Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 14, 2011: An Excerpt from SNAKE WALKERS, A Novel by J. Everett Prewitt

May 15, 2011February 14, 2011 by KND

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 14, 2011

An Excerpt from

SNAKE WALKERS

A Novel by J. Everett Prewitt

By Stephen Windwalker
Editor, Kindle Nation Daily
©Kindle Nation Daily 2011

In Africa, the Snake Walkers are a mythical tribe that teaches its children from birth how to walk th

rough a nest of poisonous snakes without being bitten. In J. Everett Prewitt’s fictionalized Arkansas town of the early 1960s, the snakes are no less poisonous….

After the 2005 hardcover edition received unanimous critical acclaim, Kindle Nation is happy to announce that J. Everett Prewitt is celebrating the release of his novel Snake Walkers on Kindle with a generous free excerpt through our Free Kindle Nation Shorts program.

Click here to read the free excerpt from Snake Walkers

Here’s the set-up:

In his first novel, J. Everett Prewitt brings us a critically acclaimed story of violence and transformation in a small Arkansas community during the early 1960s.

Traumatized as a child after witnessing a hanging, Anthony Andrews, the first black reporter at the Arkansas Sun, seeks to solve the mysterious abandonment of a small town and the disappearance of fourteen white men.

His investigation leads him from rural Arkansas to Cleveland, Ohio as he tries to uncover a family secret kept hidden for over a decade. The closer he gets to the truth, the more he must question his own motives.

His quest not only reveals the true identity of people he has met along the way, but also points Anthony toward a path that leads to his own salvation.

The Reviews:

Snake Walkers is a captivating book. –Midwest Book Review

Prewitt is a natural story teller. I was drawn right into the story. He captured my attention from the first paragraph. The plot carries with it all the elements of conflict, romance, and intrigue. The story unfolds a haunting theme of mystery. –Richard R. Blake, Vine Voice Top 1000 Reviewer.

“Snake Walkers is a fascinating read that revisits a horrific time in history where the lives of African Americans were tragically taken by those who wanted to suppress them.” –Books2Mention Magazine.

(Prewitt) develops complex characters and a fascinating mystery with historical roots. It is an engaging novel with insights to ponder. –-Small Press Review, July-August 2005, Kaye Bache-Snyder

SNAKE WALKERS is a dynamic work of fiction with a slow, deliberate pace that is reminiscent of Southern Life. The characters are well developed, colorful, flawed and each of them is transformed in the course of the story. The plot is full of twists and suspense; this adds an additional layer of richness to an already compelling work of historical fiction. –RAWSISTAZ Reviewers.

Everett writes with a great mastery of plot and characters capturing the attention of readers right from the riveting opening to the punding climax…This compelling page-turner marks the debut of an extremely promising new talent. –-BookWire Review

Click here to read the free excerpt from Snake Walkers

Click here to purchase the entire book from Amazon for just $3.99

Snake Walkers

by J. Everett Prewitt

Kindle Edition

List Price: $3.99

Buy Now

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SNAKE WALKERS

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 14, 2011

SNAKE WALKERS

A Novel by J. Everett Prewitt

I have given you authority over all the power of the enemy and you can walk among snake and scorpions and crush them. Nothing will injure you.

Luke 10:19

New Living Translation Bible

PROLOGUE

Late Summer, 1948

A farm outside Pine Bluff, Arkansas

The two thirteen-year-old cousins raced around the edges of the cornfield as the sun slowly moved across the horizon, changing from a fiery yellow to a burnt orange, signaling its pending departure. The smaller boy, a visitor at his cousin’s farm, and the faster of the two, stopped for the third time to wait for his playmate and to look across the rows of corn toward the woods.

“I’ve never been in any woods before,” the smaller one said.

“City boy,” the larger one said teasingly, “Almost grown and ain’t never been in no woods.”

The smaller boy looked once more toward the looming cluster of trees.

As if reading his mind, the larger boy, more seriously now, pointed toward the woods and whispered, “They’s hainted. You ain’t want to go there. Nobody go there. That’s where the ghost of dead people live.”

Anthony Andrews shrugged. “I still want to go. Will you tell?” he asked.

Joe Mathis hesitated, grimacing and shaking his head at his cousin’s bullheadedness. “Nah. I ain’t gonna tell.”

Without a second thought, Anthony started toward his destination, glancing back to see his cousin standing, arms folded, still shaking his head.

It took longer than he expected to reach the edge of the forest through the endless rows of corn. The trees that appeared so small in the distance loomed over him now like giant guardians to the entrance of some other world. Unfamiliar with his surroundings, he hesitated at the edge of the forest, listening, as Joe’s warning of a haunted woods echoed faintly in his head.

It didn’t take long for the adventurer in him to win out, though. So despite any misgivings, he entered, moving cautiously into the quiet darkness.

Where the cornfield he had just passed through was lively with the sounds of swishing stalks swaying in the wind, accompanied by the high-pitched cawing of crows, the even higher-pitched chirps of the woodland birds, and the faint, lowing of a distant cow, the woods were unlike anyplace he had ever been.

There was a dampness in the air that seemed to diminish any sounds of life, creating a quietness that settled like a blanket over the towering, majestic trees. Even the singing of the birds seemed muted.

Anthony stood still, his hands on his hips. It was as if he had entered another place in time.

Eventually he stepped carefully over the roots that snaked from the huge clustered trunks of the lofty oak trees and moved inward, entering an open area of red and yellow dahlias and black-eyed susans. He felt more at ease after seeing their bright colors and inhaling their light, breezy fragrance.

Hesitantly, he walked farther, past a thicket of brightly colored bushes, and found a group of smaller pear trees encircled by a blanket of flowers and shrubs. The place was like a beautiful painting. It was better by far than anywhere else he had ever visited. Anthony decided this would be his secret place, where he would come to be alone and surround himself with the magic the area possessed.

He walked deeper into the woods, through the trees, flowers, and bushes, marveling at the variety of shapes, colors, sounds, and smells. Occasionally he looked behind him so he wouldn’t get lost, but he had no intention of going back until he was satisfied he had seen everything. There was a small hill shaped like the letter L that overlooked a meadow. Anthony climbed it to get an even better look at his paradise.

A deeper shade of darkness descended through the trees. Although he knew it was time to leave, he remained, savoring his surroundings. I’ll go back in a little while, he thought as he lay on the ground, hands behind his head, looking up at the emerging stars.

He lingered as long as he possibly could before reluctantly rising, stretching his thin arms and legs to begin his descent. Before he could take his first step, though, he was stopped by the faint sound of men laughing that drifted through the stillness of the night. It startled, then upset him, that there were other people in his woods.

The noise came from down the slope on the other side of the hill, accompanied by more laughter and a sound he had never heard before. He lay down on his stomach and eased to the edge, fearful that even the smallest of sounds would alert the men. Brush and other growth along the ridge of the hill allowed him to see, but still remain concealed.

The moon had emerged, and played hide-and-seek, while the darkness made its home among the trees. He could barely make out a group of men with one small torch surrounding a smaller person at the far edge of the woods near a cluster of medium-sized trees. They were walking toward him. Some had what looked like big sticks or baseball bats, and one man had what looked like a rope. While the other men varied in size and shape, the man with the rope stood out. He was fat and squat-looking, and he reminded Anthony of a picture of an ogre he had seen in one of the books at the school library.

The men stopped near the base of the hill next to a smaller oak tree. Anthony watched as two of them held the person in the middle. The squat-looking man slung a rope over a branch. There was faint whining and sniffling coming from within the gathering. As the men shuffled around waiting for the man with the rope to finish, shards of light from the moon bathed the group in a dull, yellow hue. It made the white rope and the beige-colored baseball bats more visible.

Anthony counted nine men in the group, all dressed in overalls and boots as if they had just left their farms. They were white except for the person in the middle. Anthony could see him more clearly as additional light filtered through the trees. The face wasn’t familiar, but it was clear he was a colored boy, like him, and young, like him.

The strange noises were coming from the boy.

“Shut up, nigger, and quit your moaning,” a tall, pale-looking man growled.

Anthony froze.

“I ain’t do nothin’.”

A bat interrupted the boy’s plea. It hit him in the forehead. A short scream erupted from the young boy as his head snapped back from the vicious blow before he slumped. Two men on either side held him to keep him from falling to the ground. A knot as big as a baseball appeared almost instantly on his forehead.

Anthony shuddered and wiped a tear running down his cheek. The sound was the same one his friend Cal Harper’s bat had made when he had hit a homerun the week before.

“Goddammit, Junior. You almost hit me,” the taller of the men said.

“But I didn’t.”

The men laughed.

The boy looked around frantically, then froze. His gaze was fixed in Anthony’s direction, but he said nothing. Could he see me? Anthony thought as the boy continued to look toward the small hill where Anthony lay. Anthony wrung his hands in despair. He was only a boy himself.

The squat man pulled on both ends of the rope, inspecting the branch. “It’ll do,” he rasped in a deep, gravelly voice.

Anthony watched in disbelief as one of the men put the noose around the boy’s neck. Three of them grabbed the other end and began pulling the rope. The tree limb creaked from the additional weight.

As the body rose slowly from the ground, an eerie whine punctured the night air, causing the men pulling the rope to stop briefly before tying the end of the rope to a stump. Only a faint gurgling noise could be heard among the jeering laughter as the body, which at first jerked spasmodically, barely swung back and forth while the men stood admiring their handiwork. They then picked up their bats and started swatting at the hanging boy.

Chills rushed through Anthony’s body, and more tears poured down his face as the sound of the bats penetrated the darkness.

“You swing like a girl, Tyson,” a heavy-voiced man said.

“Oh yeah? Your momma don’t think so.”

In morbid fascination, Anthony wiped his eyes to look one more time.

“Watch this,” the tallest of men said as he swung with full force at the boy’s head.

Anthony began to tremble uncontrollably as the boy’s head snapped back again. There was another cracking sound. This time the young boy’s head fell to the side at an odd angle. What could have been blood dripped slowly from his dangling tongue, which had slipped out of his opened mouth and swung back and forth with the force of each blow.

He watched the men swat at the hanging target for what seemed like hours. The lifeless body began to sway again, creating the same creaking sounds as before, interrupted only by the men’s grunts of exertion. He watched as it slowly turned toward him. And for a brief moment, in less time than a heartbeat, one eye opened. It was almost like a blink, but in that terrifying moment, a moment where a fathomless dread flooded his body, the eye seemed to look straight at Anthony.

The moon slowly disappeared again, leaving only the smallest slivers of light behind as a witness, while Anthony, still trembling uncontrollably, turned away for the last time.

At first he couldn’t stand. His legs were so weak; Anthony feared he would have to stay there all night. He crawled on his hands and knees through the brush and down the other side of the hill until he felt his strength return. Unable to see clearly through teary eyes, he willed himself to run as fast as he could through the woods toward the farm.

He hurtled his thin body through the brush and trees, oblivious to the cuts and scratches from the branches that grabbed him at every step. Noise was of no concern to him now. Anthony’s thin legs pumped so fast that he fell headfirst down a brush-covered ditch. A flock of startled black birds cawed; their wings flapped angrily as they took flight.

The fall slowed him temporarily, but his feet never stopped moving until he reached the clearing where he could see the lights from his uncle Mathis’s house above the rows of corn that were now as still as the rest of the night.

His lungs were on fire as he fell exhausted on the ground. With his chest heaving from both fear and fatigue, Anthony looked back at the edge of the woods, terrified that the same men he watched hang and beat the boy would burst out of the woods and do the same to him.

The grunts and wet thuds made by the bats as they hit the bloodied, lifeless body followed him all the way back to the farm. He burst through the front door and through the house to the bedroom, acknowledging no one. “Where have you…Anthony?” His mother’s voice sounded alien and distant.

Bumping his knees on the bed he shared with Joe, he climbed in, shivering, with his clothes still on, pulling every blanket he could reach over himself.

Eventually, there was a quiet shuffle of bare feet as someone else entered the room. The bed sagged from the weight of another person as Anthony slid even farther under the covers.

“I told you,” Joe whispered.

PART I

Chapter 1

January 1961

Pine Bluff, Arkansas

At 5:30 A. M., the two runners had the track to themselves. It was an isolated area surrounding a grass-covered football field at the back of an old brick school. Anthony liked the track since few people used it. Because it was so secluded, there was minimal chance of human contact. That day, though, Anthony wanted company.

The air was brisk with no breeze and a temperature of around fifty-five degrees. The mist lifting from the ground made the men look ghostly. The crunch of their shoes hitting the red cinders was the only sound penetrating the morning stillness. Anthony, the slightly taller of the two, ran with an effortless gait. The shorter, huskier runner with the build of a running back labored as he ran to keep up.

“Anthony James Andrews, if you keep up this pace, you’re going to be running by yourself,” the shorter one said as he struggled to keep abreast.

“You’re the one who ran track in school,” Anthony chided his friend Chucky as they turned into the backstretch for the seventeenth lap.

“Yeah, but it was 440 yards, not the marathon,” Chucky said puffing, “and I wasn’t obsessed with it like you.”

Anthony and Charles “Chucky” Aaron White met when they first started elementary school. Their friendship grew on its own, unattended by words, like a cactus would grow unattended by water. Neither acknowledged their closeness in so many words, but both considered the other to be a best friend. Their friendship was the reason that when Anthony called, knowing that even though Chucky hated to run long distances, Chucky would come.

Their laugh, throaty but subdued, sounded like it came from the same person. In fact, there was little to distinguish the two except their height. Both twenty-six-year-olds would be considered attractive with dusky brown complexions, short hair, high cheekbones, and angular noses that stopped just short of the wider noses attributed to their African ancestors. Anthony, however, at six feet even was, two inches taller than Chucky.

Anthony had to admit that Chucky was right. He was obsessed, and there was a reason. It hadn’t been a good night. As a matter of fact, it hadn’t been a good week. The nightmares had returned.

A week ago, he was working at his father’s funeral home when they received the body of an old colored man who had been beaten to death outside the town of Wynne, Arkansas. After a glimpse at the naked corpse with its head bashed in on one side, a leg that lay at an awkward angle indicating it had been broken in more than one place, all but two of its fingers missing and a hole where the testicles used to be, Anthony experienced his first flashback in years.

It had been thirteen years since the incident in the woods. He had hoped the pain of it would disappear in time, but it hadn’t completely. It was still there, lurking in the shadows, waiting, like some gigantic, poisonous viper. At the beginning, during the most dreadful periods, Anthony felt that he was just within the serpent’s reach, and if it ever caught him, it would swallow him whole.

It was evident that time would not be his narcotic, so he ran. Running was redemptive. It cleaned and restored the natural order of things within him. The eye that constantly penetrated his dreams, the nightmares, the flashbacks, the nagging fear that something was behind him faded away, at least for a time. The pain of exhaustion temporarily replaced the pain of sadness and powerlessness, but even that dissipated until only the steady, rhythmic sound of his feet was left to propel his mind to a more peaceful place.

“Lost in thought?” Chucky asked, bringing Anthony back to the present as they slowed to a jog to cool down.

“I’m sorry, man. There’s a lot of stuff on my mind these days,” Anthony said.

“Whenever you want to unload, all you have to do is start talking,” Chucky said, tapping Anthony’s back in a show of support. “That’s what friends are for.”

“Thanks, man. I appreciate that.”

“Talking about friends, are we going to see you at Mo’s this Saturday?” Chucky asked. “When you don’t show, we have no choice but to talk about you. You need to be there to salvage your reputation,” he said, laughing and still trying to catch his breath.

Anthony laughed with him. “I plan on it.”

“Good. I’m going to get some coffee after I shower. You want to join me?” Chucky asked.

“No. I’m going to do some weights before I head to work.”

Chucky turned with raised eyebrows. “Weights? When did you start doing weights?”

“Just recently. Nothing heavy. Just a lot of repetitions.”

“For how long?”

“Another hour or so.”

Chucky shook his head. “Are you sure you aren’t overdoing it?”

“I – I just feel better when I’ve had a complete workout.”

Chucky raised his hands, palms up. “This wasn’t a complete workout?”

Anthony took a deep breath. “Not to me.”

Chucky looked at Anthony closely. “What’s going on man?”

“Everything’s okay, Chucky.”

Chucky continued to stare at Anthony. “How’s everything at the funeral home?” Chucky asked as they slowed to a walk.

Anthony shook his head slightly. “It’s fine, but it’s not what I want to do for the rest of my life.”

“The money’s good, isn’t it?” Chucky asked.

“It is, but my father and I don’t agree on a lot of things,” Anthony said as he thought about the old man who was beaten to death and the rift it caused between him and his father.

After Anthony saw the body, he had gone home that day shaking his head in disgust at the anguish it caused him and the weakness he felt because of it. As soon as he had entered his apartment, he retrieved the folded, yellowed piece of paper he had carried with him since he was a child. Before the woods, Anthony feared nothing. Now fear, though most times dormant, accompanied him everywhere he went. It scared him most that he wasn’t in control.

Aunt Ida, his father’s sister who passed four years earlier, used to always say, “The devil knockin” when she began to feel “strange.” Anthony didn’t realize the significance of her statement until years later when she was sent to a home for the mentally unstable.

Years had passed since the devil had knocked on Anthony’s door, but it had come, pounding away, that day he saw the old man’s body. And like a reopened wound, the memories of Emmanuel came too. Anthony had named the boy he saw in the woods in his mind because it wasn’t right that he didn’t have a name. The helplessness he felt as he watched them put a noose around Emmanuel’s neck tormented him all over again.

He had stayed in his apartment for two sleepless weeks, walking the floor, and hardly eating because he knew he would throw it up. His mother called every day. His father called once, to find out when he would return to work.

After the second weekend away from the job, his mother had insisted Anthony come to the house for dinner. It was only the second time during that two-week period that he had left the apartment.

The dinner table had always been where almost all discussions took place. That night was different. His dad’s usually caustic commentary was subdued. Even his mother was quieter than usual. Halfway through the meal, Randall Andrews had looked up at Anthony. “Son, I don’t think you’re going to cut it in this business.”

“Randall!”

Anthony had been startled more by his mother’s response than his father’s statement. “What do you mean, Dad?”

“You see a dead man, and you take off for two weeks? How can I depend on you if I have to worry about you running off again?”

Anthony had shaken his head slightly. His father hadn’t understood. He couldn’t have understood. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m not cut out for this business.”

“Anthony! Your father is just upset right now. Don’t make it any worse.”

A half smile had crossed Anthony’s face for a brief second. “Dad’s right, Mom, as always, but for the wrong reasons.”

His father’s face had darkened as he looked at Anthony closely. “So what’s the reason? What’s the reason I have to almost turn down customers because my son, who would eventually inherit one of the most profitable businesses in this town , can’t stand the sight of a dead body?” Anthony’s father looked at him in disdain before shaking his head. “And for the life of me, I fail to understand why you even agonize over some nigger that probably had it coming anyway.”

Anthony had stood then, speaking louder than he ever had to his father. “Because he’s a human being Dad, and no one should have been treated like he was.” Anthony’s voice lowered. “And if you can’t understand that, Dad, then I’m not going to try to explain it to you.”

“What I do understand is that I raised a son to follow in my footsteps, but he can’t take it,” his father had said as he slammed his palm on the table.

A need to fight back had coursed through Anthony’s veins and settled somewhere near the front of his brain. He couldn’t tell then if the sudden headache was from anger or fear, but he couldn’t show anger. Anger meant you had lost control. He couldn’t show fear either, because he was the cub, and the wolf was tougher, and if you cower, the wolf wins.

The wolf and the cub. That was their relationship in a nutshell. How could a father like that understand? All he was concerned with was being right at all costs, running his funeral business and making money. Nothing else counted.

Just a few months ago, Anthony recalled a conversation between his dad and a few of his friends after reading the headline in the Arkansas Sun, which blared, “King in North Carolina.” The article lamented that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was involved in a sit-in at Woolworth’s lunch counter, stirring up people unnecessarily. Anthony had read the same article with interest because for some time, racial tension had been on the rise, and southern states like Arkansas were feeling the pressure. America was feeling the pressure.

A journalist in a New York once wrote, “Race relationships in the South have always been covered by a thin veneer of southern decorum. Peel the skin off, though, and what you find is an unspoken contract between blacks and whites that governs every aspect of their lives.”

Anthony agreed, but in the past few years, he noticed that the assigned roles and established relationships were slowly beginning to unravel as more and more Negroes joined the chorus of voices seeking change.

Attitudes were shifting-or maybe hardening was a better description. Resentments that had simmered just below the surface now erupted like bubbles in the belly of a lava-pregnant mountain-one, then another, bursting, subsiding, then multiplying in numbers, until it finally overflowed.

The festering rage over the death of young black men like Emmett Till, the discord over Rosa Parks and her refusal to move to the back of the bus, the integration of the schools, and the general turmoil created by Dr. King and his people ignited a slow but steadily growing fire in the South as well as the North. Even among colored folks though, it wasn’t a heat that everyone welcomed, especially in his household.

“That damned King!” Randall grumbled that day in the parlor. “Rabble rousers like him are destroying the very fabric of the South that allows so many of us to obtain a good living. The lowlife and rebellious few that are causing all the trouble should get off the streets, stop complaining, work harder, and achieve. Then there would be no reason to march and cause trouble.”

Anthony tried to understand his father’s anxiety, but he couldn’t. Randall Andrews had expressed the same concern when the nine children integrated Central High. “Uppity Negroes. A colored school isn’t good enough for them?” But Anthony had to admire those kids and others like them who felt so strongly about Negro rights that they would risk their lives for it.

The results of this unrest, though, were the same as if one were to hit a hornet’s nest with a stick. Acts of violence against Negroes increased, and tension was so thick you could almost touch it.

There were times during that period when Anthony almost felt compelled to join the quest for rights and freedom, but he was torn. He was torn between his sense of justice for all, the agony of his past, and his own pursuits. In the end, he opted to take the path of personal gain. There were many reasons. Some he couldn’t formulate. But at that moment in his life, he decided that if he were to accomplish his lifelong dream of becoming a reporter, he would have to focus. Nothing was more important.

Anthony sighed. He often wondered why his dad and mom ever married. Randall Andrews was rigid and a constant complainer who was always railing against something. If it wasn’t the poor niggers trying to get burial services for little or nothing, it was the outsiders coming in and causing trouble with the white man. Mildred Andrews, on the other hand, was a quiet, gentle woman who never raised her voice and who listened more than she talked. Whatever peace there was in the house was because of her.

Anthony had more of his mother’s characteristics than his father’s.

***

Anthony glanced at Chucky. He wasn’t comfortable sharing his problem with his friends. They all looked up to him. They would be disappointed knowing that a dead body had caused him so much distress. It was a burden he would have to bear by himself, and a problem he would have to solve by himself.

They stopped their walk as Chucky turned to look at Anthony and nodded knowingly. “I can understand you having problems with your dad.” He laughed. “I would imagine that anybody who worked for Mr. Andrews would. ‘We’re the upper echelon of Negro society,’ ” Chucky mimicked.

Anthony smiled. “Yeah, they even started calling themselves the ‘Echelons’ until someone told them that the name sounded like some singing group from Detroit.” His smile faded. “You know. I try to please him, but he’s convinced that Andrews Funeral Home is my future. I went to school to become a journalist, and that’s what I intend to do,” Anthony said resolutely. “For some reason, my father doesn’t believe I can do it.”

“Well, there’s the Arkansas State Press down here. There’s a colored paper in Mississippi, and I believe there’s one in Tennessee. If you want to go north, there’s the Chicago Defender, the Pittsburgh Courier, the Call & Post in Cleveland…” Chucky hesitated. “There are some more that don’t come to mind right now. Which papers would you want to work for?”

Anthony looked toward the sky. The morning mist had receded, replaced by the sun that peeked out behind lazily shifting clouds. He stood there for a moment in contemplat

Think “The West Wing meets I Am Legend….” – Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 13, 2011: An Excerpt from TORMENT, A Novel of Dark Horror by Jeremy Bishop

May 16, 2011February 13, 2011 by KND

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 13, 2011

An Excerpt from

TORMENT

A Novel of Dark Horror

By Jeremy Bishop

Think “The West Wing meets I Am Legend….”

By Stephen Windwalker
Editor, Kindle Nation Daily
©Kindle Nation Daily 2011

Small town reporter, Mia Durante, finds herself having brunch with the President of the United States on the day civilization comes to an end.

An electromagnetic pulse blinds the U.S.

Cars crash.

Planes fall.

Chaos reigns.

Power is restored within minutes, but it’s already too late.

Russian nukes are falling. U.S. allies around the world are all ready wiped out.

The United States will cease to exist inside of five minutes.

After giving the order to launch a full-scale retaliation, dooming the planet, the president, White House staff, Secret Service and those lucky enough to be visiting the white house, are whisked below ground where they board several Earth Escape Pods. As the EEPs launch into Earth orbit, missiles descend.

Less than forty survive the end of the world. When they return, they’re greeted by survivors of a different sort. The bloodbath that follows leaves Durante and nine other survivors on the run. They find themselves fighting for survival in a world in which only torment remains and where death is the only escape.

Click here to begin reading the free excerpt of TORMENT

That’s the set-up for Jeremy Bishops’s bestselling novel TORMENT, from which we are serving up a nice 7,800 excerpt this evening through our Free Kindle Nation Shorts program. Well, perhaps “nice” is not the best choice of words here.

But it doesn’t matter. With a set-up like that, I think there are very few readers who haven’t clicked through already to begin reading the free excerpt. So I don’t think there will be a lot of attention paid here to my choice of adjectives. After all, it’s the book that’s important here, and if you start reading I think you’ll quickly agree….

Click here to purchase the entire book from Amazon for just $2.99

TORMENT

A Novel of Dark Horror

by Jeremy Bishop

Kindle Edition

Kindle Price: $2.99

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TORMENT – A Novel of Dark Horror

PRAISE FOR TORMENT

“Jeremy Bishop takes a terrifying bite out of the zombie genre with TORMENT. This is a dark and devious post-apocalypting thrill-ride!” -Jonathan Maberry, NY Times Bestselling authr of PATIENT ZERO and ROT & RUIN

“TORMENT is a nightmarish descent through Armageddon. With barely a pause for breath, Bishop drags you out of normality, straight into the depths of a devastated post-apocalyptic landscape. Surreal and extraordinary locations, grotesque characters and outlandish events rise up from the devastated ashes of the familiar in this startlingly original horror novel. Dreamlike, disturbing and never predictable, once you start reading, you won’t want to put it down.” — David Moody, author of HATER, DOG BLOOD & the AUTUMN series.

“Jeremy Bishop explodes onto the zombie scene with TORMENT, a thought-provoking gorefest that turns the genre on its head. Both shocking and riveting, this is a debut novel that leaves the reader hungry for more.” — Steven Savile, #1 International bestselling author of PRIMEVAL and SILVER

“With originality not seen since Fleischer’s Zombieland, Bishop’s debut novel will drag you kicking and screaming to the very bloody end. Look out Maberry … there’s a new sheriff in town.”
— Thenovelblog.com

“This is one of those kick-ass icky books that constantly surprised me. I’m looking forward to what Bishop has up his sleeve next.” — Jeff Ayers, Author Magazine

“TORMENT is a fast paced horror story filled with monsters and zombies (but not the kind you might expect in a novel like this). [It’s] gory and intense, all things a book like this should be.”
— TheManEatingBookworm

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Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 13, 2011
An Excerpt from

Torment

A Novel of Dark Horror

By Jeremy Bishop

The physical toll of reentry seemed paltry compared to the pulsing acceleration of liftoff. Mia’s stomach lurched when gravity took hold, but other than that, she remained fully conscious and aware. The view out the window shifted from dark space, to deep purple and then to clear blue sky. Not a cloud in sight. The view through the command center window was much more expansive than the small portal had been, but she still could not see the ground.

And that’s what she really wanted to see.

She expected the world to be scorched and decimated. Ruins of the human civilization. Over time, what was left would be reduced to dust, and future generations, born from the children of the few survivors, would build a new world. Villages at first. Then small cities. Migrations would come next. Trade routes. Countries. Wars. Human civilization would be remade and probably, someday in the future, undone again.

She wondered for a moment if this could have happened before. Maybe the flood was some kind of man-made cataclysm? she thought. Six thousand years in the future, our descendants might debate the mythology surrounding the time when God burned the Earth, sparing those who fled into space, in EEPs that contained all the knowledge and life of the previous earth. The knowledge, all digital, wouldn’t survive long. Batteries would die and the technology to recreate them wouldn’t exist for a long time to come. But in the years to come, using the technology on the EEPs, they would recreate Earth’s animal life.

She knew it was all ludicrous, but that didn’t keep her from hoping.

What else is there to hope for? she wondered.

The parachutes deployed and jolted the EEP hard, slowing the descent to a swaying flutter.

She unlocked the bar restraint and pushed it back over her head.

“What are you doing?” Austin asked.

“I want to see.” The cushioning system disengaged with the removal of the bar and she could move again. She undid the Velcro snaps and pushed out of her chair. But she didn’t make it far. While gravity was now tugging her toward the Earth’s core, her brain had yet to readjust. Some part of her mind expected to float free of the chair, but she merely bounced in the seat.

Austin chuckled. “Heavier than you remember?”

“Hey,” she said, before standing and leaning toward the window.

“When we touch down, you’ll want to be back in the chair and strapped in,” he said, undoing his own restraints. “It could be rough.”

The EEP had swayed back so she could see only sky. “Won’t the shock absorbers take most of it?”

“Unless we land on a ledge and flip over.”

She looked back at him. “That could happen?”

“If it’s a short fall we could end up upside down or on our side. If it’s a long fall, the EEP would right itself-it’s bottom heavy-but the parachutes might not slow us down again.”

Mia frowned, but felt the EEP sway in the other direction. She leaned over the command console and looked out the window. As the world below came into view, Austin joined her.

“Oh my God,” she whispered.

“Well, that’s not what I expected.”

A residential neighborhood, seemingly untouched by the war, stood one thousand feet below. Things looked different in the distance-darker-but this small part of the world looked livable.

“Do you think there are survivors?”

“I don’t see how it’s possible. Then again, I don’t see how this is possible either. I was expecting ruins everywhere.” As the EEP spun around, Austin saw a gleaming white circle below them. “There’s EEP Beta.”

Mia strained to see. The massive spacecraft had come to rest atop of a house, now flattened beneath it.

“EEP Alpha, do you read?”

Austin toggled the com system. “We hear you Reggie. What’s the score?”

“The system was right. I’m on the ground. The air is breathable. The Geiger counter is pinging at normal levels. No fallout anywhere. It’s like the missiles never dropped.”

“Have you seen any survivors?”

“Not a one.” Reggie was quiet for a moment. “No animals either. No birds. No bugs. Somehow this neighborhood survived.”

A stiff breeze caught EEP Alpha and began pulling them away from EEP Beta. “Looks like we’re going to touch down a few blocks away,” Austin said. “Stay where you are. We’ll come to you.”

“Copy that, Austin.”

Austin motioned to the chairs and sat down. “Better strap in, we’ll be on the ground in thirty seconds.”

Mia nodded, took her seat and began to lift the bar restraint over her body. But before she did, Reggie’s voice came over the speakers again. “Oh my God, I see survivors!”

Mia and Austin launched from their chairs and looked out the window. EEP Beta was further away, but still visible. They could see Reggie in front, waving his arms, and his group of survivors exiting the EEP behind him. Further down the street, a crowd of people approached.

“Looks like the whole neighborhood,” Reggie said. “Sounds like they’re shouting something.”

“What are they saying?” Austin asked, while keeping one eye on their distance from the ground. Maybe fifteen seconds left.

“Can’t tell. They’re all shouting. Making it hard to hear.” Reggie’s voice grew louder as he spoke to the people, who were now just a few feet away. “One at a time! I can’t hear you!”

A new voice, feminine, came over Reggie’s mic. “Please run! I don’t want to hurt-“

“Reggie…” Austin said. Something about the woman’s voice bothered him. But he didn’t get any further.

“What?” Reggie said, “I don’t–” The scream that followed was horrible, like something from a B-movie actress, but worse because it came from the voice of a man.

“Fuck,” Austin said. They were far from the action now, but the jerky violent movements of the mob as they descended on the survivors, coupled with Reggie’s scream told him everything he needed to know. They were being slaughtered. The last thing he saw was a group of the mob peel off and head in their direction. Then a tall power line passed by the window.

He shoved Mia into her seat and dove into his. “Hold on!”

The impact came a moment later. The EEP shook and screeched as they plowed through a house, scraped across the open street and slammed into a second home. The EEP tipped for a moment as the full parachutes tugged, but the heavy base settled to the ground with a thud.

They were still for only a moment when Austin leapt from his seat and yanked her up. There was no time to ask about injuries. No time to ponder what had happened. They needed to move.

“There an armory on board?” she asked.

Austin nodded. They were on the same page.

Though the neighborhood looked as American as they come, he didn’t know where they had landed. What he did know was that the locals were hostile and would reach them inside five minutes.

They had to run.

They had to fight.

The war, it seemed, wasn’t over.

America

“Everyone up!” Mia shouted as she rejoined the others. She felt happy to see Garbarino and Paul Byers jump up at the ready.

When Austin added, “Move! We have hostiles incoming!” Vanderwarf and White stood. Austin pointed to them, “You two, weapons cache. I want a firearm in the hands of everyone over seven years old in under a minute.” He turned to Garbarino and Byers. “Joe, break out the survival packs. One for everyone.”

Garbarino waved for Paul to follow him, then looked back. “What about the kid? She won’t be able to carry it.”

“I’ll double up,” Austin said.

“So will you,” Mia said to Garbarino as she pulled Liz free of her restraints and picked her up. “I’m carrying Liz.”

He frowned for a moment, but then nodded. It made sense.

“Explain the situation to them while I check things out.” Austin said as he moved around Mia and headed for the exterior hatch.

Mia watched him unlock the hatch and step outside, no pause or consideration given to the survivability of the atmosphere. When she turned back, Mark, Collins and Chang were staring at her wide-eyed.

“What’s happening?” Collins asked. “Is it the Russians? Did they survive somehow?”

“We’re in a residential neighborhood,” Mia said, and then thought about her next words. She didn’t want to scare Liz further. She could feel the little girl’s limbs shaking as she silently held on tight. “EEP Beta landed a few blocks over. They…encountered a large hostile group.”

Chang sucked in a breath. “They’re dead?”

Mia shot her a look as Liz tightened her grip.

Chang looked at the floor. “Sorry.”

Mia tried to think of a way to say things without Liz understanding. She decided on military speak, which she knew thanks to Matt. “They’re KIA,” Mia said. “Yes. Some of the group is coming this way.”

“Hence the backpacks and weapons,” Mark said. “We’re on the run.”

Vanderwarf and White reentered the room, each carrying a small arsenal-several handguns, spare clips, two shotguns and three MP5 submachine guns. They laid them out on a reclining chair. Mia had spent a lot of time at the shooting range with various men in her former life and was a pretty good shot. She felt thankful for that as she took a Sig Sauer handgun and four spare clips, and shoved them all into a pocket with one hand while holding Liz with the other.

Collins took a handgun as well. He didn’t look comfortable holding it.

“You’ve shot before?” Paul asked him.

“I’ve only fired a gun a few times. My father took me hunting. Never liked it.” He moved the weapon up and down, feeling its weight in his hand. “Not sure I could shoot someone.”

Mia let out scoffing laugh. “Says the man who pushed the button.”

Collins stiffened. “Hey-“

“No time for talking, you two,” White said. “Focus on surviving or you’re likely not to.” He held a handgun out to Mark. “Not going to be a stereotype, are you?”

“Hardly,” Mark said, taking an MP5 and a Sig Sauer.

Vanderwarf squinted at him, motioning to the MP5. “You know how to use that?”

“The handgun, yes.” He held up the MP5. “This thing, no-“

Garbarino and Paul returned, a slew of backpacks on their backs and in their arms.

Mark pointed to Paul, “-but he does.” After taking two spare clips for the MP5, Mark handed the weapon to his brother, who had just deposited the bags at their feet.

Paul inspected the MP5, checked the clip and chambered the first round. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” Mark said as he slipped on his backpack.

The exterior hatch swung open. Austin entered and found several weapons aimed in his direction. He paused for a moment, realizing he’d almost been shot, then stepped in and claimed a second handgun for himself. “Those who have never fired a weapon, please don’t aim or fire at something until those of us with experience say so. The switch on the left side is the safety. Switch it to the off position-” He demonstrated this for them. “-point it at your target and pull the trigger.”

“Right,” Chang said. She placed her handgun in her backpack and slung it over her shoulder. She still wore her work clothes. She wasn’t wearing high heels, but her shoes weren’t exactly made for running. “How far do we have to go?”

While most of the people looked at her the way they might a mental patient, Austin said what they were all thinking. “As far as we have to, now-“

A distant scream cut through the air.

“What’s that?” Chang asked.

Austin moved to the hatch, leading with his gun. “They’re coming.” He turned back to the group. “Get those packs on and grab as many weapons as you can carry.”

Garbarino picked up two handguns, one of them being the weapon taken from him previously, and a shotgun. Vanderwarf and White had the MP5s and one handgun each. Collins took the second shotgun.

A gunshot echoed loudly inside the EEP sending hands to ears.

“Fuck!” Garbarino shouted.

“They’re here!” Austin squeezed off two rounds. “Garbarino, take them south. I’ll slow them down!”

Mia followed Garbarino out of the EEP and on to the street of the McMansion lined neighborhood. The blacktop street smelled of new pavement and was bisected by two bright yellow lines, perhaps days old. The maple trees lining the street were bare, and the grass brown, but being the middle of February in what looked like the American Northeast to her, that was expected. What wasn’t expected was the temperature, which Mia pegged around eighty degrees. Other than that aberration, the neighborhood looked like so many others hastily built over the previous ten years. There was no rushing mob, but she did see two bodies lying face down one hundred feet away. As the others exited and followed Garbarino around the backside of the EEP, Mia stopped by Austin. “You shouldn’t stay by yourself.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“You could die.”

“I know I’m not paid to do this anymore, but it’s still my job.” Austin motioned toward Liz. “And it’s not like you can help.”

“What about Garbarino? Why did you put him in charge?”

“He’ll toe the line as long as he feels respected,” Austin said. “If I don’t make it back, he’s in charge in a fight, you’re in charge of everything else. He’ll go for that.”

“If he doesn’t?”

Austin looked over her shoulder. “Then you’ll have help.”

Paul had waited for her. He stood there, brandishing his submachine gun like a true war hero. And he’d heard everything.

“But that’s not going to happen,” Austin said. “I just want to give you a head start. I can catch up.”

A terrified voice called out from the distance.

“Is that one of ours?” Paul asked.

“Wrong direction,” Austin said, taking aim past the two bodies he’d already shot. “Now go!”

Paul took Mia by the arm and led her around the EEP. She was surprised to see Garbarino waiting there for them and wondered if he had heard any of their conversation. But he just waved them on, shouting, “Move your asses!”

Two shots rang out from Austin’s position.

Mia saw the rest of their crew jogging down the street, away from the EEP and the oncoming crowd. She looked back the way they’d come. It didn’t feel right, leaving Austin. But then Liz leaned back, looked her in the eyes and said, “What the hell are you waiting for, Auntie Mia, move your ass!”

She started forward. Then two more shots set them all to running, like horses out of the gate. They didn’t slow until they caught up to Collins, who was already out of breath.

Mia thought about it and realized she’d never seen photos of or heard news about this president going out for jogs. In fact, she seemed to recall he had heart problems. Great.

Two blocks from the EEP, more gunshots rang out. Then a scream. A man’s scream.

Then silence. They all stared back at the EEP, waiting for Austin to come running, but he didn’t.

After a moment, Mia turned to Garbarino, placed her hand on his arm, and very intentionally said, “Lead the way,” all the while feeling like she’d just handed them all over to the devil.

Within twenty minutes, Mia, Collins, Chang and the Byers brothers lagged behind their three Secret Service escorts. Mia was in shape, but lacked endurance, especially when carrying a fifty pound seven year old. Liz seemed to sense this and tapped her shoulder. “I can run now,” the girl said. “I’m not afraid anymore.”

Mia looked the girl in the eyes. “You sure?”

She nodded.

“Stay right next to me.”

The nod continued. Mia put her down, then put her hands on her knees while she caught her breath. The brothers and Chang stopped with her, while Collins walked on ahead, his body soaked in sweat.

Garbarino heard the number of moving feet behind him change and turned around. “Hey! Keep moving.”

“We need to rest,” Mia said.

“Those people might still be chasing us,” he said, stomping toward her.

“There hasn’t been a sound or a gunshot for a while,” she countered.

Garbarino stood above her. “That’s probably because Austin is dead and those sons-a-bitches are sneaking up on us. Now…” He took her arm and yanked her up. “Move!”

“Hey!” Liz shouted and went to hit Garbarino, but Mia caught her little fist.

She stood face-to-face with the man, and when she did she realized she stood a good two inches taller. “Right now, if those people charged us, I wouldn’t have the energy to run. We’ve been through a lot and the non-stop adrenaline rush of being launched into space by a series of nuclear blasts, watching the world be destroyed, floating in zero gravity, dropping back down to Earth and then being attacked by crazed survivors, is starting to wear off.”

Garbarino’s face slowly fell as he listened to her. The words seemed to suck the energy out of him. He looked around the neighborhood. “Houses up there look big. Might be a good place to hole up.”

Mia looked up the road and saw several new and very large houses. They were the kind contractors built in a month, the kind she mocked when she drove by, but right now they looked incredibly normal and inviting. She smiled. “Thank you.”

“Let’s move,” Chang said. “Maybe the plumbing still works.”

Mark followed after her. “I could go for a shower.”

“I’ll take a bath,” Paul said, loping ahead of the other two, looking ridiculous with his submachine gun.

Mia took Liz’s hand and nodded at Garbarino. “You did the right thing.”

“Yeah, well, let’s hope it doesn’t get us killed.” He motioned for her to get moving and followed behind her. She looked

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 10, 2011: An Excerpt from Class Collision: Fall from Grace, a novel by Annette Mackey

May 16, 2011February 10, 2011 by KND

What does it mean when an indie novel comes out of nowhere to score a better than 4.9-star rating from 12 Amazon reviews?

Well, certainly no book is intended to please everyone, but I’ve got to say that when you look beyond the ratings and read the actual reviews for Annette Mackey’s sweet but nicely textured hi

Annette Mackey

storical romance Class Collision: Fall from Grace, she has accomplished something pretty remarkable for a first-time indie author.

The first rave review that I read was written by Avni, age 17, who couldn’t put it down, but then, when she finished it, she said “I passed it onto my neighbor for her to read. She read it in about three hours and was then banging on my door to talk to me about how amazing she thought this book was.”

By the time I got to the last review, it was clear to me that readers of all ages had found something special in this novel, and reviewer Margaret Williams put the icing on the cake when she shared this:

“The book is obviously written to a younger audience, and I am in my 80’s. Nevertheless, I found that it held my attention through all of the story. I loved the setting in the depression era. That’s when I grew up so that part of it was endearing to me. I especially liked the way the author described the emotional feelings of her characters. It felt real. I look forward to the sequel with great anticipation.”

Just so.

Here’s the set-up, followed by a link to the author’s generous 10,000-word excerpt:

Class Collision: Fall From Grace

by Annette Mackey

Kindle Edition

List Price: $2.99

Buy Now

What if you didn’t know your boyfriend was worth millions

Born into wealth and privilege, David spends his days rattling the servants and torturing the maid until he is kidnapped for ransom and left for dead. Grueling years follow until he meets Linda.
She’s sassy, pigheaded, beautiful and way more than he can possibly handle. Hate, love and passion combine as he tries to win her heart. She sees him as a drifter. Little does she know he’s a prince in disguise.

Set during the Great Depression, Class Collision will transport you to a simpler time filled with heartache and unexpected love.

Click here to download Class Collision (or a free sample) to your Kindle, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch, BlackBerry, Android-compatible, PC or Mac and start reading within 60 seconds!

Click here to begin reading a free excerpt

Click here to get the entire book on Kindle

Class Collision:

Fall From Grace

by Annette Mackey

Kindle Edition

List Price: $2.99

Buy Now

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 10, 2011
An Excerpt from

Class Collision:

Fall from Grace

a novel by Annette Mackey

Chapter 7

The Collision

    It was dark and cold. David’s head rolled as he emerged from the blackness. For a minute he thought it had been a dream. Then, with a start, he realized that he was not home in his bed. He had been attacked! With every ounce of effort, he forced his eyes open and tried to focus. Odd. What were his shirt and tie doing there? He was not lying down, but rather his head was hanging as he sat in a chair. Ah, he thought, now it made sense.
    Incrementally, he began to hear through muffled ears. Someone was crying, no … sobbing. Groggily, David raised his head, and it swayed in response. Alex was a few feet away, tied with a rope across his chest and his arms behind his back in a small wooden chair. Puzzled, he looked down at his own chest again. Strange, he had not seen the rope there before. Then he realized pain in his arms and wrists, a burning sensation that increased dramatically as he became more aware. He, too, was strapped from behind, but with what, barbed wire? Irritated, he wondered why his antagonists had stretched his arms so tightly. Didn’t they realize the job could have been done without causing so much pain? And what was this rope drawn down across his legs for? Were they going on a Ferris wheel? Really!
    Nearly fully awake, he looked at Alex who was sniffling. David felt a surge of anger. Crying at a time like this was not going to help matters. Irritated, he looked away.
    “I’m sorry,” Alex said with a quiver.
    David swung his head back around, and it flopped in response from the lingering drugs.
    “I’m sorry I didn’t listen when you said you were scared.” Alex started to cry harder, despite his obvious effort to control his voice.
    Although he was embarrassed for Alex, David was suddenly more embarrassed for himself as he recollected the way he had acted. Hearing Alex verbalize it was even worse. Wanting to change the subject he spoke. “Do you know what’s going on, Alex? Who were those men, and what do they want?”
    “I don’t know,” Alex trembled. “I only woke up just a few minutes before you. I don’t know anything.” Alex sniffled as a few more tears dribbled.
    If he hadn’t acted so peculiar himself, David might have word-lashed Alex right out of his hysteria, but seeing as he had just met those unwelcome emotions, he decided to let it go. Instead, he looked around the room hoping for a clue. Just then, Alex burst out.
    “What’s going on here, David? Obviously you know something. You’re the one that said we shouldn’t go down to the car!”
    “Shhh!” David shot back. “They’ll hear you.”
    “Who? Who’s going to hear? David, you had better let me in on this or so help me-“
    David cut him off in a loud whisper, “I have no idea, Alex! But I’ll tell you one thing, it’s pretty dumb to sit here crying about it.”
    “Oh sure, now you’re the tough guy. You little wimp. I saw you! You were shivering like a chicken liver.”
    “Fine, Alex, I was scared  as a chicken liver,” David emphasized. “Are you happy now?”
    Sheer raw emotion had taken over. “Act like it was nothing. I’ve never seen anyone so terrified in my entire life.”
    David glared at his words. “Will you just stop so I can think?” He tried to keep his voice down, but like Alex, he, too, was tense. The combination of the situation and the lingering drugs blurred his mind in a most unsettling manner.
    “You’re just a big phony,” Alex snarled. “I heard you whimpering at the conservatory, and I’ll never let you forget it. You treat everybody as if they were nothing. But you’re no better.”
    Alex continued to rant, but David didn’t care. They were in trouble, and somebody had to take the lead. He noted how dark it was outside and wondered how much time had passed. He thought of Clifford’s reaction when he had buried the Spanish coins and wondered if his parents had been informed yet. Poor Mother. She had been through enough to last a lifetime.
    Alex’s ranting continued. “… You think you’re so special, so much better than the rest of us. Well, let me tell you something, mister, you’re just the same as everybody else. The only differences is that you’ve never had to deal with anyone so spectacularly and magnificently irritating. That’s why you can’t understand how other people feel. And what’s more, you’ve got no social skills! None whatsoever. You think you’re so superior, but you’re not! Oh, except that, of course, you’re really good at playing the puppet and, well, I hate to be the one to break it to you because it’s going to come as a total shock, but you’re totally stuck-up and irritating and downright rude with your I’m better than you attitude …”
    “Oh, brother,” David spat. Alex had to take this opportune time to fall to pieces. Great. Just great. It looked like David was going to have to figure things out on his own. He turned his attention back to the inside of the room. The floor was tile, and there were several desks shoved against the far wall. As his senses awakened, he became painfully aware of a miserable rotting stench, like molding socks. Err … At least it smelled the way he imagined dirty socks would smell. Having never smelled such a thing, he was left to his imagination.
    Frustrated, he pulled at his arms. This hurt! How was he supposed to concentrate when his arms were slowly being pulled from their sockets?
    “Can you see anyone out that door?” David whispered, interrupting Alex who was still in the process of venting every real and imagined oppression that he had ever endured in his life.
    Surprised, Alex stopped. “Uh … ” he sputtered, startled back to reality.
    “Well?” David pressed.
    Alex stretched his neck as far as he could. “No,” he whispered still craning. He had been so busy ranting that he had totally lost track of the current situation.
    “They must not be here, or they would have come when they heard us talking,” David reasoned aloud as he tried to scoot his chair toward Alex’s. His unknown adversary had tied each foot very tightly to a different leg of the chair. Only his toes reached the floor, making each inch gained with a wince of pain. His unaccustomed body immediately set his brain to work on the abuses he would inflict on his abductors once they were brought to justice. Chinese water torture for one. He heard it was quite effective.
    “Why do you think they took us? I mean, brought us here like this?” Alex asked. “We haven’t done anything. Have … have you … done anything?”
    Sometimes David wondered at Alex. How could he be the oldest? He was so stupidly naїve. “They probably kidnapped us for ransom.”
    “Kidnapped? They kidnapped us?”
    David stopped his efforts momentarily to give Alex an even bigger look of dismay. “What would you call it?”
    “Well … I don’t know. I guess … I … didn’t think,” he admitted.
    “I’ll say.” Then in irritation he shot out, “Do I have to do all the work here? Maybe you could work toward me too.”
    Understanding smacked across Alex’s face, and he immediately sprang into action, if you could call scooting inch-by-inch “springing.”
    After a few minutes of agonizingly slow progress, they were in position, back to back. “Okay,” David whispered, “hold still while I try to untie you.”
    “Are you sure this is such a good idea?” Alex began to doubt the intelligence of the plan. “What if they come back? I don’t think they’ll be too happy to catch us like this.”
    “Be quiet and concentrate,” David ordered.
    “I’m holding still, how much concentration does it take?”
    “Then pipe down so that I can concentrate!”
    “You know, David, Mother would never believe what a pain you really are. Have you ever noticed that you never listen to anybody but yourself? Oh no. You’ve always got to be in charge. You are two years my junior, and it gets annoying! Even now, when we are both tied up, who gives the orders? David, always David. I’ve about had it.”
    “Could you pleeeease?”
    “You see? Still giving orders!”
    “For Pete’s sake. I think you’re trying to be difficult.”
    “Don’t turn this around on me!”
    “How much effort does it take? You press your lips together and voilà, closed mouth, hence silence.”
    David continued to work on the ropes as they argued. Despite the quarrel, he did make some considerable progress. Unfortunately, and unbeknownst to them, an exterior door had opened and shut during the course of their argument, giving an advantage to the unforgiving stranger that was now upon them.
    “What’s this?”
    Alex and David both looked up to see a tall, unkempt man with sandy hair standing in the doorway wearing tattered brown pants and suspenders that rolled over a once-muslin shirt. David recognized him immediately as the man who had pulled him inside the car.
    “Why you lit’le weasels,” the man whom they would come to know as Willy spoke with a broken English accent. “Eh, Beez, we got ourselves some ‘neakers here, we do.”
    A shorter, heavier man with dark hair came into the room. The very man who stood watching that day when David insulted the beggar woman and her child.
    Beez wore suit pants and a white shirt with several buttons undone at the top and sleeves rolled to the elbows. A cigarette hung from his mouth as he leaned one hand on the doorframe. Rolling the cigarette with his lips, he summed up the situation. His voice was soft and gritty. “So here you are, back to back. That’s not the way we left ya,” he said as he paced circles around the boys. “What’s a matter? Ya sick o’ lookin’ at each other?” He spoke with a thick Brooklyn accent.
    David looked directly into the man’s dark eyes and protruded his chin in challenge. Alex preferred to look at the floor, hoping beyond hope that his lack of eye contact would dismiss him from the conversation.
    “Huuhhh?!!” the man shouted.
    By raising his voice, David surmised that they were in the country, away from eager ears.
    Beez’s volatile temperament was on the verge of exploding. “Just what do you think you was doing?”
    “That’s just what I was about to ask you.” David spoke with authority. “I demand you release us. Now!”
    Beez inhaled deeply then flicked the smoldering cigarette across the floor, the butt still glowing as it came to a spinning stop. He crouched and breathed the soot into David’s face causing his eyes to water as he coughed.
    Beez remained inches from his face, studying, until without warning, he threw David’s chair across the room in a single heaving motion. The chair landed at an angle on two legs as it screeched and teetered to the floor with a crash on its side. Unable to compensate, David’s head clunked down with a sickening thud on the tile.
    “That’s where I left ya,” Beez proclaimed and pulled a fresh cigarette from his pocket. “Rich brat,” he muttered as he turned for the door. He snapped his fingers at Willy. “Take care o’ the other one,” he said as he left.
    Willy’s eyes had glazed over as if watching a scene at the theater. Instantly, he snapped and tightened Alex’s ropes as Alex let out a soft grunt of pain. Then Willy unleashed a painful smack across Alex’s face with the back of his hand. Alex’s head jerked to one side from the impact. Satisfied, he went to David and cinched his ropes tighter before turning to leave. With obvious satisfaction, he left David lying motionless on the cold tile floor.
    Alex stared at the closed door then back at David, then at the door again. Finally, he whispered. “Are you all right?” His voice was breathy and hoarse with fear. The only light came from beneath the door. “David?” Alex pressed. He couldn’t call any louder for fear that the men would return and with that thought he started to hyperventilate. “David,” he continued to whisper as he breathed in heaps.
    David’s head was spinning, leaving him unable to answer. Halfway between two worlds, the conscious and unconscious, and still swimming in a sea of lingering drugs, he couldn’t manage a word. He felt the warmth of acid threatening in his mouth as it spilled in his throat. The smoldering cigarette that lay near his face only made matters worse.
    “David …” Alex continued to huff in hyperventilation. “David … are you okay?”
    “I’m fine,” David finally managed to muster. No matter how bad the pain, he couldn’t stand the idea that Alex might learn of it. He was tied to a tipped chair with ropes tearing at his flesh, his head reeling from the combined assault of trauma and drugs and the fear of imminent vomit. This was bad, and Alex wanted to know if he was okay? No. He was notokay, but he wasn’t going to say it.
    He closed his eyes and imagined the Virginia coastline with a cool ocean breeze. Mind over matter, mind over matter, that’s all it takes. Mind over matter. A few minutes later, his mind lost the matter as he puked it from his guts in heave after heave. Thankfully, there wasn’t much to expel. They hadn’t eaten since breakfast so the putrid regurgitation was mostly water and acid with an occasional lump here and there.
    Alex looked on in horror through the darkness. “I don’t think you’re okay,” he commented dryly, turning his head so that he wouldn’t join in vomiting as David heaved again and again. “Nope  nope,” he said shaking his head against the malodorous smell. “Definitely not okay.”
    When it was over, David tried to rest his head, only to realize that doing so would settle him right in the middle of the puddle of vomit. “Fresh mountain snow, big puffy clouds, cool autumn breezes,” he mumbled to himself. It was a difficult process. The acidic soup lay only inches from his face. To his grave misfortune, the idea that he would be sleeping in it combined with the smell made him heave again … And again … One more time.
    The muscles in his abdomen ached from the pressure as the violent process wreaked havoc. What he wouldn’t give for the use of his hands. It would be worth every single last Spanish coin. At this point, for a damp, soothing washcloth, he would even throw in his loyal feline. This drip-dry business was no fun at all. Where was Clifford when he needed him? And Mother … she would wipe his sweaty forehead with a cloth and talk in soft, soothing tones. He thought of how she would rub his arms down as he lay on the bed and pictured her silken hair shining in the glow of a dim lamp. Reluctantly, he released the tension in his neck and let the upper half of his head rest in the pool. With a grimace, he closed his eyes against the odor. The room was still turning. Wishing it to be still, he opened his eyes. No such luck. Halfway around, then back again. Too tired. Too tired … He rested back as the smell drifted. Sleep … was all … he … wanted.
    Alex couldn’t understand why David had thrown up. And sleep? It was unbelievable and totally unfair. What a brother! Bossy, pretentious, proud, and able to sleep in any position.
    “There I go again,” he chastised. “I’ve got to stop.” His penny-ante side was taking over again, but it was hard to believe that some part of this wasn’t David’s fault. Nobody liked him. He must have done something to someone. He must be to blame. He must.
    But then, he was Alex’s best friend.

Chapter 8

Maniac

Friday before Thanksgiving, 1931 …
    Dawn approached and with it, the revelation of the grungy state of their new residence. The building was noticeably run-down with piles of junk heaped everywhere. There was a puddle of water near where David lay, remnants of the last rain, and what looked to be a bunch of desks the night before was really three desks piled amidst rubble and demolition waste shoved along the opposite wall.
    Between the boarded windows, thick grime, and soot, Alex could see a field of sorts, one which looked long-since abandoned, with an old tractor rusting under a nearby dead tree.
    Just then, David moaned. Since he had been doing that all night, Alex wasn’t sure if it meant anything. He moaned again, and then spoke.
    “Is it morning?”
    “Yes. How are you feeling?” Alex tried to sound concerned. Through the course of the night, his sympathy for David had grown, partly out of guilt and partly out of duty.
    David raised his head a few inches. The vomit had dried in crusty clumps that stuck to his hair like bad gel from the dime-store sales rack. The area of his head that had been resting in the pool was still damp and dripped slightly.
    “Awful.”
    “Yeah, well, you don’t look so good either.” Alex’s own wrists were throbbing. He couldn’t imagine how David’s must feel.
    David set his head back down. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”
    “I think it’s about eight o’clock.”
    “I wonder what everyone is doing at home.”
    “Probably eating breakfast. Boy, what you won’t do to get out of oatmeal,” he teased, hoping to lighten the moment.
    David tried to force a laugh. Even that hurt.
    A few minutes later the door creaked open and Willy stepped in. He smelled the vomit right away. “Aghh! What the? Uuugh … uuuyee oiy,” he pinched at his nose as he fled the room.
    It wasn’t long before the shouting started as the men argued over the situation. The need for the remote location was becoming more apparent all the time.
    Alex stared at the door in disbelief. He had never heard two grown men behave in such a manner. After several shouts and multiple threats Willy returned with his nostrils flaring. Beez was obviously the one in charge. Either that or he was the bigger bully.
    “I ain’t cleanin’ it up, I’ll tell you at right now,” Willy complained. “No sir. I ain’t doin’ it. No matter how much money.”
    He tipped David’s chair up right, and David shuddered from the pain, especially when the legs of the chair clunked down, distributing a shock to every nerve in his body. Willy continued to rant as he untied David’s ropes, none too gentle. One would assume that being released after such a long ordeal would be a welcome experience. It wasn’t. The pain was unbelievable. The bristly cords yanked and pulled, sending twine micro slivers into David’s open wounds with each merciless jerk.
    “You sir, you’re the one ‘at gets the job. Stupid bloke.”
    With each tug David braced. He had to keep up the front. These men were nothing to him. Nothing! And he wanted to be sure that they knew, that he knew, that he was better than them. Even if it killed him.
    Once untied, Willy shoved David from the chair to the floor. He fell, nearly landing on his face with his knee in the puddle of muck. As he tried to get up, the realization of what his body had been through became more evident.
    “Hurry up, you little brat ‘for I rub your whole face in it!”
    His aching ankles couldn’t manage his weight as he tried to get up, sending him to the floor. For the first time he saw his hands and wrists. The injuries were infuriating, which gratefully did the trick. New strength poured into every facet of his body, and he rose to his feet, settling into a stance of perfect posture. The skin around his wrists was raw, thick, and swollen with deep purple bruises. Blood stained his shirt cuffs. His suit coat was rumpled with splats of vomit here and there, and blood had run thick into the creases of his hands where it dried in crusts. All of this added steam to his anger, and he stood with more pride and determination than he had in his entire life. Even though David was a child with his hair askew, Willy stepped back, completely intimidated. Unfortunately, the effect didn’t last long. In an instant, Willy regained his senses and pulled at David’s ear.
    “Come on, you.”
    Willy kept a hold of David’s ear and dragged him down the dilapidated hallway to a double door where he shoved it open and tossed David down the exterior steps. David lost his footing and fell most of the way to the ground. Despite the tumble, he was elated to be free. The fresh air instantly dispersed the haunting nausea.
    “There. You see that bucket?” Willy ordered. “You get that buck

A Free 15,000-Word Excerpt from The Advocate’s Betrayal, a novel by Theresa Burrell – Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 4, 2011

May 16, 2011February 5, 2011 by KND

By Stephen Windwalker
Editor, Kindle Nation Daily
©Kindle Nation Daily 2011

In Teresa Burrell’s novel The Advocate’s Betrayal, Sabre Orin Brown is a legal advocate for children in the San Diego justice system.

She witnesses her share of horror every day.

Every now and then, that horror gets personal.

The best legal thrillers have us sitting on the edge of our seats long before the action ever enters the courtroom. As an attorney, an advocate, and an author, Teresa Burrell weaves experience and imagination into a terrifying 5-star tale that reviewers are calling “legal suspense at its finest.”

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vocate’s Betrayal

by Teresa Burrell

4.5 out of 5 stars – 12 Reviews

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Here’s the set-up:

When Sabre’s friend Betty calls one morning with the shocking news that her husband was murdered in his sleep, Sabre makes it her mission to find the killer. The cops suspect Betty, and Sabre has no leads. It would be easier if Betty wasn’t hiding something, but even after she gets thrown in jail, she refuses to say a word about her past and the mystery that chased the couple across the country and ultimately hunted her husband to his death.

Sabre can’t put her own life on hold, either. She is still trying to protect the two children on her caseload whose parents have brainwashed them with a violent racial hatred. Even more, she’s also still recovering from the horrific events of the previous year, when a stalker burned her home to the ground. Life never gets easy, but at least Sabre is not alone. She has the comfort of her calm and stable boyfriend, Luke, and the help of good friends.

But when a private detective, JP, follows the murder from Betty’s empty trailer home to a small town in Texas and a nightclub in Chicago, it starts to seem like finding the answers may be more dangerous than ever. Only one thing becomes remarkably clear: When the people closest to you have so much to hide, you can’t trust anyone.

What The Reviewers Are Saying About The Advocate’s Betrayal

“Sabre Orin Brown is destined to be a favorite mystery heroine. From the opening scenes of this legal thriller to the final twist, this book will keep you guessing. Teresa Burrell surpasses herself in this stand-alone follow-up to her debut novel. Sabre must overcome innumerable obstacles as she is faced with the seemingly impossible task of clearing the name of a good friend who has been accused of murder.” –Molly B Good

“Teresa Burrell delivers another smash mystery legal thriller in this follow-up to The Advocate. This time Sabre Orin Brown tackles a personal case involving the death of a close friend. The story takes a bunch of twists and turns until the final explosive ending. Page turner until the end!” –Hamlet, Reviewer

“What distinguishes the Advocate series from other books is that these legal thrillers are being written by a real lawyer. I’m so tired of all the generic legal dramas/comedies/etc series filling a reader’s head with such a fictional view of the judicial system. Thank you Teresa for getting it right for a change!” –Ann Onimuss

“I read Ms. Burrell’s first book, The Advocate, and thought it was great! This one is even better. It is fast paced and has some mysterious turns that leave you wondering how it is going to all work out…or if it will. You can’t go wrong with this book.”

–Mr. Ravic, Reviewer

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Free Kindle Nation Shorts – February 4, 2011

An Excerpt from

The Advocate’s Betrayal:

A Novel by Theresa Burrell

Prologue

Pain, from a sharp knife plunged into his chest, yanked John out of a deep sleep. He forced his eyelids open. The only thing worse than the pain was the shock when he saw who was standing over him. It wasn’t until the blood dripped on his face that he realized it was not a dream.

“No, no, not you….” John reached out, hitting his hand against the wall. He tried to speak again, but could only mumble. “Our Father, who art in heaven…”

The killer mockingly said, “Are you praying, old man? Here, use this….,” tossing John’s rosary at his open hand near the floor. It caught on his fingertips and dangled there. John felt his air diminishing as his lungs filled up with blood. He fumbled his fingers until his thumb and index finger clasped the first large bead, the words no longer audible. “…hallowed be Thy name…”

His attacker stepped back, gazing at him lying there, holding the knife dripping with blood, his blood. John reached for his chest, but his arm wouldn’t move. “…Thy kingdom come…” The naked walls of the trailer felt like a box. They were so close on every side. It was stifling. This was his box, his cage, his coffin. The only illumination came from the front room. He listened as the footsteps echoed back and forth at the end of his queen-size bed that filled the room, leaving less than a foot on each side. And then he heard the rubber soles of the shoes exit the bedroom.

He heard water run. His backside felt wet. Was it water? No, the water came from the kitchenette; blood pooled around his body. John heard his assailant washing away his blood in his kitchen -his murderer washing away the evidence. “…Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven…”

Footsteps returned to John’s bedroom, and with them returned his fear. Was the attacker returning to finish the job? John couldn’t protect himself; he couldn’t even move. Then the fear subsided. It was too late. The damage already done. “…Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses…”

The floor creaked all the way to the front door. Click-door unlocked, opened. The lights went out in the front room, completely dark, or was it the light in his mind that ceased? The pain in his chest intensified. His body felt lethargic. The front door closed. John listened carefully-no lock. The trailer shifted when the last step was vacated. He was alone, left to die alone.

John tried to move, to struggle, to fight, but his body wouldn’t budge. He saw his life-the despicable parts when he was a kid, the pain he inflicted on others-but mostly he thought of the man he had become. The man who tried his whole life to fix what he had done as a child, that’s who he really was. It pained him to have to think he would suffer eternal damnation for the crimes he committed so long ago. Was this his punishment-betrayal, death, eternal damnation? “…as we forgive those…”

Chapter 1

When the phone rang at four o’clock in the morning Sabre knew it could only mean trouble, but she was used to trouble. “Who screwed up now?” she mumbled, forgetting for a second Luke lying in bed next to her.

“Umm…,” Luke groaned.

Sabre savored the smell of clean sweat and faint cologne, reliving the touch of his mouth on the nape of her neck and his hard body holding her, making love to her for the first time. It had been a long time coming. She struggled to find the phone on the nightstand, knocking over a glass of wine. “Damn it,” she mumbled. When she put the phone to her ear, she heard her friend Betty breathing heavily and stammering over her words as she tried to speak. Sabre’s heart quivered in her chest.

“He’s d..dead. John’s dead,” Betty cried.

“Betty, where are you?” Sabre’s heart beat faster. She felt a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“At home. Th…there’s so much blood.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“I’ll be right there.” Sabre’s arm felt weak. She dropped the phone to her chest and lay there for a second, her body still and in shock. Luke reached his arm around her waist and pulled her shapely naked body close to him, nibbling on her earlobe. Sabre yanked away, throwing his arm off her and slamming the phone into the cradle. “Not now,” she said curtly, but with no anger in her voice. She stood up and flipped on the light.

“What is it?” Luke asked, scratching his head as he sat up.

“John’s dead.” She snapped, sounding more like a question than a statement, propelling Luke from the bed. “I’m going to help Betty.” She stepped into her jeans, wrestling with her sweatshirt as she pulled it over her head, twisted her shoulder-length, brown hair up on top of her head, and stuck a clip in it.

Luke had his shirt on before she finished speaking, looking around for his pants and shoes. “I’m going with you.” He reached for her arm, squeezing it lightly. “I’m so sorry, Sabre.”

Tears filled her dark brown eyes. John and Betty were her friends, and although Sabre was about thirty years their junior, they had grown very close. They were extended family, more like an aunt and uncle to her. They had been there for her during her turmoil last year, and now John was dead and Betty needed her.

The summer morning air felt cool on Sabre’s tear-filled face as she ran to the car. “Put your keys away. I’m driving,” Luke said. Sabre’s hand shook as she opened the door to Luke’s silver metallic BMW Z4 Roadster.

Luke drove east on I-8 at speeds above eighty. Sabre didn’t complain about the speed as she would have under normal circumstances. She didn’t even notice. She watched as the buildings passed her window, most of them barely visible without their lights on. Only a few cars on the freeway, but too many she thought. Where were they going? How many were going to help a friend whose husband had just died? Why John? It felt like losing her father all over again, and a piece of her brother, Ron, as well. Ron had introduced her to John and Betty just a few months before his disappearance. The couple had been such a great help to her, consoling her and always trying to keep her hopes up. John reminded her so much of her father-the same lighthearted strength that is so hard to find in a man, and a deep, resonant voice that always brought her comfort. She’d never hear that voice call her “Sparky” again. He tagged her with that nickname the first day they met, and he never called her anything else. Sabre remembered that day. The couple was always holding hands, only letting go when Betty went to get John a cup of coffee – before he ever asked – or when John went to check the gas in Betty’s car. They took care of each other.

Luke and Sabre drove for about two minutes without speaking. Luke broke the silence. “What happened? Do you know?”

“No, she didn’t say, just that he was dead…and there was blood.” Sabre shook her head. “What will Betty do without him? She loved him so much. She used to say, ‘I’d like you to find someone just like my John, but there’s no one quite like him.’ That’s why she tried so hard to get us together, you know.”

“I know.” Luke squeezed her hand. “I’m glad she did.”

Within fifteen minutes of the call, they had driven into the motor home park and pulled up in front of space number twelve, a thirty-five foot, twenty-year-old trailer, the only home in the park with lights on. As they stepped out of the car, the lights went on next door. No light illuminated Betty’s porch. Luke took Sabre’s hand as they went up the short, dark walkway. She couldn’t see much, but she could smell the gardenias along the path. Just as they reached the door, the porch light went on and Sabre heard the click of the door unlocking. She felt an ache in her stomach when she saw Betty’s puffy eyes with black liner smeared down her face, her usual perfectly spiked, fire-red hair flat on one side and the rest sticking out in clumps, and the deep lines of confusion on her forehead. What had once been white kittens on the side of her pale blue pajama top were now soaked red with blood. When Sabre hugged her friend’s plump body, it felt listless and tears dampened Betty’s cheeks.

“Where is he?” Luke asked.

“In there.” Betty pointed to the bedroom.

Luke walked to the back of the trailer, his body tall and straight. Sabre could see the muscles strain on the back of his neck as she and Betty followed. Sabre noticed Betty held a rosary. As far as she knew, Betty wasn’t Catholic. She stopped and put her arm around Betty’s shoulder. “Were you praying?” she asked motioning toward the rosary.

Betty slipped it in her pocket and said, “It belonged to J…John. The only thing he had from his childhood.”

They walked into the bedroom, Luke several steps ahead. “Oh…” Sabre covered her mouth to stifle her cry. John lay on his back, the blankets pulled up to his waist. His right arm hung over the edge of the bed, the left side of his chest covered in blood. Sabre suddenly longed for her strong, energetic friend, John. She wanted him to comfort her. This wasn’t him. A lifeless, slaughtered body laid in his bed, no longer the man who gave her fatherly advice or comforted her when she needed to feel like a child.

Luke put his arm around Sabre. He reached down and touched John’s arm. “He’s cold,” he said.

“Have you called the police?” Sabre asked.

“No.”

“Why not?”

Betty started to sob, “I didn’t kn..know what to do. So, I called you.”

Sabre walked over to where Betty stood in the doorway, her voice low and undemanding. “Betty, what happened?”

“I…I don’t know.”

Sabre reached out and took Betty’s hand. “Tell me, what did you do when you left us at Viejas?”

“I came straight home and went to bed.”

“You just crawled into bed next to John?”

“I thought he was sleeping, so I kept very quiet.” She gulped. “I didn’t even turn on the light in the bedroom. I just put my pajamas on and slipped into bed beside him.” Sabre nodded encouragement. “I went right to sleep because he wasn’t snoring.” Betty stopped to catch her breath and shook her head from side to side. “He always snores. Why didn’t I know there was something wrong?” She sobbed. “I was so thankful he wasn’t snoring, I didn’t even check on him.”

Sabre squeezed her hand a little tighter. “Betty, when did you know there was something wrong?”

“When I got up to go to the bathroom, I felt my wet, sticky pajamas. I…I turned on the light and saw it was bl..blood. Then I saw John.” Betty’s chest throbbed as she continued to sob. “He just lay there all covered with blood.”

“Betty, we need to call the police.”

“W…would you?” Betty took a step forward, then back, then stood there rocking, confused.

“Of course.”

Sabre called 9-1-1, and within minutes three squad cars arrived, plus two detectives in an unmarked car and an ambulance followed by a coroner. The dawn broke as neighbors exited their mobile homes to catch a glimpse of the show, many of them watching from their porches, others edging closer and forming a crowd near Betty’s and John’s trailer. They stretched their necks to see. Some asked questions of the officers, others relayed what they saw and what they speculated, but all buzzed with curiosity as the police put up the yellow and black ribbon partitioning off the area.

One man wandered onto the green rock lawn. “Please step back,” a short, young man in uniform said curtly. “Please stay behind the police line.”

A police officer entered the motor home, glanced around, and started spouting orders like he was reading from a bad script. “I need everyone to step outside. This is a crime scene. Please don’t touch anything.”

“Sabre, what are you doing here?” Detective Gregory Nelson asked, as he walked up to the mobile home while pulling on his tie.

“These are friends of mine. Betty called me.”

“I’ll want to talk to you, but first I need to go inside. Please wait out here.”

Betty stumbled to a folding chair outside near the door and sat down. With one elbow on the arm of the chair, she lay her head in her hand and wept. Sabre approached her and put a hand on her shoulder, but she didn’t know what to say. Betty continued to cry. Sabre looked back and saw Luke standing with his hands in his pockets by the pink geranium bush, watching her from a distance.

When Detective Nelson came out, he asked Betty for her name and the name of the victim, about what she had seen, and when. He wiggled the knot on his tie. “Sabre, would you mind getting Betty some clothes? We’ll need the pajamas.”

“Greg, is she a suspect?”

“Not at this point, but we need the pajamas. They have blood on them, and they may be evidence.” He turned to an officer standing at the door. “Please escort Ms. Brown inside. She needs to get a change of clothes for the victim’s wife.”

As Sabre entered the trailer she focused on two policemen walking around the living room with kits and brushes, dusting for fingerprints. She saw an officer pick up a knife from the sink, put it into a bag, and zip the bag closed. She watched as they opened drawers and cupboards, invading her friends’ home. She walked past the kitchen table containing the ceramic rooster, two placemats, and a deck of cards. She scanned the room for answers but saw only a worn, dark green sofa with two pillows, an end table next to it with a stack of loose newspapers and a pair of reading glasses, and Betty’s sketch book. A small desk across from the sofa housed a laptop computer. Only one picture adorned the wall, a drawing Betty had done of an old cabin in the woods, and except for the shelf with a small collection of salt and pepper shakers, the room contained very few mementos, an observation Sabre hadn’t made until now.

When they approached the bedroom, Sabre could see an officer taking photos. It hit her that something was missing. She looked around and saw only a few picture frames with photos, and none of them photos of Betty or John. She wondered how she had missed that before, and if it mattered.

Sabre continued to observe the officers as she gathered up Betty’s things. She looked around, processing every detail of each officer’s task. She watched as they bagged evidence-the pink rug with the blood stain, the book of matches from a Las Vegas casino, and the Viagra bottle by the side of the bed. It didn’t seem real. Never in her twenty-nine years of life, including her six years of practicing law, had Sabre seen anything so gruesome. She had dealt with many crime scenes in court, but she’d never seen an actual murdered body or the officers at work gathering the information on a crime. This was a corpse, not her friend whom she had known for five plus years and to whom she had grown very close. Emotions confused her-sadness for her friend John, concern for Betty, and fascination at the process she observed.

When she brought the clothes out to Betty, Detective Nelson approached her. “Sabre, will you and your friend….Lucas, is it?”

“Yes sir, Lucas, Luke Rahm,” Luke said.

“Will you two please meet me down at the station? I’d like to speak to each of you. I’ll take Betty with me.”

Up until this point, Sabre had been there as Betty’s friend, but Betty was a suspect, regardless of what Nelson said. Sabre realized she should be treating her like a client and advising her accordingly. She took a deep breath and cleared her head. She needed to think like an attorney. She didn’t have the luxury of being just a friend.

Sabre touched Betty gently on the shoulder. “Betty, you ride with Detective Nelson to the police station. I’ll be right behind you. Here are your clothes. And listen carefully to what I’m about to say. You do not talk to him,” she said, pointing at Nelson, “or to anyone else until I get there. Don’t say a word. Understand?”

“Do I have to go?”

“I’m afraid so. If you don’t, it’ll only be worse.”

“Sabre, I’m scared. I don’t want to go,” she pleaded. Sabre felt physical pain for her friend. Betty had been there for her so many times. She had held her when she cried for her missing brother. She had become family to her, an aunt she could confide in when she couldn’t talk to her mother. Simple yet worldly, Betty didn’t talk much about her past, but Sabre knew she had experienced some pretty rough times.

Sabre put one hand on each of Betty’s shoulders, looked her directly in the eye, and said, “I’m sorry, but they’ll take you one way or the other. Just go with Nelson, and please don’t say anything. Just tell them you’re waiting for me. Understand?”

“Okay,” Betty said, her chin buried in her chest as she walked to the car.

Sabre turned to Detective Nelson, “Greg, don’t question her without me. I’m her friend, but I’m also her attorney,” Sabre said sternly.

“We’re not arresting her,” he said.

“I know, but I’m shaken up about all this and about losing John, and I haven’t been thinking clearly either. Just give me a little time to get my act together here, too. A crime appears to have been committed. Betty and John are my friends and I don’t want anything to go wrong.”

“Your call. I’ll see you there in a few.”

Luke and Sabre maintained silence on the way to the station. With his left hand on the wheel, Luke reached with his right and put it on Sabre’s knee. She took a deep breath and sighed. She looked at Luke, his face solemn. She hadn’t really thought about the effect this had on him, but John and Betty were his friends, too. She squeezed his hand.

Sabre’s mind drifted back two months to when she first met Luke at a barbecue at Betty’s. Betty claimed she hadn’t been trying to set them up, but Sabre knew differently. When she arrived at their house, Betty sent Luke out to her car to help her bring in the ice. Sabre was smitten the moment she looked into his dark, bedroom eyes. He apparently felt the same because, after a few hours together that afternoon, he asked for her phone number. He called the next day, and within a few weeks they were exclusive.

A feeling of warmth came over her as she remembered that afternoon. John leaned over the barbeque to flip a burger. Betty brought him a beer. They both looked at Sabre and Luke, chuckled a little, and when Betty walked away, John tapped her lightly on the butt. Betty lunged forward a little. “Oof,” she said.

Sabre and Luke had driven on surface streets about five miles from the police station when Luke asked, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, just trying to process everything.” She shifted in her seat. “Not such a great way to end the evening, our first time making love and all.”

“I know, baby, but I’m glad I was there with you.” He pulled her hand up to his lips and kissed it, holding it there for several seconds.

“Me, too.” She sighed. “I just feel so bad about John, and I’m so worried about Betty.”

“You don’t think she had anything to do with this, do you?”

Sabre responded with indignation that he would even ask. “Of course not. She wouldn’t hurt anyone, certainly not John. You know how much she loved him.” She looked at Luke, eyebrow raised. “Why, do you?”

“No…no, I don’t think so, either,” Luke said as he looked out the window, his voice trailing off.

“Besides, he must’ve been killed while Betty was with us. We’re her witnesses. We can vouch for her.”

“True.” Luke cleared his throat. “At least you can. I wasn’t with her the whole time. I was playing blackjack for a couple of hours while you two were off doing whatever it was you were doing. You were together, right?”

“Not the whole time. We went to play bingo, but then Betty decided she wanted to play the slots, so I stayed and she went to play the machines.” Sabre shifted in her seat and took a deep breath. “But she was there. I know she was there. I saw her about ten-thirty on the slots, and she told me she’d be leaving shortly.”

Silence filled the car the rest of the way to the police station.

Chapter 2

“Thank you for coming in, Sabre.”

“We shouldn’t even be here, Greg. She doesn’t know what happened.” Sabre tilted her head to one side and looked Nelson directly in the eye. “You think she killed him, don’t you?”

Detective Nelson loosened his tie. “I have no idea who killed him, but you know the drill, Sabre.” His voice softened. “I just need to ask her some questions.” He took Sabre by the arm. “Come on, let’s go talk to your client,” he said, as he led her to the interview room. The tiled floor resounded with the click of her heels as Sabre walked through the nearly empty corridor. When they reached the door, Detective Nelson opened it and held it for Sabre to pass. “Go on in. I’ll be there in just a second.”

Betty sat in the sparse interview room in the brown pants and the jailhouse orange, long-sleeve shirt Sabre had picked out for her. Sabre suddenly regretted her fashion choice for Betty. The bloody pajamas had been placed in the custody of the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department. The room contained only a table and two chairs, the dirty cream-colored walls needed paint, and the tile screamed “early fifties.” It resembled every other interview room in the county justice system-no windows and poor lighting.

“How are you holding up, Betty?” Sabre asked when they came in.

“Ok,” she said.

“Did they try to question you before I got here?”

“No, the officer just asked if I wanted something to drink. Nothing else.”

“Good.”

“What do they want from me?” Betty spit out the words as she stood up and ran her hand through her hair. “Oof,” she said bringing her hand down quickly.

“Right now they’re just trying to get information. Just tell the detective what you told me and hopefully we can get out of here. If I don’t like the questioning, I’ll stop it.”

“Do they think I had something to do with this?” Before Sabre could answer, Betty said. “I didn’t, you know.” She sounded so vulnerable and childlike.

“I know you didn’t,” Sabre was taken aback by Betty’s statement. “They need to start somewhere, and you were the last one with John as far as they know.”

Detective Nelson came in carrying another chair and seemed to take control of the room. He sat down and took Betty’s statement. “Why did you call Sabre and not the police?” Nelson asked.

“John was dead. I was upset.” Betty shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. She’s the first person I thought of.”

“Why didn’t you just call the police?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did you and your husband have a fight tonight?”

“No, we seldom fight,” Betty said assertively.

“Why didn’t he go to the casino with you?”

“He doesn’t gamble.”

“Does he ever go to the casino with you?”

“He’s been once or twice, but he gets bored, so when I go it’s usually with friends. I don’t go very often, either, a couple of times a year maybe.”

“Do you know anyone who might want your husband dead?”

“No.” Betty shook her head.

“Has he fought with anyone recently? Neighbors? Fellow workers?”

“No, not that I’m aware of.” Betty’s brow wrinkled. “He never fought with anyone. Everyone loved him. Sabre and Luke loved him. I loved him. Everyone loved him.”

“I’m sure they did, but why didn’t you call the police when you found him?” Nelson asked again.

“I don’t know.”

“What time did you last see John?”

“Around six-thirty. We usually eat dinner around that time, but I fixed John’s dinner a little early because of my plans to eat with Sabre and Luke. John ate about six and I cleaned up the kitchen and left. I left in such a hurry, I didn’t even kiss him goodbye.” Betty began to cry.

Nelson stopped his questioning for a moment and then asked, “Did he seem upset about anything before you left?”

“N..No.”

“Did you talk to him after that?”

“No,” Betty sucked the air in through her nose, stifling her cry. Sabre brought her a Kleenex, glancing at Nelson out of the corner of her eye.

“What time did you get home?” Nelson asked.

“About eleven P.M.”

“But you didn’t notice there was a problem until this morning?”

“No, I thought he was asleep.”

“When you saw the blood, why didn’t you call the police?”

“Greg, she said she didn’t know,” Sabre interrupted. “She was in shock when I got there.” Nelson looked at his notes and Sabre continued. “She’s answered all your questions. Most of them more than once. May we go home now?”

“Yeah, we’re done for now.”

Sabre, Luke, and Betty left the police station heading west on I-8, the morning commuter traffic in full force. Sabre, afraid she would be late for court, called her friend Bob and asked him to cover until she arrived.

“I’m taking you to my house, Betty. You can get some rest there. Luke will stay with you. He has his computer so he can work from there today.” Sabre turned to Luke so Betty couldn’t see her and mouthed, “Thank you.”

Luke winked back at her.

“Sure,” Betty responded, wringing her hands together. “Whatever you think.”

Sabre arrived at court about ten-thirty. The parking lot was full, so she had to park in the dirt and walk past Juvenile Hall. With an arm full of files, dressed in her black power suit and her Gucci high-heeled pumps, Sabre rushed to the courthouse. Inside at the metal detector, the bailiff waved her through. She walked across the crowded hallway and set her files on her usual shelf, one that protruded from the wall near the information desk.

Bob tapped her on the shoulder. “Hey, Ms. Sabre Orin Brown. How’s my little Sobs this morning?” Sobs was Bob’s nickname for Sabre. Sometimes he called her his little S.O.B. He loved to tease her about her initials.

Sabre managed a smile. She looked at her friend and thought how much he reminded her of the actor, Bill Pullman, but with prematurely-gray hair. He wasn’t movie star gorgeous, but was still devilishly cute, and he delivered his lines with great finesse. “I’m hanging in there.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re here. It’s been a crazy morning.”

“Yeah, tell me about it.” Sabre didn’t look up at her friend but she felt better just having him near. Sabre and Bob met when they both started working juvenile about six years ago. They had their first jurisdictional trial together, which they won, and soon after discovered that winning was no easy task. Their work at juvenile court and their deep compassion for the children bonded them. They were best friends, but they never gave Bob’s wife, Marilee, anything to worry about.

“Hey, are you okay? What’s going on? And why are you late?”

“You know my friend Betty, the little red-headed spitfire?”

“Yeah, I’ve seen her a few times. Why?”

“Her husband, John, is dead. He was murdered last night.”

“Murdered?” Bob said loudly, as he placed his hand on Sabre’s shoulder. “How?”

“Someone stabbed him in his bed. When Betty came home from the casino, John was apparently already dead. Betty didn’t know it until she rose to go to the bathroom and found blood on her pajamas. Luke and I went over there as soon as she called. We’ve been at the police station most of the night.”

“Do they know who did it?”

“Not yet. Remember Detective Greg Nelson from the Murdock case?”

“Yes.”

“He’s one of the investigating officers, and I’m glad, because he treated her better than someone else may have.”

“Are they accusing her of the murder?”

“No, at least not yet, but they don’t have any other suspects.”

“Attorneys Brown and Clark, please report to Department Four.” Mike, the bailiff, announced their surnames over the intercom.

“I guess we better go,” Bob said. “I did a couple of your reviews in Department One, but I haven’t done anything yet in Four.”

Bob and Sabre hustled into Department Four. Mike, her favorite bailiff, was assigned to this department. Apart from being good looking and intelligent, he was also a dedicated father. He asked, “What shenanigans are you two wild and crazy ones up to this morning?”

“The usual,” Bob answered. “Wreaking havoc in Kiddie Court.”

Mike shook his head. “Like we’d expect anything else.” He turned to Sabre. “Brown, you ready?”

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – January 30, 2011: An excerpt from Operation Neurosurgeon: You never know … who’s in the OR, a medical thriller by Barbara Ebel MD

May 17, 2011January 31, 2011 by KND

Who says a rising neurosurgeon can’t fall from his pinnacle? From the skullduggery taking place deep in the Tennessee woods to the silent tension in the OR, Doctor Danny Tilson’s life takes an abrupt turn after performing surgery alongside a scrub nurse with aqua eyes and a velvet voice.

Can Danny’s situation get any worse after the alluring lady disappears, he inherits her roguish retriever, and his Albert Einstein historical book turns up missing? A pack of Tennessee attorneys pursue Danny while he develops a scheme with his paramedic best friend to payback the mysterious woman who left in a hurry.

That’s the set-up for Dr. Barbara Ebel’s medical thriller Operation Neurosurgeon, introduced with a 7,500-word excerpt today through our Free Kindle Nation Shorts program!

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A Brand New Free Kindle Nation Short:

An excerpt from

Operation Neurosurgeon

You never know … who’s in the OR
By Barbara Ebel MD

Chapter 1

– 2009 –

Through the desolate winter woods, she could see a run down single story house. She firmly pressed the accelerator to climb the hilly, rutted road as pebbles kicked up from the gravel, pinging underneath her sedan. All around her, tall spindly trees stood without a quiver, the area still, quiet and remote. On this damp, cold February afternoon, she had come to conclude a deal with a man named Ray.

The road narrowed past the house, fading over the hill, but she veered slowly to the left, a barren area in front of the peeling house, where a dusty red pickup truck stood idle and a black plumaged vulture busily scavenged. Deliberately she left her belongings, clicked the lock on her car and walked to the front door. She threw the long end of her rust scarf behind her shoulder. The raptor grunted through his hooked beak as he flew off to the backwoods. The door opened before she knocked.

“Nobody visits a feller like me,” the man said, smiling at her while adjusting his baseball cap, “unless we’re buying and selling. You must be the lady with the book.”

The tidily shaven man wore a salt and pepper colored beard and mustache and an open plaid cotton shirt with a tee shirt underneath. The boots peeking out from under his blue jeans had seen muddy days.

The woman smiled pleasantly at him and went in the front door empty handed. If the man had any furniture, she wasn’t aware of it. Car parts lay strewn everywhere, which made her wonder if he slept in a bed.

Ray followed her glance. “You nearly can’t find one of them no mores,” he said, pointing to a charcoal colored, elongated piece of vinyl plastic on the floor. She looked quizzically at him and shoved the woolen hat she’d been wearing into her pocket.

“It’s an original 1984 Mercedes dashboard. See, the holes are for vents and the radio. Got a bite on that one from a teenager restoring his first car.” She didn’t seem interested though. She eyed the dust, in some spots thick as bread.

“Are you sure you have twelve-thousand dollars to pay for this?” she asked, unbuttoning her jacket.

“You come out thirty miles from Knoxville? That baby in your belly may need something,” he said, pointing to her pregnancy. “You want a soda or something?”

“No thank you,” she said, grimacing at him.

“Oh, yeah. I got the money,” he said. “All I got now to my name is seventy-five thousand dollars. I got ruint in Memphis. Was a part owner in a used car dealership. Went away for a little while, and the other guy cleaned me out. Can’t afford nothing like a lawyer to chase ‘im down.”

She tapped her foot.

“Anyhow, I won’t bother yer with all that. I got a thing going good on eBay. I got a reputation, it ain’t soiled. You can trust me, I give people what I tell them, whether I’m buying or selling.”

A beagle-looking mutt crawled out from behind a car door. “Molly, you’re milk containers are dragging on the floor. Better get out to your pups,” the man said, prodding her out the partially closed door.

“You like dogs?” he asked.

“I suppose so.”

“I got no use for people who don’t care for dogs. Something not right about people like that.”

The woman turned and followed the clumsy dog outside, grabbed a bag from the front seat, and came back in. She took out a book, opened the back cover, and handed him a folded piece of paper. Certificate of Authenticity, the man read, from a company in New Orleans, verifying the signature on the front page to be Albert Einstein’s. He inverted his hand and wiggled his fingers, gesturing to her if he could hold the aged book.

“Where’d you say you got it?” He observed her carefully.

“It’s been in the family for years. I took my precious belongings with me when I left New Orleans because of Hurricane Katrina. Since I lost my house there, I decided to stay in Tennessee. Now I’m selling my expensive things. I have to make ends meet, especially with a baby coming.”

“Good thing you got this certificate with it, then. Twelve-thousand dollars, we’ve got a deal.”

He walked away to the back of the house while she held on to the physicist’s 1920 publication. He came through the doorway with a stack of money and a brown paper bag. She nodded once when she finished counting the bills, so he handed her the empty bag.

“I still got your email address and phone number,” he said. “I keep track of what goes and comes.”

“You won’t need them,” she said and left abruptly.

He watched her back out, stood there until the car disappeared out of sight down the gray road.

Chapter 2

– 1989 –

“You dawdling over there?”

“No. Peeing, Dad.” Danny zipped his fly and wheeled around, his boots sinking in soft leafy earth. His father, Greg, stood on polished creek stone at the river’s edge beside Danny’s wife. “And on rounds, the proper term is urinating.” Danny slipped from the woods and approached them.

Greg threw a few red salmon eggs into the Caney Fork River and handed Danny his spinning rod. “I better catch up to the better half of you newlyweds.”

Sara propped her pole on the cooler, held up a rainbow trout in front of Danny, and exclaimed “Tah-dah.”

“We’re just here to have fun.” Danny grinned at both of them. “It’s not as if our lives depend on it.” But Danny knew the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency had recently stocked the river. The three of them had been bottom fishing since before the morning fog lifted like a friendly ghost drifting away to expose the slow but noticeable current.

“You’re right, Danny. You know what I say.”

Sara plucked algae off her four-pound test line and looked questioningly at her father-in-law. She waited to wade into the water, figuring one of Greg’s metaphorical sayings or idioms were forthcoming. She’d dated Danny throughout his four years of medical school at Vanderbilt and had spent so much time at his Dad’s house, where Danny had lived, that sometimes more lipsticks and tampons had been in Danny’s bathroom than her own.

“You may want to fish for dinner,” Greg said, “but if you must fish to catch dinner, you’ve screwed up.”

Sara pushed dew-misted hair behind her ear. “Danny’s one of only two residents they’ve accepted into the neurosurgery program, Dad. That doesn’t qualify as, umm, messing up.”

Danny beamed at his wife. During med school, almost two dozen students were already married or headed that way, but some couples split with the strain of exams and deadlines, hours in labs, physician’s offices and clinical rotations with overnight calls. Sara kept busy teaching high school biology and running, and always helped Danny focus. When he needed long-term perspective, objectivity, or softening after his brain was slammed shut for hours between pages of Principles ofPharmacology, she could turn him around. She would run her hand through his hair, or massage between his shoulder blades, or whisper to him under the sheets after they made love. When they took their vows a month ago, Danny secretly promised to nourish the effect they had on each other.

Greg had forgotten to bring wading boots, so he stayed on shore while Sara and Danny carefully picked their steps. Occasional diehards just sucked it up and waded in. The water was as warm as it would get, a cold summer temperature, unforgiving for anyone without proper gear.

Quiet spread across their sanctuary except for a small surface splash or a fish tail grazing the surface. A young man in a small canoe paddled by and without any fanfare hoisted his baby boat onto a jeep rack and left.

Danny and Sara finally came to shore, each with a brown trout. “Both about the same size,” Sara said. Danny agreed, leaned over and pecked his wife on the cheek as they crouched, holding their fish like new baby birds. The trout squirmed in their hands, then darted away. Sara smiled, pleased with their release.

“Time to go Dad. They’ll be generating soon.” Danny nodded at the Center Hill Dam, the nearby Goliath. Sara picked up their poles and Danny and Greg grabbed the unused salmon eggs, cooler, and tackle boxes; they walked slowly up the road to the parking lot as they heard the generating dam gushing Center Hill Lake water into the Caney Fork.

“This is the last load, Dad,” Danny said.

Greg waved his hand as Danny walked by him with a flat cardboard box and suitcase and entered his bedroom. Inside, ebony blue curtains framed windows to a view that appeared as if by magic despite his mother’s illness. She had died three years ago from ovarian cancer.

Danny looked out over south facing slopes of grown hickories, southern red oaks and maples, white and Virginia pines. Donna had assisted the native habitat by producing a real show for early spring. She’d worked with Mexican migrants from a wholesale nursery to plant rows of redbuds and terraced beds of mountain laurel, rhododendrons and wildflowers. Specks of white, hints of pink and tinges of purple had helped her to divert thoughts of a possible short life expectancy to reminiscing about her family and their accomplishments. She would leave behind a wonderful marriage, two fantastic children, and a beautiful estate.

Danny turned his head to find Greg at his doorway. “I miss her, Dad. There’s not a day …”

“Me, too,” Greg said, gazing at his shoes, his thick dark eyebrows practically covering his eyes. “I still can’t believe I’m without her at fifty-two years old.”

Greg walked in and sat on Danny’s bed, his shoulders slumping over. Greg had gotten married in 1960, after only dating Donna for six months. They never missed Sunday devotion together until Donna had been bedridden. Greg’s gaze averted to the outside hallway where one of his wedding pictures hung, the loving couple fixed in an embrace.

“You know what I told her?”

Danny shook his head no.

“A girlfriend who prays with me is worth keeping.”

Danny did know that, as well as the adoration his father had shown his mother for as long as he could remember. He patted his father’s knee once and got up. Danny unfolded the cardboard box, and then dumped it in front of his dresser.

“Dad, Sara and I can’t thank you enough for the wedding present. The house is home already. Sara’s summer vacation and my break before residency made it all work out.” Danny looked around. “Will you turn my room into a guest bedroom?”

“Yes. And I’ll keep it the same. For visiting grandkids?”

Danny laughed. “Are you prying, Dad?”

“If there are plans for me to be a grandfather, I want to be the third one to know.”

“Done deal,” Danny said, checking his top drawers to make sure he’d emptied them on a previous trip. He opened the last drawer and threw his winter stash of sweaters into the box. A large baggie still sat at the bottom, which Danny picked up, then sat next to Greg on the cream-colored bedspread. The mattress indented with their weight and their knees lined up together, their six foot two frames carbon copied from similar blueprints.

Danny’s eyes gleamed. Greg reached to touch the plastic storage bag, an uncanny method to preserve the emotionally stirring and valuable treasure. Danny opened the bag and took out the brown hard-covered book as gently as he had held a hummingbird the previous week after he had found it stunned from hitting Sara and Danny’s glass front door. He placed the small item on his lap and opened the faded cover to the yellowish tinge of aged paper.

“Your sister will wear your mom’s jewelry,” Greg said, “but you? Someday you can bequeath what your mother gave you to your children or a museum. Or sell it.”

Danny whistled, knowing it’s price tag would have plenty of zeroes, with more added as time went on.

“I still remember when your mother purchased it. She drove a hard bargain and requested that the store manager in New Orleans have the book and the signature verified by an authenticator of such things.”

They both looked at the front page: Einstein’s 1920 Relativity: The Special and the General Theory. Many copies existed, but this was one of the few remaining from the early 1900’s. Two-thirds down on the page was the author’s signature: Albert Einstein. Which wasn’t the usual way the historical genius had autographed his books. Almost always, he had signed A. Einstein.

“It’s the real McCoy,” Greg said. “And with Einstein’s full signature, you’ve inherited a diamond in a trowel of white sand.” Danny slid it back in the bag. “Perhaps you should put it in a safe deposit box.”

“Perhaps. But occasionally I look at it, Dad. I think of Mom.” Danny paused, looking again to the summer’s day, tree shadows beginning their leftward crawl. “It’s inspiration for entering a field where I’ll surgically be in the very matter which spawns incredible ideas and discoveries like his.”

When Greg left, Danny packed the last shirts and shoes left in his closet, a few medical texts in the nightstand and a bottle of Sara’s shampoo from his bathroom. He opened it and smiled. Orange ginger. Sara’s hair.

Danny glumly endured his first postgraduate year, then six months of general surgery, a few months of neurology and one month of neuro ICU. He knew how important these rotations were for establishing his clinical knowledge and skills; but he couldn’t wait to focus on physical brains, the control panel of it all. As he tolerated these months, he tried to listen to Greg, who kept telling him, “It’s not the end result, but the journey that matters.”

Finally, late in his second year of residency, Danny was smack in the middle of his first true month of neurosurgery. He pushed through hospital health care providers in scrubs, police officers, and uniformed ambulance personnel in the ER hallway, to see three stretchers in the trauma room. Someone yanked at his arm.

“Dr. Tilson, the one in between. The anesthesiologist is intubating the difficult airway over there, the driver. The ER physician will probably declare that patient on the right, another driver who went off the road to avoid them.” The navy blue uniformed man, the same age as Danny, spoke quickly and sped Danny to the head of the middle stretcher.

Danny had already begun assessing the patient while gesturing for the young man to continue. “This patient. Right front seat, wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. A ten-pointer buck ran from the ditch, driver slammed the brakes, trophy rack came through the front window. Brown body and appendages followed. She was talking when I arrived, but became somnolent en route. To be on the safe side, I intubated her.”

Danny glanced at the monitors. Vital signs okay, but not great. Dirty, dark blood covered the sheet and neck brace behind the motionless woman’s head. He slipped on gloves and felt around the endotracheal tube protruding from the patient’s mouth, palpating facial bones for stability and orbital area for swelling. Danny checked her pupil size and reaction to light. A general surgeon had arrived and simultaneously examined her abdomen and chest. They assessed quietly despite the chaos around them.

Danny finished, stepped back to a tray covered with the patient’s ER paperwork and grabbed physician order and progress sheets. “I’m going to need a non-contrast CT scan of the brain,” he said to the general surgeon and nearby nurse.

The surgeon nodded. “Looks negative down here.” A gloved nurse waited for Danny’s other orders.

“Nice job, driver,” Danny said to the man who had given him report. He pressed ahead with his writing without looking at him.

“I’m not just an ambulance driver,” the man said sarcastically, “but a highly trained EMT. A paramedic. And unlike you, I’m launched in my career. You’ll be pussyfooting around for the next five years before getting yourself established.”

The female nurse didn’t move.

“Shut up, Casey,” Danny said with a small grin.

The nurse exhaled. “Phew. I thought you two were for real.” She untwisted a pretty ivory earring.

“We’re throw backs to grade school. It’s just that he never grew up.” Danny glanced sideways at Casey. “And I still think you should’ve been a quarterback. Thick neck, muscular build and all.”

Before Casey could open his mouth, Danny continued, “I’m not touching a book tonight, so pop over. Sara and I could use some deck time.”

“Okay. For Sara. But don’t let that baby fall asleep until I see her awake. What do you two do, tranquilize her?”

“That’s what babies do, Casey, they sleep.”

Casey weaved out of the trauma room through the diminishing gawkers. As the patient’s stretcher rolled past, Danny paged his chief resident to give her a report.

“When the CT is finished, meet me in radiology,” Dr. Welch said.

Chief residents, in their final sixth year of neurological surgery, were in charge of lower residents and had an attending physician available for counsel. Danny had an appreciation for Dr. Welch, a thick waisted, fast talking female whose gender in her specialty made her rarer than lobster ice cream.

Karen Welch stood in the CT scanning office when Danny arrived. She had evaluated the patient before they had transported her to the ICU. She glanced up and down the CT images on the viewer, hands on her hips.

“Dr. Tilson, glad you could join me. So your college bound, buck startled patient has a high-density area on CT,” she said, pointing.

Danny carefully looked through the images, careful not to let Karen bait him into hurrying the probable diagnosis, or missing something else evident.

“A cerebral contusion from a sudden deceleration of the head.”

“Is there more to that story?”

Danny took a step off the imaging room’s platform to establish better eye contact. “The brain impacted on bony prominences. A coup injury occurred where the skull struck the brain. A contrecoup injury is an injury directly opposite the impact site.”

Karen Welch turned to her resident. “Surgical treatment is not indicated at this time. When will surgical decompression be warranted?”

“With threatening herniation. If she becomes refractory to medical management. With increased ICP.”

“Ah, yes. The magic three letters for increased intracranial pressure. You know what to do.” She winked at the radiologist sitting in front of his equipment.

She handed Danny the patient’s chart from the table and began walking out. “I’ll talk to the general surgery resident. Most of the patient’s scalp wounds are only a few inches. They can clean and suture them without bringing the patient to the OR.”

That evening, Danny left Vanderbilt University Hospital and traveled southeast to the wedding present Greg had given them almost two years ago. Greg had hired the builder, but Danny and Sara had approved the plans and construction, giving the builder lots of latitude with his work. Since they chose a lot in a newborn subdivision, their split-level ranch at the end of a cul-de-sac faced woods in the back. Danny and Sara liked the outdoor, natural environment and had a wooden deck built on the front and back of the single story side of the house.

Danny hit the remote and pulled his four-year old Toyota into the garage. “Hi girls,” he said, entering the door. Melissa sat in her high chair, her right hand swinging a red rattle, the other hand holding a small white stuffed dog with a ribbon collar. She shook with glee when she planted her eyes on Danny. Sara graded the sprawling papers in front of her but got up to meet Danny halfway.

Danny put his right arm around Sara, pressing his head into her blonde peppered hair. Her bob cut accentuated the contour of her cheeks and her silky hair made him linger and revel in its fragrance. He pulled back. Sometimes her hair stayed behind her ears, but sometimes she’d purposefully leave it up front and kink it softly around her face. Danny liked it either way.

“Good day, night and day?” Sara asked.

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Free Kindle Nation Shorts – January 31, 2010: A Touch of Deceit by Gary Ponzo, An Amazon Kindle Exclusive Novel

May 17, 2011January 31, 2011 by KND

By Stephen Windwalker
Editor of Kindle Nation Daily ©Kindle Nation Daily 2011

There are a number of different approaches we can take here, but they all come out the same way.

You could listen to what I have to say about the very talented novelist behind the Nick Bracco series, and I would tell you that Gary Ponzo is the real thing, a suspense novelist with full command of the tools of the trade.

You could listen to the literary gatekeepers who have honored this author’s work by twice nominating him for the prestigious Pushcart Prize for short fiction and showering him with other awards,

You could listen to your fellow Amazon readers, and the verdict there is the most stellar that I have seen for any fiction writer yet to participate in the Free Kindle Nation Shorts program. 31 readers have reviewed A Touch of Deceit. 25 have rated the novel with 5 stars and six with 4 stars. That is a pretty amazing testimonial.

But the good news is that you do not have to listen to anyone else, because Gary Ponzo has provided us with a generous 11,500-word excerpt. If you are a fan of suspense fiction, I will be surprised if he does not grab you like he grabbed me with the first few paragraphs. Clear out a few hours this weekend and budget two bucks for the download, because you’re not likely to stop reading until you’ve read the whole thing.

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This novel is an Amazon Kindle Exclusive

Here’s the set-up:

FBI agent Nick Bracco can’t stop a Kurdish terrorist from firing missiles at random homes across the country. The police can’t stand watch over every household, so Bracco recruits his cousin Tommy to help track down this terrorist. Tommy is in the Mafia. Oh yeah, it gets messy fast. As fast as you can turn the pages.

Winner of the Southwest Writers Award, Thriller category.

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A Touch of Deceit
by Gary Ponzo

4.8 out of 5 stars – 31 Reviews

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A Touch of Deceit

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A Touch of Deceit
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by Gary Ponzo

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January 31, 2011

    There was a time when Nick Bracco would walk down Gold Street late at night and young vandals would scatter. The law was present and the guilty took cover. West Baltimore was alive with crime, but Gold Street remained quarantined, reserved for the dirtiest of the dirty. That’s how Nick remembered it anyway. Before he left for the Bureau to fight terrorists. Now, the narrow corridor of row houses felt closer to him and the slender strip of buckled sidewalk echoed his footsteps like a sentry announcing his presence. It wasn’t his turf anymore. He was a foreigner.
    Nick scrutinized the landscape and searched for something out of place. The battered cars seemed right, the graffiti, even the shadows seemed to darken the proper corners. But something was missing. There were no lookouts on the concrete stairwells. The ubiquitous bass line of hip-hop was absent. The stillness reminded him of jungle birds falling silent in the prelude to danger. The only comfort came from the matching footsteps beside him. As usual, Matt McColm was by his side. They’d been partners for ten years and were approaching the point of finishing each other’s sentences.
    “You’re awfully quiet,” Matt said.
    “Did I mention that I don’t have a good feeling about this?”
    “Uh, huh.” Matt tightened his collar against the autumn chill and worked a piece of gum with his jaw. “That’s your theme song.”
    “Really? Don’t you ever get a bad feeling about a call?”
    “All the time.”
    “How come you never tell me?”
    “I’m going to feed the flames of paranoia?”
    They walked a little further in silence. It got darker with every step. The number of working streetlights dwindled.
    “Did you just call me paranoid?” Nick said.
    Matt looked straight ahead as he walked; his casual demeanor caused him to appear aloof, but Nick knew better. Even at half-mast, Matt’s eyes were alert and aware.
    “Maybe paranoid is too strong of a word,” Matt said.
    “I would hope so.”
    “More like Mother-henish.”
    “That’s better,” Nick said. “By the way, did you eat your broccoli tonight?”
    “Yes, Dear.”
    They strode further; low-lying clouds gave the night a claustrophobic feel.
    “This guy asked for you specifically?” Matt said.
    Nick nodded.
    “That bother you a little?” Matt asked.
    “No,” Nick said. “That bothers me a lot.”
    Up ahead, a parked car jostled. They both stopped. Neither of them spoke. They split up. By the book. Years of working together coming into play. Matt crouched and crept into the street. Nick stayed on the sidewalk and gave the car a wide berth. In seconds Matt became invisible. The car maintained a spastic rhythm. It was subtle, but Nick understood the familiar motion even before he flashed his penlight into the back seat and saw a pair of young eyes pop up through the grimy window. They were wide open and reacted like a jewel thief caught with a handful of pearls. The kid’s hair was disheveled and his shirt was half-off. His panting breath caused the inside of the window to fog up. He wasn’t alone. A pair of bare legs straddled his torso.
    From the other side of the vehicle, Matt emerged from the shadows and charged the car with his pistol out front. He was just a few yards away when Nick held up his hand and said, “No.”
    Matt stopped dead. He must’ve seen the grin on Nick’s face and realized the situation. He slowly holstered his Glock and took time to catch his breath.
    Nick heard the kid’s voice through the closed window. “I ain’t doing nuthin’, man.”
    Nick clicked off his penlight and slipped it back into his jacket. He smiled. “It may be nothing, but you sure worked up a sweat doing it.”
    When Matt fell back into step next to his partner, Nick said, “You seemed a little . . . uh, paranoid?”
    Matt returned to nonchalant mode. “Kids that young shouldn’t be doing the nasty out in the street.”
    “Consider their role models,” Nick said. “You can’t change the tide with an oar.”
    “Pardon me, Professor Bracco. Who said that one-Nietzsche?”
    “I just made it up.”
    “It sounded like it.”
    They slowed their pace until Nick stopped in front of an old brick building with a worn, green awning above the entrance. Nick gestured down a dark flight of stairs where a giant steel door stood menacingly secure. “There it is.”
    Matt nodded. “You bring me to all the best spots.”
    When he was certain of their solitude, Nick descended the stairs. Matt followed, keeping an eye on their rear. In the darkness, Nick barely made out Matt’s silhouette.
    “Listen,” Nick said, “it’ll be easier if we don’t have to use our creds, but let’s see how it goes. I don’t want to say any more than I have to, and you say nothing at all. Just be the silent brute that you are. Capisce?”
    “Understood.”
    “If we get lucky, I’ll see a familiar face.” Nick raised his fist, hovered it in front of the door, then stopped to sniff the air. “You wearing aftershave?”
    “A little.”
    “You have a date after this?”
    “Uh huh.”
    “When?”
    “Midnight.”
    “Who makes a date with you at midnight?”
    “Veronica Post.”
    “First date?”
    “Yup.”
    “At midnight?”
    “She’s a waitress. She doesn’t get off until then.”
    In the murky darkness, Nick sighed. He turned to face the door and, just like a thousand times before, he said, “Ready?”
    He couldn’t see the response, but he heard Matt unfasten the flap to his holster. Matt was ready.
    Nick used his wedding band hand to pound on the metal door. He shifted his weight as they waited. Nick heard Matt chewing his gum.
    Nick said, “Midnight, huh?”
    A rectangular peephole slid open allowing just enough light through to see a dark face peering out. The face was so large the opening supported only enough room for one of his eyes.
    “Yeah?” the man grunted.
    Nick leaned close to the opening so the man could see his face. The opening quickly slid shut.
    They stood in the silence while Nick thought of his next move.
    “He seems like a nice fellow,” Matt said.
    The clang of locks unbolting was followed by the door squeaking open. It reminded Nick of an old horror movie.
    The large black man wore a large black shirt that hung over his jeans and covered enough space to hide a rocket launcher. The man ignored Nick and gave Matt the once over.
    Matt gave him the stone cold glare of a pissed-off FBI agent. No one did it better.
    Then the man turned his attention to Nick. His head was round and clean-shaven. His expressionless face seemed to be set in cement.
    Nick spread open his hands and raised his eyebrows. “Well?”
    The man’s face slowly softened, then worked its way into a full out smile. “Where the fuck you been, Bracco?” He engulfed Nick into a giant bear hug, momentarily lifting him off of his feet.
    Nick patted the beast a couple of times on the back and slid down to face him. “I can’t believe you still work here.” He gestured to Matt, “This here is Matt McColm. Matt, this is Truth.”
    Truth nodded to Matt, then slapped Nick on the shoulder. “Last time I saw you, you were still with the Western.”
    “It’s been a decade.”
    “Wow, seems like just yesterday you’d come in and drag Woody to G.A. meetings.”
    Nick grinned. He looked over the big man’s shoulder to the solid green door that Truth guarded. Beyond the fireproof frame was a large, unfinished basement filled with poker tables. This time of night the tables would be surrounded by chiropractors, strippers, tax accountants, firefighters and probably even a couple of cops from Nick’s old beat. A mixture of cigar and cigarette smoke would be lingering just below the fluorescents.
    “How’s the crowd?” Nick asked.
    “Not too bad. You want a seat?”
    Nick shook his head. “I’d scare them all off. You know I’m with the feds now?”
    Truth frowned. “You don’t come around for ten years and the first thing you think to do is insult me?”
    Nick stood silent and waited.
    “We may be compulsive gamblers,” Truth explained, “but we’re not illiterates. I read the story. Local boy makes good.”
    Nick held up a hand. “Hold on. Don’t believe everything you read in the rags.”
    “Since when is Newsweek a rag?”
    Nick shrugged. “Sometimes the legend exceeds the facts.”
    Truth waved a thick finger back and forth between the two agents. “He’s the partner. They called you two the Dynamic Duo or the A-Team or some shit.”
    Nick said nothing.
    Truth snapped his large fingers. “Dream Team. That’s it. I knew it was something like that. You two dug up some kind of terrorist cell planning to waste the Washington Monument. Isn’t that right?”
    He pointed to Nick. “According to the article, you the brains and he’s the muscle.”
    Matt stood stone-faced.
    “The way you say it,” Nick said. “It makes my partner here sound like a bimbo with large biceps. Look at him. Does he look like he pumps iron?”
    Truth examined Matt’s long, thin frame and shook his head. “Nope. So he must be good with a 9.”
    “Precisely. He’s the FBI’s sharp-shooting champ three years running.”
    Truth smiled. “You two aren’t here to raid the place, I know that much. They wouldn’t send that much talent for this old joint.”
    “Come on, Truth.” Nick said. “This is a landmark. My father used to play here. I’d rather see it turned into a museum first.”
    Truth’s smile transformed into something approaching concern. “And you’re not here to play poker either?”
    Nick shook his head.
    “Then it must be business.”
    Nick stood motionless and let the big man put it all together.
    Truth looked at Nick, but nodded toward Matt. “You wouldn’t bring the cowboy unless you felt a need for backup. Something I should know?”
    Nick thought about how much he should tell him. He trusted Truth as much as any civilian.
    “I’m not sure,” Nick said. “I need to see Ray Seville. Is he still playing?”
    “Seville? Yeah, he’s back there making his usual donations. What do you want with a weasel like him?”
    “He called the field office and left a message for me to meet him here.”
    Truth smiled. “The snitch strikes again.”
    “Maybe,” Nick said.
    Matt cleared his throat in a forced fashion.
    “Oh, yeah,” Nick said. “Matt’s in a bit of a hurry. He’s got a date tonight.”
    Truth engaged Matt’s hardened face again, only this time Matt threw in a wink.
    Truth smiled and held out his hand, “All right then, gents. Hand them over and I’ll get Ray for you.”
    Nick cringed.
    Matt glared at his partner. “You can’t be serious?”
    Truth didn’t budge. His palm remained open while his fingertips flexed impatiently.
    “Truth,” Nick said. “Is that really necessary?”
    Truth looked at Matt this time. In a tone that denoted overuse, he said, “A long time ago there was a shootout in the parlor. A couple of drunks got carried away during a tight hand. The drunks were Baltimore PD. Fortunately, they were more drunk than cops that night and neither one got hurt too bad. When one of their fellow officers was called to the scene, he came down hard. Even though the two drunk cops were his senior, he was someone everyone respected and they obeyed his commands. Back then he made a rule: if Lloyd’s was going to stay open it had to be firearm free. No exceptions. The Mayor, the Governor. No one.”
    Truth took his time to look back at Nick. “Do you remember who that cop was?”
    Nick nodded, reluctantly. “Me.”
    “Bingo,” Truth smiled.
    Nick fished the 9MM from his holster and handed it to Truth. He looked at Matt and said, “Sorry, I forgot.”
    Truth took Nick’s gun and shoved it into the abyss under his oversized tee shirt. He looked at Matt and kept his hand out. “It’s only out of respect that I don’t pat you down,” Truth said. “I trust Nick.”
    Matt moaned while removing his Glock. “Forgot, my ass.”
    “Relax, Truth has our back until we’re done here. Right Truth?”
    “Fifteen years,” Truth said. “No one’s got by me yet.” He gestured for them to follow and he stopped after only a few steps. He pointed to an open door and said, “Wait in there and I’ll get him for you.”
    Before entering the room, they watched Truth walk down the hall and open the green door. As he pulled the door shut behind him, a burst of cigar smoke escaped along the ceiling and crept toward the front door. Nick followed Matt into the small sitting room and remained standing. Matt eased onto a dingy green sofa, rested his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands together.
    The room was a windowless twelve by twelve with two corduroy sofas facing each other. Between the sofas was a carved up oak coffee table that wobbled without ever being touched. The only light came from a pair of bare fluorescent bulbs that hung from a cracked ceiling.
    “I’m just glad you didn’t agree to wear a blindfold,” Matt said. “We would have missed this beautiful decor.”
    “Calm down,” Nick said. “I wouldn’t want you to be uptight for Valerie.”
    “Veronica.”
    “Right.”
    Nick paced while Matt tapped his fingertips.
    Nick heard the green door open. Truth was followed by a wiry man with deep pockets under his eyes. He wore a baseball cap with the brim twisted to the side.
    Nick gestured for him to sit down.
    Truth said, “I’ll be right outside if you need me,” then pulled the door shut behind him.
    Ray Seville sank into the couch across from Matt and pulled a mangled pack of cigarettes from his jeans pocket. He flipped open a pack of matches and flicked one against the striker. He sucked the cigarette to life, then shook the match and pointed the extinguished stick at Matt. “Who’s he?”
    Matt glared.
    “He’s my partner,” Nick said.
    “I thought I left a message for you to come alone.”
    “He’s my partner. He goes where I go.”
    “Yeah, well, how do I know I can trust him?”
    “How do you know you can trust me?”
    Seville managed a meager grin. “Aw, come on. Me and you, we have history.”
    “History?” Nick said. “I arrested you half a dozen times working Gold Street.”
    Seville waved the back of his hand. “Yeah, but you was always straight with me. A lot of other cops were pure bullshit. Tell me one thing, then come at me from a different angle two minutes later.”
    Nick sighed. “Listen, Ray, I’m not with the Western anymore. You want to roll over on one of your buddies, I’ll call a shoe and get him to meet you somewhere safe. Not down here in the basement of Lloyd’s poker house.”
    Seville took another drag of his cigarette and looked past Nick at Matt still leaning forward, elbows on his knees, “What’s his problem?”
    “I told you, he’s my partner.”
    “Doesn’t he know how to speak?”
    “He’s just here to intimidate.”
    “Intimidate? Intimidate who?”
    The guy was a pure idiot. Nick wondered how Ray survived among the predators that prowled West Baltimore on a nightly basis. Nick glanced at his watch and said, “Ray, where are we going here?”
    Seville stared at the hardwood floor while the flimsy ash danced between his feet. “A couple of weeks ago I get a call from this guy asking me for a phony drivers license.”
    “How did he know to call you?” Nick asked.
    “I dunno. Maybe somebody told him. Stop being a cop for a second and listen.”
    Nick folded his arms.
    “Well, anyway, I meet him and get the info he wants me to use on the license. I usually ask some questions to see what I’m getting myself into, but this guy cuts me off before I can even start. I never been eye-fucked like that before.”
    Seville took another drag of his cigarette and pointed to Matt. “Is he like your trained monkey or what?”
    Nick stretched out his arm and held Matt back as he came out of his seat, then he admonished Ray with a stare that forced his attention back to the floorboards.
    Ray’s cigarette slowly shrank between his index and middle finger. “Shit, the guy was talking to me like I was a moron, telling me over and over where to make the drop. How long to wait. I look like I just fell off the turnip truck?”
    Nick let that one go.
    “He asked me everything under the sun, except if I know how to make a good dupe. I mean shit, the guy didn’t even haggle with my rate.” Ray dropped the ciga

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – January 28, 2011: Free Your Inner Novelist With D.D. Scott’s MUSE THERAPY: Unleashing Your Inner Sybil, A Free Excerpt

May 18, 2011January 28, 2011 by KND

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – January 27, 2011

Free Your Inner Novelist
With D.D. Scott’s

MUSE THERAPY:

Unleashing Your Inner Sybil

————-

A Free Excerpt

By Stephen Windwalker
Editor, Kindle Nation Daily
©Kindle Nation Daily 2011

About a year ago, acting on a recommendation by Seth Godin, I read a remarkable book entitled The War of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle by Steven Pressfield. It was a pretty remarkable book — all about removing or avoiding the sources of friction that were keeping me from getting done as much as I would like to get done — and it has had an effect on my life nearly every day since I read it.

But it was a bit dry in places, and I suspect that it was also a bit of a guy’s book, if you don’t mind my saying so. Neither of those was a deal-breaker for me personally of course, but I remember daydreaming at the time that it would be great if somebody could come along and deliver a similar message that might be more vivid, more lifely, more fun, and more accessible, including, of course, to women.

And so, now, along comes the woman of my dreams, or of my daydreams in any case, to write an incredibly smart, funny, and truly inspirational book that could be the spicier sibling of Pressfield’s book. And I am here to tell you that, like The War of Art, D.D. Scott’s MUSE THERAPY: Unleashing the Inner Sybil is going to have an effect on thousands of people’s lives nearly every day once they have read it.

What I haven’t mentioned is that, like The War of Art, MUSE THERAPY is written with writers in mind. But with both books, the messages will resonate far more widely than just among the community of writers or, in the case of MUSE THERAPY, romance writers.

Whether you are working on the next great read to feature a Fabio clone on the cover (with or without Stetson), any other form of creative endeavor, or frankly any activity that requires you to focus on working solo to harvest your individual talents, D.D. Scott has written a book that could change your life, and give you plenty of laughs in the bargain!

Click here to begin reading the free excerpt

Of D.D. Scott’s MUSE THERAPY

Here’s the set-up:

Romantic Comedy Author and a Writer’s Go-To-Gal for Muse Therapy D. D. Scott is treating you and your muses to the book version of her wildly successful Muse Therapy Online Classes and Live Workshops.

MUSE THERAPY utilizes fun and fabulous tools to inject life into writers’ tired and/or stressed out muses. By showing you how to analyze your muses’ funks, rein in your creative divas and ultimately up your page counts, D. D.’s created a writer’s go-to-manual for “muse disorders”. She’ll help you dig deep then deeper still into your writer psyche.

Why is she helping writers the world over?

Here’s the scoop…

Once upon a time her muses weren’t ticking. They were ticked off. Why? Because they were too damn tired and stressed out trying to find their way on the Yellow Brick Road to Publishing Oz. Screw the Happily Ever After. Her creative divas couldn’t produce past page one.

Saying that writing-for-publication is tough is the bolder-than-bold-faced understatement of the new millennium. And with today’s huge economic and technological changes, it ain’t gettin’ any easier.

But once D. D. shows you how to recognize, acknowledge and accept your muses’ afflictions and teaches you her tricks, tips and “trips” to treat the word witches of your writing world, you and your muses will be cranking out pages with gusto.

Plus, you won’t be alone in your journey. Her MUSE THERAPY tips and tricks continue to be apropos no matter where a writer is in his/her career. By sharing fantastic and at times roll on the floor, laugh out loud anecdotes she gathered – either interviewing or attending workshops given by the romance genre’s hottest stars – she proves this assertion. You’ll hear from:

Allison Brennan

Jennifer Crusie

Cynthia Eden

Janet Evanovich

Jennifer Greene

Nancy Haddock

Gemma Halliday

Linda Howard

Eloisa James

Marcia James

Jayne Ann Krentz

Debbie Macomber

Nora Roberts

Karen Rose

Tawny Weber

Welcome to “therapy”…MUSE THERAPY that is.

Click here to download D.D. Scott’s MUSE THERAPY(or a free sample) to your Kindle, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch, BlackBerry, Android-compatible, PC or Mac and start reading within 60 seconds!

Free Kindle Nation Shorts – January 28, 2011

An Excerpt from
MUSE THERAPY:
Unleashing Your Inner Sybil

by D.D. Scott

INTRODUCTION

Once upon a time my muses weren’t ticking. They were ticked off. Why? Because they were too damn tired and stressed out trying to find their way on the Yellow Brick Road to Publishing Oz. Screw the Happily Ever After. My creative divas couldn’t produce past page one.

Let me clarify a bit. I’m not talking about my ticked off muses from yester

year, before I wrote this book to give your muses a good kick in the pants. I’m talking about my yesterday muses, or maybe the day before that, or last week and last month. ‘Cause here’s the thing…our creative divas are a constant work in progress (hereinafter referred to as WIP) as are the manuscripts of our hearts that we’re trying like Hell to get published.

Saying that writing-for-publication is tough is the bolder-than-bold-faced understatement of the new millennium. Writing-for-publication is a bitch! There’s just no sweeter-than-raw-sugar way to say it. And with today’s huge economic and technological changes, it ain’t gettin’ any easier.

The ruby slipper advice that once took your manuscripts from the slush pile to Emerald City has been re-shoed. Editors have been there, done that and are looking elsewhere for the ‘Yes…I want that one’. It’s a new publishing world, and if you want to make it, you can’t be anything less than brave and fierce in your determination. Not only do your muses need to be dancing like nobody’s watching. They’d better be dancing their asses off for the long-haul.

But how can our muses keep bootscootin’ when publishers continuously change the beat of what they want and don’t want? When no one else is still gutting it out with you on the dance floor? When the music we like isn’t the crowd favorite or worse yet, it’s the genre publishers insist is dead?

For years, seven to be exact, I pondered these less-than-stellar writing-for-publication realities…just like you are now. Frankly, I still ponder them every day while getting my BITCHOK groove on (Butt In The Chair Hands On Keyboard) producing the next batch of pages I hope to sell to some editor somewhere over the publishing rainbow of rejection.

But not until January of 2009 while I was comfy on the couch in a Smoky Mountain chalet in Tennessee, with a spirited fire crackling and warming my fluffy-socked feet, did I discover Muse Oz.

On that frigid, snow-frosted mountain night, I was looking for a way to make my writing-for-publication career plan break out and stand out from the slush pile pack. I’d always been a big fan of NOT running with the wolves. Instead, I like to stay out of the pack and ahead of the leader dog just a smidgeon. So how could I get myself to be a Seth Godin Purple Cow on my Yellow Brick Road to bestsellerdom?

Godin, a Tufts and Stanford educated marketing guru, said in his New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller PURPLE COW that to transform your company (or yourself), you’ve got to be “remarkable”…as remarkable as a Purple Cow in a barnyard full of brown Hiefers.

Here’s what I knew for sure…Writers didn’t need to be reminded how tough writing-for-publication is. We all “get” that! Nothing “remarkable” about that. It just plain sucks. And on those rare occasions we forget, there are plenty of books out there emphasizing the realities of Publishing Hell and crashing creative spirits.

What writers need are fun and productive techniques to keep their muses cranking out pages ’til some editor somewhere likes what they put on the page and offers them the “big bucks”…or just bucks period.

To keep my muses cranking out manuscripts I rely in part on multiple award-winning poet, playwright, filmmaker and iconic creativity teacher Julia Cameron’s THE ARTIST’S WAY. Cameron taught me (and reminds me each time I return to her book – which is a bunch) that writers, like all artists, fly in the face of failure on just their “wings and a prayer”. We continue traveling writing-for-publication paths because those fascinating but at times treacherous roads feed our souls, awaken our spirits and boost our zest for life.

Beyond Julia Cameron’s guidance, I rely on my own unique brand of psychobabble bullshit cultivated by my studies at Purdue University. I graduated magna cum laude with a BA in Political Science and Psychology. Basically, I’m qualified to lie then make reasonable excuses for and an analysis of the world’s beyond crazy antics. Seriously though, I love analyzing what makes leaders and the groups they lead tick. In addition, I have a knack for public speaking and teaching. I simply love to share and debate ideas.

So back to my Smoky Mountain chalet but add a gin and tonic with lime to the fire-warmed, toasty scene I previously set. I was taking a class that night – add perpetual student to my resume – by award-winning writer and instructor extraordinaire Randy Ingermanson, aka The Snowflake Guy, on how to write what he calls a “SuperArticle” or “Pillar Article” to capture people’s attention on a world-wide stage. Randy pushed me to think about what it was I knew and could teach writers in a unique way that would also introduce D. D. Scott to the world in a big, splashy, one-of-a-kind blitz. What could I write to make the buzz (at the water-coolers near the publishers’ slush piles) about me and my writing?

Finally…I had it!

Thanks to Seth Godin, Julia Cameron, The Snowflake Guy, a fabulous fireplace in a mountain chalet and my share of gin, I discovered a way to be a purple cow on my way to Publishing Oz. And boy would my parents be thrilled I was actually going to use my college degree! I reached for my legal pad and pencil – how I start most all of my writing projects – and MUSE THERAPY FOR WRITERS: UNLEASHING YOUR INNER SYBIL was born.

MUSE THERAPY utilizes fun and fabulous tools to inject life into writers’ tired and/or stressed out muses. By showing you how to analyze your muses’ funks, rein in your creative divas and ultimately up your page counts, I’ve created a writer’s go-to-manual for “muse disorders”. I’ll help you dig deep then deeper still into your writer psyche.

Once I show you how to recognize, acknowledge and accept your muses’ afflictions, I’ll teach you tricks, tips and “trips” to treat the word witches of our writing world.

My techniques are built upon poking good-natured fun at just how closely our life as writers parallels that of the best mental health maladies.

By showing you how to keep your BITCHOK groove on, I’ll keep you laughing out loud and producing a plethora of pages. Using creative exercises such as Muse Therapy “trips”, collaging as a WIP of your WIP, “Rorschach-inspired” Feng Shui, Bi-Polar and Neurotic Writing, and stimulants like bitchy signs when coffee, chocolate and martinis aren’t enough, I’ll empower you to regain sovereignty over your creative dynasties.

You may know you need MUSE THERAPY. You may not. Depends on whether or not you’re in denial. Although you DID pick-up this book which could be a significant clue, let me convince you beyond reasonable sanity that you damn well need to continue reading.

When any of the below sound even remotely familiar, you need MUSE THERAPY:

1. Your muses aren’t ticking. They’re ticked off.

2. Your muses are in a funk saying “up yours” instead of upping your page counts.

3. Even great sex or a new pair of shoes can’t rein in your creative divas.

4. The following sessions sound appealing:

** Unleashing Your Inner Sybil

** Writing Bi-Polar: I Suck vs. I’m a Genius

** What Do You Mean I’m Neurotic? No, I’m Not. Well, Not Exactly. But Okay… There Are Times When. Like You Need To Know That. Anyway, I Was Thinking, My Jeep Is Red

** Rorschach For Writers: I See Dead Lines

** Stimulants: When Coffee, Chocolate, and Martinis Aren’t Enough

** Goin’ Jungian

** Muses and Misplaced Aggression – Kick Your Own Ass Not Somebody Else’s

** Word Witch Paranoia

** Rockin’ It With Anal Retention

5. Your word witches are on their way to publishing Oz but the Yellow Brick Road you’re bootscootin’ on…well…the damn thing never ends!

6. Everyone says your writing is a waste of time, a “hobby” that will never “pay-off”.

7. You feel the urge to tell everyone in reason six to (I’m thinking of a phrase that starts with a 4-letter-word and ends with a ‘you’, ‘off’ or ‘me’).

Here’s the secret MUSE THERAPY reveals…upping page counts isn’t done by hurling nasty insults at your muses. Oh no. When writing-for-publication, you must wine and dine those divas. Whether it’s with coffee, chocolate, fabulous finds in some chic boutique, or with what I call Muse Therapy Trips, it’s all about pampering those chicks and chucks ’til you get out of them exactly what you want…and then some.

To do this, you must discover why, when, where and how your muses produce fabulous bursts of ideas on your screen and manuscript pages. With MUSE THERAPY, you’ll have a terrific time conquering your creative divas and taking back the crown of your personal Muse-ville kingdoms.

And you’re not alone in your journey. My MUSE THERAPY tips and tricks continue to be apropos no matter where a writer is in his/her career. By sharing fantastic and at times roll on the floor, laugh out loud anecdotes I gathered – either interviewing or attending workshops given by the romance genre’s hottest stars – I’ll prove this assertion. You’ll hear from:

Allison Brennan

Jennifer Crusie

Cynthia Eden

Janet Evanovich

Jennifer Greene

Nancy Haddock

Gemma Halliday

Linda Howard

Eloisa James

Marcia James

Jayne Ann Krentz

Debbie Macomber

Nora Roberts

Karen Rose

Tawny Weber

You’ll appreciate and relate to the at times hilarious at times appalling and embarrassing flops and miss-steps they endured on their way to bestseller superstardom.

Believe you me, I was shocked to garner attention from such writing greats!

I conceived MUSE THERAPY: UNLEASHING YOUR INNER SYBIL as an online class that I’d be lucky to attract interest in since, at that time, I was still unpublished. But I debuted the idea at RWA’s National Conference in Washington D.C. in July 2009 to gigantic kudos then booked seventeen online classes and live workshops within the next sixty days (including being asked to provide “therapy” for the 2010 RT Convention in Columbus Ohio). Muses were evidently hurting all over the globe, and I’d realized the awesome reach of my approach. I’d created a huge hit for writers to heal their partners on the page!

And wow was I completely humbled when class participants continued asking me to write a companion book. Even though I had no clue what the Hell I was doing (just ask my agent), I soon set out on that non-fiction Yellow Brick Road with gusto. Like I’ll show you to do, I reined in my creative divas. You’re reading the results.

So let’s get started…the next book you read could be yours!

Grab a comfy couch or your favorite chair and put up your feet. It’s time to give your muses a big-time boost of productive power. Note: I’m serious about putting up your feet. Get comfortable. Whatever form that takes for you.

Besides a comfy couch or chair, you’ll need the following tools on your MUSE THERAPY journey:

A Journal or Notebook – one that really makes your muses wake-up and take notice. Something so in line with their tastes that they’re dying to crack open the cover and get to work. For example, I love anything hot pink and chocolate brown in color, and the more sparkles on it the better. So I snatch up those puppies wherever and whenever I find ’em. And don’t forget the equally fabulous pen or pencil your muses also can’t resist. Oh, and if you’re a techno person, using your PC, laptop or notebook, or smart phone is perfectly fine too. MUSE THERAPY is all about whatever works for you and your muses. Who cares what anyone else thinks of your methods and tools?

A Reward Box to fill with slips of paper containing treats for yourself as rewards for reining in your creative divas and upping your page counts. For example, I might jot down that I’d like a mani or pedi or mani/pedi combo – depending on my budget. Or how about an evening at the movie theatre instead of at home with my DVR? And I’d love to have another massage. So I write down all these treats and toss them into my Reward Box. Every so often, after I’ve met another production goal, I pick a slip from the box and treat myself and my muses to something I know ahead of time I’ll beyond love. And as in the above MUSE THERAPY tool, of course it’s okay to put all your rewards on some techno-terrific spreadsheet too!

To pamper your muses, you must first pamper yourself. In MUSE THERAPY, it’s all about you, Baby! Give yourself permission to be queen of your creative domain. Your muses will be glad you did and so will you.

Just don’t fool yourself into thinking once you’re done with this book, you’re good to go. Writers are WIPs just like their WIPs. Our

muses can always use a tune-up. And MUSE THERAPY FOR WRITERS: UNLEASHING YOUR INNER SYBIL is the right mechanic as verified by the following bestselling authors:

“Had a blast doing this. Love your idea, and hope you have a terrific time with it!” – Jennifer Greene aka Alison Hart

“Sounds like fun, and I’m sure will help people.” – Eloisa James

“Love your subtitles :)” – Allison Brennan

“All the best! I have to find a time…I’ll be home long enough to take the whole course!” – Nancy Haddock

“I really REALLY appreciate your asking for my input. I’m so excited… and know it’s going to be amazing. I’ll send people your way!!” – Tawny Weber

“Thanks so much for asking me to participate! This was fun. :)” – Cynthia Eden

“Thanks so much for including me in your workshop quotes! I really like your “voice” and humor. Let me know if there is anything else I can do.” – Marcia James

So get back on that couch of yours and put up your feet. You’re ready to embark on your first of many MUSE THERAPY sessions. Take note of the creative exercises I teach that really make your muses dance like nobody’s watching. You’ll return to these fun and fabulous tools whenever your creative divas need another kick in the pants.

Most writing books harp on and on and on about the beyond bleak chance you will ever see your book on a shelf or e-reader screen. Instead of dampening your creative zest, yet again, with additional cold shots of discouragement, we’re going to focus on reigniting the fiction and/or non-fiction flames kindling your muses. Using unique exercises and tools, we’ll warm up your muses and analyze their funks then rein in those fickle divas and up your page counts.

Playing on the “crazy trip” writing-for-publication is (even on a good day), we’ll assess your writer’s journey in a parody-like roast as if you are the next great mental health case study.

We’ll study and continuously build-on laugh out loud visuals including photos, art work reproductions, bitchy signs, comics and cartoons. Using these outrageous images, I’ll help you stimulate and reinvigorate your cranky, stressed-out muses.

Focusing on laughter as the best and most successful therapy, MUSE THERAPY shows you and your muses it’s okay to be “crazy” as long as your “crazy” works for you by upping your page counts and taking back the throne of your creative empires.

Welcome to “therapy”…MUSE THERAPY that is.

CHAPTER ONE

NAME THAT MUSE

You’re still reading. Bravo! I take it you’ve decided you need a writer’s go-to-gal for muse “disorders”. You’ve committed yourself to staying on the “crazy” writer’s journey to publication. For that, you should probably be committed.

Instead, pat yourself on the back. Go ahead. Give yourself a hearty tap. Few people are waiting in line to do it for you, right? So have at it! Congratulate yourself for being at the top of your creative game. You’re not in denial. And shame isn’t blocking your momentum ’cause you’re still “in therapy”. You must be in the writing business for fun, fortune and fame.

What? That’s not it? Okay. At least that last ideal looks fabulous on paper. You gotta see it to believe it. Right?

So bad jokes aside, let’s get started.

I’m going to remind you again, like I will throughout the book, that you’re not alone in your take-back-the-power struggles. For example, New York Times bestselling author of historical romances and Fordham University Shakespeare professor Eloisa James told me “My muse doesn’t fizzle because I can’t allow her to…I keep my imagination alive…”

Yes. Even New York Times Bestsellers have to work at keeping their muses on the ball. But not just the top of the chart authors have to pamper their muses. Here’s what a couple of my Muse Therapy Online Class participants shared with me about their on-going struggles with their creative divas:

“I’m still trying to get my muse back here. She sent me a postcard from some beach in Tahiti saying that I was the one who needed therapy and not to bother her while she is sunbathing, swimming and dancing with (insert names of hot cabana boys)…Oh and the chocolates I sent her were good but she wants dark chocolate next time and more rum. Grrr.”

“A few weeks ago, I had a big push and submitted a bunch of stuff and now I’m waiting to hear back. And, I guess my muses feel like they needed a vaca(tion). Haven’t heard a peep from them. Guess I’ll have to call them out…”

When you’re fin

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