Rod Lindsey's Blog, page 6

Oh Sinnerman, where you gonna run to?Sinnerman, where y...

Oh Sinnerman, where you gonna run to?
Sinnerman, where you gonna run to?
Where you gonna run to?
All on that day


Well I run to the rock, please hide me
I run to the rock, please hide me
I run to the rock, please hide me, Lord
All on that day


But the rock cried out, I can't hide you
The rock cried out, I can't hide you
The rock cried out, I ain't gonna hide you guy
All on that day


 Sinnerman (American Traditional) from Skyshooter


Speak up! I'm a little deaf in that ear...or, is it both ...

Speak up! I'm a little deaf in that ear...or, is it both ears?  

Ezra Hooten A Character Study by Rod Lindsey   Ezra Hooten and Donna Messenger were a perfect fit for each other.  Not the same – far from it – but a perfect fit nonetheless.  They’d been friends since grade school.  Their mothers were friends through the Pleasanton Assembly of God church, both choir members.  Then there was the Bayside PTA, Pine Point Garden Club, and the list goes on, making it inevitable Ezra and Donna would see a good deal of each other.  By the time they got to middle school they were inseparable.              Ezra became Hoot the summer after seventh grade thanks to Donna.  He took her sailing in the brand-new/secondhand fourteen-foot dinghy his father gave him for his birthday that year, just the two of them on a windward tack up the coast a couple miles and then back, Donna sitting close at the tiller and helping him with the sheets.              “This is a real hoot,” she told him, ducking the boom and snuggling in closer against the chilly breeze.  “In fact…you’re a real hoot, Ezra Hooten.”  She gave him a kiss on the cheek, said, “Hoot Hooten…I’m going to call you that from now on.  Hoot – the boy more fun to be with than anyone else I know.”             “Best friends?” Hoot said.  “How ‘bout boyfriend and girlfriend?”             “Forever,” Donna agreed with a long, soft kiss – on the lips this time.              She allowed him to slide his hand underneath her sweatshirt and touch her puffies on the return leg of the trip, a priceless memory.  Donna had no breasts, yet, only puffy promises of things still to come turning stiff at the touch of Hoot’s cold fingers.  It was all the adolescent sex either of them needed at the time.  Enough to keep Hoot’s bedclothes a mess the rest of that summer and well on to Christmas.              Norman Carpenter started school with Hoot and Donna three weeks later. 

Welcome Comments From A Rabid Fan! Pam Stack14 hours...

Welcome Comments From A Rabid Fan! 
Pam Stack14 hours ago I'm reading "Troubleshooter" by Rod Lindsey. This is such a taut, well written thriller and character study that I am scared about what will happen next. I'm excited about it. But I'm freaked out by it. Lindsey has done something that not many authors can do: I've had dreams and nightmares about this story; I'm afraid of what will happen to my 2 characters; I'm anxious to see it unfold but can only peek with one eye open - he's managed to make me think about his story when I'm not reading it. He's managed to make me become invested in the story. It's pretty incredible reading and although I'm not done yet, I highly recommend that you go out and get yourself a copy. It's freaking PERFECT.

Pam Stack It's so good that I can't stop thinking about it. It's not a scary book - it's so well written that the clash between to protagonist and antagonist is going to be monumental. So worth reading... THAT'S what a book should do - GRAB you by the shirt and shake you up. make you WANT to finish but, it should nag you, pull you in, seduce you with the story. This absolutely has me. 100%.   This one is a winner.

The road to La Push followed the Quillayute River west f...

The road to La Push followed the Quillayute River west from Forks, crossing the fast-moving water’s cold and snakelike path several times through hills forested with both old and new growth, red cedar and fir, cottonwoods along the riverbank.  They passed a well-kept campground resort with a large sign out front proclaiming they were crossing the Treaty Line, beyond which vampires were not allowed.  “Twilighters,” Chief Ellis said, explaining the sign.  “Those Stephanie Meyer novels and movies about vampires and werewolves and high school kids all take place around Forks.  Ever read ‘em?” “I’m afraid not,” Hoot answered, giving a moment’s reflection to Maddie and her Romance novels.  Maddie would know about the Forks/Twilight connection. “I’ve read em.  In fact, I’d wager just about everybody ‘round here who can read has read em.  Goofy, sexy stories.  The tourism from it is a big deal around Forks.  People here were kinda desperate t’ grab onto something after the logging died out.  A one-stoplight town – and did you know our high school is brand new?  Mostly built with onlineenrollment money.  Students from all over wanna graduate from Forks High…” 

Angela, Going Home by Rod Lindsey No on...

  Angela, Going Home by
Rod Lindsey
 
No one else was awake while Angela nursed her second cup of coffee, thinking.  It was early morning.  Still dark.  She sat in the dimly-lit kitchen at a wobbly table near the back door, a castaway on an island of thought in a sea of scuffed black-and-white linoleum – population one.  Angela pondered her circumstances with a furrowed brow, feeling tormented about what to do next, wondering for the hundredth time if what she was doing was worth the effort.  If it would make any difference.  If it even mattered to anyone but her.
          She had awakened from the clutches of fitful sleep nearly an hour ago, aching and disoriented and shaking off dark dreams.  She was anxious, vexed with the irrepressible feeling that she had to hurry.  There were things that needed to be done, set straight.  She couldn’t turn back, now.  It was too late.Worried about her kids, Angela called her sister-in-law in Seattle.  Got the answering machine – too early! – and hung up without leaving a message.  She proceeded to have a good hiccuppy cry and then told herself to get over it, knowing the kids were as well-cared-for as possible under the circumstances.She asked herself; And how is that knowledge supposed to make it better?  Make me miss them less…make them miss their mother less?Maybe Angela’s anxiety was simply a matter of ordinary grief jerking at her heartstrings.  After all, it was only last month when Daddy died…Only last month – the end of her father’s life and she had not been at his bedside to say goodbye.  To say I’m sorry.She had always assumed that reconciliation between herself and her father would occur in some vague, far-off future.  That she would be there in the end and there would be time to talk.  But there wasn’t time.  She wasn’t there and now it was too late.  That was a cold fact, one of those unpleasant reality bites that inevitably come with little or no warning.  She had missed the funeral, too.  Another unpleasant bite. Angela, with Les’ dogged help, had determined that the cost of airfare to return to the Midwest on short notice was beyond their means, the close-to-the-bone budget they lived on.  She swore to Les she didn’t blame him for that.  But it was a lie: she sure as hell did blame him.  Who else?  And now she was heading home anyhow – because and in spite of it all.  She was just taking something of a circuitous route.Maybe what she was doing was a last-ditch slap at Les, an elaborate stop-taking-me-for-granted gesture. Maybe it was the sudden and painful growth of a backbone. Or only a silly girl’s walk on the wild side. These were easy notions for Angela to stomach, this level of egocentric self-flagellation. Much better than the idea that she may be guilty of inflicting grief on everyone she knew for nothing but her own vanity. Her foolishness. Her selfishness. Les deserved a good slap, after all. Whereas she… Angela plunged her hand into a bag of Celtic Runes she’d found on Liz’s bookcase, loving the cool touch of the porcelain tiles, mixing them up. She drew a single tile for guidance and drew Kano, the Rune of Opening, portending seriousness, clear intent, and concentration. 
           That’s just great, she thought…clear intent? – I’ve never had clear intent my entire life that I’m aware of. Making concise and meaningful plans was not something Angela accomplished easily. Maybe this was because she’d never really had to, Daddy always there to point the way until Les came along and replaced him. Now Daddy was gone and Les was…incapable.            Making meaningful plans required looking into the future. And projecting herself into the future had always been a frightening concept to Angela, so daunting sometimes that she ended-up feeling like a hunkered down rabbit. The result was that she kept her ambitions close and humble. Plenty of times while growing up – and screwing up – constantly afraid of making bad choices, she’d thought that she actually liked that hunkered-down feeling. Believed that it kept her safe.  But those days were over. Now it was time to stick her nose out and sniff.  She put away the Runes, lit a cigarette, and dialed a different number.

Dark in Spokane Washington and not so dark in Joplin Missouri where it was two hours earlier and the sun rose a bit higher on the horizon. The call to Nikki was cold, the phone spitting out words that were stiff and brittle.
          “It’s me, Sis.” Angela said.
          “Oh my God…Angie! Where are you?”
          “I’m okay. I’m safe.”
          There was a pause. The last two words seemed to have temporarily got lost in a fiber-optic vacuum somewhere before falling out at the other end.
          “The Tukwila police called here,” Nikki finally replied in a flat tone. “Said you were missing.”
          “Already?” Les evidently reacted quicker and with more urgency than Angela had thought he would. She wondered if it even occurred to him to call his long-detested sister, guessing the kids might be there. “I’m not missing. I’m AWOL,” she said.
          “But, where are you? Are you okay?”
          “Don’t worry. I’m fine. Don’t bother to star sixty-nine me – I’m in Spokane Washington and I’ll be leaving here soon. If the Tukwila police call back just tell them I’m somewhere in the middle of America.”
            Another pause. More words getting lost. Then; “God, Angie…Don’t you know Les and your kids are worried to death!”
          “What about the kids? Has Les called?”  Angela imagined the question beaming like a Star Trek laser from Spokane some twenty-two thousand miles into space where it bounced off a satellite in geostationary orbit, journeying back to earth in Joplin where it was twenty-eight degrees, windy, and snowing, words arriving frigid and numb from the journey.
          “No. Just the police,” Nikki finally answered.
          “If Les had a brain he would have called his sister – or you – before he called the police. I swear the man could turn an ordinary zit into skin cancer without a second thought.”
          “They only said you went missing. Without the kids. Said they’re okay.”
          “There you go, then. And please don’t try to make me feel worse about the kids than I already do. I’m sure they’re fine. Les’s sister will see to it.”
            “Are you coming home?”
            “You mean to Joplin?”
           “Uh huh.”
            “Yeah. I suppose I am.”
            Shorter pause. Words finding their way now. “When?”
            “How are Kenny and Mom?”
            “’Bout the same,” Nikki answered, sighing. “We’re all sad about Daddy. Worried about you.”
            “Try to loosen up some, Sis,” Angela said. “You don’t need to be so tight. Everything will work out.” 
            “Okay. Sure,” Nikki answered. “When are you coming?”
            It occurred to Angela that she knew little-to-nothing of her sister’s life the past nine years – even less of her mother’s – and hadn’t really missed the knowledge until she got word of Daddy’s death. No amount of catching up could possibly find what was lost after she dropped out of high school with only three months to go and ran off with Les to become a wife and mother. She had already missed her father’s passing. Missed his funeral. Missed the whole last decade of her family’s history – so what was the urgency?
            “Might be a while.”
            “Please make it soon. Be here by Christmas?”
            “See ya, Sis.”
            “Goodbye, Angie.”
            Angie. She hadn’t been called that in a very long time. Angie…her sister’s voice already fading from her memory, the name sounding odd, part of a whole world that had shattered, the pieces falling away so fast it made her dizzy. Did she really need to hold on to the few bits she still possessed? 
            What did she need?  She wasn’t sure. All she knew was that it felt like there was a big empty place deep inside her where a stranger lurked – an altogether new her waiting to take up residence in the void – and she could feel that hollowness making a buzzing noise inside her, sounding like the dead telephone receiver buzzing in her ear. 
            Yes, it was a hollowness that needed filling before the stranger took over. 
            But not today.

Another Good Review at Wise Grey OwlThank you, WGO! ...

Another Good Review at Wise Grey OwlThank you, WGO! Mary Firmin 22/09/2012 06:37Very Good Story, Very Well Written, Definitely Recommend, Very Well EditedTROUBLESHOOTER
By
Rod Lindsey

Five Stars
Troubleshooter is a buddy movie gone awry. Way Awry! These two men began as boyhood friends, bonding in the sweat lodges of a Shaman. They continue to remain friends throughout the Vietnam War where they were Special Ops warriors. But after the war, they take totally different life paths and end up with a wild desire to kill each other. Their relationship is not helped when one steals the other’s girlfriend. Federal Marshall Ezra Hooten, nicknamed Troublshooter because of his accuracy with a gun, and Norman Carpenter, a psychotic killer, known as Creeper, for his ability to creep up on the enemy undetected, have been tracking each other for years. Enter Angela Hunter who decides to leave her home, husband and two kids to become a reluctant stripper. Her life is soon entangled with the seamy characters in this gritty, sexy story which takes place in the magnificent North West. I love this book and I think it is extremely well written. It is filled with believable and exciting characters that act totally different from what you expect. Mr. Lindsey has put a surprise on every page and I highly recommend it to action loving readers who thrive on a good thriller.
Mary Firmin, author Deadly Pleasures

Another 5-star Amazon Review A witty steamy ri...

Another 5-star Amazon Review   A witty steamy ride. August 19, 2012 - by Readymadered Outlaws, lawmen in pursuit and hot women, everything a good detective novel has and more! The steamy, damp and sometime seedy location coupled with the authors' wordsmithery makes for a vivid adventure that can't be put down. The story is developed through the keen characters personal narratives that is engaging and a great ride.  - My sincere thanks to Readymadered...I'm pleased you liked it!