The #MysteryNovember Book Tour Day 25 Mark Barry @GreenWizard62 #wwwblogs

Welcome to Day 25 of The #MysteryNovember Book Tour.

Today our guest is Mark Barry with his book Hollywood Shakedown.

Buddy Chinn, a deadbeat Los Angelino living in the shadow of doomed Hollywood Park meets a bigtime book collector and gets a proposition. Find a unique and long-lost manuscript written by your deceased beat poet dad: Succeed and receive a hundred grand. Fail? It doesn’t bear thinking about. Enlisting the help of an English comic dealer and poker player, the two men search the country and beyond, avoiding the attentions of hooligans, gangsters and a gorgeous gang boss with a thing for big guys. Like Buddy.
Will they find the merchandise? Or will they end up underneath a flyover holding up the Interstate.
Thriller. Chase book. Black Comedy. Philosophy.
You read it. You call it.

Where is your home town?

I live in Southwell, but am from Nottingham, in the East Midlands of England. I live about eight miles from where Robin Hood used to live in Sherwood Forest. Most of my work is set here; Nottingham, not Sherwood Forest!

What do you like about writing in the mystery genre?

I like creating life puzzles and I particularly enjoy writing about the criminals, deadbeats, losers and wannabes who live inside the puzzles I create. I also like the twists and turns you can inflict on a reader and getting inside the psychology of the protagonists.

What sub-genre of mystery does your book fit?

Hollywood Shakedown is difficult to place into a specific genre. One of Elmore Leonard’s many mysteries would be the closest match, or even the ironic work of Charles Willeford – Shark Infested Custard? It is heavily influenced by books such as Charles Bukowski’s flawed fiction novel, Pulp and the writing of fifties pulp writer Jim Thompson, who I adore. Like Martin Amis’ incredible Night Train, it is a mix of contemporary fiction mixed with crime. It also has a plot twist I have seen implemented only once and has never failed to surprise the readers who have sampled the book.

Where is your book set?

Los Angeles, mostly; but also Chicago and London.

Can you introduce us to the main characters?

The main characters are Buddy Chinn, a washed up, lazy, fat, alcoholic, horseplaying novelist, whose father is a brilliant and lauded sixties “beat” poet, and his friend Simon, a chirpy, English poker player and superhero comics dealer. Supported by a wide variety of villains led by a rare manuscript collector called Mortimer Saxon. One of the main characters is Buddy’s “free spirited” girlfriend, Monique, a favourite of mine. Her chapters are amongst my best writing.

Where can readers find out more about you and your writing?

I can mostly be found on Twitter @Greenwizard62

and, if you know a friend of mine on Facebook, I am Wiz Green 9

My blog is greenwizardpublishing@blogspot.co.uk and I write there regularly about my work and the work of my friends in Indie.

Where can readers find your book?

Amazon Uk Author Page http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1425158526&sr=8-2-ent

Amazon.com Author Page http://www.amazon.com/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1425158526&sr=8-2-ent

Beach Reads Blog Tour 2015 Day 13 #Beachbooks @GreenWizard62

As thoughts turn to the end of our Beach Read holiday when suitcases need re-packing, we’re not ready to leave yet. My guest today is Mark Barry.

Rosie Amber Beach Reads 

My bucket list is currently full of cities at the moment, and I think San Diego would be up there. I would visit Santa Anita racecourse (and travel down the coast to Del Mar) and spend the evenings on a beach front bar talking books. What better place to talk horses and books than over a tall Mojito in the glorious sunshine!

 

I’m not a Kindle fan, so I would take several paperback books. I DO read Kindle books (many of my favourite authors and friends are e-book only), but it’s just not the same. It doesn’t have the same impact at all. I always leave books behind whenever I travel – sometimes my own.

 

I would leave Hollywood Shakedown of my own library. I wrote it in 2010 and it is intended to be an airport novel for intelligent people. Quite a few people think it’s my best book. It’s pretty unsung and I tend to scratch my head about how to market it as it is unlike my other books. It is also long enough for a week’s beach holiday!

Find a copy here form Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 

A Fun Read 

After The Sucker Punch by Lorraine Devon Wilke

 

A sweeping, seventies, old school family saga that’s also long enough to engage you for a good week on the beach. In fact, it’s made for the beach and the airport. Beautifully written, light, accessible, I have yet to come across a book as good as this in Indie. In fact, you genuinely would not know this is an Indie book. It is sublime and – like many books we write – underappreciated, especially over here.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 

A book from your favourite genre 

Warlock – The Complete Series

 

Put a bullet to my head and I would say that I prefer comics and graphic novels to books. I would have loved to have been a comic book writer. This graphic novel, written and drawn in the mid-seventies, by Jim Starlin is the finest epic saga. It’s scope is astonishing. The next Avengers film features Thanos, the scheming villain and servant of Death that Starlin invented, and he has never been better than he is here in this seminal appearance. I read this every year without fail.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 

A book you would only read on holiday in a sun, sea and sand location 

Jackie Collins – Lucky

 

Every genre writer has a sneaky, guilty pleasure, and I like the work of Jackie Collins, who has the trashy, worthless, star-spangled celebrity bonk buster down pat. My favourite – and most people seem to agree with me – and best is Lucky. Surprisingly well written and incredibly easy to read, this is an ideal book to leave behind in some Tanzania beach hut. It will be read.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 

A book you could truly escape with 

Music of Chance by Paul Auster

 

In any Desert Island quartet, you have to go for quality somewhere down the line and this is one of my favourite books from one of the world’s finest contemporary fiction writers. It’s not his best – you have to aim at something like Book of Illusions or Brooklyn Follies for that honour – but it packs the biggest punch. One of those books that you live rather than read. Hence the escape.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 

 

 

 

Beach Reads Blog Tour 2015 Day 7 #Beachbooks @LindleyE

So we are just ending our first week of our holiday beach reads, everyone should be enjoying some sun and kicking back for a good rest.

Today my guest is E.L. Lindley

Beach Reads Blog Tour

 

I’m not much of a beach person so my ideal holiday destination is always a city break. I’m not overly keen on flying these days either so I can’t think of anything better than taking the train to Paris and spending my holiday embracing the lovely cafe culture there. I would spend my days watching the world go by with a glass of wine and a good book. Wherever I go, I always have a paperback and my kindle in my bag so I’d have lots to choose from. My iPod is another permanent companion but curiously I have never listened to an audio book so this would be the perfect opportunity for me to give one a try.

 

A Fun Read – I think it would be a lot of fun to charge up my kindle and re-read one of my own books. The Georgie Connelly stories are light-hearted crime thrillers which would hopefully get me into a holiday frame of mind. I’d choose Business As Usual because it’s the first one in the series and introduces us to Georgie Connelly. It’s also the first book I ever wrote so it would be nice to re-visit it. I’d then like to spend the rest of the holiday channelling my inner Georgie as she’s such a lively, mad-cap character who’s up for anything.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 To be released soon

An Easy Read For Me – A book I’m really looking forward to reading is Thicker than Water by Georgia Rose, which I’ll be downloading onto my kindle the second it’s released. It’s the third book in The Grayson Trilogy and I know this will be an easy read for me purely because I enjoyed the first two books so much. The stories are exquisitely written and introduce us to Emma Grayson and Trent who, despite neither of them having had easy lives, manage to connect and nurture their feelings for each other. As Thicker than Water is the final part of the trilogy, I’m really hoping that things will work out for Emma and Trent. For me the strength of the stories lie in the fact that they’re not just love at first sight, happy ending style romance but deal with real issues such as bereavement and loneliness.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Georgia-Rose/e/B00I4YW2ZA/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1

 

A Book I’ve Been Meaning To Read For Ages – I’ve had a paperback copy of Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn on my bedside table for months. I loved Dark Places and Gone Girl and, everyone I know who has read them, keeps telling me that Sharp Objects is Flynn’s best novel. It’s the story of a journalist who returns to her home town after many years in order to cover the story of a missing girl. Flynn does seem to divide opinion, possibly because Gone Girl was such a phenomenal success, but readers seem to love or hate her. I’m definitely in the ‘love her’ camp and really enjoy her dark, spiky style.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

 A Book From My Favourite Genre – My favourite genre is crime and so I’d get my kindle out to read Hollywood Shakedown by Mark Barry, which I really love. It’s a gritty, old school crime novel and has a wonderful cast of dysfunctionally loveable characters. Frustrated writer, Buddy Chinn is at the centre of the story and he’s the kind of character that readers will adore and want to kill in equal measure. He’s very much a laid back Los Angeleno and so would provide the perfect antidote to all that stylish Parisian glamour. The plot has lots of twists and turns and takes the reader from LA to Chicago and London with lots of hilarious cross cultural shenanigans. It’s the perfect accompaniment to a nice glass of chardonnay.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

A Book I Could Truly Escape With – I recently saw Far From The Madding Crowd at the cinema and it really made me want to read the book. It’s the story of Bathsheba Everdene, who’s trying to be an independent woman when it wasn’t really the done thing. She makes some terrible choices though and ends up in a bit of a pickle. I’m not a massive Thomas Hardy fan but I love The Mayor of Casterbridge because, when I was at school the teacher read it aloud to us and it was such a memorable experience. I think I would try and recreate that pleasure by listening to Far From The Madding Crowd on audio book. It’s really long so it would be perfect for the train journey from Sheffield to London and then onto Paris.

Find a copy here from Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com