Charmer, Conman, Kidnapper

Edward, My Bad Boy,

also appears in 4 of the
Legends of the Winged Scarab Novels

He charms in Sirocco, Storm over Land and Sea

He cons in After the Cataclysm

His bad side crystallizes in The Crystal Curse

And what happens in The Nile Conspiracy,
well -- you'll just have to read about it.

Even in Shadow Love, he is remembered
with some regret about what could have been...

How did he get to be that way?

This short novella here shows how he
spirals from charmer down to criminal.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009BQZ1JY

Excerpt

Helen, a high-powered executive and consummate professional when not enthralled by tall Brits, informed him she had to take an early morning flight to Europe and that her generosity, alas, could not extend to her home, her Mercedes and her treasured sailboat while she was away.

Edward understood, being the perfect gentleman. He returned her key, kissed her good-night, promised to call her in two weeks.

That Sunday morning, the normally fastidious Edward did not shave. He dressed in the midnight blue silk pajamas and brown leather slippers—gifts from a nice woman in Newport Beach—and confidently drove up the Silver Strand that connects seedy Imperial Beach to affluent Coronado.

A couple of homes down from Helen’s, he spied a yellow-hulled San Diego Union in a driveway. Slowing down just enough, he expertly scooped the Sunday paper up. Then he drove to a lone beach emergency-telephone he had scouted out the day before. Smoothing out a sheet torn from his motel’s Yellow Pages, he dialed the number of the first-listed locksmith. No answer. Second: No answer. The third promised to meet him at the given address within thirty minutes.

“Can you imagine? Here I am, out in the street in my pajamas. I come out to pick up my Sunday paper and the door slams behind me.” Edward’s speech is colloquial and friendly, without a trace of his usual Eton-tinged accent.

“It happens all the time,” the locksmith commiserated. “I’ll have you back in your house in no time.”

* * * 

A Curse for Egypt - The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam?

The monster dam is set to open "sometime in 2017" along the Blue Nile in Ethiopia, the largest hydroelectric project not only in that country but in the whole of Africa.

 (Photo: Ghetty Images)

Its conflict with Egypt over water rights forms the basis of

The Nile Conspiracy.

Egypt receives 80% of its water. Will the filling of this monster reservoir threatens to strangle the Blue Nile?

Needless to say, the Egyptians are very worried - especially as it will take 5 to 15 years to fill the huge catch basin from the Blue Nile flowing out of Lake Tana.

The Axe, The Shield, and The Triton - A Discovered Diamond

Author James M. Hockey was born on the slopes of the Iron Age hill fort of Ham Hill. During the Roman period the IInd Legion had a camp here. This fort is only eight miles from the Cadbury hill fort, the favored if speculative location for Camelot and Arthur during post-Roman times. It is in this countryside that Alfred the Great hid and plotted the defeat of the invading Danes.

Moving just two miles down the road Hockey spent the early years of his life under the shadow of St. Michaels Hill, the scene of one of the last abortive rebellions against the Normans after 1066.

It is hardly surprising that history is in his blood and that his writing is set in this historic countryside.

 

Read my review of Hockey's Book 1

The Axe, The Shield, and The Triton 

of his 3-book

Tales of Bowdyn Series 

on Helen Hollick's Discovering Diamonds website.

https://discoveringdiamonds.blogspot.com/

 

It is easy to see why this dark ages novel

was honored with the coveted

Discovered Diamond

Award

 Treat yourself here to Hockey's complete series:

US - https://www.amazon.com/James-M.-Hockey

UK -https://www.amazon.co.uk/James-M.-Hockey

Spicy Recollections

Check out three spicy recollections about 

Love, Lust and Betrayal

 (No, this is not autobiographical - although I do love pearls).

http://www.amazon.com/Intermezzos-Three-Short-Romances

(If you find them amusing, a brief review would be most appreciated.)

A Taste

I'd like you to taste 

 a short (somewhat irreverent) story 

showing off my non-historical side

(You might find, it's my 'hysterical side')

http://www.amazon.com/Inter-Galactica

Authors & Their Supporting Characters

Helen Hollick is Hosting a Fabulous 

Supporting Role Blog Hop 

December 6 through 17 

(Designed for us by Avalon♔Graphics LLC)  

I was given the honor of starting these Interviews on the 6th

(or being the first to jump into the dinghy to test if it leaks, if you will).

My character is - no, not Edward, as some of you who have read the Legends of the Winged Scarab might surmise - but Vergil, a pardoned pirate from Venezuela's infamous San Antonio prison on Isla Margarita.

Even though he only pops up in Book 4 (The Crystal Curse)

as a humble guard on the Bucanero II

(the refurbished "lost" real Russian ghost ship Lyubov Orlova),

and in Book 5 (The Nile Conspiracy),

on the confiscated and renamed Super Yacht Khamsin,

this dubious character begins to play a vital role in the lives

(or, shall I say, deaths) of many - some deserving, others innocent.

Here, he is taking aim at the construction site of the

Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.

 As they say, "Once a pirate, always a pirate."
(You can read more about his wily ways on the Excerpt tab.)

Every day from the 6th through the 17th,

meet a major supporting character
from the novels of award-winning authors

here:

https://ofhistoryandkings.blogspot.com/

Follow/Retweet:

Hashtag #SupportingRole

Supporting Role Features will be on the above blog -
whereas the Links below go to authors' websites -  please, do visit them as well.

6th      Inge H Borg
7th      Matthew Harffy
8th     Alison Morton
9th     Regina Jeffers
10th   Anna Belfrage
11th    Christoph Fischer
12th   Pauline Barclay
13th   Antoine Vanner
14th   Annie Whitehead
15th   Derek Birks
16th   Carolyn Hughes
17th   Helen Hollick  (Our wonderful host for all these great features)

My Review of 1066 Turned Upside Down

Alternative fiction stories by nine authors 

A Superb Collaboration 

This interesting alternative history of England’s tumultuous year 1066 is a collaboration of nine authors, each a successful writer of his/her own historical fiction novels:

     Joanna Courtney

     Helen Hollick

     Anna Belfrage

     Richard Dee

     G.K. Holloway

     Carol McGrath

     Alison Morton

     Eliza Redgold

     Annie Whitehead

     In 1066 Turned Upside Down, each writer envisions a fascinating “what if” version about that fateful year in England's history. And with each outcome, modern man would have inherited a much different world, in some instances giving rise to my notion of “too bad it didn’t happen that way.”

     I must confess to not knowing much about this time in England’s long history. However, having read James M. Hockey’s excellent “Edith Fair as a Swan: Tales of Bowdyn 3” (an excellent series, by the way), I was at least familiar with King Harold’s “common wife Edith.
     Because of this, and the excellent Foreword by C. C. Humphreys, I enjoyed the “what if” scenario in 1066 even more.

Check it out here: https://www.amazon.com/1066

Poetry Perfection

My Review of Jim Bennett's 

Cold Comes Through, 

Poetry Book 1

Writing—and reading—true poetry is often associated with admitting vulnerability. Reading it, you have to let it in. Writing it is a lot more arduous: You have to let it out. And letting it out, Jim Bennett does with Cold Comes Through, Book 1 of his five-volume poetry series.

Having read Bennett’s poetry series in reverse order, his first volume—I find—is the most melancholy as it deals with loss, grieving and remembrance. Death hovers nearby, cloaked in autumn leaves, or the heartbreaking throes of Alzheimer’s. But Bennett’s insight into human nature always treats the most dire of his themes with dignity and grace.

After finally reading Cold Comes Through, I know I shall do so again, as I will surely re-read the entire series from time to time. Poetry creates a cultured haven from the blustery world that trammels us daily. Jim Bennett’s poems are some of the best I have had the pleasure ever reading.

* * * * *

Jim Bennett's 5-Volume Poetry is available here:

Amazon US https://www.amazon.com/Jim-Bennett

Amazon UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/Jim-Bennett

Website: http://jim-bennett.ca/

Jim Bennett's Poetry Series is also available in Paperback on Lulu:

http://www.lulu.com/JimBennett