Hank Garner's Blog, page 22
July 3, 2019
Author Stories Podcast Episode 669 | Lauren Kate Interview
Today’s author interview guests is Lauren Kate, author of The Orphan’s Song.
[image error] The historical adult debut novel by # 1 New York Times bestselling author Lauren Kate, The Orphan’s Song is a sweeping love story about family and music–and the secrets each hold–that follows the intertwined fates of two Venetian orphans.
“A tangled knot of betrayal and love, lies and redemption. Marvelous.” –Fiona Davis, author of The Address
A song brought them together.
A secret will tear them apart.
Venice, 1736. When fate brings Violetta and Mino together on the roof of the Hospital of the Incurables, they form a connection that will change their lives forever. Both are orphans at the Incurables, dreaming of escape. But when the resident Maestro notices Violetta’s voice, she is selected for the Incurables’ world famous coro, and must sign an oath never to sing beyond its church doors.
After a declaration of love ends in heartbreak, Mino flees the Incurables in search of his family. Known as the “city of masks,” Venice is full of secrets, and Mino is certain one will lead to his long-lost mother. Without him, the walls close in on Violetta and she begins a dangerous and forbidden nightlife, hoping her voice can secure her freedom. But neither finds what they are looking for, until a haunting memory Violetta has suppressed since childhood leads them to a shocking confrontation.
Vibrant with the glamour and beauty of Venice at its zenith, The Orphan’s Song takes us on a breathtaking journey of passion, heartbreak, and betrayal before it crescendos to an unforgettable ending, a celebration of the enduring nature and transformative power of love.
Lauren Kate is the #1 New York Times and internationally bestselling author of nine novels for young adults, including Fallen, which was made into a major motion picture by Sony. Her books have been translated into more than thirty languages and have sold more than ten million copies worldwide. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, daughter Matilda, and son Venice (named after the city where The Orphan’s Song is set).
July 2, 2019
Author Stories Podcast Episode 668 | David Bell Returns To Talk About Layover
David Bell returns today to talk about his new thriller Layover.
[image error] In this high concept psychological suspense novel from the USA Today bestselling author of Somebody’s Daughter, a chance meeting with a woman in an airport sends a man on a pulse-pounding quest for the truth.
Joshua Fields takes the same flights every week for work, his life a series of departures and arrivals, hotels and airports. During yet another layover, he meets Morgan, a beautiful stranger with whom he feels an immediate connection. When it’s time for their respective flights, Morgan kisses Joshua passionately, lamenting that they’ll never see each other again.
As soon as Morgan disappears in the crowd, Joshua is shocked to see her face on a nearby TV. The reason: Morgan is a missing person.
What follows is a whirlwind, fast-paced journey filled with lies, deceit, and secrets as Joshua tries to discover why Morgan has vanished from her own life. Every time he thinks one mystery is solved, another rears its head—and his worst enemy might be his own assumptions about those around him.
David Bell is a bestselling and award-winning author whose work has been translated into multiple foreign languages. He’s currently an associate professor of English at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Kentucky, where he directs the MFA program. He received an MA in creative writing from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and a PhD in American literature and creative writing from the University of Cincinnati. His previous novels are Bring Her Home, Since She Went Away, Somebody I Used to Know, The Forgotten Girl, Never Come Back, The Hiding Place, and Cemetery Girl.
July 1, 2019
Author Stories Podcast Episode 667 | Rick Partlow Interview
Today’s author interview guest is Rick Partlow, author of the Wholesale Slaughter series.
[image error]A king can’t defeat an army of lawless pirates. But a mercenary can.
Logan Conner is the son of a king, the heir to the largest of the five star-dominions, and the best mech pilot in the galaxy. His people are plagued by pirates and raiders, surrounded by enemies, and not even his father can fight them all.
Logan gives up his position, his rank, even his name, and becomes Jonathan Slaughter, leader of a rough-and-ready band of mercenary mech-jocks, bent on taking the battle to the enemy on their own terms.
They’re Wholesale Slaughter. Kicking ass is what they do.
Get book one in this thrilling and unpredictable Military Sci-Fi Adventure Today!
Also available on Audible, narrated by the award-winning Marc Vietor.
Rick Partlow is that rarest of species, a native Floridian. Born in Tampa, he attended Florida Southern College and graduated with a degree in History and a commission in the US Army as an Infantry officer.
His lifelong love of science fiction began with Have Space Suit—Will Travel and the other Heinlein juveniles and traveled through Clifford Simak, Asimov, Clarke and on to William Gibson, Walter Jon Williams and Peter F Hamilton. And somewhere, submerged in the worlds of others, Rick began to create his own worlds.
He has written 25 books in seven different series, and his short stories have been included in ten different anthologies.
He is currently working on a series for Aethon books, a six-volume military SF saga about a mercenary unit called Wholesale Slaughter. The first two books are out now and the next two will be out this summer.
He lives in central Florida with his wife, two children and a willful mutt of a dog. Besides writing and reading science fiction and fantasy, he enjoys outdoor photography, hiking and camping.
Author Stories Podcast Episode 666 | Ellen LaCorte Interview
Today’s author interview guest is Ellen Lacorte who joins me today to talk about her new book The Perfect Fraud.
In this propulsive debut thriller, two women with deep secrets are thrown together by an unexpected meeting that plunges both their lives into chaos. But it’s a sick little girl whose fate hangs in the balance.
Motherhood is tough. But then, so is daughterhood. When we first meet Claire, she’s living in Sedona, Arizona with her boyfriend Cal and ducking calls from her mother. Her mom is a world class psychic on the East Coast and Claire doesn’t want her to discover the truth. Claire works in the family business and calls herself a psychic, but she doesn’t really have “the gift” and hasn’t for a long time. She’s a fraud.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, Rena, a young mother, has family issues of her own. She’s divorced and her four-year-old daughter, Stephanie, suffers from mysterious, seemingly incurable stomach problems. No matter how many specialists Rena drags her to, no matter how many mommy-blog posts she makes about her child’s health issues, trying to get help and support from her online community, Stephanie only gets sicker.
When Claire and Rena meet by chance on an airplane, their carefully constructed lives begin to explode. Can these two women help each other and can they help Stephanie before it’s too late?
Ellen LaCorte worked for many years in HR. She now writes full time from her home where she lives with her husband in Titusville, New Jersey. They have two grown sons.
June 28, 2019
Author Stories Podcast Episode 665 | Sadie Jones Interview
Today’s author interview guest is Sadie Jones, author of The Snakes.
The award-winning, bestselling author of The Uninvited Guests and The Outcast returns with a bold, brilliant, and beautiful novel, unflinching in its gaze, which holds the reader in its tense grip from start to unforgettable finish.
“I wonder if it hurts them to shed their skins,” she said. She didn’t feel afraid standing in the darkness, imagining snakes, even with the smell of death in the air.”
Recently married, psychologist Bea and Dan, a mixed-race artist, rent out their tiny flat to escape London for a few precious months. Driving through France they visit Bea’s dropout brother Alex at the hotel he runs in Burgundy. Disturbingly, they find him all alone and the ramshackle hotel deserted, apart from the nest of snakes in the attic.
When Alex and Bea’s parents make a surprise visit, Dan can’t understand why Bea is so appalled, or why she’s never wanted him to know them; Liv and Griff Adamson are charming, and rich. They are the richest people he has ever met. Maybe Bea’s ashamed of him, or maybe she regrets the secrets she’s been keeping.
Tragedy strikes suddenly, brutally, and in its aftermath the family is stripped back to its heart, and then its rotten core, and even Bea with all her strength and goodness can’t escape.
A chilling page-turner and impossible to put down, The Snakes is Sadie Jones at her best: breathtakingly powerful, brilliantly incisive, and utterly devastating.
Sadie Jones is the author of four novels, including The Outcast, winner of the Costa First Novel Award in Great Britain and a finalist for the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize/Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction; Small Wars; and the bestselling The Uninvited Guests.
https://youtu.be/W5pdech_g5A
June 27, 2019
Author Stories Podcast Episode 664 | Louise Candlish Interview
Today’s author interview guest is Louise Candlish, author of Those People.
[image error] From the author of the international bestseller Our House, a new novel of twisty domestic suspense asks, “Could you hate your neighbor enough to plot to kill him?”
Lowland Way is the suburban dream. The houses are beautiful, the neighbors get along, and the kids play together on weekends.
But when Darren and Jodie move into the house on the corner, they donʼt follow the rules. They blast music at all hours, begin an unsightly renovation, and run a used-car business from their yard. It doesn’t take long for an all-out war to start brewing.
Then, early one Saturday, a horrific death shocks the street. As police search for witnesses, accusations start flying—and everyone has something to hide.
Sunday Times bestselling author Louise Candlish was born in Hexham, Northumberland, and grew up in the Midlands town of Northampton. She studied English at University College London and worked as an illustrated books editor and copywriter before writing fiction. She is the author of twelve novels, including the thriller Our House, winner of the British Book Awards 2019 Crime & Thriller Book of the Year and a #1 bestseller in paperback, ebook and audiobook.
Those People follows in hardback in June 2019.
Louise lives in Herne Hill in South London with her husband and teenage daughter. Besides books, the things she likes best are: coffee; TV; cats and dogs (equally); salted caramel; France (especially the Ile de Re); Italy (especially Sicily); tennis; Vanity Fair magazine; ‘Book at Bedtime’; lasagne; heavy metal; ‘The Archers’; driving towards the sea (but not into it); anything at the Royal Opera House; white wine; Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (or, failing that, a Starbar); using parentheses, semi-colons, and Oxford commas.
Author photo by Jonny Ring
June 26, 2019
Author Stories Podcast Episode 663 | David Bruns and J. R. Olson Return With Rules Of Engagment
Today I am joined by David Bruns and J. R. Olson, The Two Navy Guys, who have a fantastic new pulse pounding thriller called Rules Of Engagement.
[image error]“In Rules of Engagement, David Bruns and J. R. Olson deliver a captivating and utterly authentic portrayal of modern day combat that compares with the best of the timeless classics by Tom Clancy, Dale Brown, and Stephen Coonts. This one must not be missed!” ―Mark Greaney, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Mission Critical
A terrorist breach of the computer systems of the three most powerful navies is about to set them on a collision course for World War III.
Rafiq Roshed is one of the most wanted men in the world. A terrorist with a virulent grudge against the West, he’s disappeared into North Korea where he quietly launches cyber sneak attacks in service of Kim Jong-un. But now he’s about to unleash his virtual masterpiece―a computer virus that, once inserted into the command systems of a military, not only takes over, but also learns the art of war. First penetrating the Chinese, he has their war machine launch a series of attacks on the U.S. Pacific forces.
Don Riley, head of U.S. Cyber Command, discovers that not only have the Chinese lost control of their military, but the same virus has infected the American network. It’s only a matter of time before the U.S. loses control of its own military. His secret weapon in this war is a trio of supremely talented midshipmen from the U.S. Naval Academy, who uncover the infiltration, and are working to track down the elusive terrorist.
But time is running out. China and Japan have lost control of their military and the U.S. is in danger of doing the same. The weapons are hot and the result is an ever-larger real-world conflict where casualties continue to mount. The only remaining hope is to find and stop the attack at its source―before time runs out.
David Bruns and J. R. Olson
DAVID BRUNS was an officer in the submarine force, before leaving the Navy for corporate life. He lives in Shakopee, Minnesota.
J. R. OLSON spent more than 20 years in the Navy, retiring as a commander. He now teaches college courses in Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism. He lives in Webster, Minnesota.
Both Bruns and Olson are graduates of U.S. Naval Academy. Together, they are the authors of the WMD (Weapons of Mass Deception) Files series.
DAVID BRUNS is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and was an officer in the submarine force, before leaving the Navy for corporate life. He lives in Shakopee, Minnesota.
With J. R. Olson, Bruns is the author of the WMD (Weapons of Mass Deception) Files series.
J. R. OLSON spent more than 20 years in the Navy, retiring as a commander. He now teaches college courses in Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism. He lives in Webster, Minnesota.
With David Bruns, Olson is the author of the WMD (Weapons of Mass Deception) Files series.
June 25, 2019
The Author Stories Podcast Episode 662 | Season Butler Interview
Today’s author interview guest is Season Butler, author of Cygnet: A Novel.
[image error]An utterly original coming-of-age tale, marked by wrenching humor and staggering charisma, about a young woman resisting the savagery of adulthood in a community of the elderly rejecting the promise of youth.
“Cygnet is a beautiful book, a meander through the fluid anxiety of youth, an observation of fixed imperfections of age, and a longing search for compassion on the journey between.” —Uzodinma Iweala, author of Speak No Evil and Beasts of No Nation
“It’s too hot for most of the clothes I packed to come here, when I thought this would only be for a week or two. My mother kissed me with those purple-brown lips of hers and said, we’ll be back, hold tight.”
The seventeen-year-old Kid doesn’t know where her parents are. They left her with her grandmother Lolly, promising to return soon. That was months ago. Now Lolly is dead and the Kid is alone, stranded ten miles off the coast of New Hampshire on tiny Swan Island. Unable to reach her parents and with no other relatives to turn to, she works for a neighbor, airbrushing the past by digitally retouching family photos and movies to earn enough money to survive.
Surrounded by the vast ocean, the Kid’s temporary home is no ordinary vacation retreat. The island is populated by an idiosyncratic group of the elderly who call themselves Wrinklies. They have left behind the youth-obsessed mainland—“the Bad Place”—to create their own alternative community, one where only the elderly are welcome. The adolescent’s presence on their island oasis unnerves the Wrinklies, turning some downright hostile. They don’t care if she has nowhere to go;they just want her gone. She is a reminder of all they’ve left behind and are determined to forget.
But the Kid isn’t the only problem threatening the insular community. Swan Island is eroding into the rising sea, threatening the Wrinklies’ very existence there. The Kid’s own house edges closer to the seaside cliffs each day. To find a way forward, she must come to terms with the realities of her life, the inevitability of loss, and an unknown future that is hers alone to embrace.
Season Butler makes her literary debut with an ambitious work of bold imagination. Tough and tender, compassionate and ferocious, understated and provocative, Cygnet is a meditation on death and life, past and future, aging and youth, memory and forgetting, that explores what it means to find acceptance—of things gone and of those yet to come.
Season Butler is a writer and artist born in Washington, DC. Season also works as a dramaturg, and teaches Performance Studies and Creative Writing. An early draft of her debut novel, Cygnet, was shortlisted for the 2014 SI Leeds Prize for unpublished fiction by Black and Asian women. She lives and works between London and Berlin.
The Author Stories Podcast Episode 661 | Brad Thor Interview
Today on Author Stories Brad Thor returns to the show to talk about his 19th book in the wildly popular Scott Harvath series, Backlash.
Brad’s previous visit to Author Stories: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn459U1rvzY
[image error] “Raw emotion, nonstop action, and relentless pacing makes Backlash another one-night read from Brad Thor, who delivers the book to beat in 2019.” —The Real Book Spy
#1 New York Times, #1 Wall Street Journal, and #1 Publishers Weekly bestselling author Brad Thor is back with his most gripping thriller yet!
In ancient texts, there are stories about men who struck from the shadows, seemingly beyond the reach of death itself. These men were considered part angel, part demon. Their loyalty was to their families, their friends, and their kings. You crossed these men at your peril. And once crossed, there was no crossing back.
They were fearless; men of honor who have been known throughout history by different names: Spartan, Viking, Samurai.
Today, men like these still strike from the shadows. They are highly prized intelligence agents, military operatives, and assassins.
One man is all three.
Two days ago, that man was crossed—badly.
Now, far from home and surrounded by his enemy, Scot Harvath must battle his way out.
With no support, no cavalry coming, and no one even aware of where he is, it will take everything he has ever learned to survive.
But survival isn’t enough. Harvath wants revenge.
In the most explosive novel Brad Thor has ever written, page after captivating page of action, intrigue, loyalty, and betrayal will keep you hooked until the very last sentence.
Brad Thor is the #1 New York Timesbestselling author of nineteen thrillers, including: Spymaster (“One of the all-time best thriller novels” – The Washington Times), The Last Patriot (nominated best thriller of the year by the International Thriller Writers Association), Blowback(One of the “Top 100 Killer Thrillers of All Time” – NPR), Foreign Influence (One of Suspense Magazine’s best political thrillers of the year), and The Lions of Lucerne (“One of the best political thrillers ever” – Barnes & Noble).
MEDIA CONTRIBUTOR
Brad has hosted the Glenn Beck TV and radio programs, and has appeared on FOX News Channel, CNN, CNN Headline News, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS to discuss terrorism, as well as how closely his novels of international intrigue parallel the real threats facing the world today.
BACKGROUND
Brad has served as a member of the Department of Homeland Security’s Analytic Red Cell Unit, and has lectured to law enforcement organizations on over-the-horizon/future threats. He has been a keynote speaker for the National Tactical Officers Association annual conference, the Young America’s Foundation, and the Ronald Reagan 100 celebration. A supporter of The Heritage Foundation, Brad has spoken at their national headquarters on the need for robust missile defense.
In 2008, Brad shadowed a Black Ops team in Afghanistan to research his thriller, The Apostle.
Brad graduated cum laude from the University of Southern California where he studied creative writing, film, and television production. Prior to becoming a novelist, Brad was the award-winning creator, producer, writer and host of the critically acclaimed national public television series, Traveling Lite.
June 24, 2019
The Author Stories Podcast Episode 660 | Lea Carpenter Interview
Today’s author interview guest is Lea Carpenter, author of Red, White, Blue: A novel.
[image error]A dark, powerful, and subtly crafted novel that traces the intertwined fates of a CIA case officer and a young woman who is forced to confront her dead father’s secret past–at once a gripping, immersive tale of duplicity and espionage, and a moving story of love and loyalty.
Anna is the beloved only child of the charismatic Noel, a New York City banker–and a mother who abandoned her. When Noel dies in a mysterious skiing accident in Switzerland the day before his daughter’s wedding, Anna, consumed by grief, grows increasingly distant from her prominent music-producing husband, who begins running for office. One day, while on her honeymoon in the south of France, Anna meets an enigmatic stranger who will cause perhaps even greater upheaval in her life. It will soon become clear that this meeting was no chance encounter: this man once worked with Anna’s father and has information about parts of Noel’s life that Anna never knew. When she arrives back in New York, she receives a parcel that contains a series of cryptic recordings and videos showing Noel at the center of a brutal interrogation. Soon, everything Anna knows about her father’s life–and his death–is called into question, launching her into a desperate search for the truth.
Smart, fast-moving, and suspenseful, Red, White, Blue plunges us into the inner workings of the CIA, a China Ops gone wrong, and the consequences of a collision between one’s deepest personal ties and the most exacting and fateful professional commitment.
LEA CARPENTER graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton and has an MBA from Harvard Business School, where she was valedictorian. She is a Contributing Editor at Esquire and has written the screenplay for Mile 22, a film about CIA’s Special Activities Division, directed by Peter Berg and starring Mark Wahlberg and John Malkovich. She is developing Eleven Days for television with Lucy Donnelly (Grey Gardens) and Gideon Raff (Homeland). She lives in New York.
