

Purchase Links:
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Purchase Links:
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STIFF LIZARD by LISA HANEBERG
Series: A Spy Shop Mystery
Publisher:
Written Pursuits Press
Pages: 364 pages
Pub Date: March 13th, 2021
Categories: Women Sleuths / Cozy Mystery / Private Investigator / Humor
Lisa Haneberg loves to explore Galveston Island’s gritty back streets, stellar seafood joints, magnificent natural areas, and all points in between. In addition to the Spy Shop Mysteries, she’s a blogger and has authored over a dozen nonfiction books. She earned an MFA degree from Goddard College and a BS in Behavioral Sciences from the University of Maryland.
Before writing crime fiction, she was a seasoned human resources professional with a strange attraction to gnarly internal investigations. She lives with her husband and dog in Lexington, Kentucky. Lisa once owned a home on Galveston Island and is a frequent visitor.
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Amazon Author Page | Goodreads Author Page
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Dying isn’t just hard on the ones left behind, the regret of unfinished lives weighs heavily on the terminally ill. That’s where Dire’s Club steps in, a specialty travel agency that takes a small group of dying people on one final adventure-so they can be free of guilt, be more than a diagnosis, and find a way to confront life…and death.
Life Coach Charlotte Claybrooke built a successful second career guiding people out of grief, but the impending tenth anniversary of her own heart-wrenching tragedy sets her on a journey to find life among the dying.
Staring death in the face was Jimmy Dire’s business. He met it with a warm hug, a kind word, and a smile. Dire’s Club gave the terminally ill one final, bucket-list adventure before passing on, but dying was expensive. The bills, like Jimmy’s lies, were piling up. It’s only a matter of time before he’s forced to face a different type of death.
A rock god, a telenovela star, a grandmother living her life-long dream, and a young tech genius round out this group of strangers facing death together. But when tragedy strikes, their bond is shattered. Lies and fraud surface, forcing the dying to come together to save someone’s life.
Everybody dies. The lucky ones have fun doing it.
Dire’s Club trailer from Kimberly Walton on Vimeo.
From author Kimberly Packard: When this story idea came to me, I journaled this part out. These were the very first words of DIRE’S CLUB. I had no clue where it would go – and quite frankly, it’s been all over the manuscript, but it now lives with Jimmy’s first chapter and I see it as his philosophy on life.
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Despite their mistrust, Jackie and Avery join forces to unmask the truth—before the death toll mounts even higher.
Bestseller Kelly Irvin is back with a nail-biting romantic suspense where nothing is certain until the very last page.
PRAISE FOR HER EVERY MOVE:
“A gripping story that will have you on the edge of your seat until ‘The End.’” —Patricia Bradley, author of The Logan Point Series, Memphis Cold Case Novels, Natchez Trace Parkway Rangers series
“Explosive, tender, and races all the way through!” —Jennifer Graeser Dornbush, author, screenwriter, and forensic specialist
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Excerpt from Her Every Move
by Kelly Irvin
When Jackie and Avery meet for the first time:
Finding a cop was no problem. Getting him to stop long enough to listen proved more challenging. Jackie approached the uniformed officer standing guard outside the command center. He had his spiel down. “Wait. They’re interviewing everyone. They’ll get to you as soon as they can, ma’am.”
“I may have important information—”
“Everyone is anxious to get out of here, ma’am. Have a seat. They’ll get to you as soon as they can. They’ve got more than eight hundred witnesses to process. Have a cup of coffee. The Red Cross is bringing in sandwiches.”
He was trying so hard to be kind. Jackie stuffed a sock in her impatience. First responders and law enforcement saw the worst of the worst—just as she had this day.
She trudged toward the chairs again. A lanky, scruffy-looking man in street clothes and a Windbreaker emblazoned with SAPD across the back brushed past her, headed the same direction. “Excuse me, are you interviewing witnesses?”
He glanced back and stopped. The irritated expression faded. “If you’ve been triaged, ma’am, you can wait in the area set up by Victim Assistance. We’ll get to you as soon as we can.”
“I know that. Please listen to me.” Jackie fought to bring her voice down a notch. He didn’t need a hysterical witness right now. “I have information that might be important to give to you now rather than later.”
“Who are you?”
“Jackie Santoro, the adult collections coordinator at the Central Library. I helped plan this event.”
“You don’t look like a librarian.”
Jackie got that a lot. She didn’t understand it. Librarians came in all shapes and sizes. “Sorry I don’t meet your expectations.”
“Don’t apologize. It’s been a day for everyone.”
His assessment of the day was spot-on, even if he didn’t catch her sarcasm. “Do you want to take my statement or not? Officer—”
“It’s detective. Detective Avery Wick. SAPD Homicide Unit. I’d be happy to take your statement.” He glanced around, then took her arm.
Surprise washed through Jackie, followed by sudden warmth. He had a steely grip—one a person could count on—and he hadn’t hesitated to reach out. It had been a long time since someone did that for her.
He guided her to the curb. “Someone who volunteers to share information is either innocent or trying to look that way.”
So much for warmth. Detective Avery’s prickly pear persona reasserted itself.
Anger could be a tonic under the right circumstances. Jackie’s bubbled up. She tugged her arm free. “I was one of a team of people who planned this event. One of my best friends died in there.” She pointed to the Tobin Center. “What possible motive would I have to set off a bomb in the middle of my event?”
“Sit down, please.” Detective Wick’s assessing gaze ran over Jackie from head to toe and back. A shiver ran through her that had nothing to do with the cold. It felt as he could see through her. He smiled—a grim, sardonic half smile. “Give me a minute. I’m sure I can come up with a motive.”
Before Jackie could introduce herself, he walked away, leaving her with her mouth open and her entire body shaking.
He returned a minute later with a blanket and a cup of coffee. Jackie wrapped the blanket around her hunched shoulders automatically. It wouldn’t help, but his offer was so unexpected in light of his last words, she couldn’t refuse.
“Here, drink this.” He held out a Styrofoam cup filled with steaming liquid. “You look frozen.”
Did this man have multiple personalities? “Bless you.” Her words came out in a croak. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Thank you.”
Her hands shook so hard the hot liquid spilled over the edges, burning her fingers. “Ouch. Sorry.”
“Stop apologizing.” Detective Wick cupped his hands around hers and steadied them. Again, with the touch. “You’re in shock. Why weren’t you transported to Baptist or one of the other downtown hospitals?”
“I’m not hurt, not physically.” Her voice didn’t quiver. For that small victory she was grateful. “I refused to be transported. Or treated.”
She wasn’t leaving until Estrella did.
“Not smart.”
“Not hurt. They’re overwhelmed as it is.”
“We’re doing preliminary interviews . . .”
His big hands covered Jackie’s completely. She closed her eyes, concentrating on how real and firm they were. He had a callus on his thumb. His fingers were strong. Finally, the shaking stopped.
“You’re not going to pass out on me, are you?”
She opened her eyes to find him leaning so close his scent of cinnamon gum and citrusy aftershave filled her nose. After the stench of blood, excrement, and burned rubber, it was comforting. So was his angular face filled with a mixture of concern at war with barely tethered impatience.
Jackie leaned away from his space. “Absolutely not. I’ve got it—the coffee, I mean.”
His hands dropped. The warmth dissipated. She swallowed against sobs. No more tears. Estrella would not want tears. She would want action. She deserved action. “Did they find the remnants of the explosive device? Do they know how it was triggered?”
Detective Wick looked up from the narrow notebook he’d tugged from the hip pocket of his Dockers. “You said you had important information. Let’s start with that.”
Once she told him about the bag, her opportunity to get information from the detective would be gone. “Were there any unexploded devices found?”
Impatience spread across his face, his effort to muzzle it obvious. “The bomb squad cleared the hall before search and recovery began. Let me ask the questions, if you don’t mind.”
Everyone knew that. The other first responders wouldn’t have been allowed in otherwise. Search and recovery. “One of the victims is—was—my best friend Estrella Diaz.”
Detective Wick’s pale-blue eyes studied her so intently, he squinted. “I’m sorry about your friend. This has to be the worst day of your life. The faster we get all the facts, the faster we can track down the monster who did this. Okay?”
Another day came close, but Detective Wick didn’t need to know that. They were on the same page, even if he chose not to share information with her. “Won’t the ATF and the FBI have jurisdiction? How does SAPD figure in?”
“You ask a lot of questions.” The crow’s feet around his eyes and the lines around his mouth deepened. He sucked in a long breath and let it out. “Contrary to what you see on TV, the Feds don’t come in and take over. They assist. There’ll be a joint task force. But you can be sure we’ll be leading the charge with one of our own dead. Chief Little—”
“Chief of Police Little is dead?” Confirmation of the city manager’s words. Body bag number five. The chief, dressed in street clothes, had been sitting near the front with his wife—right behind the city manager and his spouse. The Littles had four kids, all still young enough to live at home. “I’m so sorry for your loss. Did his wife survive?”
“Yes, but she’s in critical condition. We want the monster who did this for the sakes of all the victims, but this one is personal.”
Estrella would be relegated to the also killed paragraph of every news story written about this incident. After the biographies and quotes collected from the peers of Councilman Sandoval, Chief Little, and Milton Schaeffer. That was fine if it meant law enforcement went after the killer with every resource available to them because of the intense public scrutiny that came with their lofty status in the community.
“You said you had something important to tell me.”
She held the coffee close, concentrating on its warmth. “There was a backpack left on the front row. I found it.”
Any hint of cordiality disappeared from his rugged face. “You found it? When?”
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“A vivid set of tales about connection to other people and to the natural world…Hale’s lovely prose shows a keen eye for detail…”
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Author Babette Fraser Hale introduces, A Wall of Bright Dead Feathers, a new story collection set in central Texas.
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Praise for Scorched Earth:
Purchase: Amazon
Futuristic Science Fiction meets NCIS in this gripping murder mystery that takes place on the planet Mars. Crucial, a labor cop, is controlled by an advanced AI called Halo, as is everyone else on earth. Crucial does what he can to send secret messages to his team as they use nanonites to disrupt Halo’s abilities. He’s happy what he’s doing, fighting the good fight, helping his sister Essential whom is a leader in the resistance. But then he gets a call from his ex Melinda who needs his help to clear her fiance’s name whom has been charged with murder. Though Crucial never wanted to return to Mars, he will do it for Melinda.
However, Mars is ruled by the Five Families, the wealthy elite. People that Crucial believes are futile to fight against. His investigation however leads him back to Earth, to a genetic experiment that has created lizard like cannibals. And Crucial will do what he can to find the truth, clear Melinda’s finances name, and stay alive, of course.
I must say Scorched Earth was very intriguing. It took a little to get used to all the scientific names for things, as I’m not used to reading futurist science fiction books. There’s alot of terminology that I had to stop and think about to understand what it was Crucial was describing. Once I got used to the narration the story flowed more easily. I loved how detailed and complex Scroched Earth was, but at the root of it is this investigation that leads Crucial down a path that lets us really explore these two worlds. Especially with things happening now, with the Mars Mission that is going to happen in our lifetime, it was fun to envision a world where people lived on Mars.
Crucial is such a wonderful character. He’s honorable and dependable. He doesn’t give up on people or himself. He’s definitely the “good cop” in this story, and you’re left rooting for him every step of the way. The depth of his character development had me flipping through each page. To be submerged in this world was unlike anything I have read before! And what Crucial ends up investigating was so beyond the stars, that I had to keep going to figure out how the story was going to unfold. It’s exciting, and a little horrifying, to be honest. But a little dark elements sure was the icing on the cake for me.
Though Scorched is the second in the trilogy, I read it before reading any of the others and it did fine as a stand alone, though now I am interested in the other books in the series!
Scorched is definitely a gripping read! It’s vivid and engrossing. A read for anyone that loves a good, dark, murder mystery, especially for those science fiction lovers out there! Be sure to check it out!
Rating: 4/5
Purchase: Amazon | Main Street Reads
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Purchase: Texas Tech University Press
At Close Range: A Memoir of Tragedy and Advocacy is a gripping account of a mother’s story and the loss of her child from a gunshot wound. Leesa Ross delves deep into her recount, her raw grief, how she picks up the pieces, and sets out on a path of safety advocacy. It was just one freak accident that completely changed her life. The painful details, how this affected her marriage and life. Her boy Jon was an adult when he had died. As a mother of a two and a half year old, this memoir really pulled me in it. What if that was me? I can’t even imagine that pain and heartache this woman had to go through, but reading her story pulled at the strings of my heart and really made me pause and listen.
I grew up in a small country town. My father owned guns. I grew up around them and they have very much been a part of my life. But as an adult, and now that I have a child of my own, and reading this story, it really makes me ponder the pro and anti gun organizations. Where do I fall? I’m somewhere in the middle on the issue. But I appreciated and understood Leesa’s point of view on the topic. You completely understand why she journeys down the path that she does. And her voice, one filled with trepidation and pain, is a powerful voice that deserves to be heard.
As for the writing, I really enjoyed getting lost in Leesa Ross’ story. Her experience is heartfelt and profound. The details and description she uses easily draws the reader in. Though a hard read from an emotional standpoint, her narrative pulls you in, easily. And once I started reading it, it was hard to put down.
I feel like this book is a great perspective on a very important issue, especially in our country. Though I may not agree with some of her beliefs, I can and do appreciate hearing her side, seeing her story, reading about what had happened to her. It’s a book for discussing, for feeling, for considering. It’s thought provoking and heart wrenching. A non-fiction read unlike any I have read. It makes us think, gets us talking. And most importantly, it makes us feel.
I hear you Leesa Ross.
I hope others will too.
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Excerpt: Chapter One, Part One
of NETWORK OF DECEIT
by Tom Threadgill
How long could a human being scream?
Three times through the video so far and Amara’s appreciation for the woman’s lung capacity grew with each viewing. No sound on the recording, but there was no mistaking the outburst. The wide eyes, gaping mouth, and panicked attempt to be anywhere else other than there. Not that the shrieking had any relevance whatsoever. The woman’s reaction was entirely normal. People tended to scream when dead bodies appeared beside them.
On the monitor, an older teenage male, his chin against his chest and face hidden with a baseball cap, drifted on the water park’s lazy river. The deeply tanned boy floated on a huge yellow inner tube with each hand, palms up, tucked under one of the black handles. His knees were propped on top, allowing his feet to dangle in the water. During the seven-and-a-half-minute video clip, a series of rapids and a few collisions with other riders jostled him enough that his hands and feet moved, making it difficult to determine if the teen was dead or passed out. Either way, the other park visitors were too absorbed in their own day to notice. That would change.
A short way ahead, the not-yet-screaming woman and her three kids—two boys and a younger girl, all under ten or eleven by the looks of them—linked their floats together in an ovalish circle. Each member of the family held the foot of their neighbor as they meandered through the twists and turns of the attraction. The distance between the teenager and family narrowed, and Amara leaned closer to the monitor as her heartbeat accelerated. This was like one of those nature videos where a lioness stalks her victim. Creeping up on the unsuspecting wildebeest until . . . now.
The teen caught up to the family and his left leg bumped against the back of the young girl’s head. She jerked, turned to see who’d nudged her, mouthed something to him, and pushed his tube away. Barely a dozen clock-ticks later, he collided with her again, sending the mother into mom mode.
She grabbed his inner tube, pulled it to herself, then heaved it away with all the strength she could muster. Doing so flipped the boy’s head toward her and his ball cap fell into the water. His open, unmoving eyes were all it took. The woman screamed. And kept screaming. She paddled furiously for several seconds in a futile attempt to flee the corpse’s gaze. The adrenaline kicked in and—still shrieking—she rolled off her inner tube and pushed her three children aside as the corpse continued its slow, rambling journey.
“You can turn it off,” Amara said.
Dr. Douglas Pritchard, the medical examiner for Bexar County, clicked his mouse and the recording paused. “I requested the footage from the Cannonball Water Park after doing the young man’s autopsy. I trust it will be useful in your investigation, Detective Alvarez?”
Her investigation? Would Zachary Coleman be her first case? Not unless Dr. Pritchard could convince her there was something worth looking into. Truthfully, he wouldn’t have to show much. Her current routine, while interesting and necessary, wasn’t exactly stimulating.
After the Feds took control of the ongoing probe into the Cotulla aftermath, she’d been granted a transfer from the San Antonio PD’s Property Crimes Division to Homicide. Her first month in the new position had consisted of reviewing old files, shadowing other detectives as they worked, and keeping her mouth shut as much as possible.
When the LT had hollered her name an hour ago, she figured he had more files for her to review. She was wrong. Lieutenant Rico Segura was sitting behind his desk, an unlit cigar hanging from his mouth. Every morning the man pulled a new stogie from his drawer and planted it between his teeth. By the end of the day, most of the cigar would be gone, whether from absorption or chewing or swallowing or spitting or . . . She managed to restrain a shudder.
Get to the ME’s office ASAP, he said. Find out what Pritchard’s got. Suspicious death. See if it’s worth investigating.
After a quick yessir, she’d hurried over and caught the doctor between autopsies and meetings. Douglas Pritchard worked with her on Cotulla, and at the time he’d been dating Sara Colby, a Texas Ranger who’d also been involved in the inquiry. The two were no longer together, a fact Amara knew from her increasingly infrequent conversations with the woman.
The ME cleared his throat. “Detective?”
“Sorry.” She shifted in the red leather armchair. “Yes, the security video will be helpful if we move forward with an investigation. But there’s nothing on there that even hints at a crime. When the tox screenings come back, the department may take another look if warranted.”
He scanned his desktop. “How’s Sara? Do you two speak often?”
“Um, last I heard she was doing well.”
He shuffled through a stack of file folders. “So that’s a no?”
“We talk on occasion. She’s fine.”
“Give her my best, would you?” He looked up and stroked his goatee. “Now that’s an interesting saying, isn’t it? My best. My best what? Intentions? Makes no sense. Wishes? I suppose that might work under the right circumstances, but I—”
“You have more evidence to support your suspicions regarding the death?”
Read Part Two of the Excerpt on Texas Book Lover on 2/21/2021.
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