Speaking of hard-boiled, I’ve been holding out on you.
About three weeks ago I received an email that began “Stephen, I hope you will consider my book, The Storm Killer, for your Kindle Nation Shorts program.” I was struck immediately by the humility of tone in the sender’s email message. The next morning, after I had read most of the novel, I went back and read the email again and I was even more astonished by that humility, because I knew the book I was reading was the real thing, in a way that one expects to come upon only once or twice in a year of reading.
I quickly wrote back and scheduled the publication of the excerpt here for today, and for the past three weeks I’ve had a strange feeling that must be something akin to what Olympic judges must go through when they know that the best skating or gymnastic performance must be coming near the end of the program. I’ve been lucky enough to be able to share some great stuff with you here over the past three weeks, and I’ve let you know what I liked. But I’ve also been aware — not to put fine a point on the analogy since fiction cannot be rated in the linear way that one rate a performance, say, on the balance beam — that I wanted to save the 10s, because I knew The Storm Killer was coming. If a novel could be a 10, I’d say this is a 10. It is a wonderfully ambitious historical novel, and the author, Mike Jastrzebski, delivers on its potential in every way, with every sense, and with an astonishing ability to create, or perhaps recreate, the times and places and characters in this work of fiction.
Let me share a couple of reviews, and then I’ll leave it up to you whether to click on the link to buy or sample this novel or to check out the generous excerpt in a recent Free Kindle Nation Shorts excerpt.
“Time: 1935. Place: New York City. Crime beat reporter Jim Locke gets sucked into a quagmire of death, deceit, and danger when his actress sister is murdered – and he becomes the prime suspect. When he uncovers a pattern of similar murders, he is convinced that a serial killer is on the loose. But the police aren’t buying it, and it’s up to Jim to stop the madman. The hunt takes him from the grimy streets and smoke-filled bars of Manhattan to deceptively laid-back Key West, just as a killer storm bears down on the island. THE STORM KILLER has it all: hard-boiled narrative, gripping suspense, period detail, an unlikely hero battling his inner demons, and a stunning conclusion that you won’t see coming. Highly recommended!”
“Mike Jastrzebski’s stunning historical debut takes readers back into the hard-boiled world of Chandler and Hammett — and brings Ernest Hemingway back to life in a book as big as the man himself. The Storm Killer, a top grade thriller with a heavy dose of noir, hurtles you from New York to Key West at a pace that will leave you breathless.”
“Jastrzebski’s hard-boiled thriller storms through New York’s gritty streets down to Prohibition-era Key West with Ernest Hemingway providing the tailwind. A crisp, fast-paced detective story, which Humphrey Bogart would have loved to play the lead in.”
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Price: £9.99
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Price: £8.99
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More Free Book Listings in the UK Kindle Store
No guarantees on how long this one will last as a freebie, since it shows a rather dear list price and is selling in the US Kindle Store for $41.21….
This book bridges the gap between theory and practice and goes beyond just one single model to present a complete toolbox – a range of models that can be used to analyze, diagnose, and resolve conflict in any situation. It shows mediators, negotiators, managers, and anyone needing to resolve conflict how to simply and effectively understand and assess the situations of conflict they face. And it goes a step further, offering specific, practical guidance on how to intervene to resolve the conflict successfully.
Each model provides a different and potentially useful angle on the problem, and includes worksheets and a step–by–step process to guide the reader in applying the tools.
- Offers eight models to help you understand the root causes of any conflict.
- Explains each model′s focus, what kind of situations it can be useful in and, most importantly, what interventions are likely to help.
- Provides you with clear direction on what specific actions to choose to resolve a particular type of conflict effectively.
- Features a detailed case study throughout the book, to which each model is applied.
- Additional examples and case studies unique to each chapter give the reader a further chance to see the models in action.
- Includes practical tools and worksheets that you can use in working with these models in your practice.
The Conflict Resolution Toolbox equips any practitioner to resolve a wide range of conflicts. Mediators, negotiators, lawyers, managers and supervisors, insurance adjusters, social workers, human resource and labour relations specialists, and others will have all the tools they need for successful conflict resolution.
LENGTH: novella, approximately 20,000 words, 96 pages in the trade paperback edition
“Reading the Peter Leroy saga is akin to watching a champion juggler deftly keep dozens of balls in the air while executing an intricate double-time dance routine-all without breathing hard. . . . Sentimental, loving, raucous, wise, and great fun, this is simply not to be missed.”
Booklist
“[Kraft’s Peter Leroy] series is smart, funny, warmly inviting, and delightfully impossible to define.”
Kate Bernheimer, The Oregonian
“Eric Kraft’s essential subject is suburban boyhood-in particular, that moment when it loses its innocence. . . . Like Lawrence Sterne, Kraft is unashamedly sentimental, digressive, and extremely funny; like Proust, profoundly nostalgic and obsessed with loss. The typical Kraft novel is a laugh-out-loud read with undertones of grief and ruefulness. Almost all of his books revolve around a single individual, Peter Leroy, who is now . . . as fully realized as any character in current American literature. . . . Under the surface humor, Kraft’s take on the national experience is thoughtful, disturbing, and unlike that of any other American writer.”
Anthony Brandt, Men’s Journal
“The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy is one of the biggest, funniest, sweetest, and looniest undertakings in contemporary American fiction.”
John Strausbaugh, New York Press
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