Category: SUSPENSE

Blog: How to Commit the Perfect Murder

This week: How to Commit the Perfect Murder, Rant about Adespresso, updated bio, book price increases.

How to Commit the Perfect Murder
There is no Sneak Preview this week because I am still only slowly progressing with the latest book. If I excerpted every week you would soon have read all of it. 🙂 Instead let me write about something which has preoccupied me this week and does for some time during most books I write. There is often a murder and one often has to think through just how the murderer in the book is going to handle it. There are many ways of murdering somebody so that it is unlikely you will be found out but very few people can or actually, do it in cold blood. It is more often done out of passion and on the spur of the moment ( it is more commonly state-sponsored executions that are planned). Serial Killers I won’t count here because they are not generally sane, usually psychopaths and don’t think rationally about what they are doing.

So my main character finds himself with a knife in his hand and the means, and motive, to kill somebody. It is war-time and you might think nobody will notice a missing person, or will care about a body in the street. But you would probably be wrong. Apart from cleaning up the crime scene (if he or she can do the deed) as best they can, the murderer will next have to consider either how to dispose of the body or how to conceal the act and make the death look natural. In my case (ie the character in my book, not me!) the latter is not possible, nor does the character need to fake his own death, but he does want to take the place of the deceased for a while. Therefore he needs to dispose of the victim. Continue reading “Blog: How to Commit the Perfect Murder”

Blog: Playing for Keeps – by Lazlo Ferran

This week: Sneak Preview, Free offer results, Short Stirlings, philosophy.

Sneak Preview is back!
Yes, I am writing again! It’s taken a few weeks but here is an excerpt from the forthcoming (in the next few years!) novel with the working title December Radio.

December Radio

Copyright © 2013 by Lazlo Ferran

All Rights Reserved

“Scary the first time but don’t look too long; you’ll be fine,” said Max Schickert, coiling the blue nylon safety line around the taut muscles in his forearm.
It was Davis Connaughy’s first trip to ‘The Telescope’. He looked at the innocent-looking gap between the two boulders with distrust. The noon-day heat of Peru in October was making him sweat slightly after the long hike up the hill above San Ramon. He glanced at the blonde Apollo in front of him and grinned. He turned to look back out across the vast valley of refulgent green, ruffled nearby by the gentle east-north east breeze.
“No problemo. I have done The Cave of Swallows twice!”
“You do realise how privileged you are to be here? Don’t fuck up! And pay attention.” Continue reading “Blog: Playing for Keeps – by Lazlo Ferran”

Blog: The World Is Not Enough

This week: Para-Worlds, Social Network build and Free Offers.

Para-Worlds
I have spent most of this week defining a para-world. When I sit down to work on one of my literary projects now, I often feel hesitant: have I forgotten the thrust of the book; does what I am going to write fit into the world-view of the main character; does the story express the world view I want to show. With about ten books published it is getting increasingly hard to keep track of the different world-views my stories encompass. Moreover, its becoming harder to invent new stories that are either so radically different from my existing ones that I don’t have to worry about any incongruity or ones that are similar enough to existing ones that I need to avoid the reader saying, “Hey, this doesn’t fit with that previous story – what’s going on?”

So I decided to think about coming up with a para-world which could encompass my sci-fi and fantasy stories. I am not exactly coining the term ‘para-world’ but I had better define what I mean. I mean by that a world that explains the unexplained elements of our own world; the hidden world as I see it if you like. Actually it is more like a hidden world as I see it; it is not the only view I have and is probably not the one I use in my day-to-day life. Continue reading “Blog: The World Is Not Enough”

Writer’s Block-Gravity’s Rainbow, Spartacus

This week: writer’s block and how to overcome or avoid, guest post on LOB Blog, Gravity’s Rainbow and Kirk Douglas.

Writer’s Block

There is no sneak preview this week because I haven’t written anything. I have also broken my own traditional use of Film Titles again because writer’s block is such an important subject for all writers and I want to make this article as easy to find using search engines as possible. I have a few tricks to share.

To be truthful, I don’t think I am actually suffering what we call the ‘classic’ writer’s block; I simply need a short break from writing. I have written three complete novels this year, two short stories and contributed to three more as well as also editing the novel The Journals of Raymond Brooks and completing my term in a prominent IT role at a London Science Institute. It’s a lot for anybody to take on and only natural that I need a break once in a while. If you read Tip 1 you will see that I simply need to take it easy and get some input from my favourite sources; movies, books and simply thinking. The last for me is something I have always enjoyed. One of the great Greek philosophers once said, if you want to experience please without pain, try philosophy. My thinking more or less involves reflecting one what I have achieved recently including any mistakes I have made, thinking about what I want to do, thinking where all my endeavors fit into the world and my aspirations, and sometimes listening for that illusive ‘voice of the muse’. Continue reading “Writer’s Block-Gravity’s Rainbow, Spartacus”

Blog: Operation Crossbow

This week: Sneak Preview, Reviews and Sales of Attack Hitler’s Bunker!

Sneak Preview

This week’s is from December Radio (aka The Farmer’s Wife). By the way the tongue-in-cheek title of the blog this week refers to the mediocre George Peppard film featuring V2 rockets; these feature in the current project December Radio.

December Radio

Copyright © 2013 by Lazlo Ferran

All Rights Reserved.

The needle scratched yet another circuit of acetate from Duke Ellington’s Cotton Tail locked groove. A ray of sun threw its first shadow over the boy’s buttock cheeks, muscular escapees from a pair of Levi’s. From under them a Maria had only minutes before unhooked herself, checked her purse and quietly shut the door. The click had opened one of the boy’s blue eyes. Without moving he surveyed the strewn cushions, vino stains, fag buts and ash; soirée memorials. No neighbour complained. Membership of the right-wing NSB party guaranteed this. Continue reading “Blog: Operation Crossbow”

Carnival of Souls and Hammer Movie Review

This week: a story’s soul,  Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell, Strunk & White: The Elements of Style.

A Story’s Soul
This week I have returned to another incomplete work, December Radio. The story is a sci-fi WWII whodunnit of sorts. So far I haven’t written much, although I have spent many hours thinking about it. The problem is that the story’s soul as I last envisaged it may be too obvious. The problem has been compounded by the recommendation by a friend, based on my description, to read Gravity’s Rainbow. I am on page 50, and so far I have very little idea what is going on; a British Agent is investigating V2 rockets amidst a chaotic kaleidoscope of disjointed feelings, weird characters and disparate locations. What is clear is that the main story is uncomfortably close to mine.  A battle has begun for the soul of my story. Attack Hitler’s Bunker was a simple story; men fighting against immense odds for Good. Its soul was born without hiccups on page one. The Ordo Lupus series have their origins in my own private obsessions with the darker side of Religion and more specifically, Faith, God, the Devil and luck. However, both Escher’s Staircase and December Radio have been born of the nebulous (to quote William Shatner) inspiration of a relationship; they have neither a beginning or end. I think the former title has now settled into a comfortable childhood, but the latter may lack something to distinguish it from its distinguished competition. Once I have the soul, the story will tell me what to write. This probably probably sounds kinda whimsy and not a little bit pretentious, but I believe it! If a book doesn’t have a soul it can’t live. Continue reading “Carnival of Souls and Hammer Movie Review”

Blog: Adolf Hitler – My Part in His Downfall

This week: Attack Hitler’s Bunker released and a sneak preview.

Attack Hitler’s Bunker
This book is now available as a kindle book on Amazon and will be available as a paperback in the next 6 days. Response has been good so far, plenty of people have responded to my posts and tweets: 190 people read the first post on Facebook which is a higher figure than in the past.

Sneak Preview
This week’s is from a story which I am provisionally calling December Radio (I might have referred to it in the past as September Radio but it’s just a working title). I am back working on this now and I will attempt to complete this before December. This book can best be described as WWII/sci-fi and is about a whole number of characters in the War gradually discovering a secret plot by some unknown enemy. They do this through evidence from a series of supernatural events. It’s quite an existential project. Continue reading “Blog: Adolf Hitler – My Part in His Downfall”

Best Seller: my Marketing Strategies

This week: Stats from FREE Promo, sneak preview from Escher’s Stairs (published as Lotus) and another FREE OFFER. This week’s title is from an obscure movie but starred James Woods and Brian Denehy, both great actors. What happened to Woods after that recent Lawyer series?

Best Seller
BookCoverPreviewThe big news this week is that I had over 2500 downloads of Ordo Lupus and the Temple Gate last week during it’s free promotion during which it made it all the way up to #74 in the Amazon US Best Sellers lists!! I can hardly believe it. Anyway more of that in a moment but don’t despair; the sneak preview is below this section this week. Continue reading “Best Seller: my Marketing Strategies”

Blog: How to Model a Life

ORDO LUPUS AND THE TEMPLE GATE IS FREE FROM TODAY – 30 AUGUST UNTIL 3 SEPTEMBER ON AMAZON SO TELL EVERYONE, THEIR DOGS, THEIR DOGS AND THEIR DOG’S BEST FRIENDS!

This week’s subject is modelling but I simply couldn’t find a well-known movie with the word ‘Model’ in the title. Hence the break in tradition for the blog’s title.

Sneak Preview
This week it is from a section called Monk in Lotus. This is the penultimate chapter of the book so I am not far from completing the first draft.

Lotus
Copyright © 2013 by Lazlo Ferran
All Rights Reserved

At the eleventh hour of the day, my duties in the dairy being completed for the morning, I was, as usual, in contemplation. Kneeling in the third pew back of the main Abbey Chapel, I watched the glossed back of the black ant. Reflecting the pillar of holy light shafting through the stained-glass window, the tiny ant’s carapace dipped up and down as it negotiated the uneven surface of the bible rail. This was my favourite time of day. Continue reading “Blog: How to Model a Life”