Monday, March 10, 2014

Teaser Post: HANGMAN: SAN FRANCISCO SLAUGHTER

I just wanted to take a moment and update readers on one of my current projects. I'm working on a new novel, tentatively titled HANGMAN: SAN FRANCISCO SLAUGHTER. Those of you who've read KILLER INSTINCTS might get the reference, but for those of you who missed it, "Hangman" was Jamie Lynch's call-sign while a member of SOG during the Vietnam war. Jamie is the uncle of William Lynch, the protagonist in KILLER INSTINCTS. Jamie is also the older son of Thomas Lynch, the main character in my COMMANDO series.

This (first) HANGMAN novel is being written for two reasons. First, to bridge the generation gap between Thomas and William Lynch. When I originally began writing KILLER INSTINCTS, my intent was to go back through the generations and write about each of the Lynch men who went to war, what I'd called at the time the Lynch Legacy. The first COMMANDO novel was the first completed volume in this idea, but I'd actually written the first thousand words of HANGMAN while writing KILLER INSTINCTS. Only now, over two years later, am I finally going back and writing the rest of the story.

The second reason for writing this book is to try and write a kick-ass '70s-style Men's Adventure novel. In 1973, Jamie Lynch has been out of the Army for a little less than a year, and he's going stir-crazy living the life of a beach bum in San Diego. After getting in touch with his old commanding officer, Jamie is given a job working for Steiger, a Silicon Valley CEO. One of Steiger's top engineers has gone missing after stealing a prototype for an ordnance guidance system, and Steiger fears the prototype will fall into the hands of one of his competitors. Lynch teams up with Blake, Steiger's chief of security, as well as an enigmatic mercenary gunslinger named Richard...

SAN FRANCISCO SLAUGHTER is going to be violent. It's going to be crass. It's going to get ugly. People are going to get killed in not-very-nice ways. There's a lot of drinking and swearing and even a little sex. There's cars and guns and arson and torture. The good guys aren't so great, but the bad guys are even worse.

I'll probably have the first draft of the manuscript finished by the first week of April. I'll be looking for some beta readers, so if you're interested, shoot me an email and I'll put you on the list. My target date for publication is June 1st.


8 comments:

J.M. Aucoin said...

Awesome. Great cover, too.

Unknown said...

Yay! Sounds great! Can't wait!

Brian Drake said...

Sounds great! I remember when we first discussed this and it gave me the idea for my Wolf series.

Mark Allen said...

Admit it, you just looked into my head, saw what I crave in a novel, and decided to write it, right? Guns, nastiness, torture, cars, arson, sex, good guys that aren't that good ... this book sounds custom-designed for me.

Sean McLachlan said...

"SAN FRANCISCO SLAUGHTER is going to be violent."
A Badelaire novel that's violent? Really????
You know I'm always up for a beta read!

Charles Gramlich said...

As a reader of those 70s kick ass men's adventure novels I find this quite fascinating. Sounds like it will be fun.

Stan R. Mitchell said...

This sounds like a GREAT read. Can't wait to see it. (Early! Sign my ass up...)

Jack Badelaire said...

Thanks for all the great comments, folks! When the manuscript is ready, I'll send out an email to anyone interested in giving it a read. I hit 30,000 words on Monday, so hopefully this'll get wrapped up by the end of the month.