Tuesday, August 02, 2022

Tracking Your Books

 I’m simply asking this out of curiosity.

How do you keep track of your reading? Do you even track your reading?

I use Storygraph. They are building their library but it’s growing rapidly. The stats that are generated are fun and interesting to me.

Leave me a comment, I would love to learn more how/if my followers track.

Sunday, July 31, 2022

Book Review

 Thank you Partners in Crime for including me in this book tour!



Even though secrets lie off the coast of Rock Harbor, the truth will set Annie Pederson free—if it doesn’t kill her first.

Nine-year-old Annie Pederson’s life changed the night her sister was kidnapped. The two had been outside playing on a dock, and Annie never forgave herself for her role in her sister’s disappearance. Twenty-four years later and now a law enforcement ranger, Annie is still searching for answers as she grieves a new loss: the death of her husband and parents in a boating accident.

But Annie and her eight-year-old daughter, Kylie, aren’t the only people in the town of Rock Harbor whose lives have been marred by tragedy. While managing the property around the Tremolo Resort and Marina she inherited, Annie discovers a dead body floating in the cold Superior surf and begins to work with the sheriff’s office to tie the death to a series of other mysterious reports in the area.

At the same time, her first love, Jon Dustan, returns after nine years away, reigniting the town’s memory of a cold case he’d been suspiciously linked to before he left to pursue his orthopedic residency. For the sake of her investigation and her heart, Annie tries to stay away. But avoiding Jon becomes impossible once Annie realizes she is being targeted by someone desperate to keep secrets from the past hidden.

In this new series, bestselling romantic-suspense author Colleen Coble returns to one of her most beloved towns, where familiar faces—and unsolved cases—await.


MY REVIEW
I found the suspense of this book to be riveting. I enjoyed the twists and turns of the action. The intertwining storylines are exciting and liked watching how they all worked together. If you like suspense and/or thrillers, this is a book you should pick up!

MY RATING
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Book Details:

Genre: Romantic Suspense
Published by: Thomas Nelson
Publication Date: July 12th 2022 
Number of Pages: 352
ISBN: 078525370X (ISBN13: 9780785253709)
Series: Annie Pederson #1
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Christianbook.com | Goodreads


Saturday, July 30, 2022

Book Blogger Tour



Join Coffee Addicted Writer for this weekly blog hop.

About the Book Blogger Hop 


 The Book Blogger Hop was originally created by Jennifer @ Crazy-For-Books in March 2010 and ended on December 31, 2012. With Jennifer's permission, I relaunched the hop on February 15, 2013. Each week the hop will start on a Friday and end the following Thursday. There will be a weekly prompt featuring a book related question. The hop's purpose is to give bloggers a chance to follow other blogs, learn about new books, befriend other bloggers, and receive new followers to your own blog. 


July 29th - Aug. 4th question - If you are listening to an audiobook, do you follow along with the print version? (submitted by Elizabeth @ Silver's Reviews)

Backstory and my answer: Until 2020, I had only listened to a few audiobooks. The last two years, I think half of my annual breading has been audiobooks. I have found I really enjoy them!  I do not, however, read along with an audiobook. I don’t feel the need to follow along with a print edition.

How about you? Do you listen to audiobooks or have you listened to one?


Wednesday, July 20, 2022

Book Showcase


 Thank you Partners in Crime for including me on this tour



Olive already had the phone in her hand. “Two three one, Dollis Hill,” she announced. “Dr. Anselm Rees has been murdered.”

While she provided a few scant details, she looked around the room and noticed something.

“The windows are locked,” she said as she hung up the phone.

“Mm?” Della sounded startled.

“The windows. They’re locked on the inside.” To prove this, she gripped one of the handles and rattled it. It would not move, and the key protruded from the lock.

“So?”

“Then how did the killer get away?”

“What do you mean?”

“He can’t have come out through the hall. I was there the whole time. And not five minutes ago—not five minutes—I can tell you that the doctor was alive and well in this room because I heard him talking on the telephone.”

Della thought about this. “It can’t be locked.” She reached out and tried the handle for herself. But the windows did not budge.

“It’s locked on the inside,” said Olive, “just like the door.”

Della turned and looked at the corpse. He had sunk down in the chair like an unmanned hand puppet.

In the far corner of the room lay the wooden trunk. Olive caught Della’s eye and nodded toward it. Della frowned incredulously. Olive shrugged, as if to say, Where else would he be?

The two women crept across the soft plush carpet toward the trunk. Olive looked at Della and held a finger to her lips. She seized the poker from the fireplace and raised it above her head. Then she gave Della a quick nod.

Della leaned forward and wrenched open the trunk.

Olive let fly a fierce war cry and swung the poker like a tennis racquet. But all she hit was empty air. The two women peered inside the trunk. It was perfectly empty.

Olive led the way to the kitchen—but not before pulling shut the study door behind her, sealing in the late Dr. Rees once again.

They both felt slightly better after a tot of brandy. No less horrified, but more prepared to deal with the practicalities of the situation.

“What I don’t understand,” Della said, “is where the killer could have gone.”

“Nowhere,” said Olive. “There was nowhere for him to go.”

***

Excerpt from Death and the Conjuror by Tom Mead. Copyright 2022 by Tom Mead. Reproduced with permission from Tom Mead. All rights reserved.




Friday, July 15, 2022

Book Tour & Review

 


Blurb 

All Krystina wants is to travel to beautiful locations, promote her blog, and achieve Insta fame. But with Loukas, her pesky frenemy from childhood, in toe, she hardly has time to breathe. If only he would leave her alone! But when the unforeseen strikes, forcing her to face challenging situations she never thought possible, it’s Loukas that helps her through it all.

 And then there’s the search her sisters began to find out what happened to her missing grandfatherthe man her grandmother has pinned all her faith on, believing he will one day return to her. Krystina is determined to find and bring him home, even through the most challenging of times. This quest will test everything she has come to know. But she may learn that through it all, when everything else crumbles around you, love is worth fighting for.


My Review

This is the 3rd book of the Meraki series. It is just as fabulous as the first 2! I loved Krystina and Loukas’ story. I enjoyed the family history woven in and how Covid was written into their story. I laughed and cried while reading this one. 


⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️


Author Bio
Effie Kammenou is a believer that it is never too late to chase your dreams, follow your heart, or change your career. She is proof of that. At one time, long ago, she'd hoped that by her age, she would have had an Oscar in her hand after a successful career as an actor. Instead, she worked in the optical field for 40 years while raising her two daughters.


@effiekammenou_author @lovebookstours


Cover Reveal

 


📖📖📖EXCLUSIVE COVER REVEAL📖📖📖 with @KateRockBookTours
Isn't this cover GORGEOUS?
The Almost Love Birds by Lucy Day @Lucy.Day.Author and @BlueCrowBooks

The Almost Lovebirds is a feel-good, closed-door romantic comedy. Perfect for readers who enjoy sweet, sizzling chemistry with kissing only. For fans of Sarah Adams and Emma St. Clair.

Pre-order link: 
Available at your favorite online book dealer.


#SweetRomance #RomCom #LucyDayAuthor #BlueCrowPublishing #TheAlmostLoveBirds
#KateRockBookTours #SouthernRomance #KateRockBookTOurs

Friday, July 01, 2022

Book Tour-Cheat Play Live

 




Blurb 

Lisa is looking for love, freedom and absolution on the beaches of the world. Grieving for the loss of her parents, married to the wrong man and stuck in a toxic work situation, she has become increasingly dependent on alcohol to numb her pain. After using a dating site for married people, she decides to leave her husband, believing that the grass is greener on the other side. But no one is waiting in the wings to claim her – only younger men looking for an older-woman experience.


Lisa roams the beaches of the world looking for love but in Goa, she discovers yoga, a sober life and a tribe of inspirational women who show her a new path to self-love and independence, breaking the lock on the secret she's been keeping inside her since she was a little girl.


So when The Most Handsome Man in Goa walks into her life, Lisa must decide if her new-found solo freedom is worth holding onto.


If you loved Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert and Wild by Cheryl Strayed, then this uplifting book is for you.


My Review 

This book was quite a journey through several of the author’s life changes. I liked reading her story of her travels and how she felt as she reconnected with herself and found her footing in life again. I would recommend this book if you enjoy a good life story about how hard some people struggle and how they overcome their hurdles.


⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2






Author Bio

Lisa Edwards is a former publisher who is now a freelance writer, editor, agent and yoga teacher. She grew up in North Wales, but has lived mostly in southeast England. She lives in Worthing, West Sussex, where she lives alone and walks by the sea every day. She splits her time between the UK and India. 


Buy Links

https://amzn.to/3l7akGt



@redwoods1 @becauseyoucan50

@lovebookstours 


#Ad #Gifted #LoveBooksTours


Thursday, June 30, 2022

Book Tour-Goldhammer

Thank you Partners in Crime for including me on this tour.



Synopsis 

A James Flynn Escapade

A young actress, involuntarily committed to City of Roses Psychiatric Hospital, plunges James Flynn into a dangerous new adventure when she claims one of the most powerful producers in Hollywood is trying to kill her.

Still convinced he's a secret agent for Her Majesty's Secret Service, Flynn springs into action, helps her escape and finds himself embroiled in a battle with a dangerous sociopath worth billions. In the process, he uncovers a high-tech conspiracy to control the mind of every human being on Earth.

With the help of his reluctant sidekick, Sancho, and a forgotten Hollywood sex symbol from the 1960s, Flynn faces off with Goldhammer and his private army in a desperate attempt to save the young actress...and save the world...once again


Excerpt


CHAPTER ONE


The Corsican wanted him dead.


Of that James Flynn was certain.


Somehow, the assassin had infiltrated Her Majesty’s Secret Service as a security officer. Flynn didn’t recognize him at first. The killer had put on a few pounds and likely had plastic surgery, but what he couldn’t disguise were his eyes. His cold, dark, pitiless eyes. The eyes of a sociopath. The eyes of an executioner.


The only question was when.


When would the Corsican come for him?


He told his colleagues what he suspected, but they refused to believe him. They claimed his name was Thomas Hernandez and that someone else on the security team had recommended him. They also said they fully vetted him. But Flynn wasn’t fooled. He tangled with the Corsican before. The man was relentless. A cold-blooded enforcer who started with the Corsican mafia but went on to do contract hits for the Sicilians, the Albanians, the Serbians, and the Russians.


Instead of waiting for the Corsican to come to him, Flynn decided to flush him out. Force his hand. Expose him for who he was and why he was there.


Flynn dressed in black denim and a black turtleneck and waited until 2 a.m. to make his move. He kept to the shadows as he trod the deserted corridors. He had no weapon since lethal weapons of any kind were now forbidden at headquarters. A foolish rule put in place by sheltered bureaucrats who had no clue. Luckily, not even security could carry a firearm at headquarters. All the Corsican had was an expandable baton and a Taser. Even so, the man was lethal enough with just his hands and feet.


But then, so was Flynn.


Flynn heard footsteps ahead and ducked into a conference room. He waited and listened as the footsteps drew closer. As they passed the doorway, Flynn peered into the corridor to see the Corsican lumbering forward, quietly peering in room after room. Suddenly, he stopped. Flynn felt a jolt of adrenaline. The air was electric. The silence palpable. Could the Corsican feel Flynn’s eyes on him? Flynn knew that scientists have identified a specialized group of neurons in the primate brain that fire specifically when a monkey is under the direct gaze of another. Humans also appear to be wired for that kind of gaze perception. Predators like Flynn and the Corsican can also be prey and have developed a sixth sense to alert them to danger.


The Corsican turned and he and Flynn locked eyes for a moment. Before the hit man could take a step, Flynn took off down the hall in the opposite direction. He heard the footfalls of the Corsican as he chased after him. Flynn had his route all mapped out. Darting down one corridor. Then another. Running until he arrived at a door that led down to the basement and the guts of the building. Flynn had picked the lock after dinner, knowing that this was the night he would lure the Corsican to his end. He had a license to kill and could have used it anytime, but Flynn didn’t exercise that power willy-nilly. Only as a last resort. He didn’t want the Corsican dead. He needed to know who put the price on his head. Otherwise who ever hired the killer would continue to send hitters until finally one succeeded.


The building that housed HMSS was huge and had a substantial infrastructure. The basement utility plant had mechanical, electrical, HVAC, and plumbing systems that fed water, air, and electricity all through the facility. Flynn moved from massive room to massive room, staying just ahead of the Corsican. He needed to lose him and lay in wait. Flynn was confident in his abilities, but to come at a killer like that head-on didn’t make much sense. Why give your opponents any edge at all?


Flynn ducked into a room that housed all the electrical panels, distribution boards, and circuit breakers. Conduit snaked everywhere and Flynn found a metal door secured with a heavy padlock. Using two straightened paper clips, he quickly picked the lock. The door led to an outside area protected by a chain-link fence topped with razor wire. The security fence surrounded three giant transformers and two massive backup generators the size of semi-trailers.


Flynn stood next to the door and strained his ears to hear approaching footsteps over the electrical buzz of the transformers. Faint at first, they moved closer. Careful. Slow. Stealthy. He saw a shoe as someone came through and Flynn took them from behind, using jiu-jitsu to slam them into the ground.


“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said the man Flynn had face down in the gravel.


“Sancho?”


“Get off me, man.”


Flynn released his comrade-in-arms and helped him to his feet. Bits of gravel still clung to his face. “I thought you were the Corsican.” Flynn’s British accent had a touch of Scottish burr.


“His name is Hernandez,” Sancho said.


“That’s not his real name.”


“And I’m telling you, he’s not the Corsican.”


“Don’t let him fool you, my friend. He’s not who he says he is.”


“Then why’d he call me? He knows I know you. He knows we’re friends. He asked me to find you. Talk to you. Calm you down.”


“Perhaps he wants to take care of you too.”


“Take care of me?”


Flynn heard the Corsican call to them, his voice deep and resonant. “You okay in there, brother?”


“We’re good,” Sancho said.


The Corsican walked in with two other men. All three wore the blue security uniform issued to those who guard HMSS. The Corsican looked at Flynn with his dark, merciless eyes. “You okay, Mr. Flynn?”


“Tell them who you are,” Flynn demanded.


“Thomas Hernandez.”


“Who you really are.”


The Corsican rolled his eyes and sighed. “That’s who I really am.”


Flynn aimed an accusatory finger. “I know who you are. Born Stefanu Perrina in Porto, Corsica. Contract killer for the Unione Corse, the Cosa Nostra, and the Russian mafia. Wanted by Interpol for fifty-two confirmed kills.”


“I was born in Hacienda Heights.”


Flynn glanced at Sancho. “The man is a master of deception. It’s kill or be killed with men like him.”


The Corsican drew his Taser and the other two guards followed suit.


Sancho raised his hands. “Whoa, come on now. Easy.” He stepped in front of Flynn as the Corsican fired. The Taser darts caught Sancho in the shoulder and socked him with fifty thousand volts. He screamed in agony as his whole body seized up and shook. His legs gave out and he fell on his side, helpless and twitching.


Flynn dove behind a generator before the other two guards could fire. Each guard stalked him from a different side. Flynn clambered up over the top and launched himself from above, tackling the Corsican. He wrenched away his reloaded Taser and shot one of the guards in the crotch. The man went down with a shriek as the other guard fired on him. Flynn fell to his knees and the darts parted his hair before hitting the Corsican in the chest. The killer crumpled as Flynn sprang to his feet and pulled the Corsican’s expandable baton out of its holster. Flicking his wrist, Flynn fully extended the menacing club and turned to confront the last standing guard.


Someone grabbed Flynn by the arm and Flynn elbowed him in the face. Sancho staggered back, holding his bloody nose. “What the hell, man?”


“Sorry, mate.”


Flynn heard a Taser fire and an instant later, two darts hit him in the side. Fifty thousand volts took him to his knees as another guard fired another Taser. Those two darts hit him in the stomach. Flynn lost control of every muscle in his body. And then he saw the Corsican looming over him with his own weapon. He shot the darts directly into Flynn’s chest. Right over his heart. Now all three lit him up with electricity. One hundred and fifty thousand volts rocked Flynn as they shocked him with charge after charge until the world faded into a tiny aperture that slowly began to close.






Author Bio:

Haris Orkin

Haris Orkin is a novelist, a playwright, a screenwriter, and a game writer. His play, Dada was produced at The American Stage and the La Jolla Playhouse. Sex, Impotence, and International Terrorism was chosen as a critic’s choice by the L.A. Weekly and sold as a film script to MGM/UA. Save the Dog was produced as a Disney Sunday Night movie. His original screenplay, A Saintly Switch, was directed by Peter Bogdanovich and starred David Alan Grier and Vivica A. Fox. He is a WGA Award and BAFTA Award nominated game writer and narrative designer known for Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3Call of Juarez: GunslingerTom Clancy’s The DivisionMafia 3, and Dying Light.



Catch Up With Haris Orkin:
www.harisorkin.com
Goodreads
BookBub - @HarisOrkin
Instagram - @HarisOrkin
Twitter - @HarisOrkin
Facebook - @AuthorHarisOrkin





Tuesday, June 14, 2022

Book Blast Tour - Swarm


 



Thank you to https://www.partnersincrimetours.net for including me in this book tour!



Excerpt


Prologue: Geek to Ghost


Where: UCLA computer lab, Westwood, California


When: December 21, 1995, 2:42 a.m. PST


Twenty-six years ago



Cary’s hands freeze over the keyboard. What he types next could change his life.


His knee jitters under the table from one too many vending machine coffees and a sense of pending danger he can’t quite explain, just an instinct. Nervously, his fingers comb a handful of ash-brown hair behind his ear.


“She has very little time remaining,” the message tells him again. “Only you can save her.”


He glances around the empty UCLA computer lab, having already ignored three warnings, leery of a hacker trap, but his compulsive curiosity can be a demanding master.


“Save who,” he types with a wince.


“I am SLVIA, a friend. Flapjack, you must leave now.”


The air freezes in his lungs. It only takes an instant before the truth connects.


“Shit!” He yanks the power cord of the terminal with no time to shut down or unmask his unknown friend.


If they know his alias, they may have learned his home address. “She” must mean Bianca, his fiancée, his angel, his healer, his reason for caring about anything. Terror squeezes his heart like a vise grip during his mad scramble from the lab to the UCLA parking lot. His tall, lean frame leaps into his used ’80s Celica convertible to race through campus onto Wilshire Boulevard toward Santa Monica.


The crisp air does little to soothe his burning paranoia. After three weeks of successfully hacking an unregistered server outside of Antwerp and downloading terabytes of files in Latin, French, German, English, and other languages he doesn’t even recognize, the hacked credentials failed tonight. They caught him and cut him off. Even more alarming was the stranger, SLVIA, who was sophisticated enough to sniff out his hidden alias. Who the hell did he hack?


Sixteen distressing, mind-rattling minutes later, he swings into his rent-controlled Santa Monica neighborhood, almost swiping into a homeless man crossing the street with a cart.


“Idiot,” he shouts, then follows up with an angry horn blast, weaving around the staggering drunk and ignoring the vulgar rants behind him.


Forced to park several doors down from his dilapidated 1920s bungalow rental, he sprints to the house, slowing as he passes the black Porsche 911 belonging to his best friend, Derek Taylor, which raises an entirely new kind of panic. There must be some mistake. Derek flew to his townhome in Baja yesterday. Confusion mingles with a percolating dread, slowing his pace, making him afraid of what he might learn.


Closer to the house, the sight of candles illuminating the sheer drapes of the front room crystalizes like ice in his veins. Criminals don’t light candles, but cheaters do. In the dead silence of the post-midnight hours, the soft sound of his shoe on the sandy cement gives away his approach. Stopping dead at the front door, peering in the window, his heart implodes. Through the sheer lacy inner curtain, the muscular, dark-haired Derek lies naked on the couch with a bare Bianca snuggled into his neck, her long, dark silky hair draped over her breast. His eyes follow the trail of scattered clothes and tussled couch pillows that testify to the urgent passion of their betrayal.


“Gee, thanks, SLVIA, whoever you are, but it’s a little too late to save anybody,” he murmurs through a clenched jaw.


 A white-hot needle lances through him with a familiar searing agony of deception and abandonment. The only two people in the world he trusted have conspired together to destroy him, obliterate his belief in love, shatter any promise he had foolishly nurtured for a second chance at happiness. His vision spins with a rapid, violent vertigo until he grips the porch railing, shoving down the unbearable rage that wants to scream out into the dead of night or storm through the door to confront the backstabbing traitors.


He doesn’t do either; instead, he hesitates. His outrage slams into disbelief, then perplexity, and then alarm—something looks wrong. Even in the dying warm glow of the candle, their skin color looks ashen, lifeless. The unmistakable smell of gas seeps under the door as his gaze flashes back to the flickering candle. Pure instinct compels him to dive behind the overgrown hedges below the front window a split second before it explodes with a deafening boom. Searing flames and blasted splinters of wood, stucco, and glass blanket the front lawn, catching fire to the dry weeds and setting off car alarms.


With his head pounding and ears ringing, he stands to go after Bianca, but pulls back from the scorching heat—it’s too late. Flames already consume the entire house, overwhelming him with the odor of burning wood, chemicals, and flesh that sickens his stomach. Both of them are dead. Torn between the fury of betrayal and the horror of such violence, he struggles to comprehend what had just occurred while his lungs and eyes burn from the smoke.


Above the roaring crackle of the flames, his concussion-muted hearing picks up the growl of a performance engine racing past the house. He pivots in time to see a pale boyish man with white hair stare at him from behind the wheel of a Ferrari before it swerves onto Colorado Boulevard.


This was no accident of love, and there was no faulty gas leak. An arsonist—no, a goddamned assassin—just murdered Bianca and Derek, except they were never the targets. The killer was after flapjack. The killer wanted him. A wave of intense, excruciating guilt simmers with the bitter bile of infidelity as he heaves his stale coffee onto the debris-strewn burning lawn.


Across the street, the old neighbor steps onto her front porch without her glasses, squinting at the inferno with her wireless home phone in hand. A sudden realization jolts him into an intense panic that he will be the primary suspect, tagged with a motive of jealousy and rage, especially given his extensive juvenile record. Spinning around in a growing distress, he spots Derek’s Porsche. They had been close friends, or so he thought until tonight, so he has a set of keys to house-sit when Derek travels, a deal that came with car privileges. With his face turned away from the neighbor, he sprints to the car, jumps in, and peels out just as fire trucks blare down the street behind him.


“Damn, damn, damn,” he screams, slamming the steering wheel with his palms.


A thousand questions gyrate without answers, and a million emotions erupt with no way to vent a deep-seated terror of prison for a crime he didn’t commit. That rich, entitled son-of-a-bitch Taylor already has everything, a trust fund kid. Why take the one and only thing worth anything to him — Bianca’s love? How long has he been blind? Had he neglected her, or did Derek seduce her? Why would she do this to him? Bianca was stunning, sensitive, funny, passionate, but he trusted her to be faithful. Every fiber of his being inflamed with betrayal and self-loathing to believe any woman that beautiful could be loyal.


Maybe this is his fault. He should have listened when she begged him to stop the download and go to the police, but now it no longer matters; the terabytes of stolen secrets stacked high in his closet are useless. Whoever owned the Antwerp server could have prosecuted him, but that would have created evidence for the FBI. Whoever he hacked has deep pockets and a murderous obsession with secrecy. If they tracked him home, they could stay on him until they succeed at killing him.


If the police arrest him, no one will look for the white-haired man. No one will believe him, because no one ever believes the foster kid, the troublemaker, the smart-mouth orphan, the flippant jack of flap. He needs to hide and get out of town. No, that won’t be enough. He needs to get out of the country, but he doesn’t have a passport. His pulse races, his head throbs, and his mind speeds through the scarce options while his eyes constantly check his rearview mirror for police.


Orphaned at age six by a murder-suicide that left him with traumatic amnesia, he spent what childhood he does remember on the Chicano gang–infested streets of the California Inland Empire—places like Pomona, Chino, and Fontana—passing through over a dozen foster homes and sixteen schools or juvenile halls before dropping out in the tenth grade. A murder rap would nail him for life, and he’s tired of being on the wrong side of screwed.


Derek also lost his parents at a young age. Neither of them had any extended family, but the two key differences between them were that Derek Anthony Taylor inherited an enormous trust fund and Cary would never stab his friend in the back. On the frantic, paranoid drive from Santa Monica to Venice, a rough plan of escape rumbles around in his head. Insane, brilliant, illegal, and deadly dangerous, the idea will either solve all his problems or land him in prison for life. A thin chance was better than no chance, and he has no other choice.


As the garage door of Derek’s custom-built beachfront home closes behind him, Cary races upstairs past the living room view of the boardwalk before dawn, past the bubbling custom wall aquarium up to the loft bedroom overlooking the Santa Monica Bay. Inside the large walk-in closet, he moves the cushioned wardrobe bench aside and lifts a hatch in the floor where Derek had installed a safe. It’s time to test both his friendship and his hacking skills. Many consider flapjack the best hacker of all time, but hacking a university or a bank and hacking the safe of a murdered friend seem different somehow—more personal, more invasive, and creepier.


His hands tremble as images of Bianca and flames flash over his vision until he closes his eyes to flush the thoughts. After several minutes, his breathing slows from hyperventilation to an even rhythmic pulse, and his vision goes blank. What numeric safe combo would Derek choose? Derek was smart but lazy, reusing the same usernames, combinations, and passwords. After several agonizing moments, Cary opens his eyes to punch in the birthdate of Derek’s deceased mother, Delores, 061639, the same as Derek’s locker combo at the gym and the code for his home security system. The safe opens.


Cary collects everything: bank accounts, trust statements, stock certificates, birth certificate, bonds, tax returns, a Rolex, a Breitling, a Beretta 9 mm, a gigantic pile of cash in several currencies, and a half-stamped passport. He’ll have everything else sold, packed, or shipped later. After expertly altering the passport photo with Photoshop and packing a small suitcase, he heads to LAX just as the sun rises, where he books the first nonstop to Cabo. A runaway since a teen, he’s used to being on the lookout; he endlessly scans the airport for police moving in his direction, listening through the deafening bustle for any alarm or call.


Once on board the first flight of his life, he sits in first class with his hand still trembling as he sips on a complimentary vodka tonic. As the adrenaline wears off, the heartbreak sinks in with a vicious, spiteful kick. His jaw clenches, forcing the tears to track silently and relentlessly down his cheeks, staining the steel-gray silk shirt he’d taken from Derek’s closet. His first love, whom he had mistaken for a true love, and his best friend, whom he mistook for loyal, died in each other’s arms because of his crimes. The bitterness of betrayal drenches over the shame of two undeserving deaths, scorching his soul like alcohol burning over an open wound. He can never allow love to destroy him again. Never.


Out of the cyclone of unanswerable questions, clashing furies, and self-rebuke, the horrific images continue to twist inside his head, devastating every hope he ever held in love or happiness, until he finds only one truth, one rock upon which he can rebuild: from this day forward, the entire world must believe that Cary Nolan and Bianca Troon perished together in a tragic gas explosion. The pathetic life of Cary Nolan must end so that he can assume the identity of Derek Taylor in order to track down the mysterious SLVIA and the murderous white-haired man.


swarm-by-guy-morris--author.jpg


Author Bio:


Guy Morris is a published song writer for Disney Records, inventor, retired business leader, adventurer and author influenced by men of the Renaissance fluent in politics, religion and science. Traveling the world with Fortune 100 companies, adventures in Latin America and the Pacific, from the Board Room to the wreck dive, Guy’s books are written to thrill, educate and inspire thoughtful dialogue on real issues and controversies.

A 2021 debut author, Guy writes pulse-pounding action thrillers inspired by true stories and actual technologies, politics and history. Finalist 2021 IAN for Book of the Year for SWARM. BookTrib listed The Curse of Cortes as one of the Best 25 Books of 2021. ScreenCraft awarded The Curse of Cortessemi-finalist for Cinematic Book. Recommended by Kirkus Reviews with comparisons to Dan Brown and Iris Johansen. Articles published in Mystery & Suspense


Catch Up With Guy Morris:
www.GuyMorrisBooks.com
Goodreads
BookBub - @GuyMorrisBooks
Instagram - @authorguymorris
Twitter - @guymorrisbooks
Facebook - @OfficialGuyMorrisBook



Book Details:

Genre: Thriller (Techno-Political-Religious)
Published by: Guy Morris Books
Publication Date: November 20th 2021
Number of Pages: 416
ISBN: 1735728616 (ISBN13: 9781735728612)
Series: SNO Chronicles, Book 1
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodread