When Samantha, from JKS Communications emailed me with their January tours, I know I wanted to meet and hear more about today’s guest, as I’m sure you will too.  So without further ado, Ms. Jenny Milchman!!

JENNY MILCHMAN

Jenny Milchman is a suspense writer from New Jersey. Her debut novel, COVER OF SNOW, is forthcoming from Ballantine in January 2013 and is available for pre-order now. Her short story The Closet was published in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine in November 2012. Another short story, The Very Old Man, has been an Amazon bestseller, and the short work Black Sun on Tupper Lake appears in the anthology ADIRONDACK MYSTERIES II.

Jenny is the Chair of the International Thriller Writers’ Debut Authors Program. She is also the founder of Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day, which was celebrated last year in all 50 states and four foreign countries by 350-and-growing bookstores.

Jenny hosts the Made It Moments forum on her blog, which has featured more than 250 international bestsellers, Edgar winners and independent authors. She co-hosts the literary series Writing Matters, which attracts guests coast-to-coast and has received national media attention, and loves to teach and speak about writing and publishing for New York Writers Workshop, Arts By The People, and WomenWhoWrite
Visit Jenny at her website, Facebook, Twitter and GoodReads.

GUEST POST

A Day in the Life of a Debut Novel…Make That Many Days

My debut novel, Cover of Snow, started life when one question grabbed me around the throat and refused to let go. What would make a good man do the worst thing he possibly could to his wife?

Of course, first I had to figure out what that worst thing would be.

I wasn’t a newlywed when the idea for Cover of Snow occurred to me, but we didn’t have kids yet, so were in that vast untrammeled region when the world still orbits around you as a couple. The worst thing a husband could do to his wife would be to leave her.

But how?

I’m a suspense writer, so my mind tends to go to dark scenarios. This wouldn’t be a women’s fiction novel about a divorce or love triangle. My heroine’s husband would abandon her in a way that revealed a whole nest of dark secrets.

Once I had that, I could begin to write. But if it seems easy from there…well, it wasn’t. This novel was written in two versions and two distinct phases of my life. The first one— with a different title, different cast of characters, different plot trajectory—contained only the above kernel. Husband loves wife, husband does something very bad.

That version was written before there were laptops, and largely before there was internet. I was accompanying my own husband on a business trip to North Carolina, and wrote chunks on a rented word processing machine at Kinko’s. Copying and other businessman’s and woman’s shuffle went on around me as I pounded out words.

I now know that I wrote that novel completely wrong—and not only because I was on a stool at Kinko’s—but also because aside from the opener, I didn’t have much of a story. And what I did have, I wasn’t sure how to communicate to the reader.

But that initial question had grabbed me around the throat and refused to let go. So some ten years later, I sat down and reread the novel I’d written in a copy shop. And I realized what was wrong with it.

Everything.

Now I could get to work.

A writing day in the life of Cover of Snow went something like this. I would wake up and not check my email. (Checking email is a recipe for delaying writing by two or three hours. For me anyway). There is one holdover from my Kinko’s days, and that’s that in addition to my netbook, I retain an old word-processing machine with a tower that runs Windows 98. This wondrous piece of machinery has never met an internet connection; in fact, it still backs up on floppies. (They’re growing scarce, so if you run across any, please send ’em my way).

First I would read over the previous day’s work, then stop for a quick breakfast. After that, I wrote for about three or four hours. Sometimes I looked at the old version, the one that didn’t work, to remind myself of characters or a line of dialogue, but mostly I was writing new. In the end, about 250 words were retained from that original novel.

A novel is a conversation between writer and reader, and even between a writer and herself. Anything you write one day will look different the next—that’s why it’s so hard for writers to stop editing and perfecting their work.

And sometimes you write the right book at the wrong time. The trick is to know when that has happened—and what the right time is.

Jenny Milchman is a suspense novelist from New Jersey whose short stories have appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Adirondack Mysteries II, and in an e-published volume called Lunch Reads. Jenny is the founder of Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day, and the chair of International Thriller Writers’ Debut Authors Program. Her first novel, Cover of Snow, is published by Ballantine.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Waking up one wintry morning in her old farmhouse nestled in the Adirondack Mountains of New York, Nora Hamilton instantly knows that something is wrong. When her fog of sleep clears, she finds her world is suddenly, irretrievably shattered: Her husband, Brendan,  has committed suicide.

The first few hours following Nora’s devastating discovery pass for her in a blur of numbness and disbelief. Then, a disturbing awareness slowly settles in: Brendan left no note and gave no indication that he was contemplating taking his own life. Why would a rock-solid police officer with unwavering affection for his wife, job, and quaint hometown suddenly choose to end it all? Having spent a lifetime avoiding hard truths, Nora must now start facing them.

Unraveling her late husband’s final days, Nora searches for answers—but meets with bewildering resistance from Brendan’s best friend and partner, his fellow police officers, and his brittle mother. It quickly becomes clear to Nora that she is asking questions no one wants to answer. For beneath the soft cover of snow lies a powerful conspiracy that will stop at nothing to keep its presence unknown . . . and its darkest secrets hidden.

I received an email from Nicky at Uniquely Books, wanting to introduce me to a new to me internationally acclaimed author J.M. Hoffman.  And instantly, I wanted to share with all of you.  So today, we get the chance to welcome and visit with Mr. Hoffman, here at CMash Reads.

J. M. HOFFMAN

Acclaimed as a “master raconteur” who writes with a “flair”(Times Literary Supplement of London), Hoffman has authored two non-fiction books and contributed to over a dozen others.

The Warwick Files is his debut work of fiction.

In addition to traveling the world lecturing about his books, Hoffman has also directed a dance troupe, taught darkroom technique, and explored Patagonia on horseback.

He lives just north of New York City.
Connect with author at his website here.
Learn more about the series here.

GUEST POST

My 2010 non-fiction book “took me five months and fifteen years to write,” as I explain in the Introduction: “five months of actual writing,” and fifteen years of research.

How long, then, did it take me to write “Checkpoint,” the inaugural tale in The Warwick Files?

It’s a short story, not even 10,000 words long.

I touch-type about 75 words a minute, because even though I ignored most of middle-school, I did pay attention in one class: typing.  They trained me to type 10,000 words in two hours, twenty-two minutes.

Now, I’m a notorious procrastinator, so we have to pad that considerably with time for things like grabbing a snack, checking my e-mail, and checking the postal mail, even at 9:30am, just in case the USPS suddenly revamped my delivery schedule and didn’t tell me.  Call it a long morning to type 10,000 words.

But of course that’s the easy part.

It takes much longer to decide what to write, something I usually do while driving or bicycling. I came up with the premise for “Checkpoint” on the way home in late summer.  Then I filled in details over the course of follow-up drives and rides.  Call it a couple of weeks.

But even that isn’t the hardest part.

The bulk of the work is creating the world in which the stories take place: the details that lie in the background, the background of the characters, the character of the locales, the local color, the colorful anecdotes, and so on, to say nothing of the voice of the author.  (I promise I don’t play this kind of silly word game in The Warwick Files — at least, not often.)

While “Checkpoint” is a complete story, as are all of the short stories in the series, it’s also part of a larger picture that readers discover bit by bit.  This is why we called the stories “episodes.”

I chose the thoroughly charming village of Warwick, NY for the central location, modifying it only slightly.  That gave me much of the background.  But I still had to invent some places in the village that are vital to the storyline, but which were inconveniently overlooked by the village planners and so don’t exist.

And I needed the main characters, starting with the hero.  The reader meets him when he’s in his 30s, but I had to create the life experience that formed him: his childhood, teen years, first love, first job (which is classified, so please don’t ask me), and so on, as well as his general temperament and personality.  Without those details, I couldn’t write the story.

I had to do the same for the important auxiliary characters, some of whom don’t even appear in the first few stories, and even for the minor roles, because this kind of detail keeps things interesting.

I’d put the total time — again, mostly in the car and on my bicycle — at somewhere around two months, on and off, bit by bit.

But the real investment in time isn’t writing at all.  It’s reading. While I’ve been doing that since preschool, it wasn’t until I was in my late teens that I started making mental notes as I read: Why does this work so well?  How did the author pull that off?  What would I do differently?  And so on.

In this regard, I’m grateful to my favorite authors: John Grisham and Tom Clancy, who introduced me to fun-filled fiction; Lee Child, whose books are still my personal favorites (even though, obviously, I love all my indirect mentors equally), and more.

So it took me a morning, two months, and more than twenty years to write “Checkpoint.”

I hope you enjoy reading it.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Checkpoint: A man evades a police checkpoint and unknowingly triggers his own murder. Police Chief Kai Goodman knows why. Do you?
The Warwick Files: A police chief with a secretive past. A quiet New York City suburb. And, officially, no spies.

THANKS TO AUTHOR, J. M. HOFFMAN, I HAVE
FIVE (5) SIGNED BOOKS TO GIVEAWAY.
OPEN TO ALL (EXCEPT BELGIUM,
NORWAY, SWEDEN, and INDIA)

DISCLAIMER
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.

Ready?  Another treat for you today!  When Liz from Media Muscle contacted me about today’s book, not only did the synopsis sound like a great read but I was intrigued about meeting the authors.  Father and daughter!  So please help me in welcoming Mr. John Stuart and Ms. Caitlin Stuart!

John Stuart and Caitlin Stuart

Hiding in Sunshine is the work of a father and daughter duo who reside in the immediate area where these fictional events transpire.  John Stuart is a successful high tech entrepreneur. Caitlin Stuart is a student and an aspiring writer with a lifelong love of reading and telling stories. This is their first co-authored novel- and is proof that a teenager and her dad can indeed collaborate amicably and productively!   They have chosen to use pseudonym’s to protect their identity (going along with the nature of the book).

GUEST POST

“Do the authors imagine that a scenario (like what happens in the book) could happen in the very near future? What would they do (or recommend to do) to prepare for something so catastrophic?”

Let us start by quoting Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta. On October 11^th, 2012 he said, “The United States was facing the possibility of a ‘cyber-Pearl Harbor’ and was increasingly vulnerable to foreign computer hackers who could dismantle the nation’s power grid, transportation system, financial networks and government.” He further continues, “An aggressor nation or extremist group could use these kinds of cyber tools to gain control of critical switches. They could derail passenger trains, or even more dangerous, derail passenger trains loaded with lethal chemicals. They could contaminate the water supply in major cities, or shut down the power grid across large parts of the country.”

Senators Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins wrote an op-ed piece in New York Tines on December 6^th, 2012: “A storm is surely gathering again, and we must resist the false sense of calm. The attack is not a matter of if, but when. It will not be launched from aircraft carriers, missile silos or massed armies. It will come through cyberspace and will strike our most vital computer systems, those that manage our electricity grids, oil and gas pipelines, telecommunications networks and financial markets.”

These cyber-attacks may strike us any time, and there is a possibility of occurring in the very near future. Enemies will attack when they want to. It’s not our choosing. Some of theprecautions one can take include keeping hard copies of monthly bank statements, 401K’s,and mutual fund statements. One should review credit card statements carefully and verify that there is nothing suspicious. Keep a summary of medications in printed form and routinely ask for a copy of medical records from the doctor’s office or the hospital. It’s not a bad idea to have at least one landline at home. It will be prudent to take the usual precautions for an extended power failure.

ABOUT THE BOOK

“Living lives of quiet affluence in a historic suburban Boston town, Gavin and Lisa Brinkley had no idea how quickly and decisively their lives, and those of their two young daughters, could be upended. A series of events—a mysterious break-in at their home, some menacing tailgating on the highway from Boston, a startling visit from an F.B.I. agent warning of an imminent kidnapping attempt—leads to the family’s abrupt uprooting from its comfortable existence into a terrifying new existence on the run, under new identities.  This taut thriller by a father daughter team follows the eleven-year odyssey of an American family on the run, in hiding through the mountain states of the American west, where survival skills and living off the grid are paramount, but so are friendship, cooperation, and resilience.  The enemy, always lurking just out of sight, is a foreign cyber-criminal enterprise that launches breathtaking assaults on the American banking system and physical infrastructure, but the Brinkleys also know that the threat is deeply personal, reaching ever closer to them from the shadows of the past.  At the same time, Gavin and Lisa discover the perils of wandering too close to the edges of the dark side, in the murky world of cyber-security.  A compelling story of suspense and treachery, HIDING IN SUNSHINE is also a celebration of a family’s abiding love and courage—and a young girl’s faith in the triumph of the truth.”

THANKS TO LIZ FROM MEDIA MUSCLE, I HAVE
ONE (1) COPY OF THIS BOOK TO GIVE AWAY.
U.S. AND CANADA RESIDENTS ONLY

CLICK HERE FOR ENTRY PAGE

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.

Today I have the the honor and pleasure to introduce you to Mr. Frank Zaccari, as he stops by and visits, during his VT with Providence Book Promotions.  Please help me welcome him to CMash Reads.

FRANK ZACCARI

Frank Zaccari is a native of western New York. He received his bachelor’s in finance from California State University at Sacramento after serving as a military medic in the United States Air Force. He spent more than two decades in the technology industry, holding various positions from account representative to CEO. He also spent time specializing in turn-around management of companies under $100 million. Zaccari left the industry to provide primary care of his children, purchasing a small business that was more accommodating to his family. He presently owns an insurance agency in Sacramento, where he currently resides. “Five Years to Live” is not his only book for sale. He has also written, “When the Wife Cheats,” “From the Ashes: The Rise of the University of Washington Volleyball Program,” and “Inside the Spaghetti Bowl.”
Visit Frank at his website here.

ABOUT THE BOOK

It is the phone call every person lives in fear of receiving. There has been an accident and your loved one is paralyzed. A spinal cord injury is the single most devastating and life altering event. Based on a true story, Michael and Donna were young, successful, in love and planning their life together. That life was radically changed by a tragic car accident. Now a wheelchair user as a quadriplegic, with limited movement, constant infections and multiple surgeries, doctors projected Michael’s best case life expectancy to be five years. See how this young couple battles through his injury and spends his five years making a lasting impact on hundreds of people. It will make you realize what can be accomplished when a person does not let circumstances dictate their life.
Purchase Link:  

Read an excerpt:

With terror in his voice, he said, “I’m not going to walk again, am I?”

“We don’t really know yet, like I said…”

Michael angrily cut her off “Answer the god-damn question. I’m not going to walk again am I?

“I don’t know Michael.” Tears began to will up in his eyes, and he looked at her, begging for an answer.

After she wiped the tear from her eyes she said “The odds are not in your favor.”

Follow Frank’s tour here for a chance to win a copy of Five Years To Live.

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 affliate.
I am providing link(s) solely for visitors
that may be interested in purchasing this Book/EBook.

I received today’s guest’s book in the mail and was surprised at the delivery.  When I read the synopsis, I knew Linda from The Hachette Book Group, had sent me a book that I would enjoy.  And then I had the ultimate honor to host this author, as she stops by and tells us about her book.  Please help me give a very warm welcome to Lucretia Grindle!!!

LUCRETIA GRINDLE

Lucretia Grindle was born in Boston, Massachusetts, and grew up spending half her time in the United States and half her time in the UK. Continuing as she started out, she still splits her time, but now calls the coast of Maine home.

GUEST POST

First, I’d like to thank you for inviting me. Being a guest author is a real honor. I’m always thrilled when readers enjoy one of my books, so I’d like to start by saying thank you for that, too. Although, strangely, once they are written, I always feel that they’re kind of ‘Out There On Their Own’, a bit like children who’ve grown up and, finally, left home. That having been said, I’m especially fond of Villa Triste. It’s a special book to me, and I’d like to take a few minutes to talk about why that is.

Several years ago, I decided that I wanted to write a trilogy of novels set in Italy. This sprang, in part, from my own realization of what I didn’t (and I’m sure still don’t) understand about a country I have come to love so much. It began with Italy’s role in World War II, which I had always found confusing, and in particular with a series of plaques that I began to notice in my wanderings around Florence. Almost all of them referred to The Partisans, whom I knew nothing about. As I began to discover more, I also began to look rather differently at the old lady who ran my green grocers, at the old man who fed the cats on the steps that lead to my favorite church, at the caretaker in the piazza around the corner from my flat, at the flower-seller and his wife who kept the kiosk on the corner. All of them were probably in their eighties; all of them had lived through 1943 and 1944. As my research grew deeper, I realized that many of them had probably fought their way through those years. More than one in four of the Italian Partisans were women. It began to occur to me that sweet old ladies, as well as sweet old men, might have very unexpected pasts.

While Villa Triste is a work of fiction, everything, down to the dates and locations of the Allied bombings, is based on fact. The two sisters are an amalgamation of several women, but the family I describe existed, as did everything that happens to Isabella and Caterina. Even the little red book is based on another tiny book kept hidden in the hem of a dress – although that one was in Milan. There was a radio circuit. It had a different name, but its fate was the same as is portrayed in the book. Villa Triste is simply my answer to what might have happened. I hope, too, that it is also the story of those very ordinary heroes who, when pressed with the moment, found such extraordinary courage.

Villa Triste is also important to me for a very personal reason. I’ve been married for the past fifteen years. My husband will be eighty-seven this year. In the course of my marriage, I have often been annoyed, and frequently infuriated, by the way older people are treated, the way they are patronized and too often, marginalized – patted on the head like sweet little creatures – or simply ignored, both in life, and in fiction. I’m sick of action heroes and heroines who are always and eternally thirty-five and beautiful. Who says beauty stops at fifty or for that matter sixty or seventy, anyway? Who says brains, guile, sneakiness, nobility and even evil stop at fifty-five or sixty-five or for that matter, ninety-five?

That’s one of my pet hates, or rather two of them – the trope of the youngish athletic overly qualified character with a weird name who steps forth to carry out derring-do, be it good or bad; and the idea that the elderly do not have Agency. And I’m sick of, and a bit sickened by, the increasingly bizarrely chopped up bodies of young women that are too often a feature of crime writing. In Villa Triste, the corpses are old men. The heroes and heroines are lost back in time, and with a few exceptions, the players who exist today are graying. Love, need, shame, courage, and fury – they bind into all of us and make us who we are, no matter what our age. To me, Villa Triste is a story about that as much as it is a story about anything. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed researching and writing it.

With all best wishes,

Lucretia

ABOUT THE BOOK

Florence, 1943. Two sisters, Isabella and Caterina Cammaccio, find themselves surrounded by terror and death; and with Italy trapped under the heel of a brutal Nazi occupation, bands of Partisans rise up.

Soon Isabella and Caterina will test their wits and deepest beliefs as never before. As the winter grinds on, they will be forced to make the most important decisions of their lives. Their choices will reverberate for decades.

In the present day, Alessandro Pallioti, a senior policeman agrees to oversee a murder investigation, after it emerges the victim was once a Partisan hero. When the case begins to unravel, Pallioti finds himself working to uncover a crime lost in the twilight of war, the consequences of which are as deadly today as they were over sixty years ago.

THANKS TO LINDA FROM THE HACHETTE BOOK GROUP, I HAVE
THREE (3) SIGNED COPIES OF THIS BOOK TO GIVE AWAY
U.S. AND CANADA RESIDENTS ONLY

CLICK HERE FOR THE ENTRY PAGE

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.

Friends!!!  We all have and need them in our lives!  We share our lives with them, laugh and cry, depend on and are there for them, some are real, others virtual but can grow to become part of our daily lives.  They are called by many names, buddies, pals, BFFs, etc.. Today my friend, Joe, from Doubleday is stopping by, to introduce us to someone who knows all about friends and has written a book on these important people in our lives as she begins her VT with Providence Book Promotions.  So without further ado, please help me in giving Ms. Carlin Flora a warm and friendly welcome to CMash Reads.  Everyone, Ms. Carlin Flora!!

CARLIN FLORA

Author photo credit is: Copyright 2012 Erin Patrice O’Brien

Carlin Flora was on the staff of Psychology Today for eight years, most recently as features editor. She is a graduate of the University of Michigan and Columbia University School of Journalism and has written for Discover, Glamour, Women’s Health, and Men’s Health, among others. She has also appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, CNN, Fox News, and 20/20. She lives in Queens, New York.
Visit Ms. Flora at her website and/or the following sites:   

Follow her tour here for reviews and more chances to win a copy of FRIENDFLUENCE.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Discover the unexpected ways friends influence our personalities, choices, emotions, and even physical health in this fun and compelling examination of friendship, based on the latest scientific research and ever-relatable anecdotes.

Why is dinner with friends often more laughter filled and less fraught than a meal with family? Although some say it’s because we choose our friends, it’s also because we expect less of them than we do of relatives. While we’re busy scrutinizing our romantic relationships and family dramas, our friends are quietly but strongly influencing everything from the articles we read to our weight fluctuations, from our sex lives to our overall happiness levels.

Evolutionary psychologists have long theorized that friendship has roots in our early dependence on others for survival. These days, we still cherish friends but tend to undervalue their role in our lives. However, the skills one needs to make good friends are among the very skills that lead to success in life, and scientific research has recently exploded with insights about the meaningful and enduring ways friendships influence us. With people marrying later—and often not at all—and more families having just one child, these relationships may be gaining in importance. The evidence even suggests that at times friends have a greater hand in our development and well-being than do our romantic partners and relatives.

Friends see each other through the process of growing up, shape each other’s interests and outlooks, and, painful though it may be, expose each other’s rough edges. Childhood and adolescence, in particular, are marked by the need to create distance between oneself and one’s parents while forging a unique identity within a group of peers, but friends continue to influence us, in ways big and small, straight through old age.

Perpetually busy parents who turn to friends—for intellectual stimulation, emotional support, and a good dose of merriment—find a perfect outlet to relieve the pressures of raising children. In the office setting, talking to a friend for just a few minutes can temporarily boost one’s memory. While we romanticize the idea of the lone genius, friendship often spurs creativity in the arts and sciences. And in recent studies, having close friends was found to reduce a person’s risk of death from breast cancer and coronary disease, while having a spouse was not.

Friendfluence surveys online-only pals, friend breakups, the power of social networks, envy, peer pressure, the dark side of amicable ties, and many other varieties of friendship. Told with warmth, scientific rigor, and a dash of humor, Friendfluence not only illuminates and interprets the science but draws on clinical psychology and philosophy to help readers evaluate and navigate their own important friendships.
Watch for my review in the near future.

Watch the video:

BOOK DETAILS:
Genre: Non-Fiction
Publisher: Doubleday
Pub Date: 1/15/13
Pages: 288
ISBN 0385535430
ISBN13: 9780385535434
PURCHASE LINKS:
  

THANKS TO JOE AND THE WONDERFUL PEOPLE AT DOUBLEDAY,
I HAVE ONE (1) COPY OF FRIENDFLUENCE TO GIVE AWAY
U.S. RESIDENTS ONLY

CLICK HERE FOR THE ENTRY PAGE

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 affliate.
I am providing link(s) solely for visitors
that may be interested in purchasing this Book/EBook.

Are you like me, during these cold and long days of winter, whereas you want to get warm and comfy and read a good book?  Well, if so, here’s a book to read.  Author, David Carnoy, is stopping by to visit, as he starts his VT with Partners In Crime Tours.  Please help me in welcoming David to CMash Reads!!!!

DAVID CARNOY

While David Carnoy lives in New York City with his wife and children, his novels take place in Silicon Valley, where he grew up and went to high school (Palo Alto). His debut novel, Knife Music (2010), was a Top-10 bestseller on the Kindle and also a bestseller on the Nook. More medical thriller than high-tech thriller, to research the novel Carnoy spent a lot of time talking with doctors, visiting trauma centers, and trailed a surgeon at a hospital in Northern California to help create the book’s protagonist, Dr. Ted Cogan.
The Big Exit (2012) isn’t a sequel to Knife Music per se. However, a few of the characters from Knife Music figure prominently in the story. His second novel has more of a high-tech slant and reflects Carnoy’s experiences as an executive editor at CNET.com, where he currently works and is trying resolve his obsession with consumer electronics products. He went to college at Wesleyan University and has an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University.
Visit David at his website here or these other sites:     

ABOUT THE BOOK

By the acclaimed author of the remarkable debut novel, Knife Music, The Big Exit is a suspenseful crime novel that keeps the surprises coming right up to the end. Richie Forman is freshly out of prison. By night, he makes a living impersonating Frank Sinatra in San Francisco’s lounges and corporate parties. But then his ex-best friend—the man who stole his fiancée while he was in prison—is found hacked to death in his garage, and Richie is the prime suspect. In a murder mystery with the twists and turns of a microchip, Carnoy weaves his characters like a master. He has written an authentic, unputdownable thriller that is sure to chill and delight.
Purchase links:        AMAZON link               Barnes & Noble link

Read an excerpt:

Follow David’s tour here where you can enter to win a copy of The Big Exit

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 affliate.
I am providing link(s) solely for visitors
that may be interested in purchasing this Book/EBook.

Our friend Nicole from Tribute Books is back to visit and today she has another author that she would like to introduce us to.  So without further ado, Mr. Ken Dalton!!

KEN DALTON

Ken Dalton was born in 1938 at Hollywood Hospital. He grew up with his parents, his older sister, Pat, and younger brother, Richard in Los Angeles. The year 1938 informs the quick reader that Ken’s older than a lot of people, but younger than some.

In a turn of bad luck, the dreaded Polio virus found Ken.

At the end of World War ll, Ken’s family moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming for a year where he learned how to live through snow blizzards, avoid walking through the large pile of coal in the basement, and how to survive life as an Army Officer’s brat on a base called Fort Warren.

By the age of sixteen, after eleven years of operations, therapy, and braces, Ken’s luck changed dramatically when he met the girl of his dreams at a party. A few years later they married, produced three wonderful children, and settled into a happy life in Southern California.

In 1966, Ken, who worked as a technician for Pacific Bell, and his family left Southern California for the green hills of Sonoma County where they bought a home in Sebastopol surrounded with apple trees. A few years later, Ken and Arlene built a new home on three and a half acres. They raised cows, pigs, and learned how to build outstanding fences. While their children grew, they hosted two exchange students, Eva Reimers from Sweden, and Tanja Wuttke from Germany, both of whom are still loved members of the Dalton clan. Also during those years, Ken was promoted to management at Pacific Bell. He eventually ended up responsible for all the central offices, sixty-three, in an area that covered five counties.

In 1977, Ken, Arlene, Bob Wiltermood, and his wife Norma, designed, built, and operated a 2000 case winery named Pommeraie Vineyards. They produced award winning Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. However, after Bob died, the winery was sold. Ken and Arlene moved to a hilltop in Healdsburg.

With the winery gone, and time on their hands, Ken and Arlene started to perform with the Camp Rose Players. Twenty years and forty productions later, both are still acting and singing.

Life was good. All Ken had to do was learn some lines and bow when the audience applauded.

Then, ten years ago, Ken started to write. His first article was published in Golf Illustrated in August 1996. More golf articles followed in national and regional magazines including Golf Magazine and Fairways and Greens.

After a two-year stint on the County Grand Jury, Ken felt the need to begin his first novel.

Now, after a decade of struggle to learn the craft of writing, Ken has become the publishing world’s latest overnight sensation.
Visit Mr. Dalton at his website, Facebook and GoodReads.

GUEST POST

CM:  From what and/or where did you decide on this particular plot?  Personal experiences?
How much and what type of research did you have to do for this novel?
Where do the plots for my mysteries come from? To be honest, plots are everywhere. What I have learned to do is recognize the obvious.

KD:  Before I penned The Tartan Shroud, my wife and I flew to Scotland for an extended visit.

The first time I walked down Edinburgh’s Royal Mile, I recalled Yogi Berra famous quote, “It’s déjà vu all over again.” I felt as if I had been there before. Most of the people passing me on the sidewalk had red hair and freckles, on their arms and faces. As the only kid in my family with red hair and freckles, you cannot imagine how it felt to discover there was a place in this world where I was a member of the majority.

But I was in Scotland to research a new location for my latest Pinky and Bear adventure, so after absorbing the local color of Edinburgh, we traveled to Pitlochry in the midlands.

While playing a round of golf at the Pitlochry Golf Club, (I didn’t say location research was all work) I crossed a wee burn (that’s a little creek to American’s) and the murder scene of The Tartan Shroud popped into my head. From that point on, my golf game suffered because the part of my brain that should have been concentrating on my swing was spinning through potential plot twists and turns.

A couple of days later, I spotted the dam that created Loch Faskally and the second puzzle piece of the plot fit into place.

Before we left Pitlochry and drove north into the highlands, we toured Blair Castle. While I wandered through the opulent rooms and confined corridors, the concluding chapters came into focus.

Now I had my plot, but I knew that I would need assistance from someone in Scotland who could guide me through the troubled waters of Scottish police procedures, and Scottish law. I found that man in Sergeant William MacFarlane. After some correspondence via snail mail, Willie took me under his wing, answered every question, and he even made suggestions in some sections of the manuscript where I had a problem concerning the proper police title.

So there you have it. That is how I developed the plot for The Tartan Shroud. All I had to do was wander through Scotland and recognize the obvious—from the Royal Mile in Edinburgh—to a golf course in Pitlochry—to the impressive Blair Castle, home of the Duke of Atholl.

ABOUT THE BOOK

A bulldozer unearths a young girl’s body on a golf course in Scotland but for some reason, Fergus Murray, the top crime officer in Tayside seems unwilling to pursue the case. Fergus contacts Willow Stone, his American cousin and pleads for help. Willow, Pinky’s favorite ex-wife, calls in all her chips and convinces Pinky, Bear, Flo, and Ettamae to go to the small Scottish town of Pitlochry to help her cousin find the killer. Along the way the American’s come across a forester with a wonky eye—haggis—the occasional bad weather spring day—various Scottish policeman all named McSomething—mutton pie—a near new, sixty-year-old Austin Taxi—a bathroom that could double for a freezer—the nearly indecipherable Scottish accent—many glasses of whiskey and beer—ancient records—a broadsword—and a real Duke! Ride with Bear, Flo, and Henry during their final mad dash across Scotland to try to stop the murderer before he kills again inside the hallowed halls of Blair Castle.
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AUTHOR, KEN DALTON, IS HOSTING A GIVEAWAY FOR
TEN (10) LUCKY WINNERS.  ENDS FEB 1st.  U.S. ONLY   ENTER BELOW

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