin Brown Publishing, August 2016), a literary thriller about the gang world.

She also co-authored “Peace in the Hood: Working with Gang Members to End the Violence,” a groundbreaking book on gang intervention (Turner Publishing, 2014).

A former staff writer for The Miami Herald and The Associated Press in Los Angeles, she was also a correspondent in Latin America, where she reported from 14 countries on issues such as the rise of Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, Colombian guerrillas, Guatemalan human rights, Salvadoran gangs, Nicaraguan landmine victims, and Mexican protests, for Time, Business Week, Financial Times, Houston Chronicle, the New York Times, and other publications.

She has had numerous short stories, poems and creative nonfiction published in literary magazines and journals, Her short story “My Mother’s Knives” was included in a horror story anthology, “And Now the Nightmare Begins” (Bear Manor Media, 2009) and her literary short story “Life Stories” is forthcoming in the anthology “100 Voices” (Centum Press, 2016)

Catch up with Christina on her Website ⇗, Twitter ⇗, or on Christina Hoag’s Facebook ⇗.

Tour Participants:

Visit these other Skin of Tattoos tour participants for more giveaways, reviews, guest posts, and interviews!

Giveaway:

This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours for Christina Hoag. There will 1 winner of a $15 Amazon.com gift card & 5 US winners of one (1) eBook copy of Skin of Tattoos by Christina Hoag. The giveaway begins on October 15th and runs through November 27th, 2016.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Get More Great Reads at Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours

Book Blast, Book Review, Giveaway, Partners In Crime Tours

FOR DUTY AND HONOR by Leo J. Maloney (Review, Blast & Giveaway) ~ PICT Presents

CMash November 22, 2016 1 Comment

For Duty and Honor

by Leo J. Maloney

November 22, 2016 Book Blast

Synopsis:

For Duty and Honor by Leo J. Maloney In this action-packed novella, Black Ops veteran Leo J. Maloney delivers a heart-pounding tale as fast, cold, and sleek as a 9mm bullet…

For Duty And Honor

The unthinkable has happened to operative Dan Morgan. Captured by the Russians. Imprisoned in the Gulag. Tortured by his cruelest, most sadistic enemy. But Morgan knows that every prisoner has a past—and every rival can be used. With the most unlikely of allies, Morgan hatches a plan. To save what’s important, he must risk everything. And that’s when the stakes go sky-high. Dan Morgan’s got to keep fighting. For duty. And honor. And even certain death…

MY REVIEW

4 stars

This is the first book that I have read by this “new to me” author. But it won’t be the last!

FOR DUTY AND HONOR, a novella, is a 96 page book that had me turning the pages to the very last word. Ninety-six pages of intense suspense and action.

The reader meets Dan Morgan while he is imprisoned in a primitive Russian jail trying to escape the brutal treatment but the reason is not known until the end, which was shocking. Also met, is his daughter, Alex, has she refuses to accept that he is missing and not knowing where he is or even worse, if he is dead.

This book had me on the edge of my seat! Chilling! Mr. Maloney is now on my “authors to read” list and can’t wait to read more by him. If he is also a “new to you” writer, I highly recommend that you read this novella and I guarantee you will be wanting more too!.

Book Details:

Genre: Thriller, Political Thriller
Published by: Kensington Books/Lyrical Underground
Publication Date: November 22nd 2016
Number of Pages: 96
ISBN: 1616509813 (ISBN13: 9781616509811)
Series: Dan Morgan #5.5

Purchase For Duty and Honor at Amazon 🔗, Barnes & Noble 🔗, & add it to your Goodreads 🔗 List!

Read an excerpt:

The prisoner’s body was a brick of exhaustion and pain.

Steel cuffs chafed against his raw wrists and ankles, the rough uniform scraping the burns and cuts that lined his arms and legs and pocked his torso. Even under the blackness of his hood, the prisoner smelled stale sweat mingled with his own breath: iron from the blood, acetone from the starvation. He could barely hold himself up against the jolting ride. All that was keeping him upright were the two thick guards at his sides boxing him in. At the outset, hours ago at the landing strip, the guards were in high spirits, joking and jesting in Russian, which the prisoner could not follow. Whenever he couldn’t hold himself up anymore and leaned into one of them or into the front seat, they would box the prisoner’s head and laugh, forcing him to sit upright again.

But as they drew nearer to their destination, and the car’s heating lost ground against the cold, the guards grew quiet, like there was something grim about the place even to them.

The prisoner swung forward as the jeep came to an abrupt stop, tires on gravel. The doors opened and the spaces on his sides cleared as the men got out, leaving him exposed to the frigid Siberian air. Against this cold, the canvas uniform felt like nothing at all.

The guards unlocked the cuffs and yanked the prisoner out. Too tired to offer any resistance, he walked along, bare feet on the freezing stony ground. Someone pulled off his cowl. He was struck by a hurricane of light that made him so dizzy that he would have vomited, if there were anything in his stomach. It took a moment for the image to stop swimming and resolve itself into the barren landscape of rock and creeping brush lit by a sun low in the sky.

The Siberian tundra.

They prodded him forward. He trudged toward the Brutalist conglomeration of buildings surrounded by tall mesh fences and barbed wire. Prison camp. Gulag. The prisoner’s trembling knee collapsed and he fell on the stony ground. A guard gave him a kick with a heavy, polished leather boot and pulled him to his feet.

They reached the top and entered the vakhta, the guardhouse. He passed through the first gate and was searched, rough hands prodding and poking at him. They then opened the second, leading him through, outside, into the yard. His gaze kept down, he saw guards’ boots, and massive furry Caucasian shepherds, each taller than a full-grown man’s waist. He didn’t look up to see the bare concrete guard towers that overlooked the terrain for miles around or at the sharpshooters that occupied them.

He was pulled inside the nearest boxy building, walls painted with chipping murals of old Soviet propaganda, apple-cheeked youngsters over fields of grain and brave soldiers of the Red Army standing against the octopus of international capitalism. On the second floor, they knocked on a wooden door.

“Postupat’.”

The guards opened the door, revealing an office with a vintage aristocratic desk. They pushed him onto the bare hardwood.

A man stood up with a creak of his chair. The prisoner watched as he approached, seeing from his vantage point only the wingtip oxfords and the hem of his pinstriped gabardine pants, walking around his desk, footsteps echoing in the concrete office.

“Amerikanskiy?”

“Da,” a guard answered.

The man crouched, studying the prisoner’s face. “You are one of General Suvorov’s, are you not?” His voice was deep and filled with gravel and a heavy Russian accent.

The prisoner didn’t respond—not that he needed to.

“You are tough, if he did not break you.” He stood, brushing off unseen dust from his suit jacket. “And if he had broken you, you would be dead already. I am Nevsky, the warden. Welcome to my prison.”

Author Bio:

Leo J. Maloney is a proud supporter of Mission K9 Rescue, www.missionk9rescue.org, which is dedicated to the service of retiring and retired military dogs and contract dogs and other dogs who serve. Mission K9 rescues, reunites, re-homes, rehabilitates, and repairs these hero dogs. Leo donates a portion of the proceeds from his writing to this organization. To find out more about Mission K9 Rescue, or to make your own donation, please visit www.missionk9rescue.org; or go to www.k9gala.org

;