Get your copy now!

Yay! The day has finally come! Cloistered to Death is here! If you didn’t pre-order, you can now get the print and Kindle versions here, PDF/epub/mobi here through Smashwords, and at all of your other favorite ebook sellers.

Enjoy!!

Six days until Cloistered to Death!

While you wait, here’s a brief snippet. Jamie is on a writing retreat at a monastery.

I was deep into a primary document written by a Mackenzie chief when I heard voices from the kitchen. A man said, in a very un-monklike tone, “Fuck off, Trent. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

A deeper voice said, “Yes, I do. You think Father Greg allowed Martin to greet the guests as a reward? Hell, no. He was punishing him for letting Lawrence hit him in the face. You know the rule.”

“Yeah, yeah. No marks.”

“Besides, Joe, you’ve got no reason to be jealous of Martin. Unless you want to be music director.”

Joe snorted. “Noooo, thank you. The turnover rate for that job is way too high.”

Nothing else was said.

I sat there for a minute, reflecting on what I’d just heard. No marks? Unless the monastery had a goat named Lawrence, Brother Martin had lied to me. And what did that remark about the turnover rate for music directors mean? Martin had said that his predecessor had died.

It occurred to me that I probably shouldn’t tell Pete about the conversation. At least not until I got home.

Cloistered to Death is ready to preorder!

Woohoo! You can now preorder Cloistered to Death at both Amazon and Smashwords. Release date is May 28. That’s Memorial Day, so you won’t have to sneak and read at work. 🙂  If you order through Nook, Kobo, iBooks, etc., it should be available in another day or two.

The print version will probably also be released on the 28th, but I can’t set up a preorder through Createspace.

Enjoy!

Jamie Brodie is on deadline. The proposal for his second book is due, and he desperately needs uninterrupted writing time. At the suggestion of patron, friend, and former monk Clinton Kenneally – and over the protests of Pete Ferguson, Jamie’s husband – Jamie schedules a week-long writing retreat at a local monastery. But the monastery is not exactly what Jamie expected…which might explain the flicker of disquiet in Clinton’s eyes.

Meanwhile, Kevin Brodie and Jon Eckhoff are dealing with a dead drug dealer, doggie diarrhea, and a camera crew from the reality TV show Two Days to Solve. The camera loves Jon, and vice versa. Kevin’s just trying to refrain from swearing on TV. But when the victim turns out to be someone from Kevin’s past, the case gets a whole lot more interesting.

And there’s no way it’ll be solved in two days.

A snippet from Cloistered to Death

Just over a month to go until publication… 😀 Enjoy this teaser!!

TWO DAYS TO SOLVE

Los Angeles, California

Monday, April 23, 2018

5:15 am

Voiceover: Homicide. The ultimate crime. When a murder is committed in Los Angeles, the LAPD’s homicide detectives have two days to solve the crime before the trail begins to go cold.

Tonight, a murder was committed. Tonight, we ride with two of LAPD’s finest, the homicide detectives of the West Los Angeles Division, as they hunt a killer.

Detective Brodie (in the passenger seat, speaking to the camera): Our victim is a male, found in front of an empty house that’s for sale. A neighbor was outside with his dog and heard the gunshot. He didn’t see anything but he called it in.

Detective Kevin Brodie has been with the Los Angeles Police Department for sixteen years, ten of them with West LA homicide.

Brodie: We have far fewer homicides in West LA than in most of the other divisions.

Detective Eckhoff (driving): We may not have as many, but the motives aren’t that different.

His partner, Detective Jonathan Eckhoff, has been with LAPD for fourteen years, seven as a homicide detective.

Eckhoff: Drugs and money. There are a lot of drugs in them thar hills. Lots of money, too.

Brodie: We get a fair number of body dumps. Up in the canyons, this side of Mulholland. Someone’s dog discovers a victim and we have no idea where the crime scene is.

Eckhoff: This time, we know.

The unmarked car is waved through a checkpoint and pulls up to the curb in front of a large house. Uniformed police and crime scene personnel swarm the site. There is a For Sale sign at the end of the driveway.

Brodie (to a uniformed officer): Hey, Ben, what’ve we got?

By Ken Lunde, http://lundestudio.com, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9110575

Officer: White male, shot in the chest at close range.

Brodie and Eckhoff approach the the house, where the victim lies just outside the front door in a pool of blood. The victim is wearing jeans and a t-shirt, and is barefoot.

Brodie: You’re not kidding, close range. (He leans in to study the wound.) Shooter must have been less than three feet away.

Eckhoff: Someone he trusted. (He scans the scene.) Oh, shit. His shoes are missing. Is this a copycat?

Brodie: No way. (To the camera) About six months ago, Harbor Division arrested a guy who’d been stabbing homeless people and stealing their shoes. He’s in jail.

Officer: This guy doesn’t look homeless. Or stabbed.

Brodie (glances down the driveway): It’s gotta be coincidence, but we’ll keep it in mind. How did he get here? (to coroner’s investigator) He doesn’t have ID?

Coroner’s Investigator: Not yet. There’s nothing in his pockets. Not even a quarter.

Brodie (still studying the body): He’s got a defensive wound.

Eckhoff (demonstrates to the camera): Someone knows he’s about to get shot, he’s likely to throw up his hands. Doesn’t help, the bullet goes right through, but it’s a reflex reaction.

CI (kneeling by the body): Chest wound isn’t a through and through, so we’ll get the bullet.

Eckhoff (looks up at the house): This is an odd place for a robbery.

Brodie: I don’t think this started off as a robbery.

Crime scene personnel are taking multiple pictures.

Brodie: He looks vaguely familiar, kinda like a guy I played ball with in college.

Eckhoff (in some disbelief): You know him?

 

Pre-order links coming soon!