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Thursday, August 31, 2017

BOOK LAUNCH: TWO DIRTY FOR DC by J. Russ Briley

J. Russ Briley infuses his thriller stories with readers' worst fears. His newest raises the specter of a dirty bomb in the heart of our nation. 

Interested? Me too!

Read on!


Two Dirty For D.C.



Five Soviet grain irradiators filled with Cesium 137 have been smuggled out of Kazakhstan. A CIA agent finds them on a Venezuelan freighter but is discovered before he can report their destination. A Russian mastermind has infiltrated factions of the US government and is plotting to smuggle the irradiators into the country in a way no one expects. His dirty bombs will put countless Americans at risk for radiation poisoning, and slow, painful deaths. Robert Carlton, the US Deputy Attorney General, and Lt. Col. Grady Barlow realize, too late, that their actions have helped the Russian and his wealthy investors. Time is running out. They must risk everything to stop the Russian from detonating his bombs. 





One Man Two Votes




Swept into the exploding, sleazy side of Washington politics, Robert Carlton has become a target. There is no option to walk away. Every agency has been infiltrated. He must find the killers behind this conspiracy, or watch his friends become its victims. Weaving past corrupt politicians, ruthless NSA operatives, and destruction of the nation’s democratic system, Robert’s family, career, and friends land in the crossfire.







J Russ Briley
Author of One Man Two Votes and Two Dirty For D.C.
Get them on Amazon: http://bit.ly/BrileyonAmazon



BIO:

J. Russ Briley combines a military background with thirty years in high tech to produce his real world characters and thrillers. From micro-controllers to industrial automation and IOT (the internet of things), J. Russ’s familiarity with technology covers a wide variety of critical infrastructure from missile guidance to water treatment plants, oil refineries, avionics, ship controls, digital communications, and security systems. Utilizing his MBA and Computer Science background in both hardware and software engineering, J. Russ has had direct working access to multiple Fortune 100 and 500 company executives and designers worldwide, including those from GE, Intel, GM, Martin Marietta, BP Oil, Texas Instruments, and Motorola. J. Russ was a member of the Air Force Academy class of ’79, and the son of a career Air Force Officer. He lived in Guam and India, visiting many foreign countries throughout his life. He received diplomatic corps training from the US government and was trained in photoreconnaissance. J. Russ currently resides in the rural Shenandoah Valley. You can hear more on J. Russ' website at www.jrussbriley.com.


Saturday, August 26, 2017

EVENT: SOUTH SHORE IRISH FESTIVAL


South Shore Irish Festival
Place: MARSHFIELD FAIRGROUNDS
Saturday, September 9 to Sunday, September 10
Time: All day, into evening!
Drinking Guinness, meeting readers, and signing books? Yes! I'm looking forward to sharing some craic and listening to music and lore. I'll be joined by fellow Sisters in Crime authors Marion Stanley and Kathryn Guare. Both authors write books woven with Irish culture and mystery, and I'll be signing copies of my newest book, THE WAKE. Find the Author's Tent and sit and chat for a bit. We will have author chats on the schedule below:



Fifteen Minutes: The “Story Behind the Story” Author Talks

Saturday
  • 2:00 - Connie Johnson Hambley, “The Troubles”
  • 3:00 – Marian Stanley, “The Immaculate”
  • 4:00 – Kathryn Guare, “Deceptive Cadence”

Sunday

  • 12:00 - Kathryn Guare
  • 1:00 – Marian Stanley
  • 2:00 – Connie Johnson Hambley


You can find a full schedule of events and acts here.
Join us!

Tuesday, August 22, 2017

BOOK LAUNCH: SECRET NEED by Satin Russell

One of the benefits of belonging to several writers' groups is that I meet a lot of talented authors. Most of our conversations surround the craft of writing or the trials and tribulations of finding readers. All the conversations boil down into one day--one glorious day!--where we can see our books take their first steps in the world!

So, drumroll! Friend and author Satin Russell's second romantic suspense book is out!! Do you like your women sexy and strong and your men sexier and stronger? How about a murder and a hot relationship thrown into the mix? Well, then! You have to read Satin's books!


SECRET NEED by Satin Russell

Liz may be forced to entrust her life to Alex, but can she trust him with her heart?

Liz Harper is a woman in control of her life. As the owner and mechanic of the best garage

in town, she is strong, confident, and in demand. It’s a far cry from her high school days spent as the social outcast. Then she runs into the boy who harassed her as a kid, only now he’s the good-looking man who is showing interest in her. Despite the attraction, she’s determined to keep her distance.

When Alex Weston returns to Bath, Maine to care for his ailing father, the place feels exactly the same. Everything except the awkward girl he used to tease. Liz Harper is all grown up and her transformation is the most intriguing thing about this place. If only he could convince her to give him the time of day.

Then fate throws them together and they discover big secrets lurk in the shadows of this small town. Caught up in a world of drugs and murder and accused of crimes they did not commit, they’re now on the run. They must learn to rely on each other if they’re going to survive.

---------------------------------------



Author BIO:

Satin Russell, author



Satin Russell was a financial advisor for many years up until she decided to pursue her dream of becoming a writer back in April 2013.

It took her a year of saving and planning before she was able to commit to her goal full-time.  Her debut novel, Secret Hunger, was published in April of 2015.

Satin lives in Massachusetts and is married to the love of her life, a man who literally flew halfway around the world for her. Other than writing, she loves reading, supporting fellow authors (especially self-published ones,) traveling, and photography. She’s also partial to a good whiskey every now and then.

Friday, August 18, 2017

BOOK LAUNCH: DEATH WARMED OVER by Kate Flora

Once again, you're catching me doing my favorite thing: Announcing a new book by a terrific author!

I met Kate Flora at a Sisters in Crime event and became an instant fan of her as a person. She's a tell-it-like-it-is woman with a huge heart and generous soul. And then to read her books? Wow! Each one is amazing. Whether you're a true crime lover or a mystery seeker, readers are richly rewarded with attention to detail and an unfolding tale that grips from the first words on. 

Read Kate's newest book, Death Warmed Over. Don't worry about getting hooked on her as an author. She has over sixteen titles published and each one is a gem. 


Death Warmed Over:

Thea Kozak is longing for a simpler life. She loves being the trouble-shooter for independent schools, the Jane Wayne they call in when campus crisis strikes, but what she really wants is a home, and more time for her marriage, and for fun. Her dreams of a perfect home are shattered when she finds her realtor, Ginger Stevens, tied to a chair in the living room of her dream home, surrounded by glowing space heaters. Ginger utters five indistinct words before she dies. The house is tainted, and Thea has moved on to managing a drug crisis on the campus of a Connecticut boarding school, when Maine state police drag her into their investigation of Ginger’s death. It seems that Ginger Stevens is the name of a child who died in New Hampshire many years ago. The police have no idea who their victim really is. Her boyfriend has disappeared. Her colleagues know little about her, and her apartment is so sanitized there are few clues.

As she drives through March slush on New England roads, trouble-shooting for her clients, Thea is also searching her memory for small details Ginger might have revealed that could be clues to her identity. A photograph of a former student at a client school may be a clue. So may be that menacing visit from the former boyfriend who claims that Ginger sent Thea a package. As she makes her way through board rooms and alternately coddles and strong-arms wayward headmasters, Thea’s own life may be in danger. But from whom? Strangers in a mysterious truck? Or from her client’s own faculty?

Determined to get justice for Ginger, Thea plays detective until she finally puts the clues together that let her understand the meaning of Ginger’s five final words.

Early reviews are in and are terrific!

“If you like your heroines smart, brave, tough, and exuberantly aware of the possibilities of the human heart, look no further than Thea Kozak.” S.J. Rozan

“Kate Flora does what all the great writers do: she takes you inside unfamiliar territory and makes you feel right at home; you climb in and are along for the whole ride.” Michael Connelly

“I’ll follow Thea Kozak anywhere. She is simply one of the most refreshing and original heroines in mystery fiction today. And Kate Flora is the rare, graceful writer who pays close attention to how long it takes the body and the heart to heal.” Laura Lippman


BIO:
Kate Flora grew up on a chicken farm in Maine where the Friday afternoon trip to the library was the high point of her week. She dreamed of being able to create the kind of compelling, enchanting worlds of the books she disappeared into every week, but growing up in the era when “help wanted” ads were still sex-segregated, she felt her calling was to go to law school and get the job they told her she couldn’t have.
After law school, Kate worked in the Maine attorney general’s office, protecting battered kids, chasing deadbeat dads, and representing the Human Rights Commission. Those years taught her all a crime writer needs to know about the human propensity to commit horrible acts. After some years in private practice, she decided to give writing a serious try when she quit the law to stay at home for a few years with her young sons. That ‘serious try’ led to ten tenacious and hellacious years in the unpublished writer’s corner, followed, finally, by the sale of her Thea Kozak series.
Kate’s books include nine Thea Kozak mysteries, four gritty Joe Burgess police procedurals, a suspense thriller (written under the name Katharine Clark), and two true crime books, Death Dealer and Finding Amy (co-written with Joseph Loughlin, a Portland, Maine Deputy Police Chief). Finding Amy was a 2007 Edgar nominee as well as a Maine Literary Award finalist, and has been optioned for a movie. Kate’s award-winning short stories have been widely anthologized and Redemption, her third Joe Burgess mystery, won the 2013 Maine Literary Award for Crime Fiction.
She is a founding member of the New England Crime Bake, the region’s annual mystery conference, and the Maine Crime Wave. With two other crime writers, she started Level Best Books, where she worked as an editor and publisher for seven years. She served a term as international president of Sisters in Crime, an organization founded to promote awareness of women writers’ contributions to the mystery field. Currently, she teaches writing and does manuscript critiques for Grub Street in Boston.

Where to buy? Click through here!

Friday, August 11, 2017

BOOK REVIEW: Heron Island by R.A. Harold

HERON ISLAND by R.A. Harold
Heron Island by R.A. Harold is a meticulously researched and lushly written turn-of-the-century murder mystery set on an island in Vermont.

The back cover description sums up the book best: "Widowed Rough Rider Dade Wyatt longs to cast off his shadowed past and retreat to a quiet life as a security operative for paper tycoon Warren Dodge. But when plans to host Wyatt’s old commander Teddy Roosevelt on Dodge's idyllic Vermont island are imperiled by a guest’s death, Wyatt descends into a maelstrom of poverty, anarchy and class war to safeguard the President and catch a killer."


Real life historical figures like Teddy Roosevelt, Vermont Lieutenant Governor Nelson Fisk and William Seward Webb populate a cast of richly drawn characters. Fictional Wyatt is helped by a Creole manservant as Wyatt draws upon his considerable deduction skills to solve a murder. 

Harold achieves what few authors can. She brings to life the history and social tensions of a period of time, then weaves motive and opportunity around the norms of that day. Her settings are detailed, characters fittingly drawn, and story moves at a pace indicative of high-society--carefully, with measured steps.

Summer is the perfect time to transport yourself to another era by becoming engrossed in this book. You will come away thoroughly entertained and have a greater understanding of American history

BIO:
Robbie Harold, Author
Roberta (Robbie) Harold is a novelist, poet and non-fiction writer from Montpelier, Vermont. As R.A. Harold, she is the author of two historical mysteries, Heron Island, set in Vermont, and its sequel, Murdered Sleep, set in Washington, DC. Murdered Sleep won the 2015 Genre Fiction award from the Independent Publishers of New England (IPNE). Her work has been published in Vermont Life, Hunger Mountain, Synezoma, and South Carolina Review. A 2001 graduate of Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf School of English, she won its Robert Haiduke Poetry Prize in 1999. She is a frequent contributor of articles and reviews to the Montpelier Bridge and is active in community theater. She is currently at work on two new novels, neither of them mysteries (except, at this point, to herself).

Tuesday, August 8, 2017

BOOK LAUNCH: BENEATH THE DEPTHS by Bruce Robert Coffin

Yippee!!! One of my favorite things in life is to announce a new book written by one of my writer pals. 

Today's launch is Bruce Robert Coffin's latest book, Beneath the Depths. I met Bruce at Crime Bake, a writer's conference here in Massachusetts, and became an instant fan. Do you want realistic Maine settings and a detective who really knows his stuff? Do yourself a favor and read this book! (And while you're at it, pick up his first novel, Among the Shadows. You'll be glad you did!)


~

In this latest gripping mystery from bestselling author Bruce Robert Coffin,
Detective Sergeant John Byron is back--and ready to prove that no one on his beat is above the law.

When the body of prominent Portland attorney Paul Ramsey turns up in the bottom of Casco Bay, following his loss of a multimillion dollar civil trial, Byron knows it's no accidental drowning. Golden boy Ramsey had a dark side--and Byron believes the key to solving his murder lies in uncovering those secrets someone wanted buried along with him.

With the brilliant Detective Diane Joyner by his side, Byron takes on Ramsey's former employer, the powerhouse law firm of Newman, Branch & DeWitt. But delving further into the troubled waters of Ramsey's past only serves to lengthen the list of suspects--unleashing a perfect storm of corruption, betrayal, and murder that only Byron can stop. If he's not too late.


*****


Bruce Robert Coffin is a former detective sergeant with more than twenty-seven years in law enforcement. At the time of his retirement, from the Portland, Maine police department, he supervised all homicide and violent crime investigations for Maine’s largest city. Following the terror attacks of September 11th, Bruce spent four years working counter-terrorism with the FBI, earning the Director’s Award, the highest honor a non-agent can receive.

He is the bestselling author of Among the Shadows, the debut novel in the Detective Byron Mystery Series. The second novel in this series, Beneath the Depths, will be released on August 8, 2017.

His short fiction appears in several anthologies, including 2016 Best American Mystery Stories.

Bruce is a member of the Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, and the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance. He lives and writes in Maine.