Books I have read

Cold City

By

F. Paul Wilson

Summary

The first of three Repairman Jack prequels, revealing the past of one of the most popular characters in contemporary dark fantasy: a self-styled “fix-it” man who is no stranger to the macabre or the supernatural, hired by victimized people who have no one else to turn to.

We join Jack a few months after his arrival in New York City. He doesn’t own a gun yet, though he’s already connected with Abe. Soon he’ll meet Julio and the Mikulski brothers. He runs afoul of some Dominicans, winds up at the East Side Marriott the night Meir Kahane is shot, gets on the bad side of some Arabs, starts a hot affair, and disrupts the smuggling of preteen sex slaves. And that’s just Book One.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13539179-cold-city?ac=1

Bio

F. Paul Wilson is an author, born in Jersey City, New Jersey. He writes novels and short stories primarily in the science fiction and horror genres. His debut novel was Healer (1976). Wilson is also a part-time practicing family physician. He made his first sales in 1970 to Analog and continued to write science fiction throughout the seventies. In 1981 he ventured into the horror genre with the international bestseller, The Keep, and helped define the field throughout the rest of the decade. In the 1990s he became a true genre hopper, moving from science fiction to horror to medical thrillers and branching into interactive scripting for Disney Interactive and other multimedia companies.

Friday's Featured Author

Something’s Cooking at Dove Acres

By

Will Zeilinger

Summary

When her Great Aunt Helen dies in a tragic barbeque explosion, young Maddie Van der Wald inherits the huge house and estate on an isolated part of Catalina Island. She reluctantly moves in amid rumors of ghosts and buried treasure

If she doesn’t follow the terms of the will, which forces her to live on the island and give up her life back in L.A., her greedy cousin stands to inherit it all.  

She meets eco-activist Luke Garrett and tells him of her plans to turn the mansion into a Bed and Breakfast inn. Her ideas go nowhere when she is plagued by debts and legal problems. To pay her bills, she agrees to allow a cell phone tower on her property. Everyone turns against her, including her best friend Jojo.

Maddie’s life has become a total mess. She wonders if her boat trip to this island was a trip to Hell. Whatever the outcome, she’s ready to fight for what is rightfully hers.

Excerpt

"What's all the noise Luke?  I'm trying to make some phone calls and... What in God's name do we have here?" With a twinkle in his eye, he extended his hand,  "Son, aren't you going to introduce us?"

"Oh sorry Dad, this is Maddie Van der Wald, Helen Devine's Grand Niece.  She's living up at Dove Acres. Maddie, my father, Charles Garrett."

From inside my get up all he probably heard me say was, "plmmph mummph yu.” I pulled my mask down, "A pleasure to meet you Mr. Garrett." I think that's what finally came out.

He chuckled, "I'm glad to meet some of Helen's family." and returned to his office shaking his head.

"Luke, I am never going to forgive you for this... ever!”

He walked me over to the dumpsters. “Just climb up that ladder on the end and hop in.”

“Can’t we open the big doors on the back instead of climbing in?”

“If I open up the back it will spill out and get mixed up with the others.”

I pulled myself up the metal rungs on the side and peered down into the cavernous container when it dawned on me the only view Luke had was my butt.

“You could at least show me the best way to get in here... Luke!”

"Oh, okay.  Hang on."

Once I got his attention away from my rear, he climbed up the other side and swung his legs around. 

"Just swing your legs around and drop down onto a bag.”

I did, landing on my back on top of a bunch of bags with pokey things in them.  I was not happy. All the bags looked the same, so I tore one open.  Papers, rags, old clothes dead flowers and old newspapers... no success.  I tore open the next one, nothing.

“I could help you if I knew what you were looking for,”

“All right.  I’m looking for a silvery pin almost four inches across that looks like two overlapping leaves with...er...rhinestones or crystals all over it…”

Luke tore into one and found a shoebox full of a bunch of junky looking pins and other jewelry.  He held up a big pin between this thumb and forefinger.

“Um...does this look like it?”

Quickly I grabbed it from his hand.  With it tightly in my giant, yellow gloved hand I pulled my mask back down and planted a big kiss right on his lips.

 “Well - um, thanks for your help.”

“Okay,” was all he said.

That’s when I discovered there was no way to get out.  I jumped up and down until Luke lifted me up high enough to grab the top edge.  He put his palm squarely on my butt and pushed me to the top like he was making a basketball shot.  I was so humiliated.

“May I please have that shoe box?”

He handed it up to me.  With it tucked under my arm I climbed down the ladder and ran to my car, still wearing all that stuff, and got out of there as quickly as I could. But now I'll have to come back to return the dumb outfit.  Maybe I’ll just mail it.

PURCHASE LINK:  

http://www.willzeilingerauthor.com
This will link to all purchase sites

Bio
I’ve been writing for over twelve years. During that time, I took novel writing classes and joined writer’s groups, but what has helped me most are published authors who mentor, encourage, critique  and listen to me while I continue to learn my craft.  I live in Southern California with my wife and we are currently working on a crime novel together. Finding time to write while life happens is a challenge.


SOCIAL LINKS:

Twitter:  @Will_Zeilinger

Facebook:  www.facebook.com/wzeilinger

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/pub/william-zeilinger/15/48/9a7/

website: http://www.willzeilingerauthor.com

blog: http://www.booksbywilzeilinger.blogspot.com

Books I have read

Billy Boyle

By

James R. Benn

Summary

Billy Boyle, a young Irish-American, cop from Boston has just made detective - with a little help from his cop relatives and friends - when World War II breaks out. 

His rabidly anti-English family calls on his mother's distant cousin, Mamie, married to a general, to wangle a staff job for him far from the fighting. But instead of a "safe, cushy" stateside assignment, he is ordered to London, still undergoing the Blitz.

His "Uncle Ike" is Dwight D. Eisenhower, plucked from obscurity to command Army forces in Europe, and he wants Billy to be his personal investigator.

Billy, who had never left Boston before he enlisted and was sent to Officer Candidate School, is not sure how good a detective he really is. But when Eisenhower asks Billy to undertake this task, he dutifully sets off for Beardsley Hall, where the Norwegian government in exile, led by King Haakon, is in residence. 

Accompanied by an aristocratic Polish officer in exile and a beautiful British WREN, his mission is to catch a spy who may have been planted there.

A theft and two murders test Billy's investigative powers, as he comes to grips with the deadly demands of a war he never wanted any part of. To his own surprise - and that of others - Billy proves to be a better detective than any one expected

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/345007.Billy_Boyle?ac=1

Bio

James R. Benn is the author of Billy Boyle: A World War II Mystery, selected by Book Sense as one of the top five mysteries of 2006 and nominated for a Dilys Award. The First Wave was a Book Sense Notable title. 
Benn is a librarian and lives in Hadlyme, Connecticut.

Friday's Books I have read

The Demands

By

Mark Billingham

Summary

The Crime The customers in a London convenience store are taken captive. Among them is young mother, Detective Helen Weeks. She is told her life depends on the co-operation of one of her colleagues - detective Tom Thorne. 

The Demand Akhtar is desperate to know what really happened to his beloved son, who died a year before in prison. He is convinced the death was not an accident and forces the one man who knows more about the case than any other, Thorne, to re-investigate. 
The Twist What Thorne discovers will upend everything he thought he knew about the fate of those he's put away...but will it be enough to fulfill the wishes of a grieving and potentially violent father?

BIO

Mark Billingham was born and brought up in Birmingham. Having worked for some years as an actor and more recently as a TV writer and stand-up comedian his first crime novel was published in 2001. Mark lives in North London with his wife and two children.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22289215-the-demands?ac=1

Fridays Featured Author

FINAL CHECKPOINT

By

Will Zeilinger

Summary

Photographer Ben DeCastro drives in sports car rallies on weekends.  He discovers an abandoned rally car in the California desert with a headless corpse in the trunk.

As a volunteer firefighter, he joins in the search for the missing drivers.  His life veers off course when their fingerprints are found on his garage door.  The FBI looks at Ben as a suspect. This hurts his professional reputation, and cramps his dating efforts with the women in his building.  An assortment of friends and neighbors try to help him with his circumstances, but cause more problems in the process.  How does he get out of this mess?

PURCHASE LINK:  

http://www.willzeilingerauthor.com

EXCERPT

“You are such a party pooper Ben DeCastro.” slurred out of her mouth as I sat her down in the passenger seat and buckled her belt. I was hoping the ride back with the top down would provide enough fresh cool air to clear her head. But as we headed down the hill toward the long stretch of road at Bolsa Chica State Beach she started singing the theme from “Green Acres” - an old TV show on the retro channel and waving her arms above her head in the slipstream.

Suddenly she leaned over and wrapped her arms around my neck, “I love you Ben.” followed by three more choruses of the theme song. Then she started to cry.

“Are you okay?” I asked as she wept on my shoulder.

“No.” she mumbled, “You didn’t say you love me too.” and started to cry on my shoulder again. I thought maybe I should drive a little further up PCH. Maybe she needed more air and because I couldn’t imagine myself getting her up to her apartment in this condition. I reached over to smooth her skirt back down because the wind had bunched it up on her thighs.

“Ben, Ben,” she shook her finger at me while at the same time parting her legs slightly. “Just what do you thing we are doing?” slid out of her now smiling mouth.

“I’m just trying to put your clothes back in place. What are you doing?”

“Who me?” she pointed at her chest, “I was just helping you.”

“Just sit still, Jessica.” I got her skirt back where it should have been so anyone in a vehicle taller than mine wouldn’t get a free show. “I think you have too many Mojitos in you.”

“You think so? I’ll fix that.” With that statement, she turned away from me and threw up over her side of the car. “Sorry Ben... but I don’t feel very well,” and did it again.

I know it sounds selfish but that put the lid on anything further with Jessica tonight and I could just imagine what the outside of my car looked like. I turned around when I got near the roundabout in Santa Serena and headed back to Seagull Beach. Jessica put her head back on the seat and closed her eyes for the rest of the ride back home.

She was fast asleep as I pulled up to the garage. Her side of my car looked and smelled like I’d imagined so I took her keys out of her purse. Luckily she was light for someone around five-foot six. I picked her up and carried her to the elevator. Her shoes were missing and probably still in my car. This woman sleeps like a log but while waiting for the elevator I looked at her face. It was very pretty - even with the little bit of drool on her cheek. The elevator chimed and the doors slid open. There was Molly. Her eyes grew wide as her mouth dropped open.

“Hi Molly.” I tried to act like everything was normal.

“Hello Ben?” She backed around us and stood by the open door staring while I turned sideways and slipped into the elevator with Jessica, who’d stopped singing, in my arms.

“She’s asleep - not feeling very well.”

Molly fanned her hand in front of her scrunched-up face, “Yeah, I can tell. Whew!”

As the doors closed, I said, “Well, I’ll see you around... G’night.” Jessica stirred in my arms a little and snuggled her face into my shoulder. I managed not to hit her head on the wall when I carried her down the hall to her door. Juggling her keys I opened her apartment door and took her inside.

I hadn’t been inside her apartment since she talked to me at the door when we met. It was very neat and clean. Her bedroom door was open so I took her in and laid her on the bed. Her eyes were still closed when her arms came up around my neck and she moaned, “Oh Ben, don’t go.” I didn’t say a word as I carefully peeled her arms from my neck and quietly slipped out of her apartment, locking the door behind me. As I turned around Molly was standing right behind me in the hallway.

“Did you follow me up here?”

Bio
I’ve been writing for over twelve years. During that time, I took novel writing classes and joined writer’s groups, but what has helps me most are published authors who mentor, encourage, critique  and listen to me while I continue to learn my craft.  I live in Southern California with my wife and we are currently working on a crime novel together. Finding time to write while life happens is a challenge.

You can find Will at the following:

Twitter:  @Will_Zeilinger

Facebook:  www.facebook.com/wzeilinger

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/pub/william-zeilinger/15/48/9a7/

website: http://www.willzeilingerauthor.com

blog: http://www.booksbywilzeilinger.blogspot.com

Books I have read

Gone Tomorrow

By

Lee Child

Summary:

Suicide bombers are easy to spot. They give out all kinds of tell-tale signs. Mostly because they're nervous. By definition they're all first-timers.

There are twelve things to look for: No one who has worked in law enforcement will ever forget them.

New York City. The subway, two o'clock in the morning. Jack Reacher studies his fellow passengers. Four are OK. The fifth isn't.

The train brakes for Grand Central Station. Will Reacher intervene, and save lives? Or is he wrong? Will his intervention cost lives - including his own?

BIO

Lee Child was born October 29th, 1954 in Coventry, England, but spent his formative years in the nearby city of Birmingham. By coincidence he won a scholarship to the same high school that JRR Tolkien had attended. He went to law school in Sheffield, England, and after part-time work in the theater he joined Granada Television in Manchester for what turned out to be an eighteen-year career as a presentation director during British TV's "golden age." During his tenure his company made Brideshead Revisited, The Jewel in the Crown, Prime Suspect, and Cracker. But he was fired in 1995 at the age of 40 as a result of corporate restructuring. Always a voracious reader, he decided to see an opportunity where others might have seen a crisis and bought six dollars' worth of paper and pencils and sat down to write a book, Killing Floor, the first in the Jack Reacher series.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4494917-gone-tomorrow?ac=1

Friday's Featured Authors

Shadows of the Past

by

Carmen Stefanescu

       Summary             

Anne's relationship with her boyfriend Neil has disintegrated. After a two-year separation, they pack for a week vacation in hopes of reconciling. But fate has other plans for them.

The discovery of a bejeweled cross and ancient human bones opens a door to a new and frightening world--one where the ghost of a medieval nun named Genevieve will not let Anne rest. This new world threatens not only to ruin Anne and Neil's vacation but to end all hopes of reconciliation as Anne feels compelled to help free Genevieve's soul from its torment.

Can Anne save her relationship and help Genevieve find her eternal rest?

A touching, compelling story of tragedy, loss and the power of endless love and good magic.

The twists and turns in this paranormal tale keep the reader guessing up to the end and weave themselves together into a quest to rekindle love.

Buy Link:

Wild Child Publishing

http://www.wildchildpublishing.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=84&products_id=410

  Excerpt

"Come, we should leave at once," she said and glanced nervously over her shoulder. "Something terrible happened after you left for town. I think the Abbess found out about us. Our meeting in Uncle Ryan's cabin is no longer a secret. We have been overheard. For all I know someone spies on us even as we speak. I think the Abbess, or one of her 'friends,' is hovering somewhere nearby and listening to every word."

Andrew pulled Genevieve to his chest. "Do you regret you've come with me?"

Passion smothered Genevieve's doubt and guilt. "Never," she answered, aware of her body's response to his touch, and she succumbed to his embrace.

Calming the gnawing unease in her mind and the thought of Sister Dominica guessing she was the dough of a sinner, Genevieve repeated, "Never."

With her eyes closed and their bodies touching she became, for the very first time, simply a woman. She melted in his embrace in spite of the invisible vicious threat breathing around them. Aware they might never be alone again, she fought hard to silence the voice of conscience berating her.

"Oh, God. Please forgive me," Andrew muttered under his breath when he bowed his head to kiss her. Their lips met in a passionate first kiss.

Genevieve's spirits fell and her heart skipped a beat when, a couple of seconds later, she opened her eyes and her gaze fell on a knot strangers.

                             … . . .

          Tears welled in Anne's eyes, blurring her vision. She couldn’t explain them, or the sudden sadness seeping into her heart. This should’ve been a moment of happiness or, at least, contentment. She was with Neil again, and the outcome of their trip together should, very likely, bring their reconciliation. Why then did she seem detached from where she stood?

Anne shivered. Why the deep feeling of having seen this place, this forest before? And why the eerie sensation of being present here only in the body, while her mind was far away?

Away from the forest.

Away from Neil, the man who'd betrayed her trust and her love.

          An onrush of sensations unfamiliar to her followed. Dizziness and a malevolent feeling of unreality suffocated her.

Anne edged cautiously closer to the rim of the bare cliff. Her foot tapped the edge. It seemed solid. She stared into the darkness of the abyss at her feet. It echoed the shadows in her heart.  An unusual curiosity took hold of her. Should she step ahead? What was down there? Other human bones? Another mystery? The presence of evil, creeping up and enveloping her, became almost palpable. The vines of fog folded around her, dragging her to the depth. Her throat turned dry, and she gasped for air.

Megan's face contorted, the voice no longer pleasant. A hoarse gurgle, spluttering distorted words, "Yes, come... I'm waiting... I've been waiting for you for such a long time..."

BIO

Carmen was born in Romania, the native country of the infamous vampire Count Dracula.

She graduated the Bucharest University, the Germanic Languages Faculty.Teacher of English and German in her native country and mother of two daughters, Carmen Stefanescu survived the grim years of communist oppression, by escaping in a parallel world, that of the books.

Places to find Carmen:

https://twitter.com/Carmen_Books

http://www.pinterest.com/carmens007/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Carmen-Stefanescu-Books/499245716760283

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6624397.Carmen_Stefanescu

http://shadowspastmystery.blogspot.ro/

http://bookblogs.ning.com/profile/CarmenStefanescu

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6624397.Carmen_Stefanescu

@Carmen_Books
 

http://youtu.be/6LmY-9yDl5s

http://www.wildchildpublishing.com/paranormal-c-84/shadows-of-the-past-p-410.html

 Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Shadows-of-the-Past-ebook/dp/B00AK2D9I8/ref=sr_1_15?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1354874514&sr=1-15&keywords=shadows+of+the+past

Barnes & Noble

 http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/shadows-of-the-past-carmen-stefanescu/1113910162?ean=2940015715026

All Romance Books

https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-shadowsofthepast-1013184-140.html