Danita Minnis

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John C. Waite will be awarding a $50 Gift Certificate to Nuts.com to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

Author Interview

1. How did you choose your genre? What made you write this book?

Suspense, mystery and adventure stories (often mixed with sci-fi) have long been my mainstay entertainment, so the urge to write in that genre came naturally. I’m a  fan of John Grisham, Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Harlan Coben, David Baldacci and others of that ilk.  Patricia Cornwell and Mary Higgins Clark et al as well. Oh, and Isaac Asimov of course.

Back in the day, as they say, I worked PR for a local university. I was helping plan a literary program and I invited Asimov to speak. He turned me down and I couldn’t figure out why. So I called him and posed the question. “I won’t fly,” he replied. I was astounded. Here was a guy with whom I had traveled the far reaches of the universe, and he was afraid to fly from New York to Pensacola. But we had a great chat about robots.


2. Writers write what they know, and must observe the world. Are you a first born, middle or last child and how does this shape your view of the world?

While I wasn’t the first born, the child who would have been my older brother died of an inherited trait before I came into the world. The impact of that fact didn’t hit me until I had children of my own, and the youngest, a boy, also developed that particular physical problem. Luckily medical science had progressed by that time to where a relatively simple procedure preserved my son’s life. Both the difficulty encountered in dealing with that aspect of my life and the knowledge that scientific progress helped save someone dear to me colors my view of science in general. 


3. Where is your favorite place to write?

My favorite place is the study in my apartment, but often I must be away from my abode. Luckily, the net gives me the flexibility to return to that environment via such programs as Google Drive. So, even if I am spending time at a friend’s place, I can feel at home.


4. How do you feel about killing your darlings, and what do you do with the remains?

That’s the way the world works, often in a manner more cruel and unusual than I can dream up. So when my “darlings” die, I simply scatter their ashes over the waves washing up on my imaginary beach.


5. You are introduced to your favorite author. Who is it, and what is that one burning question you must ask them?

My favorite author tends to change according to my mood and occasion. At the moment I am reading

Middlesex and Jeffrey Eugenides is my favorite contemporary author. The book is a monumental work. I tried at first to check the authenticity of his historical characterizations but have given up and now simply enjoy his storytelling. And I hope he writes more. That’s what I’ll ask him. When’s the next book?

6. Inquiring minds want to know…tell readers something about you that no one knows.

I can’t think of anything about me that would be interesting enough to be a fitting answer to this question. I guess the emotions that perturb me with regard to my brother’s unhappy life might fall into that category. I wonder at times if I had behaved differently toward my brother when he was young he might have been more successful. He was a brilliant guy, but in the end, addictions claimed his life. As a youngster, I often excluded him from my life. He was three years younger and always wanted to hang out with me and my friends. I would put him down, chase him away, demean him in front of his friends. It wasn’t that I didn’t love him. I just couldn’t have a little brother hanging on my heels and spoiling my fun. I wish I could go back and do it over again knowing what I know now. I think somebody wrote a book about that. 


7. You are stranded on a deserted island with only a backpack for company. What three items are in your survival pack?

A notepad and pencil, a fish hook. 


8. If you could have one superpower in your existence, what would it be?

The ability to step back in time thirty minutes. Most of the major errors in my life could have been corrected by thinking for half an hour about what I was about to do or say, and that power would give me more time to record what was happening. 


9. Favorite snack?

Anything chocolate.


10. Indy 500 – Do you know how to get where you’re going or do you drive the speed limit? 

I drive safely, although at times I do stretch the speed limit a bit, particularly on a long and winding road. I drive a sports car and get a bit of pleasure out of competing with myself. Come to think of it, I need some new tires.

The Tursiops Syndrome

by John C. Waite

GENRE: Thrille

BLURB:

How do you get a nuke into the heart of the city? Maybe a dolphin can help. From Author John Waite, the tale of a police detective who matches wits with a mad scientist and terrorists intent on destroying America. When detective Hickory Logan joins Park Ranger Kevin Whitehead investigating the mysterious death of a dolphin she finds herself sucked into a far deeper whirlpool. Can she and Kevin stop the tide of terror that threatens to kill thousands or will they be fodder for a nuclear fireball?

A newspaper review described Tursiops thus: “The writing is, well, wonderful. Waite has a gift for dialogue and story-telling, and his plot is adventurous and perfectly paced. “

Excerpt:

Red Logan hunkered down next to the Humvee’s left front wheel. He folded his lanky frame in several places to assure that the vehicle shielded him from rifle fire emanating from the house a hundred feet away.

A furious fusillade had greeted A-Company, first battalion, 407th Special Forces when their vehicles pulled to a halt in front of what was a rather strange building for northern Afghanistan. In the early morning darkness it looked for all the world like a California ranch-style home.

But there was no BMW parked in the driveway.

The firefight lasted less than fifteen minutes. There was only an occasional round pinging off the slate-riddled soil and infrequent bursts of automatic fire keeping the soldiers from charging the structure. Red wondered why the squads weren’t using some of the heavier weapons. He knew the unit armament included shoulder-fired missiles and a Carl Gustav 84-mm recoilless rifle but so far, the big stuff had been silent.

The tip had placed Azam al-Zawahiri, Al-Qaeda’s chief organizer for nine-eleven, in the house.

Numerous such tips over the past two years had come to nothing. Most of them originated in minds overly-motivated to garner the twenty million American dollars offered for the capture of several of the world’s most wanted terrorists.

At least one Osama bin Laden look-alike had been found dead. And it took weeks before authorities identified the body.  The man had been killed and left in a house to which an Afghan citizen directed U.S. forces. Not only did he not get the reward he sought, but his countrymen also jailed him for mutilating the corpse by cutting off its hands and feet.

Army intelligence, a title Red thought oxymoronic, had considered tonight’s tip more credible than most since it had come in anonymously. The tipster hadn’t mentioned the reward. So the Special Forces unit had headed out in the predawn darkness for a two-hour drive north from Kabul into the mountainous terrain.

“Red?”

The voice belonged to the figure squeezed into the wheel well behind him.

He could barely see Jessie’s sinewy shape, strangely gawky where the video camera and its now-dark lights rested on her right thigh.

“Yeah, what?” he whispered.

“Should I get some video?” Jessie asked, cocking her left hand back over her shoulder.

“Hell no. We’re reporters, not soldiers. CNN’s not paying us to get shot. Just keep your ass down. There’s nothing to shoot.”

Before he could finish his sentence, an amplified Afghan voice rang out from the vicinity of the lead Humvee, imploring the occupants of the house to surrender. The answer was a three-shot rifle volley, the rounds pinging off the hard-pack and whining away into the darkness.

“Now,” Jessie said, pushing past Red and swinging the camera onto her shoulder, leaning on the Hummer’s hood.

“No.” Red yelled, trying to pull her to the ground. But it was too late. The light on Jessie’s camera flared brilliantly then died in a crash of glass and the harsh double bark of a Kalashnikov. The rounds zinged away into the darkness, but Red heard in the report the crunch of bone.

“Jessie.” he screamed.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Thousands of author John C Waite’s words flew past Alpha Centauri years ago,  heading for the center of the galaxy, perhaps sparking an arthropod’s grin in route. Waite, a degreed journalist and retired Merchant Mariner has numerous writing and broadcasting awards to his credit, and millions of words in print and broadcast media. Originally from New Orleans he has called Panhandle Florida his home for fifty years, but still retains a taste for things Creole and Cajun. A recreational and professional sailor, his travels have covered the Caribbean, the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, portions of south and Central America, Canada, Hawaii, Ireland, Britain, and Europe. John resides in Pensacola, Florida. He is a father to four, and grandfather to four.  His books are available on Amazon.

The book will be on sale for $0.99 during the tour.

https://www.amazon.com/Tursiops-Syndrome-John-Waite-ebook/dp/B01MQVDUF1/ref=sr_1_1 a Rafflecopter giveaway p