Posted in 12 Words, Author Q&A's

12 Words with Rob Ashman

Posted on by J

It took Rob twenty-four years to write his first book. He only became serious about writing it when his dad got cancer. It was an aggressive illness and Rob gave up work for three months to look after him and his mum. Writing Those That Remain became his coping mechanism. After he wrote the book his family encouraged him to continue, so not being one for half measures, Rob got himself made redundant, went self-employed so he could devote more time to writing and four years later the Mechanic Trilogy is the result.

Today, as he prepares for the release of Those That Remain on the 22nd June, Rob takes on the LifeOfCri.me 12 word challenge

Rules

Answers should be complete sentences, and completed in no more than 12 words (unless otherwise stated)

Contractions count. It’s = 2 words.

 

LOC: What can you tell us about your upcoming release Those That Remain?

RA: It’s set in Florida about a serial killer codenamed Mechanic

LOC: What was behind the decision to write a trilogy?

RA: A catastrophic lack of planning, or that’s what my wife says.

LOC: Whats the most surprising challenge you’ve faced in your writing career?

RA: Being unable to switch off, the voices in my head are relentless.

LOC: How would you sum up your writing process?

RA; Hanging onto the coattails of a story being told by others.

LOC: Describe your perfect day

RA: Having friends over for afternoon fizz, a curry and lots of nonsense.

LOC: What’s the best book you’ve read in the last 12 months?

RA: I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes.

LOC: Why?

RA: The interlacing of the plot lines is genius, it kept me gripped.

and finally Just for laughs….

LOC: Thanks to the author Anna Smith you’ve just woken up on stage in front of the judges of a TV talent show, with just A recorder, a bag of dirty laundry and a bottle of cheap wine.  What do you do?

RA: Play Frère Jacques, drink the wine and get off.

Lucas is coasting to retirement in a mundane Florida police precinct when a brutal serial killer, codenamed Mechanic, lands on his patch. 

Three years ago they thought Mechanic was dead. But Mechanic is very much alive and no family is safe from the savage, ritualistic murders that this sadistic killer is compelled to commit.

Mechanic is always one step ahead and Lucas is forced to operate outside the law. 

But who can he trust and who is Mechanic? 

Soon Lucas will learn that the truth is more terrifying than he could ever imagine and in order to find the answers he needs, he might just have to put his life on the line… 

 

 

Bloodhound Books will also be publishing the next two books in The Mechanic Trilogy over the course of 2017.  Keep your eyes peeled for more info by following us all on Twitter….

@LOCrime   @Bloodhoundbook  and @RobAshmanAuthor

Posted in Blog Touring, Guest Posts

#BlogTour – Sweet After Death by Valentina Giambanco – Exclusive extract

Posted on by J

Prologue

The woods pressed into the town from all sides. The bite of land that had been scooped out of the wilderness by the original residents was barely visible from above during the day, and at night – when the only lights were a few scattered street lamps – it was all but gone.

The deer raised its snout, sniffed the cold night air and took a couple of steps. It paused by the line of trees and waited. Somewhere much higher up on the mountain the winds howled and shook the firs for what they were worth, but in the hollow of the valley the town of Ludlow lay silent and still. The deer ambled into the middle of the empty road and three others followed it out of the shadows. They made no sound as they padded on the veil of snow and their reflections crossed the windows of the shuttered stores on Main Street. The town stirred in its sleep but it did not wake: a dog barked from inside a house, a porch light – triggered by a faulty motion sensor – came on and went off in one of the timber-frame homes, and one of the town’s three traffic lights ticked and flickered from red to green to marshal the nonexistent 3 a.m. traffic. And yet, tucked away in an alley, a thin shadow tracked the progress of the deer and matched them step for step. They didn’t pick up its scent because it smelled of forest and dead leaves, and they didn’t hear any footsteps because it made no sound as it wove between the houses. The deer followed a familiar route that would lead them to the woods at the other end of Main Street, and it wasn’t until they had almost reached their destination that they caught the ugly scent. It was a few hundred yards away yet sharp enough to startle them. For an instant they froze and then, one after the other, they bounded out of sight. The acrid smoke spread through Main Street, reaching into the alleys and the backstreets, under the doors and into the gaps of the old window-frames. But the car burning bright by the crossroads would not be discovered until morning, and by then the thin shadow was long gone.

A few miles away Samuel shifted his weight on the thin mattress and listened out for birdsong: he couldn’t hear any, and it could only mean that it was still pitch black outside. He sighed and tried to grasp the tail of a half-remembered dream. Something had woken him up, though, and it took him a moment for the notion to sink small, keen teeth into his mind – dulled, as it was, by sleep and the warm cocoon of his blankets. Then a rough hand grabbed his shoulder and Samuel flinched and understood. He sat up without a sound, eyes peering through the gloom.

The bedroom – such as it was – was plain, with pallets for beds and a wooden stove in the corner. Embers from last night’s fire lit the bundles of blankets lying on the other pallets, and a cold draft found Samuel as soon as he threw off the covers.

He didn’t have much time, and he knew it. His heart had begun to race and his mouth was a tight line as he pulled on his boots and snatched his satchel from the side of the bed. The tip of the boy’s finger brushed against his good-luck charm, hidden in the folds of the satchel, and he felt a crackle of pleasure.

Two minutes later, Samuel walked out into the night and the door closed softly behind him. He looked up: the sky was low with heavy clouds, and he could almost taste the snow that was about to fall. He ran across the clearing and straight into the forest. He knew each tree and boulder and rock, and the dusting of white on the ground showed him the way. They had always called him ‘Mouse’ because he was small for his age – fifteen years old the previous November – small and fast. He needed all the speed and cunning he could muster now.

Speed, cunning and the spirit of the mountain on his side. He was three hundred yards away when the bell clanged and shattered the silence. They would be waking up then, rushing and scrambling after their things, and when the door opened to the night they would fall out and come after him. And God forbid they should catch him. The black raven feather in the boy’s satchel would have to work hard to keep him safe.

In the dead of winter Homicide Detective Alice Madison is sent to the remote town of Ludlow, Washington, to investigate an unspeakable crime.

Together with her partner Detective Sergeant Kevin Brown and crime scene investigator Amy Sorensen, Madison must first understand the killer’s motives…but the dark mountains that surround Ludlow know how to keep their secrets and that the human heart is wilder than any beast’s.

As the killer strikes again Madison and her team are under siege. And as they become targets Madison realises that in the freezing woods around the pretty town a cunning evil has been waiting for her.

Posted in Blog Touring, Reading, Reviews

#BlogTour – One Bad Turn by Sinead Crowley

Posted on by J

Being held hostage at gunpoint by her childhood friend is not Dr Heather Gilmore’s idea of a good day at work. It only gets worse when she hears that her nineteen-year-old daughter Leah has been kidnapped.

Sergeant Claire Boyle wasn’t expecting to get caught up in a hostage situation during a doctor’s appointment. When it becomes apparent that the kidnapping is somehow linked to the hostage-taker, a woman called Eileen Delaney, she is put in charge of finding the missing girl.

What happened between Eileen and Heather to make Eileen so determined to ruin her old friend? Claire Boyle must dig up the secrets from their pasts to find out – and quickly, because Leah is still missing, and time is running out to save her.

One Bad Turn is the third book to feature Sergeant Claire Boyle and I have to say since I’ve absolutely adored the first two books, Can Anybody Help Me? and Are You Watching Me?, I was chuffed to bits to be invited onto the blog tour for this one.

Totally addictive, One Bad Turn was for me the perfect way to spend a wet May Bank Holiday. Nestled in a comfy sofa with the sound of rain against the window, kindle in hand with a fantastic new book. One Bad Turn is a real one sitting read that makes sure you don’t want to put it down until you know what’s happening next in the story.  I lost track of the amount of times I thought to myself “just one more chapter then I’ll go do…” because the go do never got done.

One Bad turn is the story of friendship turned sour, enhanced by the impact of the financial and political situation in Ireland on the lives of Heather and Eileen.  It switches regularly in its time frame between present day and flashbacks of the circumstances surrounding the polarisation of their friendship, ensuring the reader gets a fully rounded awareness of the characters and a true understanding of how the two have ended up where they are.

It’s a fascinating story and one that you can easily read without having read any of the previous novels, but as a true book geek I’d recommend reading them first in order to truly appreciate the amazing way the Crowley makes our protagonist so realistic, heart warmingly supportable and a force of nature to be reckoned with.

 

 

 

 

Posted in Blog Touring, Reviews

#BlogTour Body Breaker by Mike Craven

Posted on by J

Investigating a severed hand found on the 3rd green of a Cumbrian golf course was not how Detective Inspector Avison Fluke had planned to spend his Saturday. So when a secretive unit from London swoop in quoting national security, he’s secretly pleased.

But trouble is never far away. A young woman arrives at his lakeside cabin with a cryptic message: a code known to only a handful of people and it forces Fluke back into the investigation he’s just been barred from.

In a case that will change his life forever, Fluke immerses himself in a world of new age travellers, corrupt cops and domestic extremists. Before long he’s alienated his entire team, made a pact with the devil and been arrested under the terrorism act.

But Fluke is only getting started. A voice has called out to him from beyond the grave and he has no intention of ignoring it.

Guest Reviewer Ann B with Mike at the Body Breaker book launch

Body Breaker is the second full novel, but third book by Mike Craven to feature Detective Inspector Avison Fluke, and after previously reading the first two books I knew I was in for a treat and I wasn’t disappointed.

In this book, D.I. Fluke is investigating a dismembered body found at a golf course. The case is swiftly taken over by the Metropolitan Police Force, so when Fluke discovers that the victim is someone from his past he decides to work the case off the books to solve it. He also has to enlist the help of someone he’d rather never deal with again and Fluke knows this will come back to bite him but he feels that he doesn’t have a choice.

I was blown away by the high calibre of Mike’s writing, his attention to detail and the way he invests in his characters, which makes them all the more real. I could identify with each and every person, and felt that I was right there at Fluke’s elbow as he fought to see justice done. It’s a compelling read from start to finish, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Ann B x

Posted in Blogging

o/t but big news! – BOMBSHELL BOOKS are BACK!

Posted on by J

Bombshell Books are back!
After launching with the hilarious The Queen of Blogging, Bombshell Books are back with two new authors and three fabulous novels.

Therese Loreskar returns with her sequel to The Queen of Blogging – The
Queen of New Beginnings

Therese Loreskar started her career in 2010 self-publishing her first novel,
which quickly became a critically acclaimed best-seller.
In 2014 she was signed by a Swedish publishing house before being signed by Bombshell in the summer of 2016. Her novel, The Queen of Blogging, received overwhelming feedback and the book was referred to as a modern Bridget Jones.

Therese has since had four bestselling children’s books.
Her never-ending energy for writing and entertaining people is her biggest trait. Therese lives in the countryside on the west coast of Sweden. She has a big and busy household with her husband, two children, deaf cat, five hamsters and a grandmother.

When she is not busy writing stories she enjoys nature, people, history,
redecorating the house without permission and all other kinds of creativity.
The Queen of New Beginnings will be published on August 10th this year.

Guardian book prize shortlisted author, Suzie Tullett, signs with Bombshell
Books. Suzie Tullett is an author of contemporary humorous fiction and romantic comedy. She has a Masters Degree in Television & Radio Scriptwriting and worked as a scriptwriter before becoming a full-time novelist. Her motto isto ‘live, laugh, love’ and when she’s not busy creating her own literarymasterpieces, she usually has her head in someone else’s.
Suzie lives in a tiny hamlet in the middle of the French countryside, along withher husband and two Greek rescue dogs. You can find Suzie on Twitter:
@SuzieTullett or you can visit her website: suzietullett.com

Her heart-warming romantic comedy, The Trouble with Words, will be published on July 29th this year.

Debut author, Callie Langridge, joins Bombshell Books Caroline was born and brought up in Berkshire. After a brief teenage spell in the depths of Lancashire, she moved back to London. Having left school at 16, she studied drama before embarking on a career in marketing. This saw her work in music marketing in the heady days of Britpop in the late ‘90s. She unleashed her creativity in the design of window displays and marketing campaigns for the leading music retailer. More recently she has
followed her passion for social history and currently works in marketing for a
national historical institution, promoting projects and running events.

On hitting her thirtieth birthday, she decided finally to take her A levels and
gained A’s in English Literature and Language, and Film Studies – not bad when working full time – and this spurred her on to take the first of many creative writing course. A few years later and she has had a number of short stories published and plays performed at theatres and venues across London.

Caroline lives in London with her long-term partner and an ever-growing
collection of antique curiosities. Her beautifully written and heart-wrenching debut novel, A Time to Change, will be published on September 24th this year.

Bombshell Books is an imprint of Bloodhound Books. Bombshell publishes
brilliant women’s fiction and is on the look out for new authors. We wants stories that will make you laugh, cry and fall in love. For more information visit our website – www.bombshellbooks.com

Posted in Articles, Blog Touring, Guest Posts

#BlogTour Don’t Wake Up by Liz Lawler and the Inspiration Behind It

Posted on by J

As part of her blog tour for her debut novel Don’t Wake up, today on LifeOfCri.me Liz Lawler talks about the inspiration behind the book.

 

 

 

 

Inspiration behind Don’t Wake Up

I wish I could tell you that I heard a particular story or read an article in a newspaper that inspired me to write Don’t Wake Up. But it wouldn’t be true. Something obviously triggered it, but I suspect it was many things that I heard or read or thought or even experienced and my mind accepted and stored a place for all this imagery to settle before becoming fully focused. I use the word imagery, because when I think of a story it is always in full technicolour with people having conversations or crying or running away. I do remember exactly what I was doing when this story came to me, and it came with a bit of a whoosh. The body of the story was inside my head by the time I had vacuumed my house one day. I then needed to give it legs and arms and a head to fully function. I have found that I never think up stories when I’m at rest, it is always when I’m physically busy with my mind at a bit of a wander.

So what triggered it, I now ask it myself? Was it the fact that I have worked in a hospital for so many years and am as familiar with that type of surroundings as I am in my own home? Possibly. It would certainly be a logical conclusion. Or was it witnessing the vulnerability of so many patients as they walk onto a ward and place their trust in you.

Yet as I write that last sentence, my stomach clenches at the thought of how vulnerable we are when we place our trust in people that we are encouraged to trust.

And this thought, I suspect, is the trigger that made me want to write a story like Don’t Wake Up. The horrific story that came to light about Winterbourne care home in recent years, that uncovered acts of abuse being meted out to people with learning difficulties, sadly didn’t shock me. It enraged me that it happened, but I wasn’t shocked. The debase behaviour of humans has always existed and it always will. It pushes me to ask questions and each probe will inevitably begin with – How could someone. How could someone do that, say that, think that. I think everyone is susceptible to carrying out an unkind act, even if it is only in thought, and for most of us it will be only ever amount to that. But for many of us we have met that unkind person, the one that we think or say about, ‘I wouldn’t let her look after my dog, let alone my child, my father, my mother.’

Every form of mental and physical cruelty is abhorrent to me and they take their ugly shapes in so many forms. It is relentless. We are saturated every single day by what we hear in the news of acts of horrendous cruelty being carried out and before we have even processed one shocking story another story has taken precedence. Sometimes a singular story will stay in our minds for ever – the images of the Chinese migrants labourers drowned on Morecambe Bay beach . . . the image of those two innocent babies in the arms of their father having been gassed with sarin. These stories stop us in our tracts, bring tears to our eyes and have us shaking our heads in despair. I am listening to the news as I write this, and in the background Teresa May is speaking of PC Palmer and his colleagues are speaking from the heart about how they felt about this man and my throat is clogged at thought of so many people hurting from this loss.

So in the writing of this blog, I have kind of worked out what inspired me to write Don’t Wake Up – a fictional story of psychological torture – I am not anaesthetized by the atrocities that the human race carry out. I am not numb to that tone of voice I hear when a child is harshly rebuked for crying, or to that heavy sigh of impatience given when that elderly woman or man asks for the toilet again.

Death should never be a cruel act. It should be natural and where possible, surrounded by love. I was very privileged to nurse my father at his home, because I had the ability to carry out this care and if death can be a beautiful thing to witness when someone is ready to face it, I was fortunate to witness it with my own father. He died in the early hours as dawn was breaking at the age of 96 with his wife beside him and me merely there as their interpreter. There is humour even in this memory as in their last conversation to each other neither were wearing their hearing aids and so I had to shout clearly the messages they gave to each other.

Alex Taylor wakes up tied to an operating table.

The man who stands over her isn’t a doctor.

The offer he makes her is utterly unspeakable.

But when Alex re-awakens, she’s unharmed – and no one believes her horrifying story. Ostracised by her colleagues, her family and her partner, she begins to wonder if she really is losing her mind.

And then she meets the next victim.