crime drama – Eileen Troemel

Jack King and I connected through social media.

Author Bio

Born into a military family, Jack King crisscrossed the country multiple times growing up. He completed graduate degrees in History and Business plus a career in sales & marketing, all of which enhance realism in his writing. Mr. King is the author of novels in three genres: crime, speculative, and historical. These include BEYOND BLOOD (watch for AGAINST BLOOD coming this fall), a YA time travel adventure series, and an historical novel

Tell us about yourself.

I’m from Texas. Author “BEYOND BLOOD (A Detective Cliff Husto Thriller)”, “GAME FOR THE MIDDLE KINGDOM”, “TIME RIDER RED ATTACK”, and “TIME RIDER WILDERTREK”. I’m an avid reader, doxie lover, fitness fanatic, husband, father, and decent cook. (I also write reviews.)

When did you know you wanted to be an author?

Mid 30’s, but didn’t start writing my first novel until twenty years later.

What genres do you like to read? Are these the same genres you write in?

I like to read almost everything except romance. I write crime thrillers, historical fiction, and time travel fantasy. I may do some science fiction / horror in the future.

Is your book for adults, young adults or children?

My time travel fantasy series is YA. Everything else is adult.

What is your current release or project?

“AGAINST BLOOD” is the next book in the Detective Cliff Husto series and hopefully will be out this fall. Starting manuscript editing process now. Book cover to come!

Tell us about the key characters

Detective Cliff Husto in my crime thrillers; TJ, his girlfriend Samantha, and his professor dad in the YA series; and Scottish Highlander David MacDougall in the historical fiction.

What is your blurb or synopsis of the book?

BEYOND BLOOD (A Detective Cliff Husto Thriller)

Someone is killing off employees at the iconic ad agency Mathis & Oliver. Making a terrifying situation even more frightening, the phantom slayer leaves no physical trace, no clues or hard evidence behind. Somehow, some way, Detective Cliff Husto must discover and stop this ghostly assassin. Because he, his lovely wife, two young sons, and Irish setter Reagan just might be . . . the next victims!

Share an excerpt

Six Years Later

It was summer. Late July. The hottest time of the hottest month. The flies and mosquitos were as annoying to him as the teen interns, college aged counselors, and adult leaders who greeted everyone and everything with that “golly gee” hyper-wholesomeness he despised and mistrusted.

The youth campgrounds and forest and adjoining lake lay close to a familiar mountain sight. He knew his old home was less than two miles away, due north-northeast, hugging the base of the massive range. These were the same damn mountains he’d seen from his childhood bedroom. The same purplish dark red flowers that looked like dried blood were in full bloom now across the span of foothills.

It was because their home was so secluded that authorities hadn’t bothered them until their father was finally arrested for some other crime—he didn’t remember what…and his oldest sister Jollie had started exhibiting severe emotional problems at school when she entered the fifth grade. The family ‘unit’—Yeah, from hell—had been broken up shortly thereafter. Kids distributed like cans of cheap dog food within the child welfare system.

He wondered if anyone still lived there.

He meant to find out that night.

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1:55am: “Hey, what—where you going, dude?”

He whispered, “To take a leak and walk around some. Catch some breeze. So dang hot, you know?” He smiled his crooked smile. “Go back to sleep, cuz. I’ll be back in a jif.”

The other boy mumbled, “Oh, okay,” and rolled over. The boy was asleep again in seconds.

He waited several minutes, listening to the hollow silence of the rustic cabin broken by light snores here and there and the night sounds of the forest outside. He made sure no one else was awake or stirring. He’d intentionally gone to bed dressed and pulled the thin blanket and underlying sheet up to his chin to cover up. Reaching under the cot, he quietly fetched his tennis shoes and put them on. In seconds he was at the screened wooden door, opening it an inch at a time to keep it from creaking. Then he slipped out.

Keeping the mountains on his left, he immediately turned inward into the denser forest behind the encampment, taking care to skirt completely around the adult leader cabins at the far north end. He could be a ghost when he needed to, making as little noise as a small forest creature. He’d been sweating profusely under the bed covers. The night air, although still warm, felt cool gently swirling around his soaked shirt top.

He walked fast. In less than fifteen minutes, even traversing thicket patches and heavy brush, he was there. Ahead, through the trees, he saw it. The weed infested clearing which sufficed as a yard and the large, rambling one-story house were just as he remembered. He crept to the window on the south end where his parents’ bedroom used to be. The window shades were partially open. Peering in, he saw two figures passed out on the king-sized bed. The woman was someone he’d never seen before. He wondered if his mother still lived there.

An older teen known to be a hard case juvenile delinquent, in and out of school, had taught him the basics of opening a locked door. Bruce had also sold him his spare ‘Bump Key’ for twenty dollars, two months allowance.

Carefully, silently, he jimmied the door open and left it ajar, using a paper towel he’d pocketed during camp supper to not leave any fingerprints anywhere. Inside, a new shadow slunk its way through the living room with the adjoining kitchen, down the long hall past the four darkened rooms to the master bedroom at the very end. At the door, he halted, listening. Evaluating. His father lay loudly snoring. The unknown woman beside him was twisted like a pretzel in her uneasy sleep. He cautiously approached. Leaning in, he could smell the alcohol on his father from the opposite side of the bed. There was a used syringe on the nightstand next to the woman.

As he stood staring at the scene, it brought back horrific memories. A tidal wave of hate flooded his body. He could feel a “bloody spasm” coming on. The innermost part of his brain, that which controlled emotion, became crazy consumed with the urgent need for killing. But the outer part of his brain, the rational side, kept his body in perfect control to do it with deliberateness and precision. Calmly, he backtracked to the kitchen. He picked up the washcloth by the sink and re-pocketed his now crumbled paper towel. Opening the drawer slowly to avoid noise—he still remembered which drawer held the wooden knife rack—he wrapped the thick cloth around the handle and slid out the largest of the meat carvers. A real butcher’s tool.

Beautiful.

Do you have a favorite scene?

The ending.

What advice would you give a beginner?

Just start. Follow your creative juices.

Social media links:

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/authorjackking/

Twitter https://twitter.com/authorjackking

Other LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-olen-king-38579b10/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8440071.Jack_King

BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jack-king

Old Website : http://jack-king.com/