Murderous Passions
The Turner Hahn/ Frank Morales Series Book 1
by B.R. Stateham
Genre: Detective Mystery
The first novel in the Turner Hahn/Frank Morales detective series. Two homicide detectives and old
friends who take on the homicide cases no one else in the police department want to touch.
Two cops. Four homicides. One case involves a college professor and six thousand suspects. The
second involves a dead farm girl, a dead gigolo, and a grieving housewife. The third is a jewel thief who
likes to play with big caliber guns. The fourth involves a drug-crazed hoodlum with a killer's desire to
challenge the world. It's just another working day for Detective Sergeants Turner Hahn and Frank
Morales.
B.R. Stateham is a fourteen-year-old boy trapped in a seventy-year-old body. But his enthusiasm and
boyish delight in anything mysterious and/or unknown continue.
Writing novels, especially detectives, is just the avenue of escape which keeps the author’s mind sharp
and inquisitive. He’s published a ton of short stories in online magazines like Crooked, Darkest Before
the Dawn, Abandoned Towers, Pulp Metal Magazine, Suspense Magazine, Spinetingler Magazine, Near
to The Knuckle, A Twist of Noir, Angie’s Diary, Power Burn Flash, and Eastern Standard Crime. He
writes both detective/mysteries, as well as science-fiction and fantasy.
GUEST POST
What is the criteria for a good novel?
For me, a good novel is divided into
two parts. First, the novel has to have a believable plot. A story
has to be told. And told in a way where the reader can follow along
and believe the logic in it. The plot doesn't have to be factually
correct. Most readers of novels, especially crime novels, willingly
allow themselves to slip into a kind of suspended animation when
reading. But in that wrapping of suspended animation, the reader has
to have this feeling that, no matter how insane the story line goes,
it somehow follows a natural path that does not strain the realms of
credulity.
The second criteria needed for a good
novel is actually the most important one. A novel needs fully
developed, three-dimensional characters. Heroes or villains, it
doesn't matter. Each character in the novel should be concisely
sculpted in as few words as possible into a fully developed human
being. And it is critically important, especially in a crime novel,
that the villain is as well formed, and as capable, as the hero or
heroes are. There is nothing worse than reading a novel where the
hero is not much better than a cardboard cut-out who does everything
heroically and never misses a step. A hero with no flaws. No warts to
show reluctantly to the reader. Or a villain who is all bad. With no
redeeming qualities or idiosyncratic oddities about his personality
which make break him for the normal mold of villainy.
The second criteria is so important
that one can say truthfully many a book/series have been successful
merely on the merits of the author developing interesting characters
and nothing else.
How did the two main characters,
Turner Hahn and Frank Morales, found in Murderous Passions, come into
existence?
I've always wanted to write a 'buddy'
novel. Two people who were friends and who worked well together. Each
with a distinctive personality readily identifiable to the reader.
Each personality possessing both strengths and and flaws. Each with
their own brand of humor. Each with their own background stories.
At the same time, I frankly admit I
wanted in some measure re-create the poetic beauty of a murder
mystery written essentially like a Raymond Chandler novel. Many
critics think Chandler was/is the epitome of master wordsmith when
writing detective novels. The way he constructed his sentences and
his choices of colorful descriptions cannot be matched. But one can
try. Maybe one should try to mimic the master. But the use of
word selection in trying to paint a mental image of one's characters
in the minds of readers is both a real challenge and a real sense
sense of accomplishment if done successfully.
Turner Hahn and Frank Morales popped
into my mind late one night when I began writing this novel. One
looked like a carbon-copy of the late great movie actor, Clark Gable.
The other became a red headed monstrosity with an immense IQ. One was
extremely rich and divorced. The other was married to an Italian wife
and had a family with numerous children and even more numerous dogs
and cats in the family fold.
Both were homicide detectives who were
very good individually. But partnered together, they became stellar.
I've written three novels featuring these two, one the fourth half
completed. And more to come. I'm just hoping to find an audience who
will agree with me they want to read as many novels as can be written
featuring these two together.
$20 Amazon
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Good Morning! Your book sounds great and I'm glad I got to learn about it. Thank you!
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