HIDDEN

Hi

I haven't posted for some time. I've been busy writing and editing my latest thriller HIDDEN.

I had hoped to finish it months ago but COVID 19 came along and everything rapidly changed. We are all dealing with unexpected events, and writers are no different. I sit at my laptop writing or thinking about my latest scene but when these world wide events happen it's harder to focus. 

HIDDEN is an Amanda Blake thriller and the third book in the series.

Amanda has grown and become stronger with each book in the series. She will never forget Scott but she knows she has to move on, though it's hard. Will Nat. help her forget her past love? You will need to read the book to find out.

Will Amanda survive these latest challenges? She's been through a lot and I get upset when she is involved in some dangerous situations. But Amanda dictates what she wants to do and I can only tell her story. 
Sometimes, Amanda thinks she will never be whole again after being a victim at the hands of a predator who had her naked and lying tied up on a table. Will she get her hands on the video from this event and destroy it?

What's Hidden about? 

Amanda’s uncle believes the voice of God speaks through him. 

He is one of the Chosen as are his devotees who live on a compound in the wilds of Montana.

When a child of the Holy Tribe of God goes missing, Amanda’s desperate to search for the boy, but her uncle isn’t concerned and refuses. Soon the child’s mother goes missing too. Amanda must use all her resources to find and rescue the boy and his mother from sinister forces while putting her own life in mortal danger.

This is just the tip of the iceberg and there is so much more to this story.

Look out for HIDDEN in August at your favorite retailer.

A journey of 10000 steps is over.

I can breathe again. 

I can sleep again.

I hope you enjoy my latest thriller. Authors rely on reviews. Please leave a review if you can. Thanks.

Sleep then My Princess is available on PRE-RELEASE @ $0.99


Link: Sleep then My Princess AMAZON KINDLE.

Sleep then My Princess

Formatting my second thriller

I'm in the final stages of formatting Sleep then My Princess. This is the part where I go cross-eyed trying to eliminate the extra spaces and tabs.

My cover is changing as I'm not happy with the original cover. Better to do it now before the launch which is 30 October.  A burning match. When the match burns out, I'll be uploading my manuscript and cheering that my journey for this book is over. I'll be parting with my child that I've seen grow into an adult.

The Deadly Caress was my first foray into writing thrillers and Sleep then My Princess is my second. I think that the second book has a more original plot and is the favorite with my beta readers.

Trailer for the Deadly Caress O. N. Stefan

2014 in Review

2014 went too fast for me. I published the Deadly Caress early in 2014. Being a first time author was a steep learning curve for me. Marketing is only one aspect of writing I'm learning as I go. 

There are so many people I want to thank that helped me put that book onto Kindle. The first one is Victoria Chie, Max, Chris and Nicole and all my friends who helped with marketing.

I have to thank my readers for their reviews and encouragement. 

The Deadly Caress wasn't an easy book to write and to hear that it was an easy read was heartening for me. It took many revisions to get it that way. Writing a book isn't a singular task. It takes a team of support people to assist along the way from editors, proofreaders and cover designers.

I plan to release my next thriller early 2015. I've been bogged down with scientific research on this one but loving it all the same.

On the reading front, I've manage to churn through many books this year. Some were amazing tomes and others, not so.

One of note is: Bloodgifted 
Bloodgifted


Another is: 

Agency Rules - Never an Easy Day at the Office

Agency Rules

I hope you have a happy and prosperous 2015.

I went to the Freecon Futurian Sci Fi convention last Sunday 7th Dec 2014. (I do love reading and writing fantasy as well as thrillers. After my next thriller is published, I'll be finishing off my latest fantasy.) Not as big a turn up as I had been told. But still it was an interesting day. I was asked to read one chapter of The Deadly Caress. I know it's not sci fi or fantasy or horror but I thought it would be good to do this.

Garry Dalrymple has to be commended for all his hard work behind the scenes for this convention.

Here's part of the chapter I read out. Please note: Amanda Blake is the main character. Dorian - her newly discovered step-brother, Brian - her newly discovered twin and Jean - her newly discovered natural mother.

Excerpt from Chapter Four of The Deadly Caress 
Amanda zipped up her raspberry-colored dress, and then stepped into her sandals, her thoughts centered on Dorian’s argument with Jean last night.
     She recalled her mother’s words before Dorian strode away. ‘I’m sorry. I was going to tell you.’
Still wounded by Jean’s confession that she hadn’t been able to tell Murray she’d had twins, Amanda pulled aside the silk drapes, and the weak morning sun streamed in.
     More than half of last night, she’d mulled over how it must have been for Jean faced with that decision. How could she begin to understand when she’d never had children?
     That she blamed herself for the loss of her own unborn child at the age of twenty had been more than enough guilt for her to carry. It had been a horrific way to wake up to what she was doing to her body and start eating properly again.
     From her bedroom, she could see a path curving from the veranda, past a winding narrow garden of mauve irises and white lilies; and at the cliff face, steps that disappeared downwards to the beach. Near the steps grew two Cypress pines that clung precariously to the rocky cliff face and leaned towards the restless, churning, water.
     Even after last night’s incident, and the conflicting emotions that had brought her here, she was glad she’d come and been given the chance to meet her twin. Being part of a family again made her feel whole. She opened the window and heard the ocean crashing angrily against the rocks and the wind wooing as it skidded past the house.
     No matter what the weather brought, she was looking forward to spending time with Brian.
A glance at the clock told her it was seven-thirty. She picked up her earrings from the French provincial dresser, had pushed one hoop in her lobe when she heard a scream.
     The woman screamed again. Amanda opened the door and hurried toward the sound, which seemed to be coming from a room at the far end of the hallway.
     She stopped in the doorway to Jean’s room. Estella stood sobbing beside a writing bureau, her face buried in her hands. A broken cup lay at her feet. She looked up as Amanda entered.
     ‘She’s….’ Her voice trailed off.
     Amanda couldn’t understand her, but she noticed the stricken woman staring towards the ensuite bathroom, its door half-open.
     Heart hammering, she pushed the door open as far as it would go.
     ‘No,’ she gasped. ‘No.’
     Jean was sprawled on the tiled floor, her eyes open, staring at nothing, her mouth agape as if wanting to say one last word. Her blue satin dressing gown had fallen open, revealing her negligee.
A sense of unreality gripped Amanda.
     ‘Is she?’ Amanda couldn’t say the word but she knew the answer to her question. There was no life left in her mother’s body.
     A toothbrush lay beside Jean’s outstretched fingers. Amanda stared hard at them, wanting them to curl around the handle, to show some small sign of life.
     Finally, she moved her gaze to the marble vanity. There lay the mundane necessities of the living—a half-drunk glass of water, an open bottle of mouthwash, toothpaste, an open bottle of pills, perfume, lipstick and a compact.
     The blue dressing gown…
     Was it still a dream…her dream? She opened her mouth to scream but no sound came out. The sound of water cascading from the faucet echoed through her thoughts.
     The scene swam out of focus. Her head felt light, and the room seemed suddenly darker. She could smell the soft scent of wildflowers and sandalwood as she felt herself sink to the floor.

I'm excited. I've been featured on the NSW Writer's Centre Blog.

http://www.nswwc.org.au/2014/11/spotlight-on%E2%80%A6-o-n-stefan/

Author interview

Tell me a little bit about yourself, O. Stefan. What do you do for a living? What part of the world do you live in? How long have you been writing? That sort of thing.

I live in Sydney, Australia and I've been writing on and off for the past 10 years. 

Tell me a little about The Deadly Caress.

The Deadly Caress is a fast-paced story set in California. Suspenseful and thrilling, it is holds a mystery that Amanda Blake, a freelance photographer, must unravel.

Amanda tracks down her birth mother, the multi millionaire Jean Campbell. Hours after her arrival, Jean is murdered.

Amanda sets out to discover her mother’s killer. Her quest takes to Australia to find the man she thinks holds the answer to the killer’s identity. While visiting this man, she has to run for her life under a hail of bullets. Someone will stop at nothing until she is dead. If she thought things were bad enough, they are about to get much worse. 

What was the genesis of that work?

It's what captured my attention at one time from a newspaper article and it started me thinking...what if a person was to discover that the woman she thought was her mother wasn't. How would she feel? What if this mother was murdered? What would this person do?

Then there's a scary scene with Amanda driving down a mountainside and that comes from my memory banks. I grew up across the road from a very bad intersection and every weekend there would be at least one horrific accident. Some of these were youths speeding and chasing each other. Drunks and careless or not drivers who had miscalculated the sharp turn and careened into an oncoming car or the nearby light post. My dad would run over to see if an ambulance was needed, as we were the only family in the street to have a phone. He'd take blankets over if the person/people was badly injured and I would help him. My sister and my mother would be too upset to be of help and didn't go.

I find my characters everywhere and nowhere. 

I was intrigued by how you go from the female protagonist's viewpoint to the creeper's viewpoint. Can you tell us something about the process you follow to accomplish that?

I did get upset when I had to put Amanda in difficult situations, as I’d grown fond of her. I find writing about the evil people easier than writing about someone who’s good because it’s harder to make the honest person shine but it does make you grow as a writer.

Did this project take a lot of research?

The Deadly Caress took a fair amount of research into police procedures and the prison system. I emailed a detective in Monterey who was very helpful. And for what it was like inside the prison system in the US, I did all my research online by reading blogs from prisoners, to online diagrams of layouts inside and articles posted online from newspapers.

What are your plans for the book in the near future?

I self published “The Deadly Caress” early this year. Currently, I’m working on polishing my next thriller “Lurking in the Shadows” which is scheduled for release in the latter part of this year.

Your art work is striking. Who did the cover for you?

I found a graphic designer on fiverr.com to design the cover for me. I’d researched the covers I liked so that made it easier for the designer.

Link: The Deadly Caress

Web site: http://onstefan.weebly.com

My sixth five star review

My sixth five star review. Wow. Sooo excited.
It's nice to get some great feedback.

P.S. Now on promotion: UK £0.92 US $1.55.

"When I chanced upon an early edition of "The Deadly Caress," I was caught up
in its brisk pace from the get go with Amanda meeting her mother Jean for the
first time after many years. The backstory surfaces rapidly, Amanda and her
twin Brian adopted out in Australia when Jean was seventeen and penniless,
but is now a rich widow in California able to call them back together. And
then the sudden twist, their time for catching up is cut short by her murder.
It is a busy plot around diverse characters eyeing a huge inheritance while
a murder takes place and suspicion is rife, giving investigators a puzzle to
unravel. The prose is clear cut and to the point in both narration and
dialogue, making the story easy to follow. It is definitely a captivating read
worthy of the five stars I've given it."
The Deadly Caress

#Brad Pitt