The Undiscovered Country by Mike Nemeth

On Episode 82 of the GSMC Book Review Podcast I spoke with Mike Nemeth about his new book, The Undiscovered Country. This is his second novel featuring his main character, Randle Marks (the first book is called Defiled).

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When Randle Marks buried his abusive father three years ago, he thought he had escaped the gravitational pull of his dysfunctional family. Living in Florida, Randle was convicted of a crime he didn’t commit. Now he’s served his time, written a book about his scientific work, and plans to marry his college sweetheart. Then his new beginnings are interrupted by his mother’s medical emergency.

He is summoned to his boyhood home of Augusta, Georgia to face long-suppressed memories, contemptuous siblings, and his dying mother’s desperate attempts to conceal her secrets and preserve her dignity. He battles dispassionate doctors who are reluctant to waste resources on a terminal patient and, in the process, discovers that his mother’s fate may not be an act of God. While investigating her medical situation, he uncovers conspiracies to hijack two estates—his mother’s modest estate, and that of a wealthy man who claims to be his birth father. To bury the past, he will have to learn the truth about the past.

Randle embarks on a journey through contemporary end-of-life rituals juxtaposed with Old South traditions and the fading mores of his mother’s generation to untangle the layers of lies that enshroud his family’s history. As he uncovers the twisted facts, Randle finds he must solve a murder no one knew had been committed. To do that, he will have to prevent the embezzlement of a stranger’s wealth, and solve the riddle of his own identity. When he learns the shocking truth, he is challenged to choose between greed, revenge and reconciliation. (Source)

The Undiscovered Country is a book that provides layers of mystery and storylines. Overall, it's the story of a man who goes home to be with his dying mother, but once there he uncovers secrets, plots, and mysteries of a variety of kinds, all of which manage to tie in to one another as the book progresses.

Genres:

• Crime Fiction
• Mystery
• Family Dynamics

What I enjoyed:

• The layers of mystery. There was a lot in this book to try and figure out, and lots of twists and turns along the way.
• I found it difficult to root for many of the characters in this story, but Mike's writing kept me engaged throughout. He has a relaxed and engaging way of telling a story that makes it easy to visualize and enter into.

Quotes:

• "Whether I could admit it, their lives had been mooring lines lashing my little boat to origins I could neither embrace nor discard. When my father passed away, my little boat, tethered only by Mom's lifeline, swung in an aimless circle, but it soon stabilized. Losing my mother wouldn't be as easy a blow to absorb. Without her, my little boat would have no past - only an uncertain future."
• "Some unfamiliar force was driving me to save my mother and unravel the mysteries surrounding my siblings As I stood silently sweating, I knew that explanation was a rationalization. Maybe an obfuscation. I needed to use this crisis to put my past behind me, to kill off Jack Marks forever so I would be free to live as Randle Marks."
• "However, the devious duplicity of my father and my siblings crushed my ego, my psyche, my being. I felt as though I weren't a part of this family, so why was I bothering with this crisis?"

Where you can find Mike online:
Website: https://mikenemethauthor.com/
Twitter: @nemosnovels
Amazon Author Page: Mike Nemeth
GoodReads: Mike Nemeth

Author Bio:

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Mike Nemeth was born and raised in Appleton, Wisconsin and is a die-hard Badger and Packer fan. A Vietnam-era Army veteran, he raised a daughter as a single parent while pursuing a career in high technology that took him from Atlanta to Texas, Colorado, Tennessee, and Florida before returning to Atlanta. He holds a private pilot’s license, once coached a state champion AAU basketball team, and is a golfer and motor-boating enthusiast.

In addition to his two novels, Mike has published two nonfiction works about sports: 128 Billion to 1, why no one can predict the outcome of the NCAA Basketball Tournament; and Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics, why the selection committee always chooses the wrong teams to play the college football National Championship. He also wrote The Missing Ingredient, an article published in The New York Times that explained why college football rankings are always wrong. visit Mike’s sports Website www.nemosnumbers.com for fresh insight into both college sports. (Source)

Want to read The Undiscovered Country? Mike has been kind enough to provide 3 copies of his novel, and one of them could be yours! All you have to do is go to either our Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram pages and comment on the post with Mike's interview. It's as simple as that: just comment on Episode 82 on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, and you'll automatically be entered to win The Undiscovered! The last day to enter is May 26th and winners will be announced on May 28th.

To hear the interview with Mike, please click here.

Populace by A M Wilson

A M Wilson was my guest for Episode 81 of the GSMC Book Review Podcast. A M joined me to talk about his debut novel, Populace, which is a dystopian, post-apocalyptic story set in the year 2151 after much of the US has been destroyed by a series of nuclear blasts.

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AMERICA 2151

NEW YORK. WASHINGTON. CHICAGO. LOS ANGELES. ALL WIPED OUT FROM NUCLEAR BLASTS.

The New United States of America is centered in Omaha, where the Leviathan Corporation provides a muted, controlled existence for its populace. Synthetic drugs keep them sane. The people are safe — for now — from the threats on the outside.

Summoned to the president’s office, unlikely hero Thomas Ignatius Stout receives an extraordinary mission: Hunt down and return, dead or alive, the vicious killer responsible for destroying the lives of millions and millions of Americans, Joe Ikowski, who remains a thorn in the government's side. Tom accepts his burden and leads an expedition past Omaha's protective barrier and into the great unknown.

That’s when Tom’s journey really begins. 

Taking him from Kentucky to Arizona to Mexicali and the Rocky Mountains, Tom finds far more than he is searching for — and starts to learn the deeply complicated, disturbing truths of his own identity and a world in which he had only before scratched the surface.

In this poignant page-turner, a novel that blends elements of science fiction, political thrillers and an Orwellian-style future, rising novelist AM Wilson takes readers on a wild ride inside what could become the future of the United States, if we ruin ourselves from the inside. It’s a novel that will make you think, no matter what you think of America. (Source)

This particular genre isn't for everyone. If you're looking for pure escapism or a nice beach read, you might want to look elsewhere. But if you're looking for an incredibly well written, thoughtful, and somewhat frightening book, you should definitely check out Populace. It's somewhat frightening because it could so easily be true. It reminded me a lot of the dystopian novels I read in High School English, and A M says he was influenced by Brave New World for the concept of this book. To be honest, this isn't my go-to genre, and it can sometimes take me awhile to get into this type of story, but A M's writing is great and the story definitely sucked me in once it got going. I needed to know what the heck was going on and what was going to happen to Tom.

Genres:

• Dystopian
• Post-Apocalyptic
• Science Fiction

What I enjoyed:

• A M's writing. He has a unique way of putting words together that I found fascinating and even beautiful at times.
• Tom. Not so much Tom as a character, per se, but seeing the world through Tom's eyes. He's lived his whole life inside the walls of Omaha, medicated and complacent. Once he gets outside the walls he begins to see everything in a new way, and the reader gets to take that journey with him.
• The way the book kept heading in directions I wasn't quite expecting.
• Is it weird to say the book cover? It's fairly simple, and yet the more I stare at it the more I like it.

Quotes:

• "His work consisted of 20 percent insinuation, 15.5 percent innuendo and 60 percent rumor, with the remainder deemed 'fact' - just enough to give the vague scent of truth to whatever it was he wrote about."
• "'I don't think there's an alternative. All of us, all the time. We limit ourselves by our choices, and those choices are limited by our circumstances, and those circumstances are limited by other's choices that put us in that place, and around and around we go.'"
• "His personality rested on the strands of a spider's web, and so he wrote, When all around us is a lie, how can we trust our own selves as true?"
  

Where you can find A M online:
Website: https://www.amwideawake.com/
Blog: https://www.amwideawake.com/blog/
Facebook: @AMWilsonWideawake
Twitter: @a_m_wideawake
Amazon Author Page: A M Wilson
GoodReads: A.M. Wilson

Author Bio:

There's no truth here. I'm not a preacher, and I'd fail at being an idol. I've loved telling stories since I couldn't see over a kitchen counter but would watch my grandmother craft pie crust through the nook in her arm. I've always loved humor — humor that challenges our worldview, humor that gets us through hard times, humor that makes us realize our own humanity. And my burden is simple: I believe everything is possible.

I'm from Flint, Mich., originally, but I've moved around a lot -- to Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, California, Spain and Argentina. I've been a journalist, a farmer, a groundskeeper, a librarian, a fast-food worker, a bagboy, a political organizer and a shill.

I've loved and lost then loved again.

Who am I? I'm AM Wilson; I'm wide awake, it's morning. And as Bob Dylan said, "I am a farmer. And whoever heard of a fatalistic farmer?"

Intrigued by Populace? Good news, it's giveaway time! A M has been kind enough to provide 3 copies of Populace and one of them could be yours! All you have to do is go to either our Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram pages and comment on the post with A M's interview. It's as simple as that: just comment on Episode 81 on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, and you'll automatically be entered to win Populace! The last day to enter is May 19th and winners will be announced on May 21st.

To hear the interview with A M, please click here.

Dancer's Flame by Jasmine Silvera

Over the weekend I had the pleasure of welcoming author Jasmine Silvera back to the GSMC Book Review Podcast for Episode 80 (astute readers might be wondering what happened to Episode 79? Never fear! That's the link for that episode, it just happens to be a non-interview episode). Jasmine was one of my first guests on the podcast; the first time was almost a year ago when we talked about her debut novel, Death's Dancer, on Episode 17. She came back this time to talk about the second book in her Grace Bloods series, Dancer's Flame.

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With the help of a god, Azrael and Isela exposed a conspiracy within and altered the world’s balance of power. But for Azrael, victory comes with dangerous new powers he can't control. Will accepting his future mean losing everything he’s gained — his allies, his territory, and his consort?

Isela’s found a home when she stepped into Azrael’s protection, and his arms. But if accepting her new role as consort means giving up the life she’s worked for will the price be too high?

When an impossible creature shows up in Prague bearing a dire warning, the search for answers divides them. Now Isela must forge a bond with the power within her while Azrael fights to keep from tearing himself apart. And time is running out. Gods don’t forget or forgive, especially a betrayal from one of their own. (Source)

Dancer's Flame picks up where Death's Dancer left off. I don't want to give too much away from the first book if you haven't read it, but part of the arc of this second book is watching Azrael's and Isela's relationship continue, and evolve, after the happily ever after of that first book. We also learn more about Azrael's cohort and Isela's family.

Genres:

• Urban Fantasy
• Contemporary Fantasy
• Romance

What I enjoyed:

• Getting more of the world and the characters I grew to love in the first book. I'm so happy this is a series so I can continue on with them for awhile!
• The arc of Azrael's and Isela's relationship. During the interview Jasmine said that she writes what she knows, and while she doesn't know what it's like to be in a supernatural relationship, she does know what it's like to be in a long-term relationship, and all of the pros and cons and challenges that go into making that relationship work. Some couples argue about money, Isela and Azrael argue about how to keep each other safe with a variety of supernatural beings trying to kill them. But it boils down to the same elements of communication and trust.
• All of the other relationships in the story. There are a LOT of secondary characters, but all of them serve a purpose and have a place within the story, and it's both fun and fascinating to watch as all of those relationships intertwine and evolve, and what that means for the rest of the characters.

Quotes:

• "[Azrael] would not define her by their relationship, yet he put it between her and the vast unknown of what she had become. Once she had been a loose end, even among her own large and complicated family.
  Azrael had changed that."
• "She would rebuild. She always did. That was the key to immortality - being able to start again no matter how many times you must."
• "'All godsdancers have something special, something that makes them different from any other dancers,' she said firmly. 'Trouble is, nobody knows quite  what it is. You can only train so far. It's why so many who begin fail to advance. And you, Isela Vogel, were the best of the best.'"

Where you can find Jasmine online:
Website: http://jasminesilvera.com/
Blog: http://jasminesilvera.com/blog/
Facebook: @JasSilvera
Facebook Group: The Academy
Twitter: @jassilvera
Instagram: jassilvera
Pinterest: Jasmine Silvera
Amazon Author Page: Jasmine Silvera
GoodReads: Jasmine Silvera
BookBub: @JasSilvera

Author Bio:

Source

Jasmine Silvera has loved reading and telling stories about imaginary worlds for as long as she can remember. She acquired a love of sci-fi, fantasy, and comic books from her dad, who thought the Hobbit was a perfectly acceptable bedtime story for a ten-year-old. She filled long hours as a volunteer at the church thrift store by reading boxes of donated Harlequins.

In college she published short stories and essays before earning a degree in Broadcast Journalism. In 2012, Jasmine quit her day job in web production to walk the Camino de Santiago and focus on her writing.

Inspired by and written during her two years living in Prague, her first published book, Death’s Dancer, was released on December 27, 2016 by Kindle Press. It was selected as part of the Kindle Scout Program.

She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and their small, opinionated human charge. (Source)

Do you want to get involved in the world of the Grace Bloods and read Dancer's Flame? Today is your lucky day because we have a giveaway! Jasmine has been kind enough to provide 3 copies of Dancer's Flame and one of them could be yours! All you have to do is go to either our Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram pages and comment on the post with Jasmine's interview. It's as simple as that: just comment on Episode 80 on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, and you'll automatically be entered to win Dancer's Flame! The last day to enter is May 19th and winners will be announced on May 21st.

To hear the interview with Jasmine, please click here.

Mondays Mean Free Books: A Cruel Kind of Beautfiul and My Oxford Year

If you've been reading the posts the last few weeks, hopefully you've noticed that we've been doing giveways with books from the authors featured on the podcasts. I have a lot of respect for the authors I speak with every week, and love being introduced to books and genres I might not have read otherwise. Being able to share those books with others is pretty much icing on the cake. Mondays have become giveaway day a the GSMC Book Review Podcast, when I take to social media to announce the winners of the most recent contests.

Congrats go out today to Deborah, who won a copy of A Cruel Kind of Beautiful by Michelle Hazen

as well as to Rachel, Jen, and Veeda, who won copies of My Oxford Year by Julia Whelan.

Our current giveaway is open until Saturday. If you would like to win a copy of Fade Out by Laurie Fagen just go to our Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram page and comment on the post with Episode 77 to enter! Check out Tuesday's and Thursday's episodes this week for the books to be featured in the next round!

If you haven't listened to the interviews with Michelle and Julia, just click the links!

Sunday Rewind - FLOOD by Melissa Scholes Young

On Episode 23 of the GSMC Book Review Podcast, I interviewed Melissa Scholes Young about her debut novel FLOOD.

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Laura Brooks fled her hometown of Hannibal, Missouri, ten years ago after a historic flood and personal heartbreak. Now she's returned unannounced, and her family and friends don't know what to make of it. She says she's just home for a brief visit and her high-school reunion, but she's carrying too much luggage for that: literal and metaphorical. Soon Laura is embroiled in small-town affairs--the contentious divorce of her rowdy best friend Rose; the campaign of her twelve-year-old godson, Bobby, to become the town's official Tom Sawyer; and the renewed interest of the man Laura once thought she'd marry, Sammy McGuire.

Leaving town when she was eighteen had been Laura's only option. She feared a stifling existence in a town ruled by its past, its mythological devotion to Mark Twain, and the economic and racial divide that runs as deep as the Mississippi River. She can't forget that fateful Fourth of July when the levees broke or the decisions that still haunt her. Now as the Mississippi rises again, a deep wound threatens to reopen, and Laura must decide if running away once more might be the best way to save herself. (Source)

FLOOD is multi-layered in the stories it tells. First, there is the story of Laura's homecoming, but underneath is the backstory of why she left in the first place. Both of those stories involve the annual flooding that happens in Hannibal. The flooding is almost another character, and has a major impact on the story and its characters. There is also the layer of Mark Twain's connection with Hannibal and how the town has been shaped by the influence of him and his books.

Genres:

• Women's Fiction
• Literary Fiction
• Coming of Age

What I enjoyed:

• The story of Laura's return to Hannibal. Having grown up in a small town, I resonated with so many of her experiences in going home.
• The interspersed chapters about Mark Twain. I learned things I never knew before about the author and the area of Hannibal.
• Related to that, I enjoyed the secondary story of Laura's best friend's son's involvement in the annual Tom and Becky contest.
• Laura's relationships, their complexities, and the way they evolve throughout the story.

Quotes:

• "Water was what people talked about, worried over, and watched. Upstream and downstream, levees busted by force and by sabotage. Barges were stuck for months and the trains stopped running."
• "It doesn't matter how long I'm gone; Hannibal is home. And when you don't have another place to go, your roots run deeper."
• "Going to town and a trip to Walmart is an event. Half your social life happens in the parking lot. You see at least a cousin, a long-lost friend, and a lot of high school acquaintances every visit. There are only three degrees of separation between you and every other customer, sometimes fewer."

Where you can find Melissa online:
Website: http://www.melissascholesyoung.com/
Facebook: @melissascholesyoung
Twitter: @mscholesyoung
Instagram: melissascholesyoung
Amazon Author Page: Melissa Scholes Young
GoodReads: Melissa Scholes Young

Author Bio:

Source

I was born and raised in Hannibal, Missouri, Mark Twain's beloved​ boyhood home. I've lived a lot of places since I left, but Hannibal is still my hometown.

My writing has been published in the Atlantic, Washington Post, Poets & Writers, Narrative, Ploughshares, and other literary journals. I'm a Contributing Editor at Fiction Writers Review and Editor of an anthology of D.C. Women Writers, Grace in Darkness.

I write now from Washington, D.C. where I teach College Writing and Creative Writing at American University. My debut novel, FLOOD, is available from Center Street/ Hachette. I live in Maryland with my husband, kids, and a chocolate labrador named Huckleberry Finn. (Source)

To hear the interview with Melissa please click here.

Fade Out and Deadly Misfire by Laurie Fagen

Episode 78 of the GSMC Book Review Podcast features an interview with Laurie Fagen. Laurie is the author of the Behind the Mic series, as well as being a contributor to the Tawnee Mountain Mysteries. Laurie has led quite the interesting life (just take a peek at her bio below) and is now channeling her experiences into writing. She was such fun to talk to; I hope you'll enjoy the interview and check out her books!

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A young radio reporter, Lisa Powers, covers the crime beat for her Chandler, AZ station. She helps the police department solve cold cases, and for fun, she writes and produces a mystery theatre podcast.

In Fade Out, book #1 in the “Behind the Mic Mysteries,” Lisa investigates the arson death of a prominent socialite, but finds herself threatened by a woman with a deadly knife; she helps a bereaved family look for a missing man; and in her “Murder in the Air Mystery Theatre” podcast, the “Frightful Fun House” isn’t so fun anymore when a young couple gets trapped inside with a dead body. (Source)

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KWLF-FM crime reporter Lisa Powers’ boss sends her to a radio news conference in New Jersey, in the dead of winter, and far away from her beloved crime beat in Arizona. She goes to the Tawnee Mountain Resort begrudgingly, afraid she’s going to miss a big story.

But at the convention, where she is up for an excellence in reporting award, an unknown stalker torments her for several days. When she takes the stage to learn the winner, the stalker antes up the stakes – with deadly force. (Source)

Lisa is a crime reporter, helps the police department solve cold cases, and writes and performs a mystery podcast. You might say she has a singular focus when it comes to her interests. This focus, though, makes her very good at her job and very effective at her work helping with the cold cases. She's young and a little over-eager sometimes, which gets her into situations she probably could avoid if she wasn't such a go-getter.

I read, and Laurie and I talked about, the 2 books described above, but there is also a prequel and a 2nd book in the Behind the Mic series. Deadly Misfire is part of the Tawnee Mountain Mysteries, so can probably be read as a stand-alone novella, but it does fit into Lisa's story as part of the series, and comes chronologically after the second book.

Genres:

• Mystery
• Thriller
• Suspense

What I enjoyed:

• The layers of mystery. Each book in the Behind the Mic series is 3 stories in one with the main story, a cold case, and the podcast. Deadly Misfire doesn't have a cold case since Lisa in New Jersey at a conference, but does still have a mystery and the podcast episodes.
• Related to the first point, it's amazing how much Laurie fits into a novel that's only a little over 200 pages. The writing is fast paced and the action draws you in immediately.
• Lisa's relationships. She's a workaholic and not always great with interactions, but she is loving and loyal and I'm interested to see how she and those relationships evolves as the series goes on.
• Another author's take on the Tawnee Mountain Resort. I find the concept of this collection truly interesting and have really liked seeing how each author puts his or her own spin on the location and characters.

Quotes:

• "I can't quite explain the gut instincts or hunches that tend to pop into my head. Sometimes I dismiss them, but most of the time they turn out to be pretty accurate." -Fade Out
• "Also in the [evidence] box is a long skinny plastic bag containing strips of traditional silver duct tape...Do today's criminals ever get caught using purple or zebra-striped duct tapes on the market today?" -Fade Out
• "My co-worker, Dean - dare I call him my boyfriend - is always trying to get me to take some time off to see parts of Arizona where I've not been, but with little success...he talks me into a weekend in Sedona, which I admit was beautiful, but how long can you sit around and gaze at red rocks? Adrenaline junkie that I am, I know I need a lot more stimulation, and shopping for crystals just doesn't cut it." -Deadly Misfire

Where you can find Laurie online:
Website: http://www.readlauriefagen.com
Facebook: @ReadLaurieFagen
Twitter: @LaurieFagen
Amazon Author Page: Laurie Fagen
GoodReads: Laurie Fagen

Author Bio:

Source

Laurie Fagen is a long-time “writer by habit,” who has written for commercial and cable television, commercial radio, corporate video, magazines, newspapers and is now delving into the world of crime fiction.

While she was getting her bachelor’s degree in radio and television at Arizona State University, she worked for KTAR Newsradio in Phoenix, providing live traffic reports from a single-engine aircraft above the city. After graduation, she worked as an assistant producer with Preston Westmoreland, booking guests for his talk show, while continuing to report on Valley traffic.

Television called, and Fagen returned to her home state of Iowa to work as a reporter/photographer for KWWL-TV, an NBC affiliate in Waterloo. She initially covered the state capital, then later landed the crime beat, covering the Waterloo Police Department, Black Hawk County Sheriff’s Department and Courts. She was also an anchor and editor in addition to her reporting and videographer duties.

Remembering why she left Iowa in the first place, Fagen returned to the Valley of the Sun to work for the City of Phoenix Public Information Office. Finding a video camera in another department, she lead the city’s efforts in creating internal employee training and other video programs, and later founded The Phoenix Channel, the City’s government access cable television station. She created, wrote, produced and anchored a number of the shows that still exist today, discovering that there is life after television news.

Fagen started her first business, Word Painting, as a writer, producer and director for corporate video, which led to a 13-year career providing marketing, sales, training, informational and other types of video programming for businesses. She also wrote magazine articles, a Fiesta Bowl parade script, murder mystery plays, two documentaries and other projects that included for KAET-TV, KPNX-TV, Phoenix Suns, Educational Management Group, Randy Murray Productions, and more. She was an adjunct professor at Scottsdale Community College, teaching a corporate video class.

She started her second business, Fagen Designs, as a fiber and jewelry artist, just before she and her late husband, Geoffrey Hancock, purchased a community newspaper in Southern Chandler. The couple published the Ocotillo News, which was later renamed SanTan Sun News, for 13 years. Under their ownership, the paper grew from 16-20 pages with a circulation of about 7,000 to an average of 80 pages twice a month with more than 38,000 printed.

At the same time she was overseeing the news division for the SanTan Sun News, she and a business partner operated a contemporary art gallery in downtown Chandler, AZ, called Art on Boston, for three years. The gallery also had studio spaces for artists to work in and provided art classes, until the economic downturn of 2010, but she continues to promote fine art and fine artists on her Art Online AZ Facebook page.  She is also a jazz singer around the Valley as Laurie Fagen & Friends.

Fagen and Hancock continued the newspaper operation until Hancock’s death in 2013, at which point she sold the paper to a local publishing company.

Organizations she has been involved with include three chapters of Women in Communications, and she was president of the Phoenix chapter; she was co-founder of the former Arizona Film, Theatre & Television, which later merged with two other similar groups to become Arizona Production Association, of which she was the second president; Arizona Quilters Guild, where she handled publicity duties; and she was the 2014 president of Sisters in Crime Desert Sleuths chapter in Phoenix.

Fagen has short stories published in the past three Desert Sleuths’ anthologies, and is an Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine honorable mention winner.

Fagen has published Fade Out, the first in a series of crime fiction novels with a young radio reporter protagonist who covers the crime beat, helps police solve cold cases and for fun, writes and produces a mystery theatre podcast. It’s available in e-book, print and audiobook. Book #2 in the series, Dead Air, is available in e-book, print and audiobook. Equalizer, a prequel novella to Fade Out, is also now available in ebook only. Fagen is writing book #3, Bleeder,  as well as Deadly Misfire,  part of a multi-author series called “Tawnee Mountain Mysteries,” to be released in spring 2018. (Source)

Do you love mysteries, cold cases, and podcasts? Would you like to read Fade Out? Perfect, because we have a giveaway! Laurie has been kind enough to provide a paperback, an e-book, and an audiobook of Fade Out and one of them could be yours! All you have to do is go to either our Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram pages and comment on the post with Laurie's interview. It's as simple as that: just comment on Episode 78 on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram (and indicate which format you would like), and you'll automatically be entered to win Fade Out! The last day to enter is May 12th and winners will be announced on May 14th.

To hear the interview with Laurie please click here.

Sunday Rewind: Waypoint Kangaroo and Kangaroo, Too by Curtis C. Chen

In June of last year I interviewed Curtis C. Chen on Episode 20 of the GSMC Book Review Podcast. Curtis is the author of a series of science fiction books about a character named Kangaroo. Well, Kangaroo is his code name, we as readers haven't yet learned his given name. Kangaroo is a spy with an unexpected ability.  The 2 books that are currently out are Waypoint Kangaroo and Kangaroo, Too.

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Kangaroo isn't your typical spy. Sure, he has extensive agency training, access to bleeding-edge technology, and a ready supply of quips and retorts. But what sets him apart is the pocket: a portal that opens into an empty, seemingly infinite, parallel universe. Kangaroo is the only person in the world who can use the pocket, and he's pretty sure his agency only keeps him around to exploit this superpower for their own purposes.

After he bungles yet another mission, Kangaroo gets sent away on a mandatory "vacation." While trying to make the most of his exile aboard an interplanetary cruise to Mars, two passengers are found dead, and Kangaroo risks blowing his cover to investigate. However, it turns out he's not the only spy on the ship—and he's just starting to realize that there is a massive conspiracy to unravel.

Now, when a hijacker takes over the ship and threatens to crash it into Mars, Kangaroo has to stop the disaster which would shatter the delicate peace that's existed between Earth and Mars ever since the brutal Martian Independence War. A new conflict could devastate the entire Solar System. Billions of lives are at stake and it's up to Kangaroo, and Kangaroo alone, to save them.

Weren't vacations supposed to be relaxing? (Source)

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On the way home from his latest mission, secret agent Kangaroo's spacecraft is wrecked by a rogue mining robot. The agency tracks the bot back to the Moon, where a retired asteroid miner—code named "Clementine"—might have information about who's behind the sabotage.

Clementine will only deal with Jessica Chu, Kangaroo's personal physician and a former military doctor once deployed in the asteroid belt. Kangaroo accompanies Jessica as a courier, smuggling Clementine's payment of solid gold in the pocket universe that only he can use.

What should be a simple infiltration is hindered by the nearly one million tourists celebrating the anniversary of the first Moon landing. And before Kangaroo and Jessica can make contact, Lunar authorities arrest Jessica for the murder of a local worker.

Jessica won't explain why she met the victim in secret and erased security footage that could exonerate her. To make things worse, a sudden terror attack puts the whole Moon under lockdown. Now Kangaroo alone has to get Clementine to talk, clear Jessica's name, and stop a crooked scheme which threatens to ruin approximately one million vacations.

But old secrets are buried on the Moon, and digging up the past will make Kangaroo's future very complicated... (Source)

As the first book description says, Kangaroo isn't your typical spy. The pocket aside (and that's atypical enough), he's not the smooth, always together, one-step-ahead-of-the-game type of agent that is often portrayed, but he's also not that character's counterpart of the bumbling, never-knows-what-they're-doing character, either. He's both of those and neither. He's what I would imagine a lot of agents would be like: skilled, intelligent, a little headstrong and stubborn, and human. He makes some questionable choices, occasionally leaps before he looks, but also has a very ingrained sense of values, and his own strong code of ethics. He also has a huge advantage with the pocket. A. because it gives him the ability to store things he might need on missions, and B. because he's the only one who has it, making him invaluable to the agency.

Genres:

• Science Fiction
• Mystery
• Thriller/Suspense

What I enjoyed:

• There is a lot more to Kangaroo than meets the eye, and we've only scratched the surface of his backstory in these two books. I'm looking forward to more of his adventures and finding out more about him.
• The books are set in a not-too-distant, but unspecified future. Curtis creates a world that is at once recognizable, fantastic, and yet still believable.
• These books made me appreciate science fiction. I've always loved watching science fiction, but have had trouble reading it because I felt too bogged down in the complicated science parts. Curtis manages to find the balance between explaining that science while still making it enjoyable and understandable for those of us for whom science might not be our best subject.
• The books are fun and funny. Serious things are happening, but Kangaroo has a snarky, cynical sense of humor perfectly suited to the situations he finds himself in.

Quotes:

• "But it’s not the guns that really put me wise to Fakey Impostorov. I can also see into his body, and simple checkpoint guards don’t have an unmistakable spiderweb of ground-to-orbit comsat antenna surgically implanted in their left shoulder. If this guy’s not a field agent for a national intelligence outfit—a spy like me—I’ll eat my shoe. And shoes taste terrible. Trust me, I know. Long story." -Waypoint Kangaroo
• "I’m Kangaroo because I have a universe-sized secret pouch. I call it “the pocket” because I named it when I was ten years old; Science Division calls it a “hyperspace shunt” because they don’t know any better than I do how it works or why I have this ability. They’ve been testing me for more than a decade, and we’re still no closer to any real answers.
  My code name is KANGAROO. That’s the only name I have within the agency. Not because my face resembles a large marsupial mammal, or because I used to be an Olympic hurdling champion—though I have, oddly enough, used both of those ploys in bars to get through some sticky social situations. Well, I tried, anyway. They are both apparently too ridiculous for anyone to believe." - Kangaroo, Too

Where you can find Curtis online:
Website: https://curtiscchen.com/
Blog: http://hotsheet.snout.org/
Facebook: @curtis.c.chen
Twitter: @Curtis.C.Chen
Instagram: sparckl
Amazon Author Page: Curtis C. Chen
GoodReads: Curtis C. Chen
BookBub: @CurtisCChen

AuthorBio:

Source

Once a Silicon Valley software engineer, Curtis C. Chen now writes fiction and runs puzzle games near Portland, Oregon. His debut novel Waypoint Kangaroo is a science fiction thriller about a superpowered spy facing his toughest mission yet: vacation. The sequel, Kangaroo Too, lands our hero on the Moon to confront long-buried secrets. (Source)

To hear the interview with Curtis, please click here.