SURPRISE!

by Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com


Twilight Times Books announces the release of The Case of the Displaced Detective Omnibus! This ebook collects the first four books of the series, The Case of the Displaced Detective: The Arrival, The Case of the Displaced Detective: At Speed, The Case of the Cosmological Killer: The Rendlesham Incident, and The Case of the Cosmological Killer: Endings and Beginnings, into one electronic book! 
 

 The Displaced Detective Series is a science fiction mystery series in which the brilliant hyperspatial physicist, Dr. Skye Chadwick, discovers that there are alternate realities, and said alternates are often populated by those we consider only literary characters. Her pet research, Project: Tesseract, hidden deep under Schriever AFB, is her means of looking in on these continua. In one particular reality, continuum 114, a certain Victorian detective (who, in fact, exists in several continua) was to have died along with his arch-nemesis at the Reichenbach Falls. Knee-jerking, Skye intervenes, rescuing her hero, who inadvertently flies through the tesseract wormhole connecting his universe with ours, while his enemy plunges to his death. Unable to send Sherlock Holmes back without causing devastating continuum collapse due to non-uniqueness, he must stay in our world and learn to adapt to the 21st century.


As Holmes comes up to speed in the modern world, he and Dr. Chadwick team up to solve abstruse, technological mysteries. The series has been aptly described as, "Sherlock Holmes meets the X-Files."
 

"…These books are like literary crack. I fell in love with her characters and her world so completely that I’ve been telling all my friends ‘YOU MUST READ THESE!’ And yes, I’ve been doing so in all caps."
~~Melissa A. Bartell,
Bibliotica

 To pick your ebook format and purchase, go to my website here. To purchase an Amazon Kindle version, go here.



--Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

Book Bombing Aaron Paul Lazar!

Hey guys, fellow Twilight Times author Aaron Paul Lazar has a book being released tomorrow, and we're having a book bomb! That's where we ask everyone to buy his book on the same day - that way, there's a huge surge on Amazon and his ranking gets driven up! (Good way to get on a best-seller list!) His book is called Don't Let The Wind Catch You, and it's great! I'm going to excerpt it today; please purchase it on Amazon tomorrow!

(P.S. Formatting issues are my own. Sometimes BlogSpot isn't the most cooperative word processor.)

-Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

~~~

Excerpts from Don’t Let the Wind Catch You

By Aaron Paul Lazar

*** 

I folded my napkin and looked first at my father, then my mother. "Mum? Dad? I have a question."

They both stopped in the middle of their pudding and looked at me with expectant smiles.

"Do you know who lives in the woods in that cabin behind the Ambuscade? He's an old hermit, lives by himself, I think."

My father took a zealous interest in his pudding.

My mother went white. She collected herself, exchanged a worried glance with my father, and lied to me for the first time in my life. "No, darling. We don't know who lives there. But that's private property. You shouldn't trespass in those woods."

***

I saw her in the distance. She lay huddled on her side near an abandoned old house with broken windows and scores of missing shingles. We hurried to her and jumped to the ground. I reached her first, but Siegfried pushed past me to inspect the damage.

He cradled her head and whispered to her with an urgency born of fear. "What happened?"

On her forehead, a bloody gash congealed in a nasty looking puddle. Her left ankle was swollen, all puffy and purple. She tried to sit up, but couldn't.

"I was scouting around this old house, when we flushed a turkey out of the brush over there." She pointed with a shaky finger toward the woods. "Golden Boy shied–really bad–and I fell. My leg got twisted."

I scooted beside her and laid a hand on her shoulder. "Can you get up? We could boost you onto Golden Boy and get you home. You'll probably need crutches, you know."

She shook her head. "I don't know if I can get up. I feel dizzy."

Something inside me took a step toward manhood. "You'll ride with me, then." I stooped over her, put one hand under her knees and the other around her back. With one swift lunge I picked her up and carried her toward Pancho. Siegfried ran ahead and held him while I managed to slide her onto his back.

I turned to Siegfried. "Give me a boost, will you?"

"Ja. Naturlich." He laced both hands together and offered me a step up. "Up you go."

With a swift upward thrust, he propelled me high in the air. I landed lightly on Pancho's back, snugging behind Elsbeth, and clucked to Pancho. "Okay, boy. Let's go. Walk on, now. Nice and easy."

The sensations I felt while pressed behind Elsbeth confused me. Although I'd always been protective of her, this was different. Sweeter, it coursed through my blood and made me want to lay my head on the soft curls on her shoulder. I didn't, of course. I didn't want them to think I was a nerd.

***

"Tully! He's coming this way." I pulled Siegfried to the window.

Elsbeth wasn't flustered. "So? He's nice"

Sig brought her back to reality. "Ja. But we're trespassing and he might tell. We could be in big trouble."

Her eyes darkened. Trouble at her house meant beatings. "Mein Gott. We should go, fast."

Tully cut across the field and was heading straight for us. He'd be there in ten minutes, easy. Just as I turned to head for the stairs, I noticed a movement in the mirror over the little girl's vanity. I froze and pointed.

"What's that?"

The twins joined me and watched as something drew in the dusty surface. The letters were cumbersome and crude. A "P" appeared first, followed by an "E." With dropped jaws we watched the last two letters form: "N" and "I." The aroma of fresh crushed peppermint leaves filled the air.

Elsbeth looked from Sig to me and back again, excitement unleashed in her eyes. "Penni!"

I didn't wait to investigate, but led them out of the house and back to our horses, fortunately tethered behind the house and out of view of Tully. We scrambled onto their backs and leaned low, squeezing their sides hard. In seconds, we'd streaked into the shelter of the woods.

***

It started with a soft moan. I sat straight up and threw back the covers. "Who's there?"

With trembling fingers, I turned on my bedside lamp. My mouth and nose filled with the scent of peppermint.

The sound came again, but this time it almost seemed to resonate from inside my skull.

Tully. Help Tully.

"What?"

Help Tully. Help Tully. Help Tully.

I stood up and looked in the closet, then poked my head out the window. No one stood on the roof or below my window. The words came again, but this time accompanied by a quick flashing vision of the abandoned house. It was as if someone had aimed a super-eight-movie projector on the inside of my eyes, but only for a second.

Blood roared in my ears, and I felt all tingly. "Penni?"

The curtains rose up and took the shape of a young woman, revealing the outline of her lips, nose, and forehead. The fabric moved in and out, as if she were breathing. Right there in my bedroom.

I rubbed my eyes to be sure I wasn't still dreaming, and approached the curtain. "Penni?"

A hand reached out from behind the gauze material, and almost touched mine. Help Tully. Now.

***

At the water's edge, I walked in four inches of water, avoiding children's colorful metal pails and shovels, sun-bleached curly heads with lobster red shoulders, and an array of mothers and fathers who chased after babies or swung them in the water. When we reached the wharf, we hurried up the sand onto the asphalt and once again I hopped around like a clown with a hotfoot.

Siegfried pushed me toward a shady section where drifts of sand covered the tar. "Stand here. We'll order, and you wait in the shade."

I nodded and handed over my wallet. "I want two hamburgers with the works, onion rings, a root beer float, and a pound of saltwater taffy, assorted flavors." I'd memorized the order all week, dying for the promised day when my mother said we could buy lunch out.

I handed him the wallet, then leaned against the side of the building and watched them stand in line, all tan and sandy and tousled. Siegfried's blond hair looked more like Paul McCartney's mop top every day, except in color, of course. Lanky, yet surprisingly poised, he towered over his sister. She stood petite and pretty, as if she were about to leap on stage in a tutu, flying into the air with unbridled energy. A surge of affection rushed through me for both of them. Siegfried had seen his sister reach for my hand several times, but instead of flipping out, he'd averted his eyes and smiled. I loved him for that.

 

~~~

Don't forget to buy Don't Let The Wind Catch You tomorrow on Amazon!

-Stephanie Osborn

http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

The Creation of El Vengador

By Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

Today we are having a "book bomb" for my new ebook, El Vengador! A book bomb is when all of the fans and readers of an author get together and purchase their copies all on the same day! This can get the ball rolling on sales, because it results in a significant bump in the sales rankings, that in turn pulls in people who are browsing but unfamiliar with the author. But first, a little bit about El Vengador, just to...you know...whet your appetite.

 

Deputy Sheriff Michael Kirtchner gets an "unknown disturbance" dispatch call to a remote house trailer in the swamp. There, he discovers an old woman and a dog, terrorized by a mysterious beast, which he takes to be a bear. But when he contacts Game Warden Jeff Stuart to come trap the animal, Stuart tells him to get out if he values his life - this is no ordinary animal. Is Kirtchner up against a Swamp Ape - a Florida version of Bigfoot - or something more...sinister?

El Vengador is my first deliberate foray into the paranormal and horror genres. I’ve had numerous friends try to convince me to do so in the last few years, but never was able to get hold of the right story idea. So I waited and let it “percolate” in the back of my mind.

But when a Facebook friend (who wants to remain anonymous - for obvious reasons!) told me the story of his encounter of a mysterious “Florida Swamp Ape” during his tenure as a deputy sheriff, I was fascinated. And when he gave his permission for me to fictionalize the story, I knew I had found my paranormal horror story.

So I took his basic story from his own words and I transformed it. I cleaned it up, couched it in proper writer’s grammar, changed the point of view. I changed the deputy’s name, added the perspective of other civilians who encountered the creature…and then I twisted the knife.

Because, you see, I have some Cherokee in me. Oh, the family can’t prove it, not after the way the Cherokee were ejected from their properties during the Trail of Tears; any Native American who could pass as white in those days, did, and all records of their heritage were lost. But because I have several distinctive genetic expressions of that heritage, I am accepted by most elders I know as Cherokee. And my curiosity being what it is, along with my sincerity in wanting to know, I’ve been taught numerous things that most people don’t generally know.

Like the fact that the Cherokee (along with the Seminole and the Iroquois Confederacy, among others) are purported to have been offshoots – colonies, if you will – of the Maya peoples. It’s interesting to note that, just as the “Cherokee” are a group of tribes [Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, etc.], the Seminole are a group of tribes [Seminole, Creek, Miccosukee, etc.], the Iroquois Confederacy are a group of tribes [Mohawk, Onondaga, Oneida, Seneca, Cayuga, and later Tuscarora] ― so too are the Maya really a collection of tribes [Yucatec, Tzotzil, Tzeltal, Ch’ol, Kekchi, Mopan, and more]! The Maya comprised, and still comprise (oh yes, they’re still around ― they were laughing their butts off at the white fear of the “end” of their repeating calendar), more than 25 different peoples. The notion of splinter groups of this huge nation (it covered a substantial portion of Central America, butted up against the Aztec/Olmec empire, and expanded out into the Caribbean) moving up into Florida, then up the East Coast of North America, isn’t hard to believe at all.

It’s also true ― as I mentioned in the story ― that the medicine people and elders hold that the Maya, in turn, came from some place across the Great Sea to the East. Depending on who you talk to, this means we/they originated in Ancient Egypt, Phoenicia, Greece, the Biblical traders of Tarshish, or even Atlantis!

So it seemed to me that it would put a fun spin on things if I had this swamp ape, this mysterious unknown creature, be something other than pure animal. As it turned out, my research into the Maya turned up a mysterious “Howler Monkey God,” one Hun-Batz by name, and an entire mythology in which this god was set. Monkey = simian, and ape =  simian, so it wasn’t a huge jump for me, to proposing a curse invoking the Son of Hun-Batz. And suddenly the whole thing congealed into this amazing, suspenseful, paranormal horror story.

How amazing and suspenseful? Well, let’s just say I literally creeped myself out. I’m a night owl, prone to insomnia and getting up in the night to putter around until I can fall back asleep. And I immediately discovered that I didn’t enjoy that anymore; I had a constant feeling that there might be...something...outside, in the yard, in the dark, watching through the windows and doors. When I did go back to bed, it was only to have lucid nightmares about the creature and the events in the book! I took to closing the curtains and blinds, avoiding the windows at night. Finally I gave up writing on the story after sundown, choosing to write only in the light, and hoping to get the imagery out of my head by bedtime.

I was more or less successful in that. I find that I still do better not to think about the book at night, and I still have the blinds and curtains closed at night. But our neighborhood is well lit with street lights, and the birds cluster in the trees around the house and sing cheerfully. So I know there’s nothing out there that they think is unusual. And that is comforting.

I don’t know that I’ll regularly write horror. I’m inclined to think, from my experiences with El Vengador, that I might not be cut out for that! Still and all, much of the science fiction mystery I do write tends to have strong elements of both paranormal and thriller, with the occasional seasoning of horror concepts thrown in for good measure. So I think I can take what I have learned from the experience and fold it back into my other works. And I think they’ll be the better for it.

And you never know. After all, my friend really did encounter…something…in the swamps of Florida…

~~~

El Vengador is an ebook available through Amazon. If you're interested, please seriously consider purchasing it today, and let's see how high we can drive the sales ranking! Best-seller? Through the roof!

 

-Stephanie Osborn

http://www.stephanie-osborn.com