L.S. Hawker's Blog, page 5
April 20, 2016
April 8, 2016
Finalist in the ITW Thriller Awards
THE DROWNING GAME is a finalist in the International Thriller Writers 2016 Thriller Awards in the Best First Novel category. The winners will be announced at the ThrillerFest awards banquet at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City on July 9.
February 12, 2016
The Denver Broncos and Watching Grown Men Cry
I’ve never seen so many grown men cry in one place in my life and probably never will again.
It was New Year’s Day, 1978, at Denver’s old Mile High Stadium. I was in the north stands with my family, like every home game, but that day was different. That day, the Broncos won their first AFC Championship. And grown men cried.
The Broncos have just won Super Bowl 50, and I’ll bet not a few fans cried (I was one of them). We’d waited nearly two decades for another Super Bowl win, and we finally got it with Peyton Manning at the helm and a defense that hearkens back to the 1977 Orange Crush. As a matter of fact, at the beginning of the season, my friend John, a bitter, long-suffering KC Chiefs fan, mentioned that Manning was beginning to remind him of Craig Morton. John used to joke that they had to wheel Morton out on to the field on a dolly for every game.
In so many ways, this season has been reminiscent of that golden Cinderella Broncos season of 1977, but with a better ending. I’m so grateful to our team for bringing the Vince Lombardi trophy back to its rightful home. I’m grateful that one of the all-time great quarterbacks, Peyton Manning, gets to go out on top where he belongs. I’m grateful to the best defense in the NFL. I’m grateful, most of all, that the Broncos have reminded me of the great life lessons of 1977.
That 1977 Cinderella season started off dubiously—with Red Miller, the Broncos’ brand-new, untested coach, and Craig Morton, a broken-down, has-been, ancient (34 was considered old in those days) quarterback. But as we did every year, we hoped for great things, even though we’d experienced only three winning seasons in the Broncos’ 18-year history.
The first inkling we fans had that the ’77 Broncos were something special came on October 13, 1977, when the Broncos beat the Oakland Raiders in Oakland for the first time ever. We were so gobsmacked by this that my family drove straight out to Denver’s old Stapleton Airport after the game to welcome the team home.
You could never get away with that today, of course. We lined the concourse right up to the jetway door, waiting for the team plane. It was sweaty and loud in there, and we fans were as delirious with happiness as the team members, who debarked the plane and giddily doled out hugs and handshakes, posed for Kodak photos, and accepted gifts and heartfelt congratulations.
One moment sticks out, though. Our family tailgated before each home game with the Gray family outside the stadium, and the Grays accompanied us to the airport. Their oldest son, Jerry, was twelve at the time, and he had recently gone to a player signing event at a car dealership in town. Legendary linebacker Tom Jackson, one of the funniest (as well as most talented) men to ever play the game exited the plane. (That Oakland game was the one where Tom trotted to the Raiders’ sideline and said to coach John Madden, “It’s all over, fat man! It’s all over!” He also regularly called Madden “The Egg.”) As Jackson burst through the plane door, Jerry seized his hand. “Hey, Tom!” Jerry said. “Remember me? I got your autograph at Sill-Terhar Ford!”
And what did TJ say? “Aw, hell, kid. All you whities look alike to me!” Then he crushed Jerry in an ecstatic bear hug.
The Raiders beat us at home just two weeks later, and it would be one of only two losses—the second to the Cowboys in Dallas. With each succeeding win, we grew more anxious and hopeful. Was it possible? We just couldn’t picture what it would look like to play in The Big Game.
Even before this big season, my family were devoted Broncomaniacs. These were the times of my family’s life, and we have a giant box full of Bronco memorabilia—everything from ticket stubs (that year, our seats were $12 apiece), banners, programs, shirts, autographs. My dad belonged to the Denver Bronco Quarterback Club, we went to training camp every year, and we counted the days until pre-season started. We wore orange every Sunday and memorized all the players’ names and numbers. I can still remember the ’77 roster today.
We approached the playoffs with the best record in the AFC at 12-2, with home-field advantage. Our first opponent was the Pittsburgh Steelers, who were at their peak, and we got to play them on Christmas Eve. What I remember best from that game was Mean Joe Greene’s epic frustration. He was so frustrated, in fact, that he was ejected from the game for punching first our center, Mike Montler, and then our opposing guard Paul Howard so hard that he crumpled to the field. We were able to see it from clear up at the top of the north stands.
Christmas came early that year when we won decisively, 34-21.
One week later, on New Year’s Day, 1978, we played in the AFC Championship. It was freezing but sunny that day, and we all told each other it was enough just to get this far. If we didn’t make it to the Super Bowl, at least we got to see the playoffs at home. But as we faced our arch-rivals, the evil Oakland Raiders, it soon became clear that it was all happening.
The old Mile High was one of the loudest stadiums ever, and was designated the biggest home-field advantage in the NFL at one time. We
rocked that place, never more so than on that day. When fans stomped their feet, the old steel structure swayed and bounced, and players could feel it down on the field. But after the clock ticked down to zero on January 1, 1978, and the final score was Denver 20, Oakland 17, there was a beat of absolute silence.
That silence was pure disbelief. We’d been the Rodney Dangerfields of pro football nearly from the first-ever AFL kickoff (the Broncos vs the Patriots at Boston University’s Nickerson Field)—the Broncos’ comical vertically striped socks, the city’s reputation as a cowtown, being part of the bastard-son AFL all dogged us for nearly two decades. So no one was more surprised that we were actually going to the Super Bowl than the fans.
And that beat of stunned silence said more than all the cheers that followed it.
It was the first time in my life that I felt that I belonged to something greater than myself, my family, my little world. That 75,000 people could all agree on one thing at the same moment, could celebrate and rejoice and revel in victory together. As corny as it sounds, that moment cracked open the universe and proved to me that hopes could be realized and that absolutely anything was possible.
Up at the top of the world, the north stands of Mile High Stadium, my family watched as the fans poured onto the field and ripped down the goalposts. My brother, sister, and I watched enviously, and finally Mom and Dad told us we could go down onto the field. It was like being told we could enter and loot the Forbidden City.
The three of us ran down five levels and threaded our way through the throng, sharing many hugs and handshakes, smiles and tears, laughter and joy with our massive extended family. We made our way toward the center of the field. There lay the NFL logo, painted on the turf. Lori, Rob, and I kicked up part of the “N.” We carried it out of the stadium, took it home, and planted it in our backyard.
For my family, that piece of turf came to symbolize the endurance of hope.
Like the Broncos, the darkest of times came for my family just a few years later, and also like our team, they stayed for a long, long time. The Broncos went on to lose more Super Bowls than any other team in NFL history. But thanks to that moment of victory and the stolen sod, we could all look back and cling to those feelings, that unity, that joy. When the darkness came, we could go outside and run our fingers through our little piece of sports and family history, and still believe that anything was possible. We could remember that even in the worst of times, hope endures.
Because years after that, the sun came out again, both for my family and for the Broncos. And that sun shone bright last Sunday, when the Broncos, in spite of past failures and against the odds, won their third Super Bowl.
January 25, 2016
January 12, 2016
Devil’s Playground
Summary
Sixteen-year-old Elizabeth Winters may be a witch, but she doesn’t know the first thing about magic.
Her father, a wizard himself, has forbidden the use of her powers for her own protection. But when accusations of witchcraft start flying through Salem Village, Elizabeth wishes she was more prepared.
Despite her lack of magical knowledge, Elizabeth appoints herself to save innocent women from the untimely demise the village has in store for them. Elizabeth finds, however, that she is not the hero Salem needs her to be. When Elizabeth is betrayed by someone she trusts, she loses control of her emotions and unintentionally curses the village with the ten plagues of Egypt. Now, Elizabeth must figure out how to break the curse before the morning of the tenth plague—the plague of death.
If she fails, Salem will cease to exist.
Author Heather Eagar
Q &A
Q: How did you come up with the idea for Devil’s Playground ?
A: It was actually my husband’s idea! Years ago when I was working on a different novel he said, “Hey, why don’t you do a story about an actual witch who lives in Salem during the witch trials.” I thought it was the best idea EVER and took it from there. It has become quite a different story than either of us envisioned, but so much better.
Q: Do you use actual people from the trials in your story?
A: Yes, I do! My main characters are mostly fictional, but I use actual people from the trials as supporting characters, and also some of quotes from the trials as well.
Q: Is Devil’s Playground a part of a series, or is it just one book?
A: I always intended for it to be just one book. Even as I was submitting it to agents and publishers, I didn’t want there to be a sequel. But with some invaluable feedback, my whole ending changed. And with that change, it seemed pretty clear that there was more to Elizabeth’s story. So…that was a long answer to say, it is the first book in a series. Because I never intended for there to be another book, I am still in the rough draft stage for book #2.
Excerpt
There, amongst the yellow kernels, the corner of a large book peeks through the grain. Instead of rushing up to Mother, for she certainly needs the corn by now, I drop the bag on an old bench. Dust explodes in my face, and I use my sleeve to stifle an expected sneeze. Shaking my head, I reach into the corn and pull out a large, leather-bound book.
“What are you doing buried down here amongst our harvest?” I murmur, running my fingers down the thick spine. At first glance it doesn’t look like much; the cover has no title and no design. The only thing that makes the book remotely interesting is the iron clasp sealing it shut—only the clasp isn’t secure. It rests, slightly ajar, and with a gentle prodding, it falls open.
My fingers tremble as I nudge the book open. It all feels wrong somehow, me alone with this mysterious book. The pages seem ancient, so much so that I am afraid to turn them, certain they will crumble away. Studying the first page, I am in awe at the beautiful penmanship. If I didn’t know any better, I would say the letters are swirling, changing, before my eyes.
But that is impossible.
After staring at the page for a moment or two, I am surprised when the letters take form, and I am able to decipher several words. Kempe’s Magisches Buch für Hexerei und Zauberei. It is in German, but I have a feeling I know what kind of book this is.
“No, that is impossible,” I whisper, stepping back. “Father would never have kept such a thing.”
And yet, he has.
I ought to hide the book away—and never look at it again. Something like this can only bring trouble. Even I know that. But an invisible force draws me close once more, and I don’t have the power to resist. Even if I did have the power, I don’t have the desire. I must know what is in that book.
Gently turning to a page at random, I stare at the strange writing. As with the cover page, the letters continue to swirl, and I wait for them to arrange themselves. Unsichtbarkeit, it finally reads in bold letters. “I wish I knew German.”
And then the letters begin to change and rearrange. When they have settled once more, I am astonished at what is in front of me. Invisibility, it says. Four lines follow the title, though, and I can’t understand a word of it. It isn’t German, and certainly not English.
“Lumen transeat per me,” I sound out. My toes begin to tingle. I try not to become too excited; it could have been a coincidence. “Ut non alii videre.” The tingling sensation moves from the toes and up my legs. Blood rushes to my head, and I feel faint, but I don’t want to stop. “Lumen—”
“What is the meaning of this?” a deep voice thunders. Before I have time to react, the book is snatched from my hands, and I am looking into the furious face of Father.
December 3, 2015
Eerie Release
So excited for my friend C.M. McCoy on the release of her fabulous novel Eerie. Info below!
Eerie
by C.M. McCoy
Release Date: 15 Dec 2015
Omnific Publishing with distribution through Simon & Schuster
Summary:
Being a ParaScience freshman is a nightmare come true
Hailey’s dreams have always been, well…vivid. As in monsters from her nightmares follow her into her waking life vivid. When her big sister goes missing, eighteen-year-old Hailey finds the only thing keeping her safe from a murderous 3,000-year old beast is an equally terrifying creature who’s fallen “madly” in love with her. Competing to win her affection, the Dream Creature, Asher, lures her to the one place that offers safety—a ParaScience university in Alaska he calls home. There, she studies the science of the supernatural and must learn to live with a roommate from Hell, survive a tunneling earworm, extract a carnivorous splinter, evade the campus poltergeists, and hope the only creature who can save her from an evil immortal doesn’t decide to kill her himself.
Watch the awesome book trailer
Ear ly praise for EERIE:
“5 stars! I felt there was a mash-up between Hogwarts, Xavier Institute for Exceptional Youngsters, and Beauty and the Beast, AND I LOVED IT! The creatures, the classes, the college, the Middle of Nowhere! How awesome!”
– Truth About Books by A. Fae on EERIE
“I would definitely buy this series. I really loved these characters. It read very quickly, and the Alaska jokes really got me giggling.
– Confessions of a Book Whore, Jamie S. on EERIE
“EERIE is Harry Potter meets Twilight meets the Bible with a little bit of the abusive/controlling 50 Shades male mixed in. This is a really fast-paced, exciting novel. There is plenty of drama, romance, mystical beings and mystery to keep you flipping the pages and promising yourself “just one more chapter” before bed. And then before you know it, ten o’clock turns into two in the morning…again.”
– Amanda’s Own Little Corner Book Reviews
About C.M. McCoy: C.M. McCoy is an Irish dancer and former Air Force officer living in the Great White North. Though B.S.’d in Chemical Engineering and German, she’s far happier writing stories involving Alaska and a body bag (with an awkward kiss in the mix.) While working emergency dispatch for Alaska State Troopers, she learned to speak in 10-codes, which she still does…but only to annoy her family.
Social Media Links
✔ Pre-order EERIE for $2.99
RAFFLECOPTER $50 Gift Card Giveaway (December 3-31)
Here’s an excerpt for your reading enjoyment
A Guarded Girl
“Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness.”
Bertrand Russell
Hailey stared at the empty can on her tray, silently willing the caffeine to kick in. The last thing she needed was to fall asleep, dream of monsters, and have an “episode” in front of her 200 closest non-friends.
No way she’d let that happen.
Now if only her droopy eyelids would cooperate, because the hard plastic chair under her butt sure wasn’t. The dang thing was teasing her and feeling mighty comfy, like a puffy armchair, and she was sinking fast. Thankfully, though, just as her head bobbed, the bell rang, jolting her into a wide-eyed, full-body spasm.
Great. Real smooth, she thought, rubbing her face with both hands as a few gigglers shuffled past.
She groaned, rising with all the enthusiasm of a mushroom, not at all looking forward to another two hours inside the social torture chamber, or as everyone else referred to it, South Side High School.
She was so intent on avoiding the students there for the rest of her senior year that she rarely looked up from her books anymore, and those last two hours dragged. When three o’clock finally rolled around, she bolted outside, took the first open seat on the bus, rested her head against the window, and let it bounce there. She was just about to make it through another day of school very happily unnoticed, when Tage Adams smacked her on the back of the head.
“Ah!” she yelled, startled from sleep.
The bus was waiting at their stop, like normal, and Tage was waiting for her in the aisle, politely—not normal.
Tucking a wayward strand behind her ear, she hurried off the bus.
Tage followed.
“What’s up with you today?” he said nonchalantly, adjusting his pace to walk next to her.
He’d never done that before.
“Nothing,” Hailey said, surprised Tage was talking to her. They’d been catching the bus at the same stop for four years, and he’d never so much as looked at her.
“You’re usually not like that, that’s all.”
“Like what?”
“Nodding off in class, falling asleep on the bus…you know, slacking off. It’s just, you know, you usually have your nose in a book.”
He watches me?
“Oh,” she said, unsure.
“Guess you were working late last night…St. Paddy’s Day…”
“Yeah.” Of course she was working late. Her family owned the most popular Irish pub in Pittsburgh. Hailey pressed her lips together. Small talk was not her thing. Especially not with him.
Her mind went blank.
Searching the pavement for a thought, she chewed her lip as too many seconds stretched the silence. Finally the pressure forced her good sense aside and she opened her mouth to say…anything.
“What’s—”
“Well, see ya ‘round, Dancing Queen.”
She snapped her mouth shut and waved as he peeled off and trotted down Bridge Street. She tried to form the word, “bye,” but all that came out was “buh—”. Standing dumbfounded, she stared after him. She hadn’t realized Tage knew she existed, let alone the fact that she waitressed. And danced.
Stunned, Hailey walked, then jogged, then stopped dead to puzzle over what had just happened. Then she jogged again until she finally reached the pub.
Nobody at that school “chatted” with Hailey. Not since the fourth grade, not since the day a particularly mean girl concocted a particularly ugly rumor—that Hailey had started the fire that killed her parents. The whispers and sideways glances lasted close to a year, and in trying to defend herself, Hailey only made things worse. By the time she figured out that nobody else believed in pyromaniac-nightmare-monsters, it was too late. She’d already earned the label, “weirdo,” which, unfortunately, stuck.
Here’s a teaser
Nowhere to Hide
“Judge of your natural character by what you do in your dreams.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
Hailey plunked her head on the desk and groaned. Why, why…why couldn’t she just tell Asher that she wanted out, that she was afraid—afraid of the others, afraid of dying, and even afraid of…of him. After all, he was planning to kill her. Only temporarily, but still.
She couldn’t believe she was even considering it, but she had no choice. If Asher didn’t kill her, one of the others would.
Permanently.
And Asher protected her. He cared about her. He loved her, right? Asher—an emotionless creature. Hailey wasn’t sure if he was even capable of love.
Oh, this made absolutely no sense. Kill her to save her? Was that love?
Freshman year at her dream college was turning into nightmare, and as she rolled her forehead on the desk, the library’s impossibly large ceiling clock echoed a thump with her heart. She simply had to pull on her big girl pants and tell Asher she was done.
That’s all.
She squeezed her eyes shut as a swarm of butterflies took flight in her stomach.
Lately, she felt an awful lot like Jekyll and Hyde: logical, rational ParaScience student by day—emotional monstrosity at night. Come to think of it, this was more like The Phantom of the Opera, and she was the naïve student who didn’t realize the secret and strange angel she’d come to know was actually a homicidal maniac…
“I’m not a maniac.”
Hailey jumped up. She didn’t mean to say that out loud.
Asher slid behind her, putting his lips next to her ear. “But I suppose I am homicidal,” he whispered, his breath on her skin sending goose bumps down her arms and legs.
She leaned into him and sighed.
So much for steadfast resolve.
Wrapping his arms around her waist, he pulled her closer.
“How did you know I was here?” she whispered.
“You were dreaming, Hailey,” he murmured. “I’ll always find you when you’re dreaming.”
November 25, 2015
Goodreads Giveaway
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Goodreads Book Giveaway
The Drowning Game
by LS Hawker
Enter to win one of ten signed paperbacks!
Giveaway ends 12/24/15.
See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.
Enter Giveaway
October 29, 2015
September 11, 2015
The Power of the Purse
An interviewer recently posed this question to me: Do you have a signature accessory, color, fragrance, phrase, or meal?
Which caused my inner twelve-year-old boy to roll his eyes (What kinda girlie question is that?) and decide that the question required an asshole answer, like
If you consider bourbon-water-rocks a meal, then YES, I DO.
But upon further review, I realized I do kind of have a signature thang, or used to, anyway. (So I tied the little monster up and banished him to the basement so I could tell you about it.)
As it turns out, I’ve always carried kind of…weird purses. Maybe this is because the adolescent male who runs my brain part-time hates carrying a purse and therefore has the final word on handbag styles.
In high school, I had a clutch that resembled a rolled-up magazine (Playgirl, that bizarre ’70s answer to Playboy Magazine) with a half-nekkid man and blissful-looking woman lying next to him on the cover. You can imagine the kind of attention my clutch attracted, which came to an end when it began to disintegrate at the end of junior year, being constructed partially from an actual paper magazine cover. The Playgirl purse passed into history, much like articles with titles like CIRCUMCISION FOR WOMEN: The Kindest Cut of All, which was one of the WTF headlines on the cover of that particular issue. I mean, were they actually advocating genital mutilation?
In college I went through a gigantic-purse phase so I could carry around all the accoutrements of a pre-hipster writer wannabe: a miniature tape recorder, a notebook and assortment of pens, a pack or two of cigarettes, a lighter. My favorite enormous one was black, big enough to fit a ten-gallon aquarium in it, made of sturdy strips of cloth in different textures sewn into an Escheresque pattern.
One weekend I traveled from Lawrence to Manhattan to visit my K-State friend Marianne. We went to our favorite club, the Avalon Ballroom, to hear Glow, one of our favorite Kansas City-based bands. After much dancing and imbibing, I took a dance break and happily swayed to Glow’s note-perfect rendition of “Let Me Roll it” by Paul McCartney and Wings, drink in hand, smoking a Marlboro Light 100. Out of nowhere, this guy runs up, wrestles my purse away from me, drops it to the ground, and empties my bourbon and water on it. As you can imagine, I was not happy. I started to scream at him when he held my purse up and showed me the smoking, smoldering hole the size of a tambourine in it. So I bought him a drink, because he saved me from not-so-spontaneous combustion. I wore a lot of hairspray in those days.
Years later, as a subversive suburban mom, I carried a purse constructed from a Colorado license plate (not mine). The ends were made from metal center hubcaps, the strap was tire rubber, and a bottle cap made up the hasp. It was always a great conversation starter, but I had to stop carrying it when my daughters reached a certain age. Along about the time they turned three, they were at the perfect height to experience the over-the-shoulder battering-ram effect. When one of them walked at my side, that purse would smash into the back of her head and knock her to the ground.
The metallic tube turned out to be an effective assault deterrent. Once potential assailants witnessed the Power of the Purse, and heard the solid, substantial-sounding thunk of it bashing into my kids’ skulls, they ran the other way. Don’t worry—there were no concussions, but it was painful nonetheless. For me, I mean, having to give up that purse for a period of time.
Finally, there are my electric guitar purses. The smaller one depicts Elvis in his heyday before the peanut-butter-and-bacon sandwiches kicked in that I purchased in Vegas. The larger came from Walt Disney World and is emblazoned with the Aerosmith Rock ’n Roller Coaster logo.
These days, I carry the smallest possible purse with just enough room for credit cards and my driver’s license. My former self would be bitterly disappointed, but the junior-high-school basement-monster boy in me is overjoyed.
