Boy, do I have a treat for you today! If you love to read thrillers and suspense you’ll want to check out Craig A. Hart’s book, SERENITY, the first in the Shelby Alexander Thriller series. AND it’s FREE right now so check it out!
About Craig: Craig A. Hart is the stay-at-home father of twin boys, a writer, and editor. He served as editor-in-chief for The Rusty Nail literary magazine and as manager for Sweatshoppe Media. He also served as director for Northern Illinois Radio Information Service, an outreach that brought daily news and information to the visually impaired. A native of Grand Rapids, Michigan, Craig lives in Iowa City, Iowa with his wife, sons, and two cats.
Here’s what SERENITY is about:
A bullet slams into a wall just past Shelby’s head. A drug dealer offers him $10,000 for information regarding his dead sister. The local sheriff has Shelby in his sights. It’s just another day in the small town of Serenity.
Set in Serenity, Michigan, the Shelby Alexander Thriller Series stars an aging ex-boxer and retired fixer whose activities flirt with the wrong side of the law. Shelby moved to Serenity, his boyhood hometown, looking for a slower pace of life. But trouble follows men like Shelby, and he finds himself embroiled in an underworld of drugs and violence that may prove to be his undoing.
Praise for SERENITY:
Readers of David Archer, John Sandford, Dustin Stevens, and Robert B. Parker will love this new series of suspense thrillers. Reviewers call Serenity “fast-paced,” “masterful,” “fantastic,” and “superb.”
EXCERPT FROM SERENITY:
Shelby Alexander filled his mug with coffee and inhaled the robust aroma of the dark brown liquid. He moved to the kitchen window and looked out at the darkness of the Michigan night as he drank his coffee. It became incredibly dark in northern Michigan, especially in winter with its overcast skies that blotted out the moon and stars. When he first moved back to the area around the small town of Serenity, in search of a little peace and slow living, he had marveled at the difference. The light pollution caused by the larger cities downstate seemed to prevent it from ever being truly dark. But up here, the darkness could become an almost palpable thing.
Shelby sipped his coffee and started to turn away from the window. Then he stopped. Something was different. He looked back outside and then saw it: a dark heap by the side of the barn, illuminated by the yellow cast of the bug light. It appeared to be a pile of old rags and he wondered if perhaps he’d simply dropped them on his way to the burn barrel.
The pile of rags moved.
It was alive.
Shelby grabbed his coat from the closet and headed into the night. A gusty wind cut through the layers of his coat as he walked toward the barn and the mystery figure. It wasn’t a dog. Or an animal of any kind: no fur. And it wasn’t a pile of rags either.
“Jenny?”
The woman stirred but didn’t look up.
“What the hell you doing out here? You’ll freeze.”
The woman didn’t answer.
Shelby leaned down, put his hands under Jenny’s arms, and lifted. He got her up on his shoulder and stood upright, swaying a little under the weight. He carried her to the back door of the house and managed to get her inside and in front of the woodstove. He removed the threadbare coat and began rubbing her arms and legs to improve the circulation.
“Jenny?”
Her eyes fluttered, but her face was white, her lips blue. Her mouth opened as if to speak, but no sound came out. He called for an ambulance and, as he waited, tried to warm her by wrapping her in blankets and holding her body close to his.
But she died on his floor in front of the woodstove.
The paramedics arrived and took her away, and that probably would have been the end of it, had the most notorious drug dealer in the area not pounded on Shelby’s door a few days later.
Check out SERENITY for FREE on Amazon here
Visit Craig’s website to find out about all of his thrillers.