Edward Hoornaert's Blog, page 12

Maybe she should just walk away #mfrwhooks

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I’m switching to a different book today. Yay! (Even though I couldn’t hear your shouts of joy, I’m sure you’re wildly excited. Right?)

Rescuing Prince Charming is set in the near future. Native Americans from an alternate Earth have ‘hopped’ their entire island kingdom to our Earth to escape environmental collapse. They’re now the most advanced nation on Earth, and they’ve graciously offered to show us how to build our first starship. Desdemona (Dusty) Johnson is a technical writer charged with documenting the mammoth undertaking so it can be duplicated in the future.

Before the ship is finished, someone phones in to say they’ve planted a time bomb in the mechanical deck. Dusty knows the unfinished prototype better than most, so she charges on board to search.

Time: Four years from tomorrow.

Place: A top-secret, underground facility on a Pacific Northwest island that doesn’t exist…yet.

Dusty Johnson really didn’t want to do this.

She took a deep breath, trying without success to dispel the dread clogging her belly. Some women daydreamed of rescuing princes from dragons. Not her.

Yet here she was, all alone, creeping through the dark guts of the half-built starship, searching for a time bomb about to explode. If the siren ordering evacuation of the research facility had summoned the expected herd of guards, she would’ve offered advice then fled with the rest of the staff. Having come this far, though, she couldn’t leave without branding herself a coward in her own eyes.

And so Dusty wove her way timidly around machinery that smelled of oil and ozone. Nothing was neat and tidy down here; in a prototype, speed and ingenuity trumped meticulous design. Everything was makeshift, a giant kludge sprawling through three-thousand cubic yards. That meant a lot of places for saboteurs to hide a bomb, but only two where technicians wouldn’t discover it in the course of a workday.

The first hiding place was a niche behind the backup life support nexus. Staring into its shadows, she paused. A heroine wouldn’t hesitate, but an ordinary, everyday woman would think twice about squeezing into a dirty cranny while wearing a new, cream-colored chambray skirt with filigree trim.

Maybe she should just walk away.

Or run.

But there was no one else around to save the ship, and reaching the stars was her life’s dream . . .

I posted a bit of this of couple weeks ago when I ‘mashed up’ the openings of the books in this series. I hope you don’t mind reading it again.

Be sure to visit the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

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Effing Feline eats garlic #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, will never understand humans. Not that I want to, mind you.

My pet human, Ed, mentioned that he’s been getting emails asking him to donate blood. In this cat’s opinion, he’s relatively sane, for a human. But why would any living creature part with its life’s blood? And what kind of monster would ask him to?

OMG. I just figured out what kind of monster! I’ll tell you after this word from my sponsor, The Saint of Quarantine Island.

After young Billy jumps off the cliff, the boat’s driver decides Janet has to haul Billy into the dinghy and row him to his floathouse. Beware a bit of bad language ahead, for Janet has already learned that the driver’s characteristic curse is bugger shit.

Billy didn’t look well, but she could do this — save a life. She’d never come close to doing such a thing, although when she’d donated blood she liked to think she was saving someone. This was different, though. Real and immediate, wooden-oar-pressing-flesh real. She, Janet Davis, was saving someone’s life.

The supply boat had drifted away from the dinghy, but the driver still watched them.

 “What’s your name?” she asked him as she rowed. Her voice was a hollow, empty whisper — some trick of the water and the cliff, no doubt. Either that or fear. Remember me, she wanted to add but didn’t.

 And a few more:

 “Oh, bugger shit, lady.”

Tears came to Janet’s eyes, but she kept rowing. “I wonder what the ‘O’ stands for,” she said to herself. “Omar? Ozymandias?”

And she smiled.

Effing Feline here again. The monster that’s been emailing Ed asking for a blood donation must be a VAMPIRE! They’re real, real! Quick, everybody, chew four cloves of garlic!

Be sure to visit the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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The Saint of Quarantine Island

[image error]Maybe you’ve read about viruses that turn people into zombies. But how about a virus that turns people into madmen, some of whom become creative geniuses?

Spurred by her husband’s infidelity and haunted by abandoned aspirations, a suburban housewife smuggles herself into a wilderness quarantine. By catching the disease, she hopes to write a book that’ll redeem her empty life — and maybe, just maybe, she’ll find love with the man they call the Saint of Gilford Island. She’d once spent a memorable though oddly chaste night with him. Surely he’ll help her build a new life.

But exile on an island of madmen is crueler than any suburban daydream. Instead of a quiet writing retreat, she finds pirates who steal everything but the clothes on her back … an arrogant Cambridge scientist who wants to whisk her away to the London of an alternate Earth … a troubled Indian boy who becomes a surrogate son … a licentious cult leader who kidnaps her.

They’re all periodically insane then sane and back again – and so will she be, if she catches the Fireworks virus. Is writing a book really worth such a risk?

What about true love?

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Effing Feline holds his nose #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, am holding my nose. That’s because I’m about to write about an unpleasant subject, one that I’ve avoided for months and months. Namely, the other animal in this house — Twiggles the Dog.

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I’ll try not to make fun of her, because poor Twiggles not only has no tail (!) she’s getting old (!!). Notice all the grey hair? That proves she old, old, old — unlike young, vigorous me. Nyah nyah nyah, Twiggles has no tail!

Oops. I said I wouldn’t do that. My bad.

Back to The Saint of Quarantine Island. After young Billy jumps off the cliff, the boat’s driver decides Janet has to haul Billy into the dinghy and row him to his floathouse.

Realizing she’d stopped pulling the rope, she resumed hauling the boy in. He was almost to the dinghy, thanks as much to his swimming as to her efforts.

“It’ll be okay, Billy,” the driver called. “I brought a mom to take care of you.”

“What!” Janet dropped the rope then scrambled to pick it up again. “What did you say?”

The driver grinned at her. “Bye, lady.”

Fingers appeared over the side of the dinghy, followed by a hand and a wet, half-drowned head covered in matted hair so long it almost looked like a beast’s.

And a few more:

Janet took his hand and pulled, but he didn’t need much help. He hauled himself into the dinghy with an efficiency that spoke of practice. He shook himself like a dog, splattering her with frigid seawater, then lay on his side, coughing. Billy Seaweed smelled briny, like his name.

Effing Feline here again. You know, folks, I really hate that Ed has opposable thumbs for opening cans. It means I have to do what he wants (sometimes).

Right now he wants me to point out that Twiggles is a schnauzer/poodle mix, or schnoodle (what a ridiculous name!). She gets the grey from her schnauzer ancestors, not because she’s old. He also says Twiggles is younger than I am, but I’m not going to tell you that.

Uh . . . oops again!

Be sure to visit the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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The Saint of Quarantine Island



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A Mishmash #mfrwhooks

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I’m feeling contrary today, so I’m going to mix things up today. Instead of continuing with snippets from my sci fi rom, Alien Contact for Kid Sisters, I’m going to take a paragraph from the beginning of each of the six books in the Alien Contact for Idiots series and see what we end up with.

A crash from the living room shocked Ell Harmon out of a nightmare. She jerked to a sitting position and peered wildly around her dark bedroom. The window rattled and the bed swayed as though a flock of cats were parading across a waterbed. But Ell had no cats. Ditto waterbed. (Alien Contact for Idiots)

Chief? Quinn Lebatarde’s lips tightened at the insult, but almost immediately, he grinned. The tourist’s clothes shouted money to burn, as did his Rolex watch and expensive digital SLR camera. And so Quinn pocketed the money but held onto the cheap, plaster replica of an ancient Kwadran woodcarving the man and his wife were buying. (Alien Contact for Kid Sisters)

One moment I didn’t exist and never had existed and then, blink, I stood in a clearing, fully dressed, well-armed, and impatient to tackle my Destiny. Like a magnet seeking north, I strode toward Destiny, downhill and to my left—baby’s first step—and tripped. Rising slowly, I stretched my arms out for balance against the world’s unexpected hazards. (Newborn)

And so Dusty wove her way timidly around machinery that smelled of oil and ozone. Nothing was neat and tidy down here; in a prototype, speed and ingenuity trumped meticulous design. Everything was makeshift, a giant kludge sprawling through three-thousand cubic yards. That meant a lot of places for saboteurs to hide a bomb, but only two where technicians wouldn’t discover it in the course of a workday. (Rescuing Prince Charming)

He hadn’t spoken during the forty minute climb through a dense yet sickly evergreen forest with so many dead needles it was sometimes like slogging through loose sand. She’d been meaning to state her terms for at least thirty-nine of those minutes, ever since they’d started up this mountain. But exertion and his fierce silence had robbed her of words. (Alien Contact for Runaway Moms)

A gust of wind, arctic gods laughing at her, turned her coat into a sail; she held onto both cat and coat with difficulty. “I gave my half of the rent money to Deidre every month,” she told the cat. “How was I to know she was keeping it for a one-way flight back to Perth?” (Alien Contact for a Christmas Nutcracker)

There you have it. I dare you to make an intelligent comment about this mishmash!

Be sure to visit the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

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Effing Feline does his taxes #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, am working on my taxes, and it’s horrible. Why should I, a cat, have to pay income tax? Just because I work for Ed as a blogger? That hardly seems fair.

Ed says I won’t have to pay anything more, and might get a refund, so oh boy, I’m hard at work. I’ll let you know the size of my refund after this message from my sponsor, The Saint of Quarantine Island .

The boat reaches Echo Bay soon after young Billy jumps off the cliff. While dumping her belongings on the supply raft, the boat’s driver realizes the jumper was Billy, who’s a fellow member of the Kwakiutl tribe. That’s pretty much the only reason the driver wants to save him; unlike Kendo Carlisle, the Saint of Gilford Island, he is not going to risk his life to help the people in quarantine.

But Janet wants to catch the virus, so he comes us with a plan.

Janet stared down at the rope in her hand then looked at the swimmer, Billy Seaweed. Surely that wasn’t his real name. “Why the dinghy?”

As the driver untied some ropes, the tiny rowboat hanging from stanchions at the stern of the gillnetter lowered until it was even with the gunwale. “You’re going to row it out there and pull Billy onto it. Then you’re going to row to his floathouse, the one at the base of the cliff, and you’re going to get those wet clothes off him and get him warm before he dies, capiche?”

Capiche? What was a Canadian Indian doing speaking Italian? “But—”

And some extra sentences:

“Get in.” The driver gestured toward the dinghy.

“But—”

“I said get in!”

He yanked her toward the fragile, swaying dinghy; she climbed in quickly, afraid he’d toss her like a sack of potatoes if she didn’t. “I don’t know how to row.”

“With your life on the line — with a kid’s life — you’ll pick it up real quick.”

[image error]Effing Feline here again, and I’m hissed! Did you know that the government’s tax refunds are in money, not catnip? That’s a revolting development!

Unfair to cats! I protest! Write your MP, congressman, or local mafia. Get them to refund everyone’s taxes in catnip!

 

If you have time after you’re done protesting, visit the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday. But only after I get my catnip, hear me!

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The Saint of Quarantine Island

Maybe you’ve read about viruses that turn people into zombies. But how about a virus that turns people into madmen, some of whom become creative geniuses?[image error]

Spurred by her husband’s infidelity and haunted by abandoned aspirations, a suburban housewife smuggles herself into a wilderness quarantine. By catching the disease, she hopes to write a book that’ll redeem her empty life — and maybe, just maybe, she’ll find love with the man they call the Saint of Gilford Island. She’d once spent a memorable though oddly chaste night with him. Surely he’ll help her build a new life.

But exile on an island of madmen is crueler than any suburban daydream. Instead of a quiet writing retreat, she finds pirates who steal everything but the clothes on her back … an arrogant Cambridge scientist who wants to whisk her away to the London of an alternate Earth … a troubled Indian boy who becomes a surrogate son … a licentious cult leader who kidnaps her.

They’re all periodically insane then sane and back again – and so will she be, if she catches the Fireworks virus. Is writing a book really worth such a risk?

What about true love?

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Their savior and protector #mfrwhooks

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In these snippets from my sci fi rom, Alien Contact for Kid Sisters, Quinn is the antihero, a petty crook and conman masquerading as a Royal Guardian. He has led Marianne Harmon, the queen’s sister, to an old, abandoned town from before his people ‘hopped’ to our Earth.

Marianne and eleven-year-old Delfina (Elfy) use one of town’s automated tailors to get clothes appropriate for their long hike. They’re speaking the Kwdran’s language, with Marianne understands . . . but not necessarily the slang. We’re in Quinn’s POV.

Elfy stamped her foot, the noise echoing off the walls of the deserted lane. “You treat me like a baby, but I’m nearly twelve. I know lots of dirty words—”

“Quiet, kid,” Quinn said.

“—and I’m going to scream every one of them if you don’t tell me—”

Quinn lunged past Marianne, brushing the front of her body in the narrow passage. He grabbed the girl, covered her mouth with his palm and—oh God—in his other hand, he held a knife.

“What are you doing?” Marianne demanded.

He tackled Elfy to the ground and knelt over her. Marianne didn’t see blood, so he hadn’t used the stiletto to silence the girl, but—

“Have you gone crazy?” Protectiveness drove all fears from Marianne’s mind as she pounded his back and head and kicked his leg. “She’s just a little girl.”

Pointing with his knife hand, he turned just as Marianne kicked toward his shoulder. Her toe got him square in the eye, instead. He fell with a thud.

And up the lane, in the direction he’d pointed, a shadow crawled out from a darkened window.

Elfy screamed. Quinn moaned and held his eye.

The shadow resolved into a featureless shape not fifty feet away, a skeletal man so hairy he looked like a beast. And Quinn, their savior and protector, lay helpless on the ground.

Be sure to visit the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

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Alien Contact for Kid Sisters

Fleeing murderous rebels, the queen’s sister finds a hero to save her.

Or is he kidnapping her, instead?

[image error]Marianne is sick of being just the kid sister of the famous queen of Kwadra Island. Although she daydreams about being a warrior, when rebels bomb the royal ball she’s shunted to one of the many tunnels that honeycomb Kwadra, where she awaits a captain of the valiant Royal Guardians.

Quinn, a scam artist fleeing the police, dons the uniform of a Royal Guardian killed by a tunnel collapse. When Marianne mistakes him for her bodyguard, Quinn can’t decide whether to save the feisty maiden, fall in love with her—or kidnap her. With bloodthirsty rebels pursuing them and a treasure map in his pocket, what will he choose?

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Dreams of travelling – Ghent

Two of my sons,  #1 and #3, are taking their first tentative steps out of lockdown. A couple of hour train ride from Amsterdam brought them from Amsterdam to the old-town section of Ghent, Belgium. Beautiful, eh?  Sigh.

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These aren’t my boys’ photos, though they promised to send me some.

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Will I ever travel to Europe again? Right now, it doesn’t feel possible, you know?

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Effing Feline’s head is empty #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, have a blank mind. I’m running out of things to write about, so I’m going to try a trick that Ed, my pet human, read about while I was keeping his lap warm. The trick to open a novel at random and plunk your finger (or paw) somewhere on the page. Whatever sentence you touch, you try to fit into your fictional character’s conversation.

It sounds crazy, I know. The idea is that humans, being an inferior species to cats, don’t stay on topic very well (unlike cats, who can concentrate singlemindedly on sleeping for hours). Inserting something random can add authenticity to fictional speech.

My superior feline version of this is to open The Saint of Quarantine Island and choose a random word. Next week I’ll riff on that word. To build your anticipation about what wisdom I’ll be imparting, I’ll tell you the word my paw selected right after this message from my sponsor.

The boat reaches Echo Bay soon after Billy jumps into it from the cliff. Janet speaks to the boat’s driver.

“Do you know the jumper?”

“Billy’s Kwakiutl, like me, and he lived on Gilford before the plague arrived. Fireworks hit Gwayasdums village real hard, so those who could, packed up and left before the island was quarantined; Billy’s the only one of us left. He’s as crazy as the worst of them when he’s soaring, and when he’s isn’t soaring he’s wild, you know? Comes from being an orphan and seeing too many people die.”

“Does he have Fireworks?”

“Yeah, I guess it comes from that, too.” He reversed the motor to stop the boat’s motion. “Let’s go.”

“Where?”

“To save the little bugger, what else?”

Effing Feline here again. And the word my paw landed on, the word I’ll discuss in dazzlingly brilliant detail next week is —

Are you sitting on the edge of your seat yet? Move to the edge, hiss it!

Here it comes. Drumroll, please —

“the”

What the heck? What can anyone say about the? Ed, this is a really lousy way of choosing a topic. I demand a recount!

Be sure to visit the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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The Saint of Quarantine Island

Maybe you’ve read about viruses that turn people into zombies. But how about a virus that turns people into madmen, some of whom become creative geniuses?

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from The Saint of Quarantine Island by Edward Hoornaert

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The Saint is released from Quarantine, day 3

The Saint of Quarantine Island

My newest science fiction romance book is sexier than most of my PG romances. Here’s an example of that — a striptease.

This scene is a flashback to the evening in Janet Davis’s hometown in suburban Los Angeles when she first met Kendo Carlisle, the so-called Saint of Gilford Island, at a charity function. Afterwards, Janet discovers that her husband has impregnated her friend. When Kendo comforted her, the distraught Janet threw up in his lap.

This is what happens next. (Fair warning: adult content lies ahead — and a surprising revelation.

Carlisle went to his hotel room, one floor above the meeting room. To clean up, Janet supposed, though he didn’t explain. When she followed without a word, he slowed to match her listless pace, tacitly inviting her company.

She might as well follow. What else was she going to do?

In the elevator, the stench of vomit humiliated her with every breath.

He got her a bottle of water from his room’s minifridge to rinse away the taste. Scotch might’ve been more appropriate. That was what Franklin would’ve offered. The innocuous bottle in her hand was more evidence this man was a saint.

[image error]While he changed in his washroom, she stood by the dresser. Why? She should apologize again then leave. He couldn’t want her around. What she’d done to him was beneath contempt, even though he hadn’t said a word of censure.

He came out wearing jeans and t-shirt with an unfamiliar First Nations design. From Canada, she supposed.

He noticed she hadn’t opened the water bottle, so he opened it for her. As she washed away the vile aftertaste, he asked if there was anything else he could do for her.

“No, thank you.”

He asked her what she was going to do. She had a hard time concentrating on his words.

“I don’t know. Kill Franklin?”

He took her seriously and protested, so she laughed. More of a choked bark, actually. She wouldn’t kill him. Seven-Published-Stories Diana, on the other hand…

“I’m fine,” she said like a little girl with well-practiced church manners. “I won’t kill anyone.” Except maybe herself.

But she wasn’t a little girl. That epithet swelled in her mind even though she was the one who’d thought it, not him.

She wore a Reformation Chamomile dress with cap sleeves and a thigh slit. It zipped down the back, and she didn’t need Carlisle’s help to unzip it. She might’ve been over the hill, but still supple enough to reach back and pull the zipper to her waist and an enticing few inches farther.

Why did she do it?

No idea. She hadn’t even realized what she was doing until her arm was tugging the zipper.

Should she stop? Rezip?

No idea.

She stood facing away from Carlisle, toward the dresser mirror. In the mirror, she watched his reaction to her unexpected move. Was that why she’d done it? To test his reaction?

His face betrayed nothing, but he was male, so he must have had something in mind when he let her come to his room, something more than just a drink of water and soothing her tears and changing his pants. But other than watching the skin revealed by the zipper, he gave no hint what the something was.

Franklin liked extravagant stripteases, the more blatant and explicit the better. She’d always been glad to oblige, glorying in her sexuality and eager to do anything to keep the marital bed hot so he wouldn’t stray.

For that reason, or more likely some other reason entirely, she gave Carlisle several seconds to study the flesh of her back, the thin strap of her bra, and the top of her half-slip. Then she waited a few seconds more. Anticipation was the soul of seduction, a truth she seemed to have been born knowing.

Finally, she turned to him.

She had his attention, certainly, but he neither said nor did anything. She pulled the cap sleeves off her arms. The dress pooled gracefully at her waist. She left it there for another few seconds before wiggling first her hands then her hips so the dress slipped to the floor. Her half-slip wasn’t new, was no longer pretty—like her, Kendo Carlisle’s lack of reaction seemed to say—so she shoved it down and off.

She’d made a mistake, though. Franklin loved to see her reach under her dress or half-slip and pull off her panties. It both promised the blatant nudity he craved and heightened his anticipation. She assumed Carlisle loved the same things.

But did he? Did all men like the same things as Franklin? God, she hoped so. Otherwise, she might as well be a virgin, ignorant of all men but one.

When she reached back to open her bra, she thought Carlisle’s eyes widened. Good. Although maybe they didn’t. She wasn’t sure.

Of anything.

Except that a striptease should be a joyful act, full of anticipation and delight that would liquefy her belly. But this one was none of that.

The uncertainty kept her from pushing the bra away from her breasts. Only when she’d turned away from her audience and looked at the wall, not the mirror, did she let the lacy scrap slide down her arms. Like most of her underwear, it was expensive and deliberately provocative, underwear meant to be removed in front of an appreciative husband.

But Carlisle wasn’t her husband.

Which meant this was wrong.

A sin.

No, it was the wages of sin. His sin. It was what the bastard deserved.

Covering her breasts with an arm, she looked over her shoulder at where Kendo sat on the bed. It was too far for him to reach out and touch, but not by much. Yet he still made no move, though the lap of his faded jeans betrayed his interest.

Why didn’t he do something, say something? Wink, even. She’d settle for a wink. Why didn’t he wink?

Because he was a saint and not just an ordinary guy the media had slapped a label onto to capture clicks and views? A real, true saint? Incorruptible?

Which made her what? Jezebel?

But she’d gone too far to back out now and besides, Jezebel was a familiar-enough role. She’d performed it with Franklin three or four times a week for seventeen years.

When she paused for half a minute, Carlisle asked if she was okay.

Instead of answering, she defiantly yanked her pantyhose and underpants down and off. The mirror’s inexorable gravity pulled her gaze like a black hole sucking everything into its orbit, but she resisted her nakedness. She knew what she looked like. She enjoyed looking at herself, usually, though sometimes lately she observed her flesh with self-conscious irony. Is this flesh, these boobs, nipples, ass, this meticulously trimmed triangle of hair…is this really the sum total of my importance to the world?

This time, though, she watched the Saint of Gilford Island, instead.

His throat bobbed. He met her gaze. Yet still he sat on the bed, visibly aroused but doing nothing about it.

That was when she knew.

Knew that this was really and truly a mistake. Worse than a mistake—it proved she was dead. Shriveled up and dead.

Janet Davis was deceased.

Or at least old. That was the same thing, wasn’t it? The beauty who could twirl any man around her little finger with a seductive smile…that woman had died of old age.

She closed her eyes. Stifled a sob. Placed her arms on the dresser and sobbed openly, until she realized bending over like that shoved her cellulite in Kendo’s face, figuratively speaking, and that wasn’t a ladylike thing to do to a saint. A person was never more vulnerable than when naked with a stranger. God up in heaven, was that ever true, especially when the man watching you, the stranger you’d met just two and a half hours ago, was fully dressed.

His silence was intolerable, yet she had no time machine to go back and un-undress. Straightening and covering her shame with her arms, she stared off toward the closed curtains. Franklin would’ve left them open for her striptease. She wouldn’t have objected. She was used to such things. It was part of who she’d become.

Maybe who she’d always been, under her rigid veneer of respectability.

The bed creaked as Carlisle rose. She still couldn’t look at him, but she could hope. Maybe she’d been wrong. Maybe the sex goddess—that was what Franklin called her, though not recently—still lived. She squeezed her eyes closed, waiting. For what?

Sex?

No.

Kindness? Reassurance?

Maybe.

Suddenly she knew.

She was waiting for the saint’s holy benediction, or curse, informing her whether she still lived or was a dead husk, empty of dreams, ideals, and tomorrows.

From behind, Saint Kendo touched her shoulders with hands hot and male and unfamiliar. She gasped.

She should turn. Smile. Run her palm over the front of his slacks. Franklin said she had magic hands.

Franklin…

She bowed her head. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

For what? For being naked? For making a mess of his pants? For being who she was? All of the above?

“Sorry…”

She’d hesitated too long. The moment for enticement had passed, closing the door on that part of her life. A sob burst from her aching chest. She bent at the waist and wrapped her arms around body, covering herself as well as possible.

The sex goddess was dead.

She was dead. She was nothing except a lifeless sex goddess, a zombie, aghast at the knowledge that the empress wore no clothes.

Then came the moment she wasn’t sure had happened. Kendo Carlisle turned her, more a suggestion with his hands than a command, until she faced him, naked and vulnerable. After a moment she glanced up.

His expression shocked her.

His jaw was square, likely from his Scottish-Canadian father, and it quivered with emotion. His dark eyes were flat and almond-shaped from his Japanese-Canadian mother…and they, too, quivered. His strong torso, despite being muscular enough to withstand the rugged life on Gilford Island, shook as though it barely had the strength to remain upright on its own. His eyes shone with unshed tears, though that was impossible. He looked more naked and vulnerable than she was.

“There’s something you should know about me.” His voice was a ghostly whisper, scarcely audible over the pounding of her heart.

She couldn’t answer. After her outlandish behavior, she no longer had the right to speak to a man such as him.

“I…” He paused. Licked his lips. Looked away from her face.

She waited. Whatever he was about to say about himself must be disgraceful. Horrible. Maybe illegal.

“I didn’t kill my wife.”

His composure crumpled. His face contorted as he let out a low moan. Shaking with silent sobs, he wrapped his arms around her, his hands hot on her bare flesh, though they remained on her back above the waist. After a long, awkward moment, she hugged him back.

Could she have heard him right? He was crying because he hadn’t killed his wife?

Had Gilford turned him insane, too?

 

The Blurb:

Spurred by her husband’s infidelity and haunted by abandoned aspirations, Janet, a suburban housewife smuggles herself into a wilderness quarantine. By catching the disease, she hopes to write a book that’ll redeem her empty life — and maybe, just maybe, find love with the man they call the Saint of Gilford Island. She’d once spent a memorable, though chaste, night with him. Surely he’ll help her build a new life.

But exile on an island of madmen is crueler than any suburban daydream. Instead of a quiet writing retreat, Janet finds pirates who steal everything but the clothes on her back … an arrogant Cambridge scientist who wants to take her to the London of an alternate Earth … a troubled Indian boy who becomes a surrogate son … a licentious cult leader who kidnaps her.

They’re all periodically insane then sane and back again – and so will she be, if she catches the Fireworks virus. Is writing a book . . . creating a legacy . . . worth such a risk?

What about true love?

[image error]In honor of release week, the special pre-sale price of $2.99. Soon, though, it will revert to full price, so don’t wait. Order it now.

Amazon  |  Canada  |  Australia  |  UK
Apple IBooks
Barnes and Noble
Kobo Books
Smashwords


And here’s Effing Feline’s 50% off coupon code for any of Ed’s books (not include The Saint of Quarantine Island) at his bookstore: NIGRZSBT1H. Isn’t he a great cat?

The Saint is released from Quarantine, day 2

The Saint of Quarantine Island

My 21st book, The Saint of Quarantine Island, was released July 1. That’s Canada Day, the country’s birthday, and choosing that day was no coincidence. This is my most Canadian novel.

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The Kingcome Queen tied up at a floathouse like Billy Seaweed’s

For those who don’t know me, I moved to Arizona over 30 years ago from a log house in the wilds of the Canadian Rockies. But with one exception (Newborn), none of my science books has a Canadian setting.

Until now. The Saint of Quarantine Island takes place on Gilford Island, where I taught in a one-room school when I was fresh out of university. We had no TV, no radio, no stores. There were no cars or roads. The only way in or out was to hitch a ride with a bush pilot in a tiny float plane.

Because there were only a dozen inhabitants of Echo Bay and Gilford is quite a large island, most of the students traveled to school on a school boat. I used the school boat, The Kingcome Queen, as the Janet Davis’s transportation onto the Gilford Island quarantine. Yes, it really existed.

If you want to learn more about Gilford, including pictures, I have a post about it here.

A snippet

This scene is from Janet Davis’s first day on Gilford Island:

Suddenly, voices sounded from the right, sending the preening seagulls screeching into the air. Janet spun around, as startled as the gulls though she kept herself from screeching.

Remembering the driver’s dire warnings, she hurried as fast as she dared on the rain-slicked walkway until she reached the corner of the house and crouched behind two rusty, greasy metal barrels. Her coat touched a barrel, leaving a dark smear. She brushed ineffectually at the stain then gave up and peeked between the barrels.

The voices were farther away than they’d sounded, so she didn’t think she’d been spotted. A small craft was rounding the cliff at the mouth of the bay. A canoe or skinny rowboat, she guessed.

“Come on, lads,” said a man standing in the bow. “Row!”

Eight paddlers strained. The craft knifed through the choppy water.

“Faster!” The man in the bow stood proudly, like a man o’ war’s figurehead, despite the cold spray that showered him with every wave. He cut an imposing figure, with brown hair cascading from under an Australian digger’s hat.

Then answering shouts arose from Janet’s left. She couldn’t see who it was because she didn’t dare emerge from her hiding place. Her colorful jacket would draw attention like a beacon, and the man in that rowboat looked awfully forbidding.

Forbidding, yet fascinating. She peeked out. His craft went straight for the raft. But why?

Her belongings!

They were thieves, intent on pillaging her belongings. She had no idea what to do about it, which made her feel worse. This sense of imminent violation-of-self was as close as she ever hoped to come to rape.

The oarsmen sprang onto the raft. A short man with wild red hair slipped and fell then fell again as he tried to rise. The thieves tossed her boxes and suitcases willy-nilly into their craft. Each throw landed on her heart like a blow.

“Please,” she whispered from her hiding place, “don’t do this.”

When shouting on the left intensified, she forgot herself enough to peek in that direction. A dozen men were piling into a pair of rowboats at the pier that jutted from the deepest part of the bay. As they rowed toward the raft, the men shook their arms and cursed the thieves. Most of their words were an angry blur, but they repeated one phrase over and over, like a chant:

“You filthy pirates!”

One of the pirates, the redhead who’d slipped, looked in her direction. Swallowing hard, she ducked and rested her head against the barrels. Had the man seen her? Her heart pounded in fear of the unknown.

With a vividness that exceeded any reality, she pictured and heard and even smelled the pirates as they abruptly shoved aside their booty in savage eagerness to seize the real prize—her. She imagined them rowing toward the floathouse, racing the men from Echo Bay—and winning, unfortunately. The huge pirate in the digger’s hat would leap from his still-moving boat to where she cowered. As he loomed over her, laughing cruelly, he held up his right arm. Where his hand should be was only a hook—long, curved and sharp. A sudden beam of sunlight somehow pierced the gloom to glint off the metal. Advancing on her, still laughing, he held up the hook. Reached toward her. Snagged the lapel of her coat then ripped it and all her other clothes away in one devastatingly powerful movement.

Then all the pirates fell on her, pummeling and beating until she was a bloody, dead carcass…

[image error]But though Janet hunkered for several minutes behind the barrels, crying quietly, she heard no outcry directed her way. Lots of shouting, yes, and thumping as her things were carelessly dropped. But nothing about her.

Her imagination was too darned powerful sometimes.

Again came a cry of pirates. Why wasn’t someone calling nine-one-one?

She pulled her cell phone from her pocket, but of course it showed NO SERVICE.

“Oh, God,” Janet whispered. Again, she rested her back against a barrel, not caring if she got dirty.

She peeked around the barrels. The Echo Bayers wouldn’t reach the raft in time to save her belongings from the pirates. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to ignore fear that made her shiver.

A gigantic laugh boomed across the water. The pirate’s laugh, surely, the huge, dramatic pirate captain in a digger’s hat. He alone was big enough for such a larger-than-life laugh. Stifling a moan, Janet searched for somewhere to run, but there was nowhere. Fear filled her mouth with salty cotton. The pirates would surely wonder where the owner of the baggage had disappeared to, and when they did—

“Got it all, lads. Now row!”

Heart pounding, Janet peered out. The pirates left the raft just before the first rowboat from Echo Bay arrived. The pirate craft shot away, a greyhound to the Echo Bayers’ dachshunds. The big man standing in the bow looked back, gave another booming laugh then made a florid, mocking bow to his pursuers.

Tears slipped from Janet’s eyes. She wished she were invisible. Wished she were home, safe, warm and dry. She couldn’t stop chewing at her lip, and her bottom was damp from sitting on these drizzle-soaked planks. Now it would be the Echo Bayers turn to wonder about and search for the owner of the baggage. What if she were to stand and call out to them? Would that be safe?

Just as she started to rise, a burst of swearing came from the raft. She ducked back down. Her head throbbed from tension, but no mere painkiller could fix what ailed her.

The Blurb:

Spurred by her husband’s infidelity and haunted by abandoned aspirations, Janet, a suburban housewife smuggles herself into a wilderness quarantine. By catching the disease, she hopes to write a book that’ll redeem her empty life — and maybe, just maybe, find love with the man they call the Saint of Gilford Island. She’d once spent a memorable, though chaste, night with him. Surely he’ll help her build a new life.

But exile on an island of madmen is crueler than any suburban daydream. Instead of a quiet writing retreat, Janet finds pirates who steal everything but the clothes on her back … an arrogant Cambridge scientist who wants to take her to the London of an alternate Earth … a troubled Indian boy who becomes a surrogate son … a licentious cult leader who kidnaps her.

They’re all periodically insane then sane and back again – and so will she be, if she catches the Fireworks virus. Is writing a book . . . creating a legacy . . . worth such a risk?

What about true love?

[image error]In honor of release week, the special pre-sale price of $2.99. Soon, though, it will revert to full price, so don’t wait. Order it now.

Amazon  |  Canada  |  Australia  |  UK
Apple IBooks
Barnes and Noble
Kobo Books
Smashwords


And here’s Effing Feline’s 50% off coupon code for any of Ed’s books (not include The Saint of Quarantine Island) at his bookstore: NIGRZSBT1H. Isn’t he a great cat?