My gift to Kindle readers: The Sacred Dog, one of my hilltown books, is free for three days — Tuesday, March 17 to Thursday, March 19. This novel is a prequel to The Unforgiving Town, which has an April 7 release. While both books can stand on their own, curious readers might want to read both.
The Sacred Dog was the first novel I completed a long time ago, actually at the start of the millennium. Despite the efforts of an agent, it failed to get picked up. So, I held onto the book, giving it the attention it deserved. I was thrilled when darkstroke books took it on, but after that publisher folded, I self-published it myself.
The Sacred Dog, set in 1984, is not a mystery but a thriller about my favorite setting, the fictional hilltowns of Western Massachusetts. I feel I know the area so well from my many years living in the real ones. At that time I was immersed in the area, editing stories for the daily newspaper where I worked. Before that, I was the hilltown reporter. Of course, news coverage included stories about personal conflicts and feuds between people who live there — but none so dark as the one in this book.
The story is basically about bad blood between two men — Frank Hooker and Al Kitchen — and that feud’s ultimate climax. Frank Hooker owns The Sacred Dog, the only bar in town, where the locals gather to drink beer, gab, and get away from their families. The only person not welcome is Al Kitchen, but Frank has his reason — he blames him for his brother, Wes’s death. But after an appeal from the grandmother who raised him, Al is allowed to have two beers. Frank figures it’s better to keep his eye on someone he doesn’t trust or like.
Al Kitchen is a hell raiser, no surprise considering the grandfather who raised him was a drunk and an abuser. About the only good thing the man did was teach him to hit a baseball well. But Al always has his kerosene-smelling granny on his side even as an adult. Al was in the car crash that killed his best buddy, Wes, but he wasn’t at the wheel — a fact Frank won’t accept.
Frank’s life is about to change now that his ex-wife and their daughter have returned after living in Florida for three years. Verona says she misses her old life although coming back might mean facing a dark secret that involves both men. All is about to come to a reckoning.
And then 17 years later, Al Kitchen returns home after being in prison. But there are no big welcomes. Townspeople preferred he died in prison. Ah, but that’s another story in The Unforgiving Town.
Here is the link to The Sacred Dog on Amazon.
And soon the sequel, The Unforgiving Town, will be released. Kindle, which is ready for pre-order, costs 99 cents, paperback, which is $14.99, will soon be. Thank you if you buy my book, and if you are so inclined to give it a review or rating.