The Assassin: excerpt

I’m taking a bit of a jump start to my upcoming thriller The Assassin by publishing a small sample here. I had intended to wait until I have the edited version, but I got impatient and wanted to share it with you instantly. All the typos and grammar mistakes are therefore mine.

The Assassin by Susanna Shore

PROLOGUE
The sharp retort of a ball hitting the centre of the tennis racket reverberated around the court. The sound was much like a single round from a marksman’s rifle with a silencer on. His rifle. And he’d timed the shot perfectly to coincide with the women’s number one returning the first serve of the third best player in the world. It was the women’s final at the Wimbledon Tennis Tournament. No one would pay attention to the strange echo. And as his mark didn’t collapse and the dark colour of his shirt covered the entrance wound, he would be well on his way before anyone even noticed that the man was dead.

As it was, he was in the service area on the ground floor when the ruckus began, audible through the loudspeakers that broadcasted the game to the dressing rooms. He was carrying a tennis racket shaped bag like so many others there, dressed in fashionable tennis clothes, with wrap-around sunglasses and a cap pressed deep in his head. He didn’t look back when people around him reacted to the sounds from the court, but just put the bag into the booth of the car that was exactly like at least a dozen cars on the players’ parking area. What was it with tennis players and black Audis anyway?

He drove calmly to the gate where the security waved him out, the news not having reached them yet. It was only coming in that they’d payed any attention to his right to be there, but his credentials were sound—if fake. After the gate, he blended into the Saturday afternoon traffic, heavy, but not congested. He’d scouted beforehand a route with the least CCTV surveillance, and followed it to an anonymous rental garage in Kingston, ten kilometres west of Wimbledon. Securely in, he took out the racket bag containing his rifle, spent ten minutes cleaning both, and shelved the bag with its rifle among all the similar innocent-looking items.

He removed the number plates from the car and replaced them with the originals, careful not to scratch them. The fake plates went on the shelf in their box with others. A quick change of clothes into a dark, tailor-made suit, a removal of the blond surfer wig he’d worn over his short black hair and adding brown contact lenses, and he was indistinguishable from the couple of million suits filling London.

After the last check that the garage was neat and the car was in pristine condition, and wiping the door handles and the steering wheel clean with his gloves on, he drove out. Forty minutes later, he was in a car rental at the Heathrow airport, chatting up the pretty receptionist as he returned the key, leaving her an impression of a charming Frenchman. A television mounted on the wall behind her showed breaking news from the Wimbledon tennis court where a high-level Saudi diplomat had been assassinated. The police had no clues.

***

Did you enjoy the sample? You can continue reading on my webpage. The Assassin will be published on September 23. You can preorder it here.

The book that wasn’t supposed to be

Every once in a while, a book wants to be written. The need to realise an idea or a story in words becomes so strong that I leave everything and start writing. Often, the ideas fall flat, resulting in only a few feverishly written chapters that don’t lead to anything. But occasionally, a book is born.

This spring, the story I needed to follow was that of an assassin. The spark was a random tweet asking what kind of a sound a tennis ball made hitting the racket. My answer became the opening line of the book:

The sharp retort of a ball hitting the centre of the tennis racket reverberated around the court.

I left it at that. But a half hour later, I realised that instead of writing the book I was working on—the sixth Two-Natured London novel—I was imagining the scene that would follow from the opening line. And I simply couldn’t continue with the job at hand until I’d written the entire first paragraph:

The sharp retort of a ball hitting the centre of the tennis racket reverberated around the court. The sound was much like a single round from a marksman’s rifle with a silencer on. His rifle.

The opening chapter flowed naturally from there and in no time at all I had the entire story pictured in my mind. A clever assassin and the agent trying to find him. I gave myself three weeks to write the story, chose a strict frame of twenty-one chapters, thousand words each. It would be a compact novelette that would purge the story out of my system.

Three weeks flew by. At the end of it, I had about the 20 000 words I had decided on. But instead of a full story, I had maybe a half of it. As the story had unfolded, the motivations behind the assassination had become more complex. I’d added new point of view characters and a subplot. Much more was needed to finish the book. Now I had to make a choice: do I leave it be, or do I continue: restructure what I’d already written to match the pace of a longer book and see where that takes me.

I chose the latter. And I don’t regret it, even though finishing the book took me longer than I’d anticipated, and there were more rewritings than I could have imagined. Pantsing a thriller isn’t an ideal approach; the story becomes unnecessary convoluted as new ideas pop up and they have to be fitted in the overall story, sometimes with forceful tweaking that either works or not, in which case a rewrite is needed. And when I finally reached the end and figured out the motivations of the antagonist, it didn’t match anything I’d written so far. So I had to rewrite it once more.

Diving into a book head-first has other drawbacks too. Story-flow takes precedence over fact-checking. I called my protagonist Agent Morris, as she works for the MI5, only to learn much later that MI5 doesn’t call their personnel ‘agents’ but ‘officers’. Agents are their non-staff informants. The plot that relied heavily on the British government trying to sell Wildcat helicopters to Saudi Arabia unravelled towards the end, when I had time to do some research on British helicopter industry and learned that the manufacturer is owned by the Italians now. So another rewrite was needed.

The book isn’t quite finished yet. Once the plot is logical—and hopefully exciting—there are the characters to think of too. They grew fairly organicly at first, as pantsed characters do, so some fleshing up is required there as well. But I’m almost done, and hopefully the book will be out in September. It won’t be a 40 000 word book though; it grew into 65 000—a long way from the novelette it was supposed to be. Sometimes that happens. A book that wasn’t supposed to be is born.

The Assassin will be published on September 23. You can preorder it here.

I’m back!

In truth, I've never been away. I've only been neglecting my blog. No reason, just laziness. And I can't promise I'll improve my attendance here, as I have a book to finish for September publication. It's taking up pretty much all my time.

For those waiting for the sixth Two-Natured London book (with Gabe in the lead) and the fifth Tracy Hayes book: those will come, fear not. However, I got it into my head to write a spy thriller first. It's called The Assassin, and it's set in the exciting world of MI5. Here's the description:

The sharp retort of a ball hitting the centre of the tennis racket reverberated around the court. The sound was much like a single round from a marksman's rifle with a silencer on. His rifle.

A Saudi diplomat has been assassinated, and MI5 agent Olivia Morris is assigned to investigate. The matter is delicate: not only are political relations between Britain and Saudi Arabia wrought; Britain wants to sell rescue helicopters to Saudis too, preferably without alerting the general public to the deal. Messing this up will result in demotion for Olivia, or worse. And she's morbidly afraid of helicopters.

It doesn't take long for Olivia to realise that the chopper contract might only be the surface. Who wants to kill the diplomat's son? How are the Russians involved? And who is the charming toff that insinuates himself to her investigation? An innocent bystander-or the assassin?

As the death-toll rises, Olivia has to run against the clock to prevent a larger disaster. And then she becomes a target herself.

The Assassin will be published in September. Stay tuned for preorder links. In the meanwhile, check out my other books, and my new webpages, at www.crimsonhousebooks.com. And did you notice my blog has a new look too?

The Assassin by Susanna Shore

Streamlining my author profile

When I began to publish my own books in 2012, one thing seemed obvious. I couldn’t publish different genres under one name. It would confuse my readers and possibly accidentally make them read books in genres they didn’t want to. They’d naturally be upset for this.

So from the beginning, I’ve been publishing with two author names: Susanna Shore for paranormal romances and Hannah Kane for contemporary romances. I even had a pen name ready for historical romances, but I’ve never got around to publishing those, and so haven’t needed it. Incidentally, I have a folder full of unfinished regency romances.

From the start, the two author names were a hassle. Do I create different webpages for them, and social media identities? I tried the first, which resulted with such a complex system of pages that I had no idea what was where. It also took me a great deal of time to keep each page updated. Fairly soon, I collected my pages under one address, crimsonhousebooks.com, which made my life easier. My social media accounts were under that umbrella also, hence my twitter handle @crimsonhouseboo.

But I couldn’t really have an effective, enjoyable social media presence under such an impersonal name, so I made the decision to use one author name for all my social media instead. I chose Susanna Shore for that. While it, too, is a pen name, Susanna is actually my given name, so it felt more personal to me. And I’ve been happy with my decision.

Little by little, Hannah Kane was side-lined completely. Those books didn’t sell – at all – so I never wrote new ones and concentrated on my paranormal romances instead. And when I wanted to write something different, first a thriller, then a series of light mysteries, I chose Susanna Shore as their author.

By then I’d come to a conclusion that readers might actually be able to discern between genres, even if the author name is the same. And so I started to think that I should give up Hannah Kane altogether. I should publish all my books as Susanna Shore and let readers decide what they want to read.

It’s been a slow process of letting go. Even though I’d decided to republish Hannah Kane books as Susanna Shore, it made me sad to give up that part of my author’s journey. And I knew some of those books needed editing too, for which I didn’t seem to have time, so I postponed the change.

But I couldn’t postpone it forever. So when I had a bit of time in my hands, I made new, uniform covers for the books and went through the contents with a critical eye. And now they are ready to be published.

The first three books to be republished are It Happened on a Lie, a fairly short romance of lies and misunderstandings, To Catch a Billionaire Dragon, a book about a fantasy author and a billionaire who inspires her, and At Her Boss’s Command about a PA whose job depends on the new CEO. They’re stand-alone books with no recurring characters, but I chose to publish them under a series name anyway, mostly to give them more visibility in searches. I chose Contemporary Romances to Go, as they are light, quick books you can read anywhere.

And here they are:

You can preorder them on Amazon (here, here and here) and Smashwords (here, here and here), and they’ll be published in February 6. You can read more about each book here. I’m really feeling positive about this change, but I’ll have to see what it brings with it. Hopefully new readers.

Reading recap: December

Happy New Year! I’m starting the year by rounding up the series of posts I did last year about the books I’ve read. December was a good reading month despite the fact that I was busy publishing my Two-Natured London Christmas short story collection. The Goodreads reading challenge counted nine books into my challenge, and even though two of those are actually very short stories, I think reading seven proper books is still impressive.

For I have Sinned by Darynda Jones

The stories were For I Have Sinned by Darynda Jones and Black Friday by Karen Chance. The first was a bit of a disappointment. The story – part of Charley Davidson series – was told from a ghost’s point of view, and it was nice. However, it was only a ten or so pages long and took about twenty per cent of the e-book. The rest was filler material I’d already read, so I kind of felt cheated out of my money. The second story was one of the many that Karen Chance offers for free on her website, a mad Christmas romp in Hell in the best Cassie Palmer style. It was about the same length than the first and not something I’d necessarily have paid money for. I’m not saying authors should offer all their stories for free, but at least inform your readers better about what they’re getting when they buy your filler stories.

Black Friday by Karen Chance

The first proper book of the month finished my Max Gladstone’s Craft Sequence binge. The sixth book, The Ruin of Angels, started what the author called ‘a new cycle’ in the series and it showed. The story was very different from the earlier ones that focused mainly on the economics and the gods driving it. This was more character driven and focused on the relationships between the characters – again an all-female cast. The setting was new too, a strange city with layers from the past coexisting with the present as a result of the Gods War, but it featured a couple of familiar faces, like Kai from Full Fathom Five, who tries to save her sister from murder charges – a thankless job – and Tara Abernathy. Ley, the sister, was a thoroughly dislikeable person and if her ruin wouldn’t have meant the ruin of the entire city, I would have wanted her to perish. Still – or because of it – this was definitely the best book in the series – so far.

The Ruin of Angels by Max Glandstone

Sometimes books improve on a reread. I needed a short book to while away a couple of hours and read again Suzanne Enoch’s The Black Duke’s Prize, one of her earlier Regency romances. I’d given it two stars the first time, mostly because of a messy plot, but the second time round it turned out to be a perfectly charming story. Not in any way her best book, but delightful.

The Black Duke's Prize by Suzanne Enoch

I’ve had a similar disappointment with Genevieve Cogman’s Invisible Library series. They sound promising, but the plots have been messy and Irene, the main character, is quite insufferable. But I gave the third book, The Burning Page, a try and I was pleasantly surprised with it. It still wasn’t a strong book, but the plot made sense and the secondary characters gained some – well – character. It felt like an end of a trilogy, but since there is another book out, the story continues.

The Burning Page by Genevieve Cogman

A great new acquaintance was Murderbot from Martha Wells’ Murderbot Diaries. All Systems Red was a compact book of a security android on a distant planet protecting a mining survey. The first person narrative was wry, and the Murderbot’s attempt to pass as a proper security robot instead of one that had hacked itself to be independent was interesting. The story was fast paced and good, and the ending a bit heart-breaking. I’ll definitely read the next book the moment it comes out.

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

 

Breath of Fire by Amanda Bouchet was another disappointment. I already disliked the first book – the tired plot of an abducted woman falling for her captor – but the second book was on sale so I bought it. I shouldn’t have. All the annoying things were still there, like Cat being all-powerful – and gaining more as the story continued. And I really don’t know why an editor would allow a publishing of a book where over half of the story is spent on a mission that doesn’t contribute to the overall plot at all and the goal of which is immediately made redundant by the last third of the book. However, the last third was good enough for me to give the book three stars instead of two. Add a LOT of gratuitous sex, and you have everything you need to know about the book.

Breath of Fire by Amanda Bouchet

The Devil You Know by Mike Carey gave me mixed feelings. The premise was interesting – an exorcist who’s given up his work after accidentally summoning a demon inside a friend of his – and the setting in London good. The story was great too, and, as it turned into a murder mystery, more complex than appeared at first. There were comparisons made in reviews to Harry Dresden and they weren’t entirely off. But what makes Harry and his world so likeable – his sense of humour and his animal sidekicks – were completely absent here. The overall feeling was glum and hopeless, and the feeling lingered long after I’d finished reading. I’m not entirely sure I’ll read another book in the series.

The Devil You Know by Mike Carey

I like fantasy books with thieves as heroes, so I was eager to read The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble’s Braids by Michael McClung. Not much thieving took place, to my disappointment. Instead, it was a revenge story with a complicated plot to solve a murder. Amra was a great heroine, but despite the first person narrative, she remained distant. What drove her on was revenge, and though bits and pieces of her past were revealed, they didn’t really add much to her character. But the story was a bit above average and since the setting for the next book was intriguing, I think I’ll read the next book too.

The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble's Braids by Michael McClung

So that was my reading year. I finished sixty books of the fifty-five I’d pledged in my reading challenge – or fifty-seven if you count out the couple of short stories I read along the way. Thirty of those sixty books ended up being from outside of my reading list, which means I didn’t read half of the books I intended to. But I don’t count that as a failure. I’ve started another reading challenge on Goodreads and pledged to read fifty-five books this year too. Those unread books from my list are waiting for me to read them this year.

And so the year comes to an end…

It’s that time of the year again, time for retrospection. It has been a long year in many respects, but I’ve been happy with my year as an author-publisher. There were some highlights, like visiting WorldCon in August, and not so bad lowlights that they would pull the entire year down.

I began the year with a bang by publishing two P.I. Tracy Hayes books that I’d written back to back at the end of the previous year. It was an intensive writing period and after it my brain needed time to recharge. Not that I realised it at first. I tried to write both of my ongoing series, Two-Natured London and the next Tracy Hayes book, but both got stuck after a few chapters.

Instead of pushing doggedly on, I decided to write something completely different. I’ve had this idea of a book brewing at the back of my brain for a long time, and I gave it a try. The project occupied my time suitably for most of the summer, and the writing process was interesting, not least because I aimed at a longer book than what I usually write. I almost finished the book too, reaching the climax of the story before I ran out of words. Basically, something went wrong with the plot somewhere along the way, and until I’ve figured out what it is and fixed it, I can’t finish the book. So far, I haven’t done it.

But the side project worked its magic on my brain and I managed to start writing the next Two-Natured London book again. It was going well too, until I absolutely had to write the fourth Tracy Hayes book – my brain is weird that way. This time the stars aligned and it took less than a month to write it from the first chapter I’d managed in the spring. P.I. with the Eye came out in November and sold nicely enough for as long as the price was only $0.99. Now it’s slowed down a bit. But more important than the sales for me was the knowledge that I’d managed to see through one project this year from start to finish.

After the book was published, I didn’t instantly return to the sixth Two-Natured London book. Instead, I had an idea for a collection of Christmas stories set in the Two-Natured London world, and set out to write them. I’ve never been all that interested in writing short stories, but these I found easy and fun to write. In no time at all I had six stories that make a nice little book. Since I started the project so close to Christmas, it’s been a race with time to get them out before it, but I think I can make it.

The only lowlight of the year has been this blog that I haven’t managed to update with the same regularity than before. Mostly I’ve recapped the books I’ve read. It has been fun, but hasn’t provided enough posts. Still, all in all, the year has been good. Two books written and four published. The next book is well under way and will come out early next year. I can retire for the holidays and rest until the next year. Thank you for following my year and I hope to see you next year too.

***

How do vampires spend Christmas? My short story collection Moonlight, Magic and Mistletoes, a Two-Natured London Christmas Special has six short stories, all of them sweet, Christmassy and romantic. The opening story, Escape on a Moonless Night, is the longest and is set in in 1660s France. In it, we learn more about the past of the vampire lord Alexander Hamilton, the leader of the warriors of the Crimson Circle. He’s forced to flee after marriage negotiations turn sour, and he’s not fleeing alone. In other stories we meet old and new characters from the Two-Natured London books, and follow how vampires, humans, and shifters find love and Christmas magic in the unique two-natured way. I’ll add a link to the collection here the moment it comes out. Stay tuned. Until then, you can read the opening chapter here.

Reading recap: November

I had a great reading month in November with six books finished, and only one of them from my reading list. Two books by Max Gladstone and two by Gail Carriger, with Nalini Singh and J.D. Robb thrown in the mix.

The Craft Sequence series by Max Gladstone continues strong with Last First Snow that takes place twenty years before the events in Two Serpents Rise. The story is about the last effort of old gods of Dresediel Lex to defend themselves against the new craft rulers, namely the King in Red. The uprise is led by Temoc, the last priest of the old gods, and father of Caleb who was the main character in Two Serpents Rise. Temoc becomes a reluctant leader of an uprising of people of Skittersill that the developers want to claim. Unlike the earlier books, which were crime mysteries, the story reads kind of like an epic fantasy with a build-up to a final battle, only it takes place on one city square and is mostly fought on negotiating tables. We also get Temoc’s side of the story of how he ended up losing his son and why Caleb hates him, which was kind of bittersweet to follow, knowing the outcome. Temoc was already my favourite character in Two Serpents Rise, and he was my favourite here too. We also get to meet a much younger Elayne Kevarian who turns out to be a more interesting character than she appears in the other books. All in all, a great book.

Last First Snow by Max Gladstone

Romancing the Werewolf by Gail Carriger was a completely different beast. A shorter M/M romance between two of my favourite characters from her Parasol Protectorate series, werewolf alpha Biffy and his newly returned beta Randolph Lyall. The London pack has relocated to Greenwich with curious consequences: babies start showing up on their doorstep. Some hilarity ensures, all too soon sorted out to my tastes. Also the romance itself resolves pretty fast and easily, considering the two of them had been waiting for decades. But it was a wonderfully uplifting book and I enjoyed it greatly.

Romancing the Werewolf by Gail Carriger

Naked in Death by J. D. Robb, the first book in her In Death series, was a bit of an impulse read after I found it cheap in a second hand bookshop. I’ve heard good things about the series, but I guess I should’ve started reading it back in the 90s when the series began. Now the futuristic world the book is set in feels dated and marred my enjoyment of the crime story. That too fell short. Some of her books written as Nora Roberts from that same time have had much better crime stories that kept me in their grips from start to finish. Also the love story between the main characters felt boring and I have no intention of reading through the twenty odd books the series has to see how it develops.

Naked in Death by J.D. Robb

The Sumage Solution by G. L. Carriger – i.e. Gail Carriger – starts her new adult urban fantasy series with a lot of sex, mostly of the same sex kind. It’s about a werewolf pack that relocates to San Francisco where they can be what they want, that is, openly gay. Set in present time, it sort of ties in with her Parasolverse world, and the differences are explained in the book. This new world has more mages and the love story is between one with daddy issues and a werewolf with issues with mages. Max was more complex and interesting of the two, though annoying at times, whereas Biff was more one dimensional. And the HEA felt like a happily for now, but since there will be more books in the series, we’ll see how that’ll go. I’ll definitely be reading those too.

The Sumage Solution by G.L. Carriger

A must read the moment it came out was Cherish Hard by Nalini Singh. I love her two urban fantasy series, and the contemporary romance series of bad-boy rockers was good too, if not as captivating. Cherish Hard is a start of a new Hard Play series that ties with the Rock Kiss series and tells the story of Sailor Bishop, whose brother Gabriel was the main character in Rock Hard. Sailor is a gardener with great plans for the future. He meets Ísa, who has plans too – not to be overlooked by people she loves. It takes a while for them to have their plans align, and all of it is wonderful to read. I’m eagerly waiting for the next book.

Cherish Hard by Nalini Singh

Four Roads Cross, book 5 in Max Gladstone’s Craft Sequence series, returns to the place and people of the first book, Three Parts Dead. The city of Alt Coulumb is slowly becoming aware that their moon goddess Seril is still alive and that her gargoyle protectors are back too. Not everyone is happy, and the most upset of all are all the investors whose money depends on Kos Everburning, the main god and spouse of Seril. They force what is basically a huge stress test on the gods: should Kos lend soulstuff to save Seril, it would make him an unreliable investment and void all the millions of investments that rely on him, thus bankrupting Alt Coulumb. A complicated plot is needed to save the city and the gods. All characters from the first book are back, the craftswoman Tara Abernathy who is mostly responsible for saving the day, Abelard the monk-technician, Cat and Riz, and the gargoyles. Even Caleb makes an appearance. It’s a great book, made better now that I was more familiar with the world and the differences in governance and theology between the different parts. Made it easier to follow everything.

Four Roads Cross by Max Gladstone

That was my reading in November. One more month to cover, but I can already tell that I didn’t manage to cover my reading list, as I deviated from it a lot. But I got some great books in their stead, so I’m not upset.

***

In other news, Tracy Hayes, P.I. with the Eye is now available on all platforms and as a paperback too. And since it took forever for it to show up on iBooks and B&N, I’m extending the opening sale with a week, so that those who prefer to shop there can have the book with only $0.99 too. The sale ends on Sunday, December 10. Don’t miss.