Today, my second novel comes out: Southern Discomfort, finally live after way too many years. Available in paperback or ebook from Amazon, and in ebook from other channels.
What’s the story? Here’s the back-cover copy, “It’s May 1973 and Maria Esposito has spent three years as a wanted fugitive. Constantly on the run, she never lets anyone get close. Now torrential floods have trapped her in Pharisee Georgia, in the middle of an FBI investigation. Maria needs to keep a low profile; too bad the murder victim’s widow insists she can help solve the case. The county sheriff makes it clear saying no is not an option.
The FBI soon becomes the least of Maria’s problems. There’s the hostile ravens. The homicidal horse. The living shadow warning her to leave town or die. Maria has no choice but to run, even though something monstrous is threatening Pharisee. Something only she can stop.
Maria tells herself she doesn’t give a damn. She can’t afford to give a damn.
She has a grim feeling she’s not going to listen …”
As I wrote about in a series of blog posts, the inspiration for the book dates back to the 1990s, when Mercedes Lackey published Born to Run, an early urban fantasy novel about elves and mages living in California cities where everyone’s cool and funky and you can get away with being weird. It occurred to me that you could get away with weird just as much in the South: if you’re part of the community/clan/neighborhood, being eccentric is acceptable. Plus back in the last century there was still an emphasis on respecting your elders — and who’s going to be older than an immortal elf?
Olwen and Aubric McAlister came over from Ireland with some of the Irish families they’d befriended, fleeing Oliver Cromwell’s brutal invasion of Eire. They settled in Georgia where the McAlisters have hidden their true nature from the wider world, though that’s getting harder as newcomers move into Pharisee County (“pharisee” is one of the old British names for elves/fae). Now someone has murdered Aubric, despite all the magical protections they have in place. Who? How? And why?
As I worked on this off-and-on between movie books, journalism and my first novel, Questionable Minds, it mutated a lot. From a contemporary novel to a story set in 1973. From a tough, mob-connected protagonist to 2nd. Lt. Maria Esposito. Perhaps most importantly, in the early drafts my protagonist learns the truth of Pharisee early on. In the finished novel, Maria can see things are weird when she arrives in town; they only get weirder from there. She doesn’t learn the truth until a third of the way into the book. Other members of my cast, such as FBI Agent Rachel Cohen, take a lot longer.
Rewriting the book until it was done took a long time. Getting the right cover took longer than expected. I went back to my friend, Samantha Collins, who did the cover for Questionable Minds. I didn’t have a clear concept for what I wanted this time and developing one took a lot longer than on the previous book (as detailed on my blog). Plus email problems slowed communication for several months, plus Sam got married, bought a house, and tackled house problems, along with everyday life (cover design is not her day job). I think the results were worth it.
In case you’re curious, the cover shows Maria facing off against Gwalchmai, the villain of the story. The hand he’s holding up is a hand of glory, a nasty piece of black magic made from the hand of a hanged man. Georgia isn’t hanging folks any more so Gwalchmai arranged a hanging himself. He’s firmly convinced he’s the good guy but when push comes to shove, he’ll hurt or kill anyone to gain his revenge.
The cat? Gwalchmai performed a Celtic ritual called the taghairm which involves roasting live cats on a spit for four days straight; one cat dies, he straps the next one to the spit. He’s gained powers from performing the ritual. Cats, however, can smell what he did to their kin. They want his blood!
Southern Discomfort is available in paperback from Amazon and in ebook from multiple retailers (more will be added as it goes through their approval systems). Now that it’s out I feel relief, I feel joy, I feel … pretty damn cool.
