Blood of the Dragonfly by Hawk MacKinney (VBT, guest post, excerpt, and GIVEAWAY) GFT

 

 

I have the pleasure of sharing a guest post by author Hawk MacKinney, who provides thoughts on...

 

 

The Craft of Writing

by

Hawk MacKinney 

www.hawkmackinneyauthor.com

 

 

Genre, the writing process, and hobbies are all aspects of the same juices that drive one to write. Genre is generated by content which begins to emerge with intros and initial settings in the first chapter. That sets the background with the ‘classic’ genre format, be it science fiction, romance, mystery, adventure, or fantasy. For me, I prefer to let an outline float behind my writing as I attempt to set the hook for readers in setting, plot, and characters. 

 

One common mistake new writers make is to create superfluous characters or story lines for the sake of bulk. Readers can pick this up in a heartbeat of a single sentence. Deleting or editing-out characters shouldn’t be a problem. In my process, I usually already have the sketch for the last chapter in mind before I finish with the opening paragraphs. In this way, subordinate or secondary characters or supporting serial characters don’t run away with some humdrum mundane wordy digression or plot twists that do nothing to move the story forward. 

 

None of these cornerstones are sacrosanct. Any can be changed. Every writer has a different process. However, in my case, I have found that outlines and final chapters hold me to my original objective. Twists and double twists are fun. Readers like sniffing out the false and the lethal. Psychotic perps are great for turning scenes and suspicions downside-up with underlying plots changing with each page and chapter.  

 

Caveat—dialogue is character-specific. Regional/planetary/cultural linguistics can be tricky and fatal for a story line if a writer is unfamiliar with usages or mismatches them. Most importantly, let your fantasies decide what you want to write—then make it yours. Your readers will recognize the heart, the passion, and the feeling behind your words.

 

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Blood of the Dragonfly

by 

Hawk MacKinney

 

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GENRE: Fiction/Mystery/Suspense

 

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BLURB:

 

While dangling a fishing hook from his flat bottom skiff before dawn, former SEAL-turned-PI Craige Ingram spots grey-black smoke coiling above the treetops across the river in the direction of the Georgia bayous and Corpsewood Manor. Bayou or bogs, fire in the uncut cypress and pines bodes a sense that the river is no barrier to the fire that threatens his ancestral home, Moccasin Hollow. Neither are the bodies later found in the burned mansion of Corpsewood Manor. Craige wastes no time in helping his ex-SEAL buddy Lt. Graysen MacGerald who is now Head of Buckingham Homicide Investigations by unofficially investigating the bodies and an exquisite dragonfly brooch found in the mansion with a reputation for evil, hauntings, and mystery.

 

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EXCERPT

 

 

Spinner and Craige dodged the potholes and bayou-puddled sorrowful drive that was already weeded-up with pieces of blackened 2x4s and tumbled rubble. Nestled among old cypress and giant hardwoods, the scorched ruins of a once-elegant time and place cast a brooding haunted ambiance. A lonesome tangle of police tape fluttered around one blackened trunk, while wads and scraps of yellow plastic flurried here and there among the blossom of mushrooms and cinders snagging on bushes and heat-brittle weeds among the char and ash clinging to seared limbs of dead shrubs. Except for half of one lonesome brick chimney, come next season, the surrounding marshes and scrubby undergrowth and vines would reclaim the scarred skeleton that once was Corpsewood and leave a burial mound of vines and voracious pitcher plants.

 

Spinner said, “I want to check that shallow ravine that follows along the north side of the drive. Looks like an overgrown gulley draining toward the river. Be an easy approach to the house without being seen.”

 

Craige said, “Dogs would've spotted them unless they’d been baited or poisoned.”

 

“Bogs won’t hold many tracks.” As the green underbrush swallowed Spinner, he called over his shoulder, “If they came in by river, I might get lucky in the mud along the riverbank for any trace of a boat being pulled up and beached.”

 

“Watch out for moccasins on those overhangs,” Craige called back to him. “If you come up on a weedy dry knoll of brush, sticks, and leaves above the water, leave it be. You don’t want to rile a mama gator guarding her nest. A twenty-footer may look cumbersome, but those big ones can move fast.” Craige stepped over chunks of tumbled cement and distorted rebar where a foundation had been an outside kitchen wall. One windowpane hung lopsided but intact in its section of wall that had collapsed outward into the soft dirt of what had been a flower garden. Sunshine peaked through to splash a glass pane angled among the ruins.

 

Beyond the foundation was a rose garden, trampled blossoms crinkled with burnt petals, broken stems buried amid tumbled bricks, crumbled mortar, and stinking charred timbers. Craige picked his way around the corner of the kitchen. He stopped at the front of the garage with its oily smudges, where the two autos had once parked. A few sooty cement blocks had tumbled from the corner of the garage. The wall had obviously been added as an afterthought. None of the square hollowed-out cement grabbed his attention until he noticed the broken end on one wasn’t smoked-seared or stained. The fire hadn’t touched it. The end had been broken off after the fire, but it wasn’t the inside hollow that grabbed him. It was the small wrapped yellowish-brown brick protruding from inside. CTU R&S ops had come across too many caches of potent hash oil and loose dry kief for him not to recognize it. He leaned down, touched nothing, saw the wrappings had been torn. The heady smell wrinkled his nose. Along one side of the package, he noticed a smattering of scattered pallid crystals. Neither the powder nor the brick with any ash or cinders; what he was seeing came after the fire. The brick looked as though it had been hurriedly pried open, an empty space inside where something had been removed. Someone had known where to look for whatever it was that was taken—someone not interested in the stash.

 

 

Amazon link

 

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

Hawk MacKinney began writing mysteries for his school newspaper, served in the US Navy for over 20 years, earned two postgraduate degrees with studies in languages and history, taught postgraduate courses in the United States and Jerusalem, authored professional articles and chordate embryology texts on fetal and adult anatomy, and is well known for his works of fiction. Moccasin Trace, a historical novel, was nominated for the prestigious Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the Writers Notes Book Award. Both his CAIRNS OF SANCTUARIE science fiction series and the MOCCASIN HOLLOW MYSTERY series have received worldwide recognition.

 

 

Website

 

 

Goodreads

 

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GIVEAWAY

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

The tour dates can be found here

 

Westobou Gold by Hawk MacKinney (VBT, guest post, excerpt, and GIVEAWAY) GFT

I am delighted to share a guest post by author Hawk MacKinney, who answers the question...



ELF: What is one of your hobbies and how has it enriched your writing?


HM: Curiosity once loosed will ingest/probe/blossom and take root in the most unexpected of ways. Had anyone predicted that two hobbies would come together with the most pleasing of an obsession to write, I likely would’ve chuckled and said nothing.

One of my postdoctoral electives was international history with my two choices being English and Russian history. Part of the studies and beyond the personalities was architecture and how built into grand edifices were reflections of a people and the rise/decline/upheavals of civilizations. I thoroughly enjoyed the dull dreg cobwebs…like the unabridged Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire. I enjoyed losing myself in the repetition of peoples and their repeated stumbles/successes, never dreaming that the writing tool kit was being honed and available…it still is but that’s an aside.

Accounts of peoples and chronicles of families in turmoil stirred ideas that could be twisted into fictional settings not yet in rough notes, much less a manuscript. Characters were vague, tales not yet outlined. It was happening without storytelling…one reason I don’t understand writer’s block.

Another elective-become-an-amateur-hobby is language and linguistics, of which I am an exceptional amateur. Both electives enrich all manner of possibilities transposing settings, scenes, actions, and characters, putting geography in a tailspin to draw pictures with words from nonfiction to fiction. My educational background and opportunities provided a leg-up with ancient dates and name changes that have their own twists when reference librarians need more specifics to hunt for sites like Pr-Bast/Bastet or Goddess Pr-Bastet buried in the sands of time in the Nile delta of the 22nd Dynasty.

It gives a wide berth to spin the fiction of one site rearranged or relocated to tie evolution of one language to another and light up an archeologist’s face or make an archeological broken shard into a tempting quick clue that often slips past the reader.

During those hours of study, never in my wildest imaginings did the concept of using them to spin outlandish chases and star-crossed worlds ever knock on my brain.


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Westobou Gold

by Hawk MacKinney

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GENRE: Mystery/Suspense

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BLURB:

The Indian Queen would risk torture and worse to keep her secrets from these barbarians in suits of metal and their search for cities of gold. They never found the gold. Empires rose; empires fell, the centuries passed. Legend became fireside myths, but no treasure was ever found. Yet, among the grey-green drapes of wisteria and wild jasmine along the misty shrouded lowlands of bayous and marshes of the Westo River, the folktales persisted.

In the lazed creep of a near-tropical dawnlit the pungent Turkish coffee permeated Moccasin Hollow. Beyond the kitchen door Lucky, Craige Ingram’s German shepherd gnawed a favorite bone. Looted burial mounds seemed a world away until plundered mounds on Moccasin Hollow land brings amateur archeologist PI Craige Ingram into the crosshairs of kidnapping. Stealthy hideaways are concealed in old colonial brick-lined river grottos beneath the big house of Ardochy plantation. Sex-tape underage blackmail and thrill killings on federal land spur a medical examiner’s preliminary postmortem to more than a hired cleaner’s quickie cover-up passed off as drug deals gone sour. Greed tangles a witch’s pigswill of illicit affairs and murder-to-hide-murder. Shady investigators and shadier politics stir an unexpected concoction that threatens the lives of those at Moccasin Hollow in a spiteful plot against ex-SEAL Craige Ingram and the woman he loves.

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EXCERPT

She hadn't noticed the figure carrying a fishing pole walk into the yard until Lucky’s ears perked, and he bounded off the porch to greet Billy and his stringer of Blue Gills.

At first Terri was startled, “Who're you?” She’d had enough surprises for one day.

Billy hadn't seen Terri. “Oh... hi. I'm Billy, Mister Ingram an’ me are friends. I just caught me a mess of fish for supper. Clean ‘em soon as I get home. You must be his girlfriend. The one he likes so much.” Lucky nuzzled at Billy's hand.

“You’ve certainly got the dog’s approval. That's something not just anyone can do. Craige doesn't invite many to fish on his place.”

Billy grinned, pleased at having such a special invite. “Mister Craige told me I could come fish anytime. He sure has been to lots of places. Done things I'd like to do some day.” He sat down on the bottom step and laid his cane fishing pole next to the steps. “I thought you were awful pretty the day I saw pictures of you on the shelves next to those of that old woman.”

Terri said, “The elderly woman is his grandmother.”

The growl of a pickup truck coming down the drive interrupted them; Lucky bounded out to meet it, as Sam Crawforde swung into the yard. Crawforde turned off the engine, and climbed out dressed in faded coveralls and a pair of well-worn, second hand army boots that were Crawforde’s version of snake boots. “Well now, Terri, you’re a sight for sore eyes. It’s been a spell since I’ve had the pleasure of seeing you.”

“It has been a while.” Terri gave a nod toward Billy, “This is Billy, an acquaintance of Craige’s who fishes here.”

Crawforde asked, “Craige here?”

Terri said, “He’s inside asleep right now. He had a long night.”

Crawforde propped one foot on the bottom step, “I’d like to sit a spell, but I have several things to take care of before heading back to my office. Tell him I dropped by. He might want to come down to the dig and see some of the things we've uncovered.”

Billy, excited, “Find any arrowheads?”

“There’s lots of them,” Crawforde said. “Lot of Indian sites around these parts.”

“My dad had some. All kinds of things, one axe head. Got two bowls. They're broken but we have the pieces.”

Crawforde said, “You know where they come from?”

“My dad said some come from Edisto Island near the shell hills back in the marshes. My uncle has a farm up near Aiken. Sometimes when he plows, he’ll turn arrowheads all over the place.”

“If the broken pottery hasn’t been meddled with, the shards can help date artifacts. Once a site is dug through, it’s spoiled for dating. If you like to know how people used to live, you might want to give some thought to studying it beyond high school.”

“I guess,” Billy sort-of replied.

“You could study all about the Indians.”

“That what you do?”

Crawforde said, “Been doing it longer than you are old,” to him his work as fresh as ever. “You can tell what tribes lived where; where they moved; who they traded with; how they reused every-day things. How their pottery designs changed, different axe heads like you found. They didn't throw away much. Recycled most of what they had. Couldn't run down to the nearest hardware store and buy a new one.”

“We just finished studying about the Cherokees.”

“Sad, the way they were treated.”

Billy said, “Cherokees had newspapers.”

“That kind of stuff interest you?”

“Sometimes.”

“What year are you in school?”

“Senior.”

Crawforde said, “Keep your grades up. College is your next step.”

“USC Columbia. My Dad went there.”

“What's your GPA?”

“Little above a three point.”

“SATs?”

“English 550, math 600”

Crawforde smiled, “Sports?”

“Football, but I like baseball best.”

“You going for a scholarship? Either football or baseball?”

Billy sighed, “Probably not. You got to be a spotlight quarterback or pitcher to get that.”

“What you got to lose by trying?”

Billy thought for a moment. “Nothing I guess.”

“Don’t say no to yourself. Go after what you want. I've served on several university admissions’ boards. When other folks say no to you, treat it as a roadblock to be overcome.”

“Or go around,” Billy said.

“You might be surprised how most people want to help. You won't have problems with USC. If you’d want, maybe one of these days you could come in the field with me. Look at some of the mounds discovered last month by one of the grad students from our department. We covered it back up to protect it.”

Billy's eyes lit up, “I’d like that.”

“Hope nobody dug it up since then.”

“That happen much?”

Crawforde said, “It’s a big problem. What's really sad is how some museums pay big money for cultural artifacts with no questions asked.” Glanced at the sky, time of day was moving on, “Got to get going. Use what daylight's left.” Gave a nod to Terri, “Nice seeing you again.”

Terri watched the pickup disappear through the trees and down the curved drive toward the highway. Summer’s darker green leaves were already tinged yellow-green around the edges along the drive.

Amazon

   

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Internationally acclaimed author and public speaker, Hawk MacKinney began writing mysteries for his school newspapers. He served in the US Navy Reserve for over 20 years, and was a tenured faculty member at several state medical facilities, teaching postgraduate courses in both the United States and Jerusalem, Israel. Since retiring Hawk has authored several novels that have received national and international recognition. Moccasin Trace, a historical novel, was nominated for the prestigious Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the Writers Notes Book Award. The Cairns of Sainctuarie, his science fiction series, includes The Bleikovat Event and The Missing Planets, with a third book in the works. Hawk’s latest project focuses on The Moccasin Hollow Mystery Series. Book 1 in the series, Hidden Chamber of Death, was released early 2016.


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The tour dates can be found here

Hidden Chamber of Death by Hawk MacKinney (VNBtM, guest post, excerpt and GIVEAWAY) GFT

-->I have the pleasure of a guest post from author Hawk MacKinney, as he muses on the synergistic relationship between authors and the team that works with them...

HM: It’s a team effort/accomplishment to reach the point of having one’s titles in print…hardcopy & electronic. That’s the easy part, which is if you love to write, can be fun and work. Then comes marketing, such as Goddess Fish Promotions. An example of the expanding electronic market(s) and by no means the only one that reaches beyond the ‘traditional’ marketing box(es).

The key…a dependable team of shared opinions and objectives. Out on the tabletop for everyone to see/hear, f2f-electronic or person-to-person makes the team package easy to work with. Constructive criticism/suggestions from reliable professionals makes writing that much more fun and the finished manuscript that much better.

A solid support team creates opportunities for writers with published titles to support and encourage those authors still on the road to finding agents/publishers & to “…get the word out!” None of us accomplish this from a single, self-made standpoint. Getting a title published is a team accomplishment that also extends well into the many aspects of marketing. Having both undergrad and graduate faculty experience has served me well in public speaking and meeting my readers.

Thank you for hosting Hidden Chamber of Death in the Moccasin Hollow Mystery Series. It is much appreciated.

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Hidden Chamber of Death

by Hawk MacKinney

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GENRE: Mystery/Suspense

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BLURB:

Hidden Chamber of Death is a compelling tale of intrigue, murder, deception and suspense that leads retired Navy SEAL/part-time private investigator Craige Ingram in search of the connection between seemingly random murders and a banking conspiracy. Working with the local homicide investigator, who just happens to be a former Navy buddy, Craige Ingram's attempts to protect a lonely widow and solve the case before another person dies are only thwarted by a psychotic killer whose motivation is based on pure depraved pleasure. In this first book of the MOCCASIN HOLLOW MYSTERY SERIES, the instincts and skills Ingram and his buddy acquired as Navy SEALS are tested to their limits.

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EXCERPT

The battered, green side door with its peeling, leprosy paint framed one small window with smudged shattered wire-glass. The door cracked just enough for a pair of bright blue eyes to peek out at him.

A voice said, “That you, Mister Craige?” The grey head was hardly visible.

“Yes,” Craige said. “Sallie Mae, that you?” Got no answer, and she didn’t come out.

The door left ajar; rusty hinges squeaked as Craige pushed against it and stepped into a vacuous, black void, the air heavy with a peculiar, stale warmth. He was more than queasy. It had the makings of a perfect ambush layout. Talk about the perfect setup. If Zeb hadn’t OKed the time and place, he would’ve been out of there. Except for jumbled, grimy clutter and vague outlines in a trashed yawning interior, he could make out no details. As his eyes adjusted, Craige found himself facing two frail figures who’d been standing there the whole time.

“Sallie Mae?”

With a fragile movement Sallie Mae said, “Right here. A’gatha Ruth here’s not too pleased about Zeb tellin’ you where to find us.”

“Don’t like this a darn tootin’,” Agatha said. “Nobody’s bizness.” She was testy. “Plenty robbin ‘n ‘killin’ to be took care of ‘stead of cops pokin’ in folk’s private matters. Botherin’ folks what druthers be left alone.”

“I don’t work for the police,” Craige said.

Agatha continued, “Fiddle-de-dee, who you think you’re foolin’? Tain’t a mite of difference twixt you and MacGerald ‘cept he calls it what it be—cop.” She had wizened, bottomless eyes. “Claimin’ we make corn squeezin’s.” Her ire rose. “Don’t try puttin’ no lyin’ to me. I know what the likes of you is after. Them bunch of scallywags wants you to help take away Sallie Mae’s croup potions.” Wiped her mouth with her hand. “That’s what, you’re after Sallie’s makin’s.” She didn’t care for him one bit.

“We been run out from lots’a places,” Sallie Mae said. “Lord knows, these old bones don’t take up much room, and these empty buildings ain’t no use fer nothin’ much.”

Craige interrupted, “Zeb told me you saw the killing in the bank’s garage.”

“Both of us seen it,” Agatha said. “What you want to know for anyhow? We ain’t talkin’ to no cops. Might as well git that out on the table right now. They throw us in jail, say we the ones what did it till we tell where our still wuz.”

“You see who did it?” Craige asked.

“‘Course we seen the man who done it,” Sallie Mae said. “Didn’t see no face, saw his big black car, the kind what rich folks drive.” She shook her head. “Lordy mercy, that poor woman didn’t have no chance.”

Agatha nodded, “Skeer a body plumb to death. Gives me chill blains jus’ thinkin’ on it. Like some animal, like he wadn’t mad. Jes took o’nry mean pleasure beating her.”

Craige asked, “You know it was a man?”

“Jesus my all!” Agatha Ruth spit snuff juice into a paper stuffed big peach can. “You ain’t much good at detecting if you cain’t tell whether a body be man or woman. Maybe you need readin’ glasses. Gettin’ a mite blurry myself, but I don’t have to see a body close-up to tell it was a man, and sure didn’t want that one close-up no how. Tell by the way he hit. He was hefty enough he didn’t have to put much swing to it. Kept whackin’n’whackin’, blood everywhere. Even after she mostly quit moving, he kept hittin’n’hittin’, her legs just’a jerkin’.”

Craige made a mental note to check with Fred if any clothing, gloves, anything showed DNA different from any of the victims.

“Awful!” Sallie Mae shivered. “We hunkered down so he wouldn’t see us.” The filtered light framed Sallie Mae’s dignified, wrinkled face, ancient beyond years with a proud reserve.

Agatha said, “Even after the police got there, we never told them what we seen.”

Amazon
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Internationally acclaimed author and public speaker, Hawk MacKinney began writing mysteries for his school newspapers. Following graduation, he served in the US Navy for over 20 years. While serving as a Navy Commander, he also had a career as a full-time faculty member at several major state medical facilities. He earned two postgraduate degrees with studies in languages and history. He has taught postgraduate courses in both the United States and Jerusalem, Israel.

In addition to professional articles and texts on fetal and adult anatomy, Hawk has authored several novels that have received national and international recognition. Moccasin Trace, a historical novel, was nominated for the prestigious Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the Writers Notes Book Award. This was followed by the Craige Ingram Mystery Series. In a change of direction, October of 2012 saw the release of Hawk’s first science fiction novel, The Bleikovat Event, in The Cairns of Sainctuarie series. Volume II in The Cairns of Sainctuarie series, The Missing Planets, was released in 2014 with Volume III in the works.

Hawk’s latest project focuses on The Moccasin Hollow Mystery Series. Book 1 in the series, Hidden Chamber of Death, was just released, and Book 2 in the series, Westobou Gold, will be released in the fall.

Website

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GIVEAWAY

a Rafflecopter giveaway


The tour dates can be found here

The Missing Planets--The Cairns of Sainctuarie by Hawk MacKinney (VBB, excerpt and GIVEAWAY) Goddess Fish Tours

(note from ELF:  To those who join with me in honoring those who serve, Happy Memorial Day!)

The Missing Planets: The Cairns of Sainctuarie

by Hawk MacKinney

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BLURB:

Planet Terato has become a member of the assembly of the Confederated League of Allied Star Systems. The Murian Outpost Terato once commanded by His Imperial Majesty’s Lord High Chamberlain Herklo Korvo XXXIV is now Teratoan staffed and under the command of Teratoan Eklam a’Qoc.

From the uncharted reaches between galaxies, attacks of extraordinary weaponry come against Terato and the Myr worlds of the Murians. Terminus Terato’s expanded link-portals and converter power modules are virtually useless. Power loss, defenses, communications and travel are totally disrupted. High Chamberlain Korvo’s unexpected return to Terminus on a mission for His Imperial Majesty leaves him stranded on Terato. Attacks grow more massive, more unpredictable; spread across the worlds of the League, as an isolated Terminus struggles among the shattered rubble and whispering remains of an ancient Polity of star-walkers.

Family and friends are lost, empires and civilizations in disarray, Terminus and Planet Terato almost defenseless. Desperate for answers, their worlds being overwhelmed by this remorseless aggressor, Eklam and Korvo reach across unexplored space in a despairing gamble and the last reserves of converter star-substrate, seeking one insignificant star system of gas giants and rocky inner planets for possible relics of the elusive Lantaraan Polity.

 

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EXCERPT

“... eastern radials unstable... strengthening vortices opposing orbital realignment...”

Parn’s head throbbed as his thoughts forced the converter toward more output. The power graph flattening with the unremitting decline as the quantum particles of the shell alloys began to disassociate. Output had reached max and was slowly dropping.

The sound of crashes and roars still louder—Ek knew Terminus couldn’t stand much more. “Once antimatter reaches the hub, the self-destruct will trigger.”

Screens blinked unresponsive. Drok shouted above the bedlam, “The Downday hasn’t attained minimum horizon-clearance. Targeting beams holding on standby. Unless the moon clears the horizon, the beams could refract; bounce off into space; never engage the receptors.” Converters shrieked like a wounded Teratoan swamp crawler. “Showing orbital irregularities... orbital constants vacillating,” eyes glued to the inputs. Puzzled at the unexpected readings coming from a source near the a’Qoc hamlet. “Receiving quick output bursts from the altar,” his tunic dusted with more debris, rivulets of sweat-puddled the dust-furrows of his face.

Ek said, “What type of altar outputs?”

Drok said, “Plasma components—unfamiliar readings.”

“The hub will lose power once the antimatter penetrates those last banks of converter,” Ek said. “Before we lose hub power I want you to go to the sublevel vaults housing the encode archives. Should a power failure warning be announced while you are there, backup power will last long enough. Be sure you are some distance away from the archive vaults before backup power is exhausted.” Reached a small odd-shaped crystal to Drok, “Use this to deactivate any security scrims, and duplicate the protocol crystals. No matter what you have to do, keep those crystals safe. If Terato survives and a Murian survey team returns, they’ll know what to do with those crystals. Those duplicates might be the only records to survive; their information could be vital for Myraa City—if Myraa City survives.”


Buy links:
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

With postgraduate degrees and faculty appointments in several medical universities, Hawk MacKinney has taught graduate courses in both the United States and Jerusalem. In addition to professional articles and texts on chordate neuroembryology, Hawk has authored several works of fiction.

Hawk began writing mysteries for his school newspaper. His works of fiction, historical love stories, science fiction and mystery-thrillers are not genre-centered, but plot-character driven, and reflect his southwest upbringing in Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma. Moccasin Trace, a historical novel nominated for the prestigious Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the Writers Notes Book Award, details the family bloodlines of his serial protagonist in the Craige Ingram Mystery Series. Vault of Secrets, the first book in the Ingram series, was followed by Nymrod Resurrection, Blood and Gold, and The Lady of Corpsewood Manor. All have received national attention. Walking the Pet is Hawk’s latest release in the Ingram series. The first book in another mystery-thriller series is scheduled for release in 2015. The Bleikovat Event, the first volume in The Cairns of Sainctuarie science fiction series, was released in 2012. Its sequel, The Missing Planets, has just been released.

Website

http://youtu.be/-m-H8pfoh-A

http://youtu.be/OvV8gqls688

http://youtu.be/tLOOHlQ3IYs

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GIVEAWAY


Hawk MacKinney will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.



a Rafflecopter giveaway



Follow the tour and comment; the more you comment, the better your chances of winning. The tour dates can be found here