Category: Book Brief

Book Brief: Lies I Never Told

Lies I Never Told
by Martin Crosbie
Genre: Literary Fiction/Short Stories
Word count: 19,000 words

“It’s what we do. We make our own beds. We become thirty and then forty and we divorce and re-marry and visit our children on weekends, and work at jobs we never dreamed of doing, and have too many relationships with people we don’t like, and on the outside we look like any other forty-year-old hero. We’re not though, because it never goes away. No matter how hard we try to hide it, inside we’re still seventeen, sitting at the river, looking for the girl with the brown eyes.”

In this collection of short stories, Martin Crosbie, the bestselling author of My Temporary Life, presents us with a glimpse into the rear-view mirror of life. Crosbie’s writing is quiet, so quiet that when the crash comes you suddenly realize you’ve been gripping onto the edge of your chair, living the story right along with the main character. In this intensely personal collection, he writes about relationships, sex, children, infidelities, guilt, and sometimes, the absence of guilt.

Lies I Never Told includes four new, original stories, one previously published short story, and the first chapters of his Amazon bestselling novel “My Temporary Life” and the follow-up “My Name Is Hardly”.

This book is available on Amazon.

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Book Brief: Fat Assassins

Fat Assassins
by Marita Fowler
Genre: Humor
Word Count: 85,000

Southern style sweet-potatoes Shasta and Ulyssa have stuck together through thick and thin since their escape from third grade fat camp. But on one dark day, they both find themselves unemployed. Shasta quits after being tased for an impromptu tirade over the Wal-Mart intercom and Ulyssa is shocked speechless when the boss’s wife falsely accuses her of being the other woman and demands her termination.

A hazardous job hunt sees them turn down egg harvesting, drug dealing and phone sex before they settle for an exterminator job.

Confusing mafia lingo leaves the girls thinking they’re being interviewed to cope with a rodent infestation. Confident that they can handle the job, they oversell their skills and demand half payment up front to seal the deal. Skeptical at first, the mob boss decides to hire this unlikely pair when he mistakes their attitude for professional stoicism.

The girls are shocked when presented with a target profile and an envelope full of cash. They want out, but it’s too late. The mob doesn’t allow do-overs. And certainly not when they’re whacking one of their own.

Shasta and Ulyssa leave a wake of destruction as they experiment with different assassination methods. But the clock is ticking and when the body count is still zero after multiple attempts, the boss decides to bring in additional assassins to finish the job and tie up loose ends.

And the girls just happen to be one of those loose ends.

This book is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, and iTunes. Continue reading “Book Brief: Fat Assassins”

Book Brief: My Name is Hardly

My Name Is Hardly
by Martin Crosbie
Genre: Thriller/Suspense, Literary Fiction
Word count: 73,000 words

A beautiful girl is missing, and may or may not want to be found, a soldier on his last and most dangerous mission, and a vow made to a dying friend. Northern Ireland, in 1996, was one of the most dangerous places in the world. The government called it a state of unrest, the people who lived through it called it the time of “The Troubles”.

Gerald “Hardly” McDougall is a forgotten man. He’s abused, bullied, and left behind. The only escape left is to join the British Army. At first, he’s a reluctant soldier, then everything changes when tensions in Northern Ireland escalate and the Army need a man with a particular set of characteristics. Hardly’s re-assigned and sent into the heart of the troubles, living in the same houses as the IRA soldiers he’s fighting against.

MY NAME IS HARDLY takes the reader on a twenty year journey through Hardly’s life–from the beginning, when he leaves Scotland and joins the Army, to the tragic final days when his time as a spy in Ireland has to come to an end.

Follow-up to the #1 Amazon Bestseller-MY TEMPORARY LIFE.

Please note-although this is book two of a trilogy, it is a stand-alone novel, and it’s not necessary to read the first book in the series in order to enjoy MY NAME IS HARDLY.

This book is available on Amazon. Continue reading “Book Brief: My Name is Hardly”

Book Brief: Mungai and the Goa Constrictor

Mungai and the Goa Constrictor
by Amelia E Curzon
Genre: Children’s Literature
Word count: 37,489

Mungai, a jungle creature of indeterminate origin, happily ambles through life dreaming up scandalous get-rich-quick schemes. On his travels he encounters Goa, an equally ruthless and selfish boa constrictor. Having explained to her “the usefulness of the lesser species” and his latest highly profitable plan, Mungai tempts Goa into joining him in his search for as many unsuspecting creatures as they can muster.

Very soon they meet and befriend some innocent animals of the woodland, including Bodger an amiable and easily led badger. With much flattery and tale spinning, Mungai manages to coax Bodger and his friends into joining forces with him and Goa in his latest ill-founded chicanery. So convinced are the little animals by Mungai‘s anecdotes of wealth and happiness, the gullible companions persuade multitudes of other species from the animal kingdom to come along as well.

But, before too long, the animals become suspicious. They also discover Mungai and Goa are in league with the two-legs they despise and fear so much. Dissatisfaction burgeons and rebellion becomes imminent. But, by the time Mungai finds out that those he shamelessly inveigled into his plans are not as naive as he first thought; the animals have organised and the tables have turned.

With so many kinds of animals involved, each with their own specific set of skills, and all working together, Mungai and Goa find their slothful world turned upside down, and realise they may be about to lose everything they have worked so little for.

This book is available from Amazon US and Amazon UK. Paperback available from CreateSpace.

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