Showing posts with label Thriller. Show all posts

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#Excerpt from HUSH by KimberlyShursen @KimberlyShursen #Thriller #MustRead #AmReading

Posted on Tuesday, November 18, 2014


Dinkytown 

12:45 a.m.

Ann kicked off her sandals and closed the door to the third-floor apartment. Ben had been polite, hailed a cab, and not pushed to take her home. She liked him. There hadn’t been a lull in their two-hour conversation.

Many of the tenants in the older, all-brick building in Dinkytown were a part of the struggling arts group—most of them a few years younger than she and Jess. The location, however, was perfect. It was cheaper to ride a bus that dropped her off in front of Abbott Northwestern Hospital than own a car. Groceries, boutiques, and restaurants, as well as Lake Calhoun and Harriett, were all within walking distance.

She walked to the kitchen, her feet killing her. With two newborns in incubators and another baby boy on life support, she was exhausted. Keeping a scrupulous eye over every newborn in the nursery was taxing.

When they’d moved in together, combining Jess’s modern taste with Ann’s more conservative look made for an eclectic ambiance. Jess’s poster of Warhol’s “Marilyn” hung next to Ann’s framed picture of a tranquil cottage surrounded by English gardens. Books, memorabilia, and trinkets filled the bookcase they’d put together using two-by-fours and paver bricks. A bright red, curved sectional took up most of the cozy living room and a cream-colored shag rug sat underneath an oval-shaped glass coffee table.

In her bedroom, she wiggled out of her jeans and tossed them on top on the silent radiator. She pulled on drawstring, cotton “bum-around” pants, and a T-shirt.

After she nabbed a bottle of water out of the refrigerator, she plopped down on the couch. Adjusting two pillows underneath her head, she found the remote and pulled the colorful afghan her mother had crocheted over her. Flipping through the channels, she stopped when she found Pretty Woman.

The rattle of pans woke her. Ann slid an arm out from underneath the blanket. “What time is it?” she asked, yawning.

“I was trying to be quiet and not wake you,” Jess said from the kitchen. “Almost eight.”

“You going in early?” Ann rubbed her eyes.

“Have to. Everything’s on sale and not even close to being marked down.”

Ann heard an egg crack and then the sizzle when it hit the frying pan. As manager of the Gap, Jess worked most weekends.

“What time you get in?” Ann put her feet on the floor, waited a couple of seconds, and stood. She shielded her eyes as she stumbled to the window and pulled down the shade to block the rising sun.

“I don’t know—around three maybe,” Jess said. “Want some eggs?”

Ann plopped back down on the couch. “Too early.”

Jess sat down on the opposite end of the couch and put the plate of scrambled eggs and toast on her lap. “You have fun?”

“I did.”

“The guy you met is dreamy.” Jess stabbed a fork into the eggs.

“Seems like a nice guy.”

“And you didn’t want to go to a bar last night,” Jess teased. “Look what you would have missed.”

“He’s a lawyer.”

Jess’s oval-shaped, green eyes grew wide. “A lawyer? Wow. You hit the jackpot.” She stuffed the last of the toast in her mouth, stood, and carried the plate into the kitchen.

“We have so much in common—kind of freaky.” Ann pushed her arms up over her head and stretched. “Family law. Does custody cases. Says he represents kids more than parents.” She wrapped the soft, cotton afghan around her and sank down into the sofa.

“So…you bring the babies into the world, and he protects them.”

Lost in her own thoughts, she didn’t hear what Jess said. “I keep thinking I’ve met him before.”

“Maybe you have. Maybe he had a sister who had a baby, and he came to into the hospital or something.” Her footsteps went down the hall. “Gonna see him again?”

“He’s picking me up this afternoon,” Ann said. “Says he’s thinking of buying a house and wants to take me by it.”

“Still against meeting guys in bars?” Jess asked as she walked down the hall to the door.

“Totally.”


hush

 Soon after Ann Ferguson and Ben Grable marry, and Ben unseals his adoption papers, their perfect life together is torn apart, sending the couple to opposite sides of the courtroom.

Representing Ann, lawyer Michael J. McConaughey (Mac) feels this is the case that could have far-reaching, judicial effects -- the one he's been waiting for.

Opposing counsel knows this high profile case happens just once in a lifetime.

And when the silent protest known as HUSH sweeps the nation, making international news, the CEO of one of the top ten pharmaceutical companies in the world plots to derail the trial that could cost his company billions.

Critically acclaimed literary thriller HUSH not only questions one of the most controversial laws that has divided the nation for over four decades, but captures a story of the far-reaching ties of family that surpasses time and distance.
*** Hush does not have political or religious content. The story is built around the emotions and thoughts of two people who differ in their beliefs.

  EDITORIAL REVIEW: "Suspenseful and well-researched, this action-packed legal thriller will take readers on a journey through the trials and tribulations of one of the most controversial subjects in society today." - Katie French, author of "The Breeders," "The Believer's," and "Eyes Ever To The Sky."

Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Thriller
Rating – PG-13
More details about the author
Connect with Kimberly Shursen through Facebook and Twitter

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@MarcADiGiacomo on 'Behold a Pale Horse', Reading & Writing #AmReading #Thriller #BookClub

Posted on Wednesday, October 8, 2014
What book should everyone read at least once?
Behold a Pale Horse by Bill Cooper.

What is hardest-getting published, writing or marketing?
They are all difficult. I am an independent so that eliminates the first part of this question. As for writing and marketing, I find it very difficult to split my time between the two.

What marketing works for you?
Word of mouth and social media are my two favorites.

Do you plan to publish more books?
I just released Back In Town, the second book in A Small Town Series.

Is your family supportive?
Do your friends support you? Yes and yes. My family has been great throughout this entire process and some of my friends end up being my toughest critics.

What other jobs have you had in your life?
I was a police officer for almost 15 years prior to my writing career.

If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be?
Somewhere in the mountains.


backintown
The small town of Hutchville, New York is turned upside down. No longer is it the quaint, sleepy, suburb of New York City. Detective Matt Longo is back on the job and embroiled in his latest nightmare. Further complicating matters is the revelation of his partner’s corruption and organized crime ties; Donny Mello has left a bitter trail of lies and deceit. With his kid brother and newly promoted Detective Franny Longo by his side, will Matt be able to put his past behind him?

Special Agent Cynthia Shyler, (F.B.I.) has been reassigned due to her meeting with Matt Longo. Will this move complicate their relationship? Or will a new stranger in town spin a web that entangles the entire Hutchville Police Department, especially our most seasoned detective, Matt Longo?
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Thriller
Rating – R
More details about the author
Connect with Marc A. DiGiacomo on Facebook & Twitter

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Behind the Scenes of Saga of the Nine : #Area38 by Mikey D. B. #AmReading #Dystopian

Posted on Tuesday, September 9, 2014

What inspired me to write my book?

This is War by 30 Seconds to Mars.  I got that album for Christmas in 2009, and the second I heard the first song, Escape, my mind went crazy.  Youtube it!  It’s the only way to properly visualize what I’m about to tell you.  

As that first song played, I imagined a man, tortured and beaten, sitting in a chair in the middle of an abandoned football stadium.  The war drums built and built and as they did, another man, a rebel, stepped into the scene and began to circle the one in the chair.  As the lyrics then played, I pictured that it’s what the rebel would be saying to the man in the chair.

Time to escape the clutches of a name,
No this is not a game,
It’s just the beginning.

I don’t believe in fate but the bottom line,
It’s time to pay,
You know you’ve got it coming.

The way Jared Leto says these words, it’s as if he’s seeking revenge for the destitute and war torn lifestyle the man in the chair caused.  Just then, he and a crowd of people shouts:

This is war!

I was listening to that song on a major sound system, taking in the details of all the instruments and voices, and when this declaration of war sounded out, the bass shook and goose bumps shot all up and down my arms.  The rest is history really.  I wanted to write about a revolution, and that album became a major player in my writing process.  I did end up getting stuck at one point.  The plot became a poor version of The Hunger Games that had a lot to do with some drama I was dealing with in the dating world.  That whole sad realization put the project on hold and I started a second one that ended up becoming the missing half to Area 38. 

I do have to say, that the ending though, it was my favorite part to write and is my favorite part to ask people about.  I came up with it while sitting on my bed.  No music this time, just was pondering and it came.  I won’t give any spoilers, but it leaves the reader asking “How--what just happened?”  It makes them mad because it seems so contradicting to the nature of a character, but that’s what I love about it.  

This book, Saga of the Nine: Area 38 leaves the reader asking these questions, and more, in utter confusion, while the rest of the three books in the saga are meant to answer those concerns.  The ending seems random to some, but that’s only because the reader is missing a huge middle chunk.  They’ve read ABC and then X.  They don’t know the rest of the alphabet, and that’s where books two, three and four come in.
Saga of the Nine

Change affects everyone and it is no different for Jackson. Living in Area 38 for as long as he can remember, he knows of no better way to exist than under the tyrannical rule of Christopher Stone, son of Stewart Stone from The Nine of The United Governmental Areas, aka The UGA. This all takes a dramatic turn when Jackson finds a red, metal box buried in his yard, filled with illegal artifacts—journals, a Bible, CDs, etc.—that are from a man of whom he has no recollection of: Mica Rouge.

 The year is 2036 and Mica, unlike Jackson, does know of a better way of life but is torn apart as he sees his country, The United States of America, crumbling from within by group known as The Political Mafia. The Mafia has infiltrated levels upon levels of governmental resources and it is up to Mica and a vigilante group known as The USA Division to stop them and their dark Utopian vision. To their demise, and at the country's expense, The Division fails and has no choice but to watch The Constitution dissolve and transform into The UGA.

 In a final stand, having not given up hope, Mica and what is left of The Division, give one final fight in Colorado, or better known as Area 38. However, all is lost as The Division is betrayed by one of their own, Stewart Stone. Mica is left with no choice but to hide in exile, leaving what little history he can of himself and the great United States of America, with his wife, long time friends, and newly born son in hopes that they will one day finish what he could not.

 Jackson, having found this legacy twenty-seven years later, decides to start the war that will end The Nine, and he with an outcast group known as The Raiders, begins his fight with Christopher Stone in Area 38. Filled with betrayal, unity, despair, hope, hate and love Area 38 follows both Mica and Jackson in their attempts to restore what they believe to be true freedom, and where one fails, the other rises to the seemingly impossible challenge.

Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Dystopian Thriller
Rating – PG13
More details about the author
Connect with Mikey D. B. on Facebook & Twitter
Website www.mikeydb.com

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Inside the Mind of Pendelton Wallace #AmWriting #Mystery #Suspense

Posted on Friday, August 29, 2014

Inside the Mind of an Author 

 You don’t want to know what goes on in my mind. It will shock and scare you.
I was at a writers conference and heard  James Rollins tell a good story.
He said that most people wake up on Sunday morning and think about the golf game they’re going to play or the football game they want to watch. He lays in bed on Sunday morning and thinks of interesting new ways to kill people.
I’m kind of like that. I don’t make up my story lines. I get them from the newspapers and news reports. I couldn’t make this kind of stuff up. However, once I have the story line, I have to add enough sex, murder and mayhem along the way to keep my readers interested.
I have so much trash and dirt in my mind that it could never be published. Hmm . . . maybe I should take a short at the erotica genre. Seriously though, if you’re a girl, you may not want to date me. Most of my erotic scenes are from memories of “the women I have loved before.”
I’m always looking at people, places and situations and thinking how they could fit into a book. Many of my friends and co-workers have wiggled their way in to books. They may not recognize themselves, but little pieces of their personalities become quirks of my characters.
I have a character in The Mexican Connection, who did not know her husband was a drug dealer until the DEA knocked down her door. This really happened. I met “Lisa” many years after the incident, but it was still indelibly etched on her character. A story like that just had to end up in print.
My head is exploding with ideas, I will never be able to write them all down. I keep a folder on my computer called “Story Ideas.” I have files in it with little kernels that may or may not someday become stories. But I write them down so I don’t lose them.
I know the story line for the next two Ted Higuera novels. I just have to read the newspapers.
I hope someday to be able to write historical fiction. I have at least three stories that I would like to tell. The first is about my great-grandfather in the Civil War. The next is about how my maternal grandfather came to this country and how he met my grandmother. Then there is the story about the USS Kearsarge and the CSS Alabama. What drama.
My mind never stops. I just don’t know if I’ll be able to keep up.

If Clive Cussler had written Ugly Betty, it would be Hacker for Hire. 

 Hacker for Hire, a suspense novel about corporate greed and industrial espionage, is the second book in a series about Latino computer security analyst Ted Higuera and his best friend, para-legal Chris Hardwick. 

 The goofy, off-beat Ted Higuera, son of Mexican immigrants, grew up in East LA. An unlikely football scholarship brought him to Seattle. 

 Chris, Ted’s college roommate, grew up with a silver spoon in his mouth. His father is the head of one of Seattle’s most prestigious law firms. 

 Ted’s first job out of college leads him into the world of organized crime where he faces a brutal beating. After being rescued by beautiful private investigator Catrina Flaherty, Ted decides to go to work for her. 

 Catrina is hired by a large computer corporation to find a leak in their corporate boardroom when the previous consultant is found floating in Elliot Bay. 

 Ted discovers that Chris’s firm has been retained by their prime suspect. Now he and Chris are working opposite sides of the same case. 

 Ted and Catrina are led deep into Seattle’s Hi-Tech world as they stalk the killer. But the killer is also hunting them. Can Ted find the killer before the killer finds him? 
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Mystery, Thriller
Rating – R
More details about the author
Connect with Pendelton Wallace on Facebook

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Greed Knows No Boundaries - Fatal Greed - by @JWMefford #AmReading #Suspense #Thriller

Posted on Tuesday, July 22, 2014

The visit had been all too brief, abrupt even, but Karina Silva squeezed her brown eyes shut and hugged the pillow against her curled-up, naked body. She took in a slow breath and caught a waft of black orchid and amber, tantalizing scents from the perfume she’d recently given to the one and only person who’d captured her heart—wholly, completely.
This evening was supposed to have been special.
She shuffled her feet under the thousand-count, white, cotton sheets, which soothed her feeling of loneliness. Clutching the down pillow against her chest, the thirty-something editor of the Times Herald turned over and took notice of the elaborate burgundy-and-gold pattern on the paneled drapes, fashionably clinging to the plush carpet.
The soft, green glow of the clock radio illuminated the room inside the swankiest boutique hotel in the ’burbs—albeit a full county away from her home base. But it had to be that way, considering she had succumbed to an unavoidable attraction that had clawed at her moral compass ever since she gazed across the green lawn at her husband’s client-appreciation party and locked eyes with her future soul mate. It was a moment she would never forget. A rush of emotion had engulfed her body, as a realization set in as to who she really was. The true Karina.
A smattering of distant car horns could be heard six floors below, but Karina glared off to the darkened corner of the room, recalling the sparkle of her lover’s blue eyes and the resulting flutter of her own heart. Karina had peered into those eyes and had found more feeling, more depth, more of a bond than she’d ever thought possible with another human being.
Her friend, her lover of the last three months, had arrived at the hotel two hours prior, and after a single embrace and two warm kisses, it ended before it really began. A familiar jingle had interrupted their intimate moment, noting the arrival of a new text on her lover’s phone. Karina never saw the words, but the response told her their rendezvous was over. Rigid movement, an instant detached demeanor, and a quick explanation about an emergency at work, followed by the sound of the door clicking shut, had left Karina alone in a king-sized sleigh bed.
A feeling of emptiness crept back into her conscience, a tiny seed of doubt sprouting inside her gut. Could this life-altering affair be nothing more than a one-sided mirage? She couldn’t keep her journalistic instincts from attempting to connect dots. She recalled every possible aversion of her lover’s eyes, each word of affirmation that may not have been as sincere and heartfelt as the previous.
And now this.

Behind the façade of every corporate takeover executives pull levers this way and that, squeezing the last profitable nickel out of the deal. But no one knows the true intent of every so-called merger. 

 No one knows the secret bonds that exist. 

 An Indian technology giant swallows up another private company that has deep roots in North Texas. For one unassuming man the thought of layoffs, of losing his own job to a bunch of arrogant assholes feels like a kick to the jewels. 

 Until the day Michael’s life changes forever.   

 Perverse alliances. An affair of the heart. A grisly murder. A spiraling string of events thrusts Michael into a life-or-death fight to save a tortured soul and hunt down a brutal killer…one who lurks closer than he ever imagined. 

 Greed knows no boundaries.
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Suspense, Thriller
Rating – R
More details about the author
Connect with John W. Mefford on Facebook & Twitter

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Lori Lesko's COPYRIGHT: A NOVEL @LeskoLori #Thriller #GoodReads #Fiction

Posted on Wednesday, July 16, 2014

I woke up on a bed. Instantly, I knew it wasn’t mine. Voices were scattered all around me, male and female. Someone tapped my wrist.
“I can’t find a vein, they keep collapsing on me,” said a female voice.
“One more try and then we’ll have to use a central line,” said another.
I breathed in and felt the tubes in my nose. God, I was in the hospital! The beeping sounds and the smell of disinfectant quickly consumed me. I became aware of my body and realized that my toes were freezing cold. I desperately wanted someone to cover me up with a blanket, but couldn’t seem to communicate this. A single delicate finger lifted my right eyelid and a white blinding light shone into my eye.
“Ms. Tyler, can you hear me? We’re going to take good care of you,” a man said. “Are you allergic to any medicines?”
“Huh?” I managed to say.
“Where’s her family?” he asked someone in the room.
“I think her sister is in the lobby.”
“She’s not my sister,” I said. Nothing in this world frustrated me more than when someone referred to Karen, the love of my life, as my sister. I sat up in the bed, and my eyes opened.
“Easy, Ms. Tyler, you’re in hospital,” claimed a chubby woman in a pink nurse’s outfit.
“I realize that now,” I said, not wanting to make a fuss.
“Ms. Tyler, you’ve had a heart attack. I need you to lie back down,” she said gently.
Now I was pissed, I mean, genuinely pissed. Quickly, it all came back to me. The paramedics who stormed into my office, talking to Karen while they took my blood pressure and asked her what I had eaten. Then I got bounced around in the back of the ambulance for about thirty minutes.
“Oh, she’s awake. Ms. Tyler, I’m Dr. Casey. I just spoke to your partner, Karen,” he said.
“Yes?” I replied.
“Your EKG shows that you’ve had a heart attack and we need to prep you for an angiogram, to make sure you don’t have any further blockages.”
“Okay,” I said in shock. That was more than enough to scare the shit out of me. I wanted to see Karen, I needed to be grounded. Where are my words? I’m a writer for God’s sake, why can’t I communicate my needs?
“We have you on a nitro patch and let’s push ten milligrams of heparin,” he said, nodding to the nurse. “I’ll see you in the OR, Ms. Tyler,” Dr. Casey said with a smile as he left the room. How could he smile at a time like this? Was I just another slab of meat for him to cut open? I wondered how long he had been working today. Was he in a hurry to get home to his sexy wife and luxurious house? My thoughts were going a mile a minute. I felt like I was having a panic attack, or was my heart failing again?

Amber Tyler is living every author’s dream: her books are all best sellers and she writes full time. She has worked hard and is well-accomplished in her career, and she has the support and love of her beautiful children and girlfriend. 

 But the dream soon turns into a terrible nightmare when her latest manuscript is stolen. She decides to fight for what is rightfully hers, only to find that the harder she tries, the easier it all slips through her fingers, putting her career, her family, and her life in jeopardy.
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Thriller
Rating – PG-13
More details about the author
Connect with Lori Lesko on Facebook & Twitter

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Writing By The Seat Of Your Pants with Richard Parry @TactualRain #Fantasy #WriteTip

Posted on Friday, June 13, 2014

No plan survives contact with the enemy, but plans are really useful anyway.
The thing is, my writing tends to be pretty organic.  The conversations my characters have aren’t manufactured through some formula.  The path the story takes?  It’s not set in stone.  I tend to outline just enough to give me a path to follow, maybe some high points to hit, and then write.
The outlines I write are more detailed at the start of the story, and less so at the end — often having a single outline point like, “Hero saves the world.”  I mean, that’s enough: it says everything it needs to say.
Making characters real means you need to allow them some flex in their interactions.  If you need John to get that cat out of the tree, but it’s more fun or interesting to have the cat escape from him instead, you’re kind of screwed if your whole story revolves around him returning to Andy with the cat.
The better writing gets lost in service to the outline you’ve drafted, and that’s not okay.
Different writers have different views on this, and I think that’s great.  I’m not trying to tell people that there’s only one way to tell a story — I’m saying that when I write stories, I try and make sure there’s room for my characters to grow through that story.  After you’ve spent 100,000 words with someone, they’re a lot more real than they were on page one, right?
When I wrote Night’s Favour, the basic outline — hand drawn in blue pen — was on a page of my notebook, and some supplementary pages for specific scenes.  Writing Upgrade, a more complex story, I’ve needed to bust out Scapple to do a quick A4 on the moving parts.  There’s lines everywhere.
Funny thing is, both stories diverged from the originally planned ending.  It’s meant more work for me in terms of the writing, but it makes me happier with the end result.  I’d rather the end show a believable outcome for my characters than keeping to an outline that was started months — if not years — ago.
Outlines are great, but like the rest of what I write, they’re disposable in favour of the better story.  To make things better, you sometimes need to throw your initial thoughts into the trash.

Valentine’s an ordinary guy with ordinary problems. His boss is an asshole. He’s an alcoholic. And he’s getting that middle age spread just a bit too early. One night — the one night he can’t remember — changes everything. What happened at the popular downtown bar, The Elephant Blues? Why is Biomne, the largest pharmaceutical company in the world, so interested in him — and the virus he carries? How is he getting stronger, faster, and more fit? And what’s the connection between Valentine and the criminally insane Russian, Volk?
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Action, Thriller, Urban Fantasy
Rating – R16
More details about the author
 Connect with Richard Parry on Facebook & Twitter

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UNFINISHED BUSINESS #Excerpt by @Ted_Tayler #AmReading #Thriller #Fiction

Posted on Thursday, June 12, 2014

There are so many different avenues through which you can promote your writing; blogging is a useful way of getting your name further up the pecking order in the search engines. It is a relatively inexpensive way of getting people to at least consider buying your books.
If you have a marketing budget (lucky you!) then virtual book tours can speed up the process of getting readers to visit your site; while they are there you have the opportunity to grab their interest with what you have written in your latest post. Personally I don’t fill my blog posts with things about my novels or short stories; I write about everything else in my life as well. The reason for this is that I want them to know that I’m a ‘real’ person who has all the same highs and lows in my life as they do. I chat about the weather, my family, events in my local town, my holidays, and the death of one of my closest friends. I cast my net as wide as possible to find a few items that will interest them.
I attempt to engage them enough to want to come back time and again. Perhaps it will take them one visit, perhaps it will take several but eventually I want them to trust me enough to believe that if they move around my website and finally take the plunge and buy one of my books, they won’t be disappointed.
I came to blogging in a roundabout fashion. I had my book of memories published in 2011 and then I invested in a website and joined Twitter. This was an afterthought! I was selling all the paperbacks I had had printed and I wondered whether I could sell the kindle version of the book as well. Writing a blog chapter every few weeks was suggested to me by the designer of my site; I didn’t know what a blog was! I’m glad I followed up on her suggestion because it was those blog chapters that I wrote over the next twelve months that reminded me how much I enjoyed writing and gave me the courage to start ‘The Final Straw’ and then self-publish my first novel. I haven’t stopped writing since.
My Twitter followers were initially music lovers and musicians, because of the content of the first book. I hit fifty thousand followers by the end of 2012; today I have around ninety five thousand. A large percentage of the latest recruits are book lovers and other authors.
Naturally, I direct followers to my site so that they can read the blog and maybe buy a book; there must be something about my tweets that keeps them coming and staying in such large numbers but there’s no guaranteed correlation between followers and book sales I can assure you! If I could crack that I’d be a happy man. On balance I’d rather be blogging and attracting more readers than giving it up as a way to promote my writing. For me it will remain an important tool as an author.

The sequel to the award winning ‘The Final Straw’ sees Colin Bailey return to the UK after almost a decade abroad. With a new name and a new face he still has scores to settle. His meticulous planning takes him ingeniously across Scotland and the North of England ticking names off his list with the police completely baffled. 

 DCI Phil Hounsell pitted his wits against Colin before and so he is sent to Durham where he teams up with super intelligent young DS Zara Wheeler; together they track their man to Manchester and then eventually south to Bath. 

 The final scenes take place on the streets of the Roman city; Phil Hounsell’s family is threatened and in a dramatic conclusion reminiscent of Holmes and Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls, the two men struggle above the foaming waters of the historic Pulteney weir. 
Buy Now @ Amazon & Smashwords
Genre – Thriller
Rating – PG-18
More details about the author
Connect with Ted Tayler on Facebook & Twitter

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#Excerpt from Birth of an Assassin by @Stone_Rik #Crime #Mystery #GoodReads

Posted on Friday, May 16, 2014

Jez turned his head and saw jeeps stacked up one behind the other, coming at him. They were equipped for combat with mounted mortar cannon and sub-machine guns rigged on the integral bases behind the front seats. The heads of soldiers bobbed behind mortar blast protectors as the vehicles maneuvered over snowdrifts. He couldn’t tell how many vehicles, but seeing them fan out and fire, the number no longer seemed relevant.
He ran. He wanted to drop the ski jacket to quicken his pace, but he’d lose his weapons. The only thing he could do was wind in his head and race flat out. WHUMP! A mortar shell exploded 50 meters forward and to the right of his position. Shrapnel whizzed by, and though he could hear it, he felt nothing. He hadn’t been hit. He crouched lower, but the rabbit-skin hat fell off. No time to pick it up. Stop for nothing. With the rifles set to automatic, they traced straight black lines in the snow on either side of him and then swept horizontally across his horizon – Kalashnikov AKMs. They didn’t quite have him in their sights, but they would get there soon enough.
Not safe running in a straight line, he zigzagged, sacrificing distance for evasive tactics. Even so, it wouldn’t take them long to get a bead on him. He looked ahead for anything that might impede his progress, and saw a murder of crows take to the air on the opposite side of the nearest hill. If only he could join them, he thought. Instead, he ran a short distance to the left and then a longer distance to the right, on occasion reversing the strategy so as not to reveal a pattern.
WHUMP! WHUMP! One after another, mortar shells exploded; and while Jez’s evasive actions proved successful, progress slowed. The jeeps occasionally stopped to drop-blast their mortar shells more accurately, but it didn’t stop them gaining ground.
Clearly, while the snow slowed him, it had no such effect on the pursuit vehicles. They would catch him before he could get to the hills. He had to make a stand. WHUMP! A shell exploded 30 meters ahead. That would do, fight from the mortar’s footprint, die like a soldier. He ran towards it. The jeeps closed in. WHUMP! Another explosion – and it was in the same hollow he was headed for. He ran in the opposite direction to make them realign their weapons.
The aim moved. Shells exploded away from the crater, so he veered back and got close enough to jump. Any other time of year the landing would have been soft, but now solid ground jarred his bones as he made contact with the fissure’s base. The earth moved and rumbled, feet banged against brittle crust that cracked and broke beneath him. A thin layer of earth had been all that remained after the two explosions and Jez crashed through the crater into another hole.
He dropped the depth of the first hollow and through into the hole below. But he couldn’t see out to shoot. If his life hadn’t been about to end he might have laughed. Too low to make a stand, he would have to… but just a minute, what was that? He wasn’t in a hole, but a pothole, a chance, a slim chance, but a chance.
He pulled the landfall aside, squeezed through and scrambled along the tunnel in a direction in line with the hills. The cave got bigger. He could stand up straight. He started running again, and half a minute carried him 100 meters in. WHUMP! Grit and soil blasted along the chasm behind him, stung his legs, back and buttocks as fragments struck. They’d realigned a fix on the crater too soon. It had to be Mitrokhin up there. The regular army weren’t that good.
With adrenalin pumping, he gave that extra push, but the channel narrowed and lowered. Lack of headroom forced him to his hands and knees. Movement slowed. The ground shook. Tremors shuddered through his arms and legs, and then a blast was followed by a rumble.
The channel collapsed and fallen earth charged towards him. Rapid breathing, his heart raced, but he had to steady his thoughts. He couldn’t lose control, but the ground rumbled, ever closer.
Still on his hands and knees, he pushed his back hard against the roof. Earth fell around his feet and legs as the miniature cave fell in. But his body remained rigid, acting as a stanchion. His part of the crown hadn’t fallen, but ahead and behind, the rumble continued and the fragile earth crashed down. The structure of the hollow folded, and when it stopped he’d become entombed. Panic engulfed him. There was no way out.
Set against the backdrop of Soviet, post-war Russia, Birth of an Assassin follows the transformation of Jez Kornfeld from wide-eyed recruit to avenging outlaw. Amidst a murky underworld of flesh-trafficking, prostitution and institutionalized corruption, the elite Jewish soldier is thrown into a world where nothing is what it seems, nobody can be trusted, and everything can be violently torn from him.
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Genre - Thriller, Crime, Suspense
Rating – R
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