Deadly Illusions Is Free for the Kindle

When I set up my tent at an outdoor festival, I can count on a few people to gaze about the array of covers and ask, "Which one do you like best?" My stock answer isn't really an answer at all. It's a statement. "That's like asking which one of my kids do I like best?" That would be partly true, partly a cop-out. It's true I don't have a favorite, but I view some a bit more fondly than others. One in this category is Deadly Illusions. Trouble is, this is the least expensive of my books at $12.95. Like all of my mysteries, though, it's only $2.99 for the Kindle.

And today, December 26, through Saturday, December 29, Deadly Illusions will be free to download from the Kindle Store here.

This is the third book in my Greg McKenzie Mystery Series. I particularly enjoyed writing it since it involved Greg and Jill opening McKenzie Investigations and launching their careers as PI's. The  response from reviewers was encouraging.

Spinetingler Magazine wrote:

"Campbell's engaging style and masterful plotting makes for a fast-paced, thrilling read. His sharp wit left this reader laughing out loud at times, yet the steadily building suspense made for a white-knuckle, edge-of-the seat ride."

Midwest Book Review had this to say:

"Greg McKenzie is a senior investigator who relies on his experience to compensate for the brawn he might have engaged in the past. His wife, Jill, is an accomplished pilot, cook, and is the perfect partner for her husband. Campbell juxtaposes her correction of Greg's "blue language" and her obvious spirituality with her determination when the going gets rough and she has to use some of the private investigator skills that most people would shrink from. All in all, DEADLY ILLUSIONS is another winner in the Chester D. Campbell literary cabinet. Campbell obviously has many stories to share, and he continues to write fabulous mysteries."

In the book, Molly Saint hires new PI's Greg and Jill McKenzie to check into her husband's background, then disappears. It starts them on a tangled trail of deceit. Complicating matters further, Greg gets drawn into a troubling police investigation stemming from the assassination of the Federal Reserve Board chairman at a Nashville hotel. The case resurrects old problems with a Murder Squad detective and his colleages among Nashville's finest. The deeper the McKenzies dig, the more deadly illusions they face. After threats, break-ins, and another murder, the charade ends in a shocking showdown.

I enjoyed writing Jill's character, and the readers appear to approve, as witness the comments of Midwest Book Review's Shelley Glodowski above. Jill does something quite unexpected in this story, but I won't say anymore as I don't want to spoil it for you.

One dilemma mystery writers face is the necessity to continually ramp up the tension by putting your protagonist in progressively more dire situations. If you aren't careful, they wind up facing impossible odds. In this book, Greg and his homicide detective friend find themselves defenseless, confronted by a remorseless killer.

What happens? Read the book. 

The Story Behind the Story

The background to my second Post Cold War political thriller, The Poksu Conspiracy, goes back sixty years. That was when my Knoxville Air National Guard unit was activated. A few months later I found myself , a young lieutenant, assigned to Fifth Air Force Headquarters in Seoul. When I returned from the war zone in 1953, I married the girl who would become mother of my four children. Back home, I also read several books on Korea and learned how the country had arrived at the situation it faced when the North invaded the South in 1950.

Thirty years later, my younger son, as an Army lieutenant, was stationed at the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) along the North Korean border. He married a Korean girl before returning to the States. By the mid-eighties he was back in the Far East, stationed on Okinawa with Army Special Forces. His team was targeted on Thailand, where they helped train Thai special forces. His second son was born on Okinawa. When his tour ended in 1987, he had a month's leave coming. He invited his mother and me to join him and his wife on a month-long tour of the region. That trip contributed many ideas I've used in my Post Cold War political thrillers.

We started that rambling tour of 1987 in Seoul, which bore no resemblance to the city I remembered  from the spring of 1952. Instead of buildings left in shambles by artillery barrages and streets largely devoid of traffic other than military, I found modern high-rise structures everywhere and wide boulevards clogged with vehicles. Though she had been married for several years and now had two small boys, my daughter-in-law wanted a proper wedding ceremony as a memento to replace the civil vows they took back during my son's DMZ tour. We attended the traditional Korean ceremony at a wedding house in Inchon, her hometown and Seoul's seaport neighbor. A similar event takes place in the book.

When I began my fiction-writing career a couple of years later with my first political thriller, Beware the Jabberwock, I used ideas for Hong Kong scenes based on the final leg of that 1987 tour. Recalling our experience in Seoul, plus memories from the Korean War days, I started work on Book 2 with an idea about what could happen in those turbulent days of the early nineties.

I decided to use a Korean homicide detective as a major character in the story. I corresponded with a staff member at the American Embassy who sent me brochures detailing the organization and structure of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Bureau, plus lots of other useful information.

The Poksu Conspiracy is probably the most thoroughly researched book I've written. I read countless books and magazines on Korea, plus such subjects as nuclear weapons. Most of the historical information in the story is factual, including South Korea's early work on gaining a nuclear capability. I came across one intriguing fact, that Japan's efforts to create an atomic bomb during World War II took place in Korea. Another factual subject I included dealt with operations of a Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army division headed by Kim Il-sung in the late 1930s.

I visited many of the locations in Seoul mentioned in the book during my 1987 trip. Our travels through the Far East also took us to Thailand, including Bangkok and Chiangmai. The main character in the book, Burke Hill, travels to Chiangmai in search of one of the Poksu guerrillas from World War II. He stays in the Top North Guest House, an interesting motel we spent a few nights in. He also goes to a couple of unique sites we visited, including the Night Bazaar and a mountainside Buddhist temple called Wat Prathat Doi Suthep.

For a book sixty years in the making, I'm happy it's finally out there for people to read. It has been twenty-one years since I wrote the original manuscript, but the story is still basically the same. You'll find it in the Kinde Store at Poksu Conspiracy.

Following a Flair for Creation

I confess I'm not a prolific blog reader, but I enjoy learning how other authors feel about their writing. What it usually boils down to is they see placing words on paper (or a computer screen) as part of their makeup. They have to write. My take on it may be basically the same, but I see it in a little different light.

I look at writing as one way to indulge a talent for creation. Creative types love to produce something out of nothing, to follow the old Star Trek manta of going where no man has gone before. I've always enjoyed the creative process. Back in the sixties I put together all the parts to create Nashville's first slick paper monthly magazine. I followed that with a venture into the advertising world, joining the creative department of Nashville's largest agency.

During the final segment of my life in the business world, I managed a statewide trade association of more than 4,000 members. One of the most fun parts of the job was to create annual conventions with openings that would excite the delegates. I put on a variety of productions using video and music, including one with a young female news reporter staging a TV newscast.

When I set up shop in my home office after retirement, I turned to novel writing as a natural outlet for my creative penchant. The first seven manuscripts I completed got varied receptions from a string of agents, none resulting in publication, but I kept at it because I enjoyed creating the tales of adventure. I finally got a contract and began to produce stories that wound up on the printed page. And as the publishing world changed, they began to appear in the electronic arena.

The first three manuscripts were a trilogy of political thrillers written twenty years ago. I've been working to revise them more in today's style, meaning tighter and somewhat less wordy. The first volume, Beware the Jabberwock, is now on Amazon, and book two, The Poksu Conspiracy, will be there by the end of this month. The new cover is shown at right, featuring South Korea's National Treasure No. 1, the Great South Gate (Namdaemun), above the hangul characters for poksu, meaning "vengeance."

I consider myself primarily a storyteller. I have no desire to write books with messages intended to sway readers' minds in some direction. I keep writing because I enjoy creating stories that interest me and hopefully will interest a few of those millions of novel readers out there. If you are one of them, tell your friends.

A Look at Chris Redding's Blonde Demolition

Today I welcome mystery writer Chris Redding, who who lives in New Jersey with her "one husband, two kids, one dog, and three rabbits." When she isn't writing, she's chauffeuring her two boys to activities and working per diem in her local hospital. She gives us a look at her latest release, Blonde Demolition. Here's the back cover summary:

Mallory Sage lives in a small, idyllic town where nothing ever happens. Just the kind of life she has always wanted. No one, not even her fellow volunteer firefighters, knows about her past life as an agent for Homeland Security.

Former partner and lover, Trey McCrane, comes back into Mallory's life. He believes they made a great team once, and that they can do so again. Besides, they don't have much choice. Paul Stanley, a twisted killer and their old nemesis, is back.

Framed for a bombing and drawn together by necessity, Mallory and Trey go on the run and must learn to trust each other again―if they hope to survive. But Mallory has been hiding another secret, one that could destroy their relationship. And time is running out.

Here's an excerpt from Blonde Demolition:

Mallory bit down and then yanked at the arm. Her meager strength came from another rush of adrenaline.

"Whoa, Mallory. It's just me."

The familiar voice froze her before she could do any damage. Oh crap. As if her day hadn't tanked already.

One by one she uncurled her fingers from around his wrist. Her shaking hands grasped the steering wheel, knuckles white.

Her eyes fell closed. If she had a list of people she never wanted to see again, his name would be at the top. Why here? Why now? This was the last thing she needed.

She steadied her breath and her gaze scanned the parking lot. No one stirred or walked to their car. She couldn't be seen with him.  

"Don't turn around. Just drive. I'll be hunkered down in the back."

She started the car and drove home. Her knuckles remained white. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I think you know."

Of course. "The bomb in our trailer?"

Emotions roiled her stomach. She'd have to stock up on antacids if Trey was back in her life. And she had just been thinking how nutty this week of fair preparations had been. Now it all looked so easy.

Her thoughts shifted to the events of the evening. Who had put the bomb there? It wasn't a prank if this guy was here. This was bigger than all of Coleville, Centre County.

She pulled in front of her house, a two-story Cape Cod set down a long driveway.

"We're here and no one can see you from the road," she said.

She got out of the car, leaving her guest to follow.

You'll find the ebook at http://tinyurl.com/7olwvhs, the paper edition at http://tinyurl.com/87qdaam.

Greg McKenzie Book 2 Free Oct. 1-3

When I wrote the book that became my first published mystery, Secret of the Scroll, I had no idea of turning it into a series. But I fell in love with Greg and Jill McKenzie and decided they were too interesting to consign to the scrap heap of discarded fictional characters. I started looking around for a plot to get them involved in a good whodunit.

My brother had a condo on Perdido Key, Florida in those days, and my wife and I spent a couple of weeks there each spring and fall. It was an ideal place to do some writing. I decided to set the new book there. The most obvious sight in those days was a bevy of cranes lifting construction materials above the beach. It was boom days for high-rise condos.

Designed to Kill developed from that start. I looked back to characters from the first book for the basic setup. Greg and Jill McKenzie owned a condo in the same spot as the one Sarah and I stayed at on Perdido Key. The McKenzies' best friends, Sam and Wilma Gannon, had a son named Tim who was architect/engineer for a new high-rise designed after a Spanish castle. At a party marking completion of the project, a fifteenth floor balcony collapses, sending two people to their deaths.

When Tim's body is found the next morning at the Gulf Islands National Seashore not far away, the sheriff's sergeant who investigates calls it an obvious suicide. Sam Gannon disagrees and asks his retired Air Force investigator friend, Greg, to look into it. Greg, with Jill's help, finds lots of inconsistencies. When he's warned to butt out by a couple of Mafia enforcers, he knows it's time to solve a murder.

A cover blurb by New York Times bestselling author Phillip Margolin calls the book "A thoroughly enjoyable mystery with an intelligent plot, clever clues and characters who are like people you know."

It has a twist at the end and you probably won't guess the identity of the murderer.

YOU CAN DOWNLOAD DESIGNED TO KILL FREE FOR THE KINDLE ON MONDAY-WEDNESDAY (OCTOBER 1-3) AT The Kindle Store.

Who's Who in Post Cold War Thriller II

Here's an advance peek at my second Post Cold War political thriller titled The Poksu Conspiracy. What follows is the Who's Who that will appear in the book. It lists all of the characters who appear in more than one chapter. I figure you won't need a cheat sheet to keep up with those who only make brief appearances. They are listed by category.

The Korean (hangul) characters for "poksu" in a square, at right, was the trademark of the small poksu guerrilla group that harassed the Japanese during World War II. It later appears as the codename for a highly-secret nuclear weapons project.

Who's Who

Worldwide Communications Consultants (Washington-based CIA spinoff)

    Nathaniel (Nate) Highsmith, President

    Burke Hill, chief financial officer, clandestine group director

    Tony Carlucci, Highsmith's executive assistant

    Jerry Chan, manager of Seoul Office

    Duane Elliston, account executive in Seoul Office

    Brittany Pickerel, research assistant in Seoul Office

    Evelyn Tilson, Hill's executive assistant

    Travis Tolliver, media specialist in Seoul Office

    An Kye-sun, Korean media specialist in Seoul Office

    Song Ji-young, Korean secretary in Seoul Office

   

American Officials

    Thornton Giles, President

    Kingsley Marshall, Director of Central Intelligence

    Ambassador Shearing, U.S. Ambassador to South Korea

    Brig. Gen. Henry Thatcher, Presidential Assistant for National Security Affairs

    Special Agent Frederick Birnbaum, instructor, FBI National Academy

    Vincent Duques, South Korean Embassy political officer and CIA Station Chief

    Special Agent Clifford Walters, FBI, San Francisco

    Damon Mansfield, South Korean Embassy cultural attaché

    Kurt Voegler, South Korean Embassy commercial attaché

   

South Korean Officials

    Kwak Sung-kyo, recently-elected president

    Hong Oh-san, prime minister

    Col. Han Sun-shin, director of Agency for Security Planning (NSP)

    Dr. Hyun U-je, head of Korea Electric Power Company (Kepco)

    Ko Pong-hak, information officer, Ministry of Culture and Information

    Park Sang-muk, Seoul public prosecutor

   

Seoul Metropolitan PoliceBureau

    Superintendent General Choi, head of Special Security Group

    Lt. Han Mi-jung, fiancée of Lieutenant. Yun

    Lt. Yun Se-jin, officer, Tongdaemun Station

    Capt. Yun Yu-sop, homicide detective, Namdaemun Station

   

World War II Poksu guerilla group

    Lee Horangi-chelmun, leader

    Ahn Wi-jong, other group survivor

   

North Korean Officials

    Kim Il-sung, premier

    Kim Jong-il, son and heir apparent

    So Song-ku, official of the Central Committee, North Korean Workers Party

   

Other Americans

    Will and Maggie Arnold, Falls Church, VA neighbors of the Hills

    Dr. Chloe Brackin, obstetrican and Lori Hill's best friend

    Lorelei Hill, wife of Burke Hill, head of Clipper Cruise & Travel

    Dr. Cabot Lowing, fellow, Highsmith Foundation

    R. Mitchell (Mitch) Steele, contractor's representative, Taesong Nuclear Power Plant

    Peggy Walters, Burke Hill's first wife

    Dr. Kim Vickers, director, Korean-American Education Foundation

   

In Hungary

    Margit Szabo, Lorelei Hill's grandmother

   

Other Koreans

    Ahn Pom-yun, drug kingpin in Chiangmai, Thailand, son of Ahn Wi-jong

    Mr. Chon, Namdaemun Market fruit vendor, Captain Yun's informant

    Hwang Sang-sol, a.k.a. Suh Tae-hung, free lance assassin

    Kang Han-kyo, editor of Koryo Ilbo, national daily newspaper

    Kim Yong-man, Mr. Chon's grandson

    Kwon, junior official at Reijeo conglomerate

    Dr. Lee Yo-ku, Seoul National University history professor

    Moon Chwa, official at Pulguksa Buddhist shrine

    Dr. Shin Man-ki, fired nuclear physicist at Reijeo installation

    Yang Jong-ku, hotel owner, chairman of Korean-American Cooperation Association

    Yi In-wha, prominent businessman, son-in-law of President Kwak's half-sister

    Yoo Hak-sil, Seoul private investigator, former cop

Last Day Secret of the Scroll Is Free

Secret of the Scroll was ranked #1 in the Thriller Suspense category on Amazon this morning among free Kindle books. It ranked #16 in the Top 100 books category. If you'd like a free ebook, today is the last of my giveaway days.

As of this morning there had been about 7500 downloads, which I'm happy with after the late start because Amazon didn't list it as free until Thursday. According to many of my colleagues who have gone this route, I should expect a pickup in sales of all of my books over the next week or so. Since Secret is the first book in the series, if they like it there are four more to read.

There has been a lot of haranguing on the lists lately about giving books away that we labored so long and hard to produce. It's all a part of marketing. "Loss leaders" they're called in the retail business. You sell something way below its value to attract customers to your other products. I'll know if it works in the next week or so.

Meanwhile, back at the keyboard, I'm getting the final edits on The Poksu Conspiracy, book two in the Post Cold War thriller trilogy. Got a great cover from Stephen Walker, which I'll post in a few days after it's finalized.