If you know who Boris and Julie are, then you know how freakin' sweet this giveaway opportunity is!!
If you don't know who Boris and Julie are, you may not be all that interested, until you go look at their work.
They're giving away ten limited edition art prints! I've been a fan of their work for years and I'm definitely entering!
Go here to check it out!!
You must be 18 to enter and the last entry will be accepted on October 8th.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Agency Rules by Khalid Muhammad
Welcome to the Virtual Book Tour for Agency Rules by Khalid Muhammad. This critically acclaimed political thriller is an action-packed page-turner!
Agency Rules
Celebrated as a ragtag force that defeated and broke the Soviet Union, no one predicted the Mujahideen would bring with them a plague that would spread like wildfire through Pakistan in the years to follow. When the battle-worn fighters returned with no enemy or war to fight, they turned their sights on the country that had been their creator and benefactor. From the same battlegrounds that birthed the Mujahideen, a young Kamal Khan emerges as a different breed of warrior. Discarding his wealthy family comforts, Kamal becomes a precision sniper, an invincible commando and a clandestine operative bringing intimidation, dominance and death with him to the battlefield. Ending the plague is his prime directive. Shrouded in political expediency, hampered by internal power struggles, international espionage and doublespeak that makes Washington’s spin doctors proud, Kamal’s mission is a nightmare of rampant militant fundamentalism that threatens to choke and take Pakistan hostage. For him, the fight is not just for freedom, but the survival of a nation.
You can buy Agency Rules at the link below:
Amazon
Khalid Muhammad
By day, Khalid Muhammad is a mild-mannered business executive keeping himself busy running a marketing and brand management company. He takes someone else’s product and creates concepts, ideas and brand stories—things that make consumers want to buy, invest and save their hard-earned money.
By night, his alter ego emerges; one that has a penchant for sadistic retribution towards those who have wronged him, and that spends its time devising intricate and detailed plans for a nefarious end.
If he hopes to continue to have friends and family, though, he has to keep his alter ego under control.
So, Khalid chooses to write novellas, novels and short stories to let the wickedness escape; the other option means a great deal of blood, numerous torture implements and…well, infinite ways to dump a body. The writing is better for everyone involved and less dangerous for the guilty… until he writes them into another story.
You can find Khalid at these links:
Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads | Amazon
Giveaway
This Giveaway is open internationally. Must be 16+ to enter.
There will be five winners each of a $10 Amazon Gift Card
This tour is brought to you by
Please check out the other hosts on the tour for chances to enter the Giveaway!
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Standing in the hall of the abandoned warehouse, blood dripped from his body, leaving a trail on the grimy floor. A body was slumped in the chair in the middle of the hall with a singular light hanging above, illuminating a small radius around it. Another lay in the doorway propping the door open. The fight inside had been more than expected from the three days he spent surveying the warehouse. By his count, there should not have been more than five men both inside and out. Instead, he had found almost seven men around the facility.
They had prepared well for his arrival.
On his approach, he saw one man guarding the entrance. There were usually two… where’s the other one? Kamal shook off the thought and sized up his enemy, noting that he was a scrawny soldier that didn’t fill his uniform. He ducked into the shadows where he could use the darkness against the soldier, catching him by surprise. He rushed the guard, knocking him to the ground before he could set himself or draw his weapon. With a quick strike to the head, the first guard was neutralized. Before he could get up, he heard the door to the warehouse open. Jumping to his feet, Kamal saw the second guard emerge, finding Kamal hovering over his partner’s incapacitated body. The guard, surprisingly, dropped his AK-47 and rushed at Kamal, driving him into the concrete wall of the warehouse with a shoulder block. As he pulled back from Kamal, he landed two solid right crosses to his jaw stunning Kamal and giving himself time to set for the fight. Kamal pulled himself up from one knee, gasping for air and taking the time to assess his opponent. The guard didn’t wait for Kamal to position himself and struck again with a swift kick to his midriff, bring the taste of blood to Kamal’s mouth. Oh, that is just unacceptable.
Kamal spat the blood onto the ground and spun around, taking the guard’s legs out with a vicious kick to his knees. As the guard hit the ground, Kamal launched himself onto him, grabbing his neck in a chokehold. The guard threw elbows behind him, and kicked helplessly in the air as Kamal increased the pressure on his throat. Within minutes, his body stopped fighting and he was down.
Kamal stood, spitting a few times to clear the blood that had filled his mouth, finally using the sleeve of his shirt to wipe the remaining away. He smirked, admiring his work. Not as tough as he looked.
Standing over both bodies, his plan rapidly changed. Grabbing the second guard by the legs, he dragged him around the corner and pulled his uniform off. Silently and rapidly, Kamal undressed and pulled on the FC garb. Wow, this fits well. The guard had seemed so much larger than himself. He ripped his own shirt in half, using half to tie the guard’s hands together and the other half to seal his mouth, in case he came to and tried to warn the others. Kamal laughed silently, giving the guard another hard kick to the head. Just for good measure, you son of a bitch.
He entered the warehouse corridor, looking for the other guards. Spotting one about fifty feet down, he straightened his shoulders and called to him, “Did he come through here?”
The guard was surprised by the question. He hadn’t heard or seen anything. He strolled over to Kamal to find out what his colleague was talking about. “What?” Kamal waited till he was close enough, and casually raised his arm, as if to indicate towards the door. Gun in hand, he brought his arm down in a vicious swipe to the guard’s head, knocking him out cold. He fell hard into the wall from the blow and as he slid down, his gun clattered to the ground noisily. The commotion alerted another guard who came rushing around the corner, sidearm in hand. Seeing his compatriot laid out on the ground, with a fellow soldier standing over him, he slowed down.
“What happened to Ayaz?”
“I don’t know! I came in looking for the guy that knocked Sheraz out and found him like this,” Kamal said, quietly pulling his sidearm from the holster. “We should warn Faheem that we have a guest,” the soldier said, turning to warn his superior. Kamal waited for him to get a safe distance away and fired two rounds into his back, dropping him to the ground like a wounded deer. The guard tried to roll himself over to fire back at Kamal, but the round had damaged his spine badly, leaving him face down on the floor. Kamal went over and fired another round into his head, and almost like a second thought, changed his sidearm with the guard’s.
Kamal moved a few yards down the corridor when another soldier jumped from behind a crate hitting him with the butt of his AK-47, stunning him. What the fuck? Kamal thought, reaching up to find blood coming from just above his eye. “What’s your problem soldier? Don’t you recognize your own?” he said, glaring at the attacker. The guard hesitated for a moment but something must have alerted him, because he drew his weapon back again. Kamal used all his body weight to jam the weapon and soldier against the wall; he could feel his eye swelling up already, and he preferred not to expend any more energy than he had to.
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Black Magic Woman by Eric Wilder
Burdened by spring floods, malaria and yellow fever, citizens of old New Orleans often turned to voodoo practitioners-African Rosalie, Sanite Dede, Bras Coupe-for protection. None were more powerful, or feared, than Doctor John and Marie Laveau. After P.I. Wyatt Thomas encounters a ghost during a hospital visit, he tells his sometimes business partner voodoo mambo Mama Mulate. She places him in a trance and channels the ghost, soon learning a curse connects him and a long-dead French aristocrat. They are doomed to remain connected forever unless Wyatt can return to old New Orleans and lift the curse before midnight on New Year's Eve.
Though this is Wilder's eighth book, and the fourth in the French Quarter Mystery series, I'd never heard of him before this. I took a few minutes to judge this book by its cover before delving in. The colors and font alone make you think there's going to be something dark and mysterious about this book. Then, we have a very serious looking voodoo woman with a snake coiled around her neck, holding a gris gris bag. Now, I know there's some serious trouble in this book! I eagerly jumped in head first.
The characters are colorful and it was plain to see that Wilder has done his research. Of course, growing up in Louisiana around such tales, I'm sure there wasn't a lot that he didn't already know! It's a lot of fun though, these characters. We have good guys and bad guys and in between guys and they all swap around! The people we're supposed to be most afraid of have these wonderful soft centers and those that we begin feeling all sentimental towards end up to be the ones that frighten the bejeepers out of us!
Next we throw in some serious voodoo and hoodoo and magic and a little time travel. Not to mention an intriguing side mystery!
My only issue with this story is that it wrapped up a little too neatly at the end. It's kind of like when your favorite team is down by 30 points with only seconds on the clock, and all of a sudden they magically score 31 points to win. The odds of that are astronomical. I'm not saying it couldn't happen, but the unrealistic nature of it was a bit of a turn off for me.
This is a great serious, however, and I strongly suggest it to anyone who enjoys mysteries and knows anything at all about Louisiana lore.
The Confessions of Jonathan Flite by Matthew J. Beier
By Carrie Anne
Jonathan Flite claims to have memories he can't explain. Seven layers of them, to be exact, all belonging to a group of teenagers who disappeared from a place called Idle County in 2010-ten years before his birth. Seventeen years of anxiety, violent outbursts, and refusal to admit he is lying have landed him at Crescent Rehabilitation Center, a seaside juvenile center for rich kids, and nobody has ever dared to believe his memories might be real.
Until now. On a blustery November day just three months after a nuclear terrorist attack in Geneva, Switzerland, ex-CIA psychiatrist Thomas Lumen arrives at Crescent to interview Jonathan for a book about Idle county. Fueled by his personal connection to the disappearances three decades earlier, he asks Jonathan to share what he knows-anything and everything.
By reigniting this thirty-year-old mystery, however, Jonathan inadvertently becomes a target of the very same religious terrorists who attacked Geneva, and they'll stop at nothing to keep the secrets of Idle County under wraps. Jonathan must then make a choice: to continue telling his story, or risk the safety of everyone he loves. (taken from Amazon description)
I have to say, the synopsis doesn't do this book justice. Yes, there is political intrigue, but I found it was only at the back of my mind, seemingly not important to what I was reading. Instead, it's a great mystery/thriller/ghost story.
Why does Jonathan have these memories that aren't his own? What really happened that day in the woods? Why are there so many other strange evens in Idle County? What does any of it have to do with the bombing in Geneva?
This book tells about Molly Butler's last summer before she disappeared. How did she end up with the other kids in the woods, kids she didn't apparently know? Molly strikes up a new friendship with the local librarian. What's her story? Molly goes on ghost hunts with her friend that summer. What did they really see?
I couldn't read this fast enough. The chapters alternated between Jonathan's time and Molly's constantly propelling the story forward. Unfortunately, when it was all said and done, I still had more questions than answers. That's when I looked up the author and found there are six more books. I can hardly wait!!
Inca's Death Cave by Bradford Wheler
By Carrie Anne
Adventure, archaeology, technology,and mystery mix to form a breathtaking action-packed tale. A 500-year-old puzzle catapults an archaeology professor and his brilliant grad student into the adventure of a lifetime. What happened to a band of Inca rebels who journeyed north in Peru to seek the fabled cave of the true gods-and escape the disease and destruction brought by Spanish conquistadors? They were never heard from again. Did they just melt back into their villages or was something more sinister involved? What trace or treasure did they leave behind? The ingenious plot of this thriller is full of twists and turns, excitement and adventure, archaeology and technology. Readers will meet fascinating characters they'll never forget: a high-tech billionaire, a quick-witted professor, his beautiful young student, and her still-tough grandfather, a retired Marine gunny sergeant. Cornell University professor Robert Johnson and his star PhD student are hired by a billionaire entrepreneur to solve a 500-year-old archaeology mystery in norther Peru. But first, they will have to survive corporate skullduggery and drug-lord thuggery. And why, 6,700 miles away in Vatican City, is the old guard so upset? What dark secrets could centuries-old manuscripts hold? This assiduously researched, fast-paced novel brings the Incas and their ancestors to life against the backdrop of the Peruvian Andes. (taken from Amazon description)
I really wanted to like this book, after having enjoyed such titles as The DaVinci code. I love historical fiction, learning more about the past in an interesting way. Add in a mystery and some action, and I'm there! Unfortunately, this book brings back all the feelings of history classes in school: boring, boring, boring.
I will agree it was thoroughly researched and I can tell the author has a love for what he was doing, going so far as to include pictures to further illustrate his ideas. The problem is, the book gets so bogged down in the technical details, the characters are never really developed and the plot feels secondary to the author showing off his knowledge. There are some humorous lines along the way, but, again, not enough to keep my interest. At one point, the main character comments that his eyes glassed over during a presentation by another character. I have to say, I know exactly how he felt!
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Minstrel's Covenant by Nance Burlow Morgan
By Carrie Anne
Mareese was still recovering from a two year old rebellion and a one year old battle with demons from the gates of hell. Saeede and Andreas lived there, happily compsoing songs about their last great adventure.
While across the sea in Nagrom, a young king sought to change the culture of war amongst the kingdoms of his continent. He sought a trade treaty with the people of Crystalier and sent his friend and ambassador to Mareese to promote his idea.
At the reception to introduce the ambassador to the leaders of Crystalier, everything was going superbly, until the ambassador was stricken with convulsions and died-the victim of poison!
The ambassador's men broke diplomatic protocols and arrested a local shopkeeper; an apothecary, and Saeede's mother! Saeede and Andreas launch a secondary investigation behind the scenes.
The investigation is nearly botched when the ambassador's man realizes who Saeede is to the apothecary. This creates a delicate diplomatic dilemma. Saeede would not be swayed and discovered an imposter afoot-an imposter who looks like the ambassador's daughter! When they are about to close in, the imposter gives them the slip, and the chase takes them across the sea to Ahnges. There it becomes apparentthat political gain is at the root of the problem.
Thrust into a tangle of mistrusting kings the two friends are called upon to apprehend the ambassador's assassin and uncover the instigator behind the murder.
Minstrel's Covenant is Bulow-Morgan's third release. A mystery adventure that spans two countries with very different cultures. The reader will be hooked from the very beginning of this intricate tale. (From Amazon description)
This is the second book in the Minstrel's Tale Mystery series, and in my mind a better one than the first. It's easy enough to pick up and jump in, with jus enough of a review to bring you up to date without retelling the whole first book. The mystery at the beginning draws you in and the characters are entertaining.
For some reason, though, the book just doesn't hold my interest. I'm not sure why. The first few chapters were interesting and I had high hopes, but I just felt like I was slogging through after that. The political intrigue went over my head and the long descriptive passages weren't as interesting to me as the sections with conversation. I felt sometimes that the author made leaps in understanding that I wasn't able to follow.
Morgan is currently writing a third book in this series. Continued improvement gives me hope that one of these days, I'll be able to say I really loved one. Now if we could just do something about the 8 bit graphics on the cover :)
Monday, September 15, 2014
Exigency by Michael Siemsen Release Day Tour!
~ Synopsis ~
From Michael Siemsen, creator of the #1 Sci-Fi Bestseller, The Dig, and the award winning (a demon's story) series, EXIGENCY transports the author's singular, visionary approach to world-building to its next pivotal juncture. Nine brilliant scientists travel light years on a one-way trip to an Earth-like planet. Their mission is to study from orbit the two species of intelligent lifeforms on the surface. The first: an isolated people embarking on civilization and building their world's first city. The second: a brutal race of massive predators, spread thick and still growing across the dominant landmass - destined to breed and eat their way to extinction within a few centuries. After eight years of observation, disaster strikes the orbiting station and only two crewmembers eject successfully. Drifting down through a dark alien sky, the pair realizes their escape pod launched not toward the safety of the city, but to the other side of the planet, touching down deep within a land no human could possibly survive.~ Interview ~
Welcome Michael Siemsen! Thank you for taking the time to humor me and answer some of my questions. After reading your latest book, Exigency, I have some questions that I would love answered! Let’s get started. Thank you for having me. I love what you’ve done with the place.1 – I know how you came up with the idea for your Matthew Turner books, but I’d like to know about your ideas for this science fiction book and where they came from. I actually wrote about this recently, so sorry if any of it ends up duplicated… The first traces of Exigency came to me a couple years ago, though it wasn't so much the premise of a story as it was a feeling – the emotions one might experience in a particular situation. People can feel alone, desolate, and/or invisible, even while in their own home surrounded by family. I tried to imagine being truly alone - say, lost in Antarctica. But even there, one might hold out hope for a rescue party. It had to be further, more alone, more desolate. How about another planet, light years from another human being? That’s pretty alone. I didn’t start writing anything at that point, as there was nothing to write, but the idea would come back to me now and then, and one day I was thinking (unrelated to the first idea) about context. Context is everything, right? Example: On your screen you see a video of a coyote limping along, injured. Maybe you feel sad for it. But the view then shifts to a woman running off with her crying baby, and she’s yelling for help. She just stopped a coyote from dragging her baby away. Our outlooks and judgments are based upon what little we see and/or hear. Somehow, this line of thought progressed to a group of scientists on a space station, orbiting an Earth-like planet teeming with intelligent life. The researchers’ technology is remarkably advanced, but how much can they truly know of this planet and its people from such a distant, disconnected perspective? And would they be conscious of their limitations, or assume that they see all? And what happens when this accrued knowledge is suddenly put to the test, first-hand?
2 - The aliens in this book are very unique and so is the planet. How did you come up with the intricacies of their personalities and their world? The planet’s intelligent races took a very long time to develop, and the vast majority of their respective evolution, histories, and spirituality are never mentioned in the book. It’s exhausting even thinking about it, actually, and would probably be less-than-thrilling information to digest. But I’ll tell you this much: I began with a lifeless planet and a primordial soup in which the successful base ingredients of life differed from earth (arsenic won out over phosphorus), and I went on from there for billions of years (though not in real time). As for personalities and culture, I modeled the Threck on Early Romans, stripping away and replacing elements based upon environment, anatomy, the advancement pace of Threck civilization, and the core brain physiology of Threck after they’ve officially matured. Riveting stuff, right?
3 – Generally, you research the place you are going to write about in your books by going there. Unless you know someone that works for Space X, how did you research for this book? Yeah, sadly I couldn’t find a cost-effective way to do a research trip on this one. In terms of time investment, this book was 9 parts research, 1 part writing. If I’m going to be making up technology and biology, they both need to be plausible and impervious to scrutiny from actual experts. After The Dig, I was particularly gratified to receive messages from archaeologists and paleos with only positive remarks. For Exigency, I read countless books, listened to many podcasts, and spoke with some experts who were highly generous with their time. I discovered in my early outlines a number of mistakes I’d made based upon assumptions, and had to adjust parts of the greater story around this information. For instance, to send a team of nine people to orbit another planet for the rest of their lives—light years away—it would cost upwards of $30 Trillion per year to deliver a constant supply at the dollar’s (and food’s) current value. And that’s only the beginning of the expenses. And so I studied what would be required for a person to stop eating solid food, receiving their nutrients through supplements in the drinking water (which, btw, must be siphoned from the planet’s atmosphere), and all the front-, back-, and side-effects of such a change. And there are little tidbits of real funfacts/science sprinkled throughout the finished book that readers may appreciate. For instance, if you don’t consume solid food for an extended period, your taste buds sort of disappear, making your tongue smooth and slimy.
4 – My husband loves Dale Brown and his books. One of the things that he said about his stuff is that he has been pretty good at predicting the military weaponry/strategy, etc over the years. Do you think any of your scientific & space related technologies will come about? What technology would you like to see? Absolutely. Ionic propulsion, interstellar travel, medicine, and in particular, the fone. The robot’s perspective view you see in movies like the terminator is the next logical leap from iPhones and Google Glass. It will begin with the early adopters receiving implants, and then will rapidly spread. Everything you can do on a smartphone will be possible through this implant (be it an actual prosthetic eye as in Exigency, or an unseen implant). Imagine the ability to snap photos with a thought, or to have captured some huge event like an always-on dashcam/DVR that keeps the last 5-10 minutes of your vision buffering. Rewind and save as needed. Play games during boring work meetings without anyone knowing (or caring, because they’re doing the same thing). We’re talking about a know-it-all’s fantasy world here. Someone says, “Oh yeah, did you know dogs are colorblind?” and know-it-all instantly pulls up Wikipedia, replying “Actually…” and spouts off a bunch of stuff verbatim as if it’s off the top of their head. Or consider the usefulness of true night vision, thermal imaging, mag, etc. Predictable privacy/big brother concerns aside, this is where we’re heading. Just a few weeks ago, I grinned as a headline appeared on my screen: Researchers Invent Interface to the Optic Nerve.
5 – Where does the inspiration for your characters come from? Are they based on anyone you know? ;) Sometimes they’re based on people I know, or combinations of multiple people. Often, they’re as fictional as the world they live in, though psychologists might refute such a claim, suggesting that, like in a dream, every character I create is some piece of myself. I’ll just be sure to keep said psychologist away from Frederick of A Warm Place to Call Home (a demon’s story).
6 – Are there any plans to write any more about this world and these aliens? A spin-off perhaps? A prequel maybe? I wrote it as a stand-alone, and still see it that way. If a really compelling story occurs to me in the future, I’m not opposed to returning to it. You never know…
7 – This is technically your first science fiction story. What made you decide to try this genre? Did you enjoy writing it more, less, or about the same as your other books? I feel like I’ve always been a Sci-Fi writer, and if you didn’t know any better, and saw my ever-growing idea and work-in-progress list, you’d probably be surprised to discover how much of what I’ve put out has not been straight Sci-Fi. The Dig is pretty Sci-Fi-ey (if I may), if you look at it as the story of a non-human civilization. Exigency is definitely my first “hard” Sci-Fi, and it’s uber-satisfying when you finish writing a beast like this. It may be just because it’s the newest, but I think it’s tied with A Warm Place to Call Home for the most enjoyable to write award. Though I’m aware that that’s a very hindsight perspective of Exigency. Frederick definitely wins out in terms of ease and fun, beginning to end.
-Now some general questions about you- That’s not a question.
8 – There are a lot of distractions around, especially with social media and this new-fangled site called Reddit. How do you block it all out and write? I’m sure I could find on Reddit a hilarious and apropos gif that perfectly expresses “a day in my life”, but instead I’ll simply say: Distractions are the devil. Espresso is my friend. Oh, and here’s a gif I found on Reddit that perfectly expresses “a day in my life.”
9 - What do you enjoy doing outside of writing? I’m into camping, lakes, hiking, travel, and when I’m around the house, unable to focus on writing, I usually end up fixing stuff or making something out of something and hanging it on our walls. I like to make stuff out of stuff. Because making stuff out of no stuff is beyond my power.
10 - What's something about you that most people don't know? That I write books. Ha! Zing! … against myself. As for those few random souls scattered across our great planet (I sold a couple books in Brazil last month. Go figure.), I don’t know how many are aware that I’m a do-it-yourselfer from beginning to (almost) end. Besides my virtuoso editor (shout out to the fastidious Kristina Circelli of Red Road Editing, my go-to since Samuel Beauchamp), I do everything from cover design and web coding to physical book layout and marketing materials. As much as a traditional publishing deal would relieve me of operational tasks, I say nay. A) I saw the samples of horses**t covers they wanted to slap on The Dig, and B) How lazy would I have to be to justify giving up lifetime rights to my books, a 90% pay cut, and losing all say into how my books are packaged, just to avoid a couple weeks extra work on each book. Seems kind of like paying a live-in chef to select and make all of my food for me, and then he eats most of it before serving it. Not to say I’ll never again consider a traditional publishing deal, but I’ve yet to see a compelling case for it (that there’s the caveat for when I announce a couple years from now that I went with NY on some new book, so no one can throw it back in my face “Nnehnh! You said never!”).
11 - Who is your favorite character that you've written? I’m a little partial to Angela in Exigency. She’s a pretty cool chick and a total smart ass. She’s pretty awesome, but I’ve sort of already called out Frederick, soooooo…
12 – Have there been any scenes in your books that were difficult for you to write? Difficult as in writerly struggles? Countless scenes. Difficult as in emotionally? The Many Lives of Samuel Beauchamp (a demon’s story) has some pretty rough subject matter. The Opal, as well, contains a fair bit of personal parallels. And then, of course, those scenes in A Warm Place to Call Home were probably as awkward to write as they were for some to read.
13 – In all of your spare time, what are you currently reading? This isn’t usually the case, but right now I’m in the middle of way too many books. Generally I’d have a single fiction book I’m reading for pleasure, and often bounce back and forth with non-fiction, sometimes overlapping. At present … [sigh] … here’s the mess I’ve created in my head: The Bone Clocks - David Mitchell What We See When We Read - Peter Mendelsund Extreme Medicine - Kevin Fong, M.D. Empress Zenobia - Pat Southern Joyland - Stephen King
14 - What is are your favorite books? As a voracious reader, I’m sure you, too, would be hard pressed to identify a single, above-all-others book. So I have secretly and deftly transmogrified your question into one that suits me. Most recent notables: Sand by Hugh Howey – (this book is how it’s done) Ready Player One by Ernest Cline – (the most fun I’ve had reading a book since … since … I guess just the most fun) Less recent favorites: Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn (I think this is her best book, even though Gone Girl made her famous) The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet by David Mitchell (greatest writer of this generation IMHO) The Road by Cormac McCarthy (also the greatest writer of this generation, if I’m allowed to do that) The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes (another single greatest writer of this generation) Redshirts by John Scalzi (hilarious, clever, must-read material for Star Trek fans) Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (like David Mitchell, Ishiguro elevates the entire Sci-Fi genre) If I were to go back any further, we’d be here into next week.
15 - Who is your favorite author? David Mitchell
16 – If you could collaborate with an author and write a book with them, who would it be, what genre would it be, and why? At first thought, a bunch of names pop into my head, but then I think about this prospect realistically and cower beneath my desk for fear of being found out by a “real” writer.
Thank you Michael Siemsen for your outstanding and hilarious answers and for humoring me with these questions. I'm sure it's helped offer a little insight into your world and hopefully given them some reasons to check it out.
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