Showing posts with label self published. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self published. Show all posts
Friday, February 08, 2019
Wednesday, August 22, 2018
Tuesday, October 07, 2014
Sunday, June 08, 2014
Sample Sunday: Excerpt from "The Walk" in Mind Slices: A Collection of New and Previously Published Stories
This week I thought I would share with you the opening to my
short story “The Walk.” A summer setting for this mystery seems appropriate the
second Sunday in June….
THE WALK
“Tower Four,
radio check.”
The scratchy
voice was barely indiscernible from the background noise. The old radios were
damn near worthless. State budget cuts meant that replacement radios weren’t
coming anytime soon.
“Tower Four
Operational.”
He had to say it
again before dispatch was able to break through the static long enough to for
him to hear, “Acknowledged. Stay cool.”
The mandatory
hourly check in completed, the solitary man on the watchtower wiped his brow
and put his tan ball cap back on his head. Two hours down and probably at least
two more before he had his chance. He was new to the prison located deep in
southwest Texas. Being the new man had drawn him the assignment in the
sweltering tower that had no working air-conditioning. With no working AC, it
was a little bit cooler outside on the catwalk than inside the tower. Unlike
the other guards, he could not hide inside behind the glass. That suited his
purposes perfectly, so he pretended to grumble for the benefit of the other
guards while relishing the opportunity.
Mom always said
every Sunday on the way to church, "There's no rest for the wicked, not
even on Sunday," and it seemed like divine providence that he was assigned
that tower. The old louvered windows were open as wide as they would go.
Prayers for a breeze hadn’t worked; the tower was broiling. The sweat frequently rolled down into his
eyes despite his cap and he worried that a drop would slip into his eye at
precisely the wrong time.
He stepped out
the door onto the old metal catwalk, as he had several times each hour, and
glanced quickly at the nearest tower. The guard there ignored him like he had
all morning, which also suited his plan perfectly. The novelty of watching the
new guy suffer had worn off quicker than he had thought possible. He didn't
know him or any of the other guards on the towers around him, and didn't expect
to live long enough to know them. While he cradled his rifle and kept a finger
lightly on the trigger, his eyes scanned all around the flat Texas desert for
any signs of life. Far to the north somewhere sat Midland, lost in the heat
haze. All he saw were heat mirages and the occasional buzzard riding the
thermals under the blazing June sun.
His radio
squawked and he glanced at his watch. After he gave approval, the small
procession began to cross the dusty inner courtyard below. The four guards surrounding the prisoner ……
If
you liked the above sample, there are 15 more short stories in Mind
Slices: A Collection of New and Previously Published Stories. The book
is a mix of fantasy, science fiction, and mystery with many stories containing
elements of more than one genre. $2.99 it is available online at:
Smashwords http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/243655
Barnes and Noble’s NOOK http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/mind-slices-kevin-tipple/1113576100?ean=2940044983076
If you have not yet read the book, I
hope you take a chance on it.
Sunday, June 01, 2014
Sample Sunday---Excerpt of "Burdens" in "Mind Slices: A Collection of New and Previously Published Stories"
Today I thought I would share a sample
from my short story titled Burdens.
It was originally conceived for an anthology that Texas author Milton Burton
was a part of several years ago. Ultimately,it didn’t make the cut. Then, all
too soon before I had another opportunity, Milton passed. I still miss him
tremendously and think about him often.
BURDENS
“Sheriff?”
The
radio constantly crackled with annoying background static but the voice of the
day dispatcher, Sue Ellen, broke through. Her being the sister of the mayor
should have meant a quick approval of my budgetary request for new radios, but
it hadn’t.
“Go
ahead, Sue Ellen.”
“Miss
Graves down at the high school just called in and told me to tell you it has
been exactly thirty-three minutes since she called the first time and she wants
to know when, exactly, you will be
there .”
Sheriff
Max Preston suppressed a curse and shook his head. Graves was a human
abomination, plain and simple, and would do the world a favor if she could find
an open pit to Hell and fall in. Every week she came up with another hoop for
him to jump through and there was nothing he could do to avoid the damn things.
Not that he could say any of that on the radio for everyone in the county to
hear on their scanners. Sue Ellen,
having all the brains and the only working moral compass in her family, waited
for him to respond.
“I
am headed there now, Dispatch.”
Sue
Ellen acknowledged and the radio went back to its usual static- filled self. Preston
drove down Main Street, passing through the stoplight at each end and then
headed out on the narrow two-lane road that went by the old Thompson place
south of town and the nearby church Thompson had built in an effort to save his
immortal soul. If half the legendary exploits were true, no church on God’s
green earth could have saved him.
About
five minutes later, Preston turned onto the small visitor parking lot at the
new high school. Old Dooley High, home of the Fighting Bobcats, where he had
toiled for four years in hot classrooms and on hotter athletic fields, was gone
with nothing on the land to mark its passing.
The new high school had the same name but none of the history, having
been built a mile away from the old school on the site where the prison was
supposed to have been built and by the same contractors using pretty much the
same plans. So it wasn’t surprising that the high school had become a three-
storied, hermetically sealed monstrosity that looked more like a prison
building than a school and had none of the charm or history of the old
building.
After
checking in again with dispatch, Preston touched the toe of a dusty brown boot
against the inside of the driver's door and pushed hard. With a squeal, the
recalcitrant door opened and allowed him to get out of the patrol car. Just
like new communications equipment, they needed new patrol cars, since one of
the three was almost always in the shop. That too was going to have to wait
until next year, if not longer. Pushing the door shut and trying to get his
poker face on, he started the long walk under the punishing Texas sun down the
blinding sidewalk to the building.
He
hated these calls that just wasted his time and the department’s meager
resources. The whole point in coming back home was to avoid the big city
nonsense. He wanted the freedom he’d had as a boy to breathe, to help those who
truly needed help, which was why he had become a cop in the first place, and to
get a part of him back that he had so carelessly thrown away years ago when he
left home without telling anyone. His
family was long gone, as was pretty much his town and everything he had grown
up with, and nothing was like he remembered. Even the old Miller General Store
where he used to buy comics and, as he got older, paperbacks with lurid covers
that hinted at forbidden delights within was gone. Times had changed, and certainly
not for the better, he thought as he pressed the door buzzer and waited for
somebody to let him in.
Classes
had ended at four and forty-five minutes later there wasn't a student in sight.
No kids loitered around the building making plans, illicit or otherwise, for
before and after the football game tonight.
Freed from their daily prison, the kids had fled to parts unknown, and
he couldn’t blame them since he would have run away as fast as he could every
day, too.
The
lock finally popped in release and Sheriff Preston walked inside. Just like it had last month during the fake
bomb threat, the place smelled antiseptic and sterile. Back when he was in school, a school smelled like
a school. He wasn’t sure what this place smelled like, but it wasn’t a school.
If you liked the above sample, there are 15 more short stories in Mind Slices: A Collection of New and Previously Published Stories. The book is a mix of fantasy, science fiction, and mystery with many stories containing elements of more than one genre. $2.99 it is available online at:
Smashwords
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/243655
Barnes
and Noble’s NOOK http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/mind-slices-kevin-tipple/1113576100?ean=2940044983076
If
you have not yet read the book, I hope you take a chance on it.
Monday, April 28, 2014
Review: "Sentinel’s Choice" by Michael E. Witzgall
It is a cold February night in
Dallas, Texas and the body of Father Robert Lanton has been found on Jefferson Street
near I-35. Homicide Detective Renee LaFleet and his partner Danny “Tex” Beers
have been assigned to the case because of Assistant Police Chief Harold “Harry”
Wong. Wong is not only very good at his job; he is tough on the officers below
him. Chief of Police Chief William Smyth III wants the case solved fast and
though the body has just been found in the last hour he is already pushing Wong
hard to get results.
Despite the fact that both
Wong and Smyth are despised by most, LaFleet likes them and respects them. The Chief
of Police knew the victim, Father Robert Lanton, and believes a Catholic, even
one who has fallen away from the church a bit, should work the case. LaFleet
has done some volunteer work with two of the department chaplains. Taken all
together that means he and his partner, Tex, have the case whether they want it
or not. A complicated case that will eventually lead to a final showdown in an
ice covered Cotton Bowl.
Buried in this book self-published
by the author’s own police tactical company, Charlie-Mike Enterprises is an
interesting story. At nearly every point through Sentinel’s Choice the
story is bogged down with overly long and unrealistic conversations between
characters as well as long descriptions of situations. Frequently when a one or
two sentence paragraph or comment from a character would work far better, the author
choose to give a multi sentence paragraph result in a text that is overly wordy
from start to finish. While the large paper back is only 314 pages, the read
seems considerably longer as the author shows off his extensive military and
police experience as he slowly takes readers through various things point by laborious
point.
That being said, there is a
story here worth reading beyond the noted issues with the book. The many
characters are interesting and a fair number of them are fully developed. The
action scenes work well as do the various complicated angles to the case. The
moral quandary at the heart of the novel is a difficult one with no easy
answers.
A small sample of the next
one in the series titled Sentinel's Dilemma is included at
the end of the book.
Sentinel’s
Choice
Michael
E. Witzgall
Charlie-Mike
Enterprises, Inc.
December
2013
ISBN#
978-0615938905
314
Pages
Large
Paperback (e-book also available)
$13.95
Material supplied by Publicist PJ Nunn of
BreakThrough Promotions for my use in an objective review.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2014
Saturday, May 04, 2013
Review: "Red Mountain: A Detective DiPino Thriller" by David Thayer
The four member team sent to
Rhinebeck, New York, had one target and one mission objective. The Durres
Syndicate wants Walt Bergman dead and they want his records. As the commander
of the NYPD Intelligence Division he knows where the bodies are buried on and
off the force. He knows the identity of confidential informants, undercover
police officers, and more. The information he has is priceless. Among other
things he is involved in, Walt Burgman is trying to use one very bad man, Edon
Calcani, to get an even worse guy by the name of Josef Brint and permanently
stop a weapon selling operation. The plan is to take them both down and anyone
else around with no help from the FBI or The Joint Terrorism Task Force. That was his plan when the plumbers he called
about a leak showed up at his door.
It was late in the evening
when Detective Mickey Reidel got the call in Queens. Walt Bergman is dead,
things are hitting the proverbial fan at every level in the NYPD, and the brass
is very hopeful the death is a suicide. Mickey is being put on the case with
the expectation that he can be counted on to understand the situation and do
what he is told. They should have known better as Mickey, like everyone in this
book, has his own complicated agenda. The brass can wish all they want, but, it
takes Mickey a matter of minutes to clearly see that Bergman’s death was anything
but a suicide. After all, who lies down
on the floor and then shoots himself?
Shifting through the point
of view of Mickey, his former partner, DiPino, cartel big shots, and numerous
other characters, readers are taken through a wild ride that primarily covers
an intense 48 hours as scores and grudges start getting settled. Bodies fall, allegiances
shift, agendas collide, and Mickey and Dipino in mostly separate storylines struggle
to stay alive in the ensuring chaos and carnage.
Self-published by the author, the book is an enjoyable thriller despite the occasional typo. The cast of characters is large with the read shifting constantly through the various characters. Everyone in the book has an agenda with most driven by political expediency to save their own careers, jobs, lives, etc. Character depth is rather limited, as is the case with most thrillers, and tends to be of the stock character type. The exceptions are Mickey and to a lesser extent Dipinio who are fleshed out a bit more than the other characters with backstory, motivations, etc. Despite the tag line of A Detective DiPino Thriller the majority of the book is aimed squarely at Detective Mickey Reidel with DiPino playing a distant secondary role.
As one expects in a book
billed as a thriller, the focus is on the action and moving the multiple storylines
forward at an intense pace. Such is the case here in Red Mountain: A Detective DiPino
Thriller where the action is often fast and furious. It soon becomes clear
to readers that when the book slows down for personal reflection internally with
a character or a revealing moment between characters somebody is sure to
suddenly and unexpectedly die as the author’s solution to keep things going is
to always kill another character. Despite the occasional typo and the author's
tendency to occasion over write with lines such as “his dinner of scrambled
eggs and Irish whiskey orbited through his digestive tract like an obnoxious
tourist in midtown” the resulting read is a pleasant diversion.
Red Mountain: A Detective DiPino
Thriller
David Thayer
David Thayer Consulting
September 2012
ISBN# 978-1-4675-3589-2
E-Book (estimated print length 213 pages)
$5.99
Material was picked up during
the author’s advertised free read promotion for my use in regards to an objective
review.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2013
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Market News---A Murder is Announced!
The second issue of Bobbi Chukran's new mystery announcement blog is now up. Her focus is on small and self published at http://a-murder-is-announced.blogspot.com/
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Review: "NO REMORSE" by Ian Walkley
The plan was to let the two fathers make the ransom
payoff in the valley a few miles outside of Tijuana. Two hundred thousand
should buy their freedom as that is what the kidnappers wanted. At least the dads
know that backup is watching them and ready to help. All they have to do is
give the bad guys the money and get their daughters, Danni and Sophia.
The kidnappers take the money and then want to change
the deal. Instead of giving them Danni and Sophia they offer two other teen
girls. Understandably the dads want their own daughters back. Things go bad
quickly and Delta Force Operator Lee McCloud and his team watch the kidnappers
kill the two girls they had been holding in the van. The dead girls were somebody’s
children who were murdered solely because the dads wanted their own daughter
back. In the aftermath, while they do have a lead to the kidnapped girls,
McCloud and his team are in a world of trouble with the United States Military.
Facing court martial and prison time for himself and
others of his team, McCloud agrees to take a discharge from the Army after
pleading guilty to some lesser charges. He also agrees to go to work as a
contractor attached to some sort of vague shadowy unit pursing various
terrorists and their monies. While they have their own stated agenda, Lee “Mac”
McCloud has his own and that is saving his goddaughter, Sophia, and her friend,
Danni.
NO REMORSE
spans the globe in a complicated read that
touches on sex slavery, organ harvesting, Islamic terrorism, politics, and various
other themes. Numerous characters are involved as are exotic locals, powerful
money interests, and nightmarish weapons. The thriller style read shifts in
point of view of the various characters through the use of very short scenes, constant
action and a minimum of internal narration. Almost no one in this novel can be
trusted as their public actions hide a far different and often devious agenda.
The result is a book that is initially slow to get
started after the opening ransom scenes as all the players are brought out and
explained. Once the pieces are in place the story revs up to high gear by the
middle of the book. At some points the pace is so quick that the very short
scenes feel rushed as the author moves on too quickly to another point of view.
Season thriller readers will also notice that while the characters, often most
notably Mac & Tally ( a computer hacker), display classic clichéd elements
(both are haunted in their own way by tragedy in the past and are damaged loners
ultimately drawn together) the overall read works fairly well as the action
moves rapidly forward on many fronts. The final events seem a bit rushed and rather
over the top theatrical with a state of the art fortress that must be breached,
complex undersea tunnels complete with submersibles, etc. Despite the flaws NO REMORSE as a whole
works rather well and is definitely highly entertaining.
As of this date, NO REMORSE remains the sole
title published by Marq Books. The paperback
copy I received of NO REMORSE contains a twelve page preview of Bait
due out later this year from the author.
NO REMORSE
Ian
Walkley
Marq
Books
January
2012
ISBN
# 978-0-9808066-0-1
Paperback
(also available in e-book)
406
Pages (including preview)
$16.99
Material supplied by publicist PJ Nunn of
BreakThrough Promotions for my objective review.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2012
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