Today is my stop on the Preordained by David L. Wallace blog tour, read an excerpt my interview with David and enter to win an Amazon GC. A Partners in Crime Virtual Blog Tour

Enjoy!

Preordained

by David L Wallace

on Tour June 1-30, 2018

Synopsis:

Art Somers is a detective in close-knit Murrell's Inlet, S.C., a small-town, coastal community with deeply held spiritual and supernatural belief systems. A serial killer has shattered his peaceful existence by abducting multiple twelve-year-old boys within his county. Young thugs, backwater drug dealers and the occasional murderer are the most Art’s had to deal with, but now he must apprehend a predator who FBI profilers can’t find.
He discovers he has a tie by blood to the case and uncovers evidence that calls into question his long held spiritual and supernatural beliefs. Abraham, the father of faith, had to choose to either sacrifice his son or disobey a direct order from God. Art must now make a choice - sacrifice his soul to save his son.
“A riveting and intriguing read.” – Clarion Review
“Original and engaging.” – Publisher’s Weekly
“A gripping detective story.” – Kirkus Reviews

Book Details:
Genre: Paranormal Crime Thriller
Published by: David L Wallace
Publication Date: April 13th 2018
Number of Pages: 346
ISBN: 0997225726 (ISBN13: 9780997225723)
Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads

Read an excerpt:

Chapter 1

From his crouched position in the woods of rural Georgetown County, South Carolina, and under the echo of his heavy breathing in the night air, he watched his favorite family’s movements inside their small brown home.
After much thought about the impression his outfit would make, he’d decided it was festive enough for the occasion. The complete ensemble consisted of a red and black head mask, aligned perfectly to the holes for his eyes, nose, and mouth and a form-fitting, black bodysuit with white wings painted on the back.
For years, he’d contemplated a befitting name for himself and finally settled on Star of David killer. He liked the way the alias reverberated in his head. It revealed a lot. It concealed everything. It hinted at his purpose and yet – it withheld the true essence of his aspirations, keeping them covered in a shroud of secrecy. He hoped an insightful reporter would have an epiphany and bestow that nickname on him. It was far more interesting than the one his parents had given him at birth. He breathed deep and exhaled slowly, taking in the ambience of the moment. He flexed his muscles. It was time to initiate the events that would lead everyone to recognize him by his self-appointed moniker.
He clenched and released his toes on each of his hospital footie–covered feet. Through the sheer curtains of the dimly lit dwelling, he watched the boy pick up the used plates from the table, which signaled the parents and their twelve-year-old son had finished their dinner. He knew them well. He’d cased their dwelling for years, observing every nuance of their behavior. He sat flushed as he watched them for the last time, shivering from time to time from the thrill of the thought of what he was about to do.
The music of the bullfrogs kept him company, along with the thought that all he’d longed for, all that he was meant to be, was about to be on full display on the world stage in a matter of hours. Like Heinz ketchup, he’d been waiting in anticipation for a long time for this moment.
He glanced at the scavengers in the clear sky above him, each casting its shadow across the moon as it circled. They were his favorite creatures—the redheaded, black-feathered, and partially white-winged turkey vultures of the Carolina skies. His outfit mimicked theirs. The birds squawked in the sky, seeming to know his plan for that evening. They’d followed his vehicle from his home until he’d parked, and now they circled directly above him. He could feel their hunger and impatience.
The boy walked outside his home and scraped the remains of their dinner plates into a slop bucket on the back porch. He picked up the hog’s food and headed out to the pigpen, which was located near the backend of their yard.
The Star of David killer watched the boy make his evening trek on pigeon-toed feet that turned inward with each step. Ever since the infant pigs were born, the boy fed the adult male hog an extra feeding at night to prevent him from dining on his offspring. That’s right, the daddy hog actually ate his own children. What a disgusting breed of animal.
The overhead undertakers began to shriek and shrill as the boy moved across his lawn, their voices echoing in the night.
The boy jumped at their sound and looked to the skies. He stared into the woods directly below them.
The Star of David killer remained as still as a stone as the kid’s gaze seemed to linger on him for a moment. The last thing he needed was for the boy to detect his presence and yell out for his daddy. The papa of the family had an itchy twelve-gauge finger that he didn’t want to deal with that evening.
Seemingly satisfied, the boy stopped searching the woods and continued his walk.
The Star of David Killer glanced overhead at the vultures, angry with them for almost giving away his position. For their carelessness, they wouldn’t be feeding on his handiwork that evening, and if they didn’t atone for their misstep, they wouldn’t partake in any of the festivities on his planned itinerary.
This was the first night—the evening of his coming-out party and the kickoff of his personal pilgrimage. It was the acknowledgment that the presence within him, who had compelled him to plan and now execute the initial steps of his mission, had chosen the right vehicle for the job.
He felt something biting him on his lower legs. Glancing down, he saw by the light of the rear porch that ants were advancing up his calves. He remained silent and didn’t move, not wanting to sound the alarm that he was out there in the dark. A small green garden snake slithered out of the brush toward him. He stepped on it and crushed its head.
The grunting male hog reveled in the slop the boy had dumped into his pen. The female hog stood to the side with her five remaining piglets cowering under her.
The killer frowned at the stench of the hogs. It wasn’t the last smell he wanted on his mind before he began his body of work. To get past it, he closed his eyes and thought of the fragrances inside the boy’s family home, smells that he knew all too well. He’d spent many nights there while they slept, enjoying their scents, with his favorites being the individual smell of each of their worn clothing. The laundry room was a treasure trove of delights. Each of the family members left their own unique and enjoyable stains in their underwear. He’d gotten to know the other families in just as much detail, meticulously taking in their routines and schedules, getting to know every nuance of each of them.
He removed his blade from his waistband and watched Rueben, his first victim, as he rinsed out the slop bucket with a water hose attached to the rear of his home. He squeezed the black-handled blade. The paring knife felt perfect in his hand, after having gone through an exhaustive testing process to find the right cutting instrument—one with just the right shape and size for optimal carving control against a moving body. He’d practiced his skills with it for many hours, initially on cantaloupes, cucumbers, and other fruits and vegetables, until he’d graduated to successful tests on small gerbils, kittens, and puppies he’d purchased at various pet stores.
Finally, the lights went out in the shack. It was time. As usual, Rueben’s parents were more than likely already fast asleep. Rueben, on the other hand, should be wide-awake in his darkened room, surfing Internet porn sites by the light of his laptop. The little fella loved to look at online pussy, but he wouldn’t live long enough to enjoy any.
As the final step of his preparation process, he extracted a bottle of removable glue from the front waistband of his outfit and placed another coat over his hands. It was an additional layer to guard against him leaving fingerprints behind, but he knew he didn’t need to worry on that score. Over the past year, he’d used razor blades every month to remove the top layer of skin on each of his fingertips, making them as smooth as a baby’s ass.
He had no fingerprints.
He could’ve easily used gloves, but he wanted to touch them, to feel his prey with his bare hands. He blew on the glue until it dried. Satisfied, he stood, stretched his legs and approached Rueben’s home on silent feet.
He hadn’t troubled himself to brush the ants from his lower torso. The stinging sensation of their bites would serve as a reminder that before that evening, he was once human.
***
Excerpt from Preordained by David L Wallace. Copyright © 2018 by David L Wallace. Reproduced with permission from David L Wallace. All rights reserved.

My Interview with David:

David hi, welcome to The Reading Frenzy
Preordained sounds fantastically scary and is your first supernatural thriller.
Tell my readers a little about it.
The setting of this first book in my Preordained series is in an interesting area of South Carolina that’s steeped in superstitious, paranormal, and supernatural beliefs systems, which is something that limited people in the world at large are aware of. When the idea for the story came to me and as I started to build the structure, I realized it had a whodunit puzzle and it also had thriller, supernatural and psychological elements. Because of the number of genres and before spending over a year working to compose the story, I flushed out the outline, put it in book form, and then sent a copy to Kirkus Reviews, Clarion Reviews and Publisher’s Weekly BookLife Prize in Fiction. Their positive feedback to me about the story reinforced my belief that others would also like the story.

What drew you to this subject?
From the standpoint of the genres, inspiration for Preordained came from both my love of those type of stories and childhood events in my life. My parents moved our family from New York to South Carolina when I was in the first grade. The locals in the surrounding areas, both family members and neighbors, would speak of ghost, paranormal, and supernatural events, believing with everything in them that those stories were real. I’ve enjoyed watching and reading numerous stories of that ilk and when I decided to pen one, naturally, I decided to make the setting be one of the neighboring counties to where I grew up.

When you were creating your protagonist Art, did he behave during the writing process or was he a bit of a rebel?
Since most of the stories I plan to write are mystery thrillers, I always start out as a plotter to work out the major clues and red herrings. Along the way of writing the story, I become a panster because when the characters begin to take on a life of their own, that’s when the magic happens. That’s when the characters introduce new twists, turns and dodges into my storylines. My characters always become rebels.

You formerly worked in the Information Technology industry.
What led you down the path to authordom?
I’ve always been interested in writing. After spending decades working as an information technology professional and no longer able to suppress my need to write, I studied writing at UCLA and authored Trojan (2016), which is a techno thriller. The idea for Trojan materialized during my attendance of a US Navy computer science class. One of the instructors removed the covers off a few of the computers in the lab and I noticed the tiny chips, the brains of those machines, were all manufactured overseas somewhere. It shocked me and made me a little nervous that our defense systems could be dependent on foreign parts. It begged the question … what if an unknown entity embedded rogue computer logic within the hardware components of those machines at the time of manufacture, causing them to crash at a predetermined time, incapacitating our defense capabilities? That question led to the formation of Trojan.

You also wrote, Ralphy The Rabbit, a children’s book.
Most children’s books are morality tales.
What lesson does Ralphy need to learn?
The second story that I wrote is a children’s chapter book titled Ralphy the Rabbit (2017). Inspiration for Ralphy came from my desire to use stories to teach my kids while I was away on assignment in the military and on business travel. Ralphy is a rabbit who desperately wants to become human who instead learns to accept himself for who he is. It helps parents and guardians to teach children to be comfortable in their own skin. I have other storylines about Ralphy that I will one day write.

What ages would enjoy Ralphy’s story?
Elementary school age kids, although I’ve had adults tell me they’ve also enjoyed and benefited from reading it.

Thank you David for answering my questions good luck with the new novel!

Author Bio:

Before publishing his debut novel in 2016, he served over 27 years as an information technology professional working initially for the US Navy, and then the Department of the Navy and various fortune companies. He’s a UCLA writing program alumnus who writes mystery thrillers and children stories. He has three wonderful kids who he enjoys immensely. Writing is his passion and his goal with each story is to capture the imagination in the opening pages and keep it engaged to the story’s riveting conclusion.