Next up: 'The Last Case'

High Peaks Publishing has started work on the third book by Marshall Scott Shields, entitled The Last Case. It's a stand-alone novel separate from the Covington Mystery Series.  

In The Last Case, Stanford Bell is a private detective known to the world as "Taco." He is also very dead. His friend, police Lieutenant Hanrahan, finds his body in Taco's office on the floor behind his desk, and sets out to discover how he became dead, who killed him and why. 

Through his own narrative, Taco introduces readers to a tall, beautiful former athlete with amber eyes who hires him to find a missing object. With help from a newspaper reporter, Taco and his client follow a seemingly random string of numbers and letters they believe will lead them to the stolen property. 

It's a classic whodunit (and why-they-dunit) written in the style of Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett that will leave readers guessing until the end.

We expect to have a cover design before too long, and while publication is still a ways off, I'll be posting some excerpts in the coming days to tide you over until the book is ready for sale. Watch for them here, and look for The Last Case coming up in 2021.

An excerpt from "An Empty Seat on the Ferry"

 Chapter 26

      They took two spots on high wooden stools with brown leather seats that surrounded the L-shaped Orchard Bar. Jennie ordered her standard Blue Moon ale with an orange wedge and Sammie opted for a vodka martini—shaken, not stirred.

      “Very James Bond of you,” Jennie quipped with a smirk.

      “James Bond isn’t this tall,” Sammie replied with a wink. She peeled back her jacket slightly to show a glimpse of her Glock. “He also isn’t this heavily armed, this well-built (she puffed out her chest) … or this black.”

      They both laughed out loud, turning heads all around the bar. When those heads—that were mostly attached to the necks of middle-aged men—caught sight of the beautiful Jennifer Covington and the stunningly handsome Sammie Ellsworth sitting side-by-side on bar stools, a lot of chairs got turned around for a better look.

      “We’ve developed quite an audience,” Jennie said as the gawking began. “I think they’re admiring our, you know, ass-ets.”

      “Can you blame them?” Sammie replied. “Eat your hearts out, boys.”

'An Empty Seat on the Ferry' now available on Amazon

 Great news! My second book, "An Empty Seat on the Ferry," is now available on Amazon in both eBook and paperback formats. To order a copy, click here:

https://www.amazon.com/Empty-Seat-Ferry-Covington-Mystery/dp/0998871885/

For a signed copy, email your name and mailing address to ShieldsBooks2018@gmail.com.

If you have already requested a book, it's in the mail. Thanks.

Front and back cover design for Covington #2

 The front and back covers are finished for the second book in the Covington Mystery Series. The book should be published soon. 

Cover designed for second Covington book

The cover design for the new book is complete. Take a look! I'm really excited about this one, "An Empty Seat on the Ferry," the second in the Covington Mystery Series. Rob and Jennie follow up the time capsule caper by taking on a pair of unsolved mysteries.

Scroll down to read some excerpts. The book will be coming out in a few weeks. Watch this space.

(Click image to enlarge.)

On writing ‘An Empty Seat on the Ferry’

The second book in the Covington Mystery Series, An Empty Seat on the Ferry, is working its way through the publication process, with a release date still several weeks away. The manuscript is written, pending final editing and proofreading, and a cover is being designed.

With that in mind, I thought I’d share some insight into the second book that features the two main characters -- married journalists Rob and Jennie Covington -- first introduced in Time Capsule published last year.

I wrote Ferry over a couple of months about this same time last year. The idea for the book came to me pretty much out of the blue, although I did start out with three facts [SPOILER ALERT] that were revealed at the conclusion of Time Capsule:

     (1) First, after solving the time capsule mystery, we learned that Rob and Jennie continued working for the Fort William, Md., News-Herald while writing a best-selling book about the case.

     (2)   During that time, Jennie gave birth to a baby girl they named Anne Elizabeth Barkley Covington.

(3)   Soon after their book was published, they moved into a Victorian-style cottage on one end of Martha’s Vineyard, where they planned to write a second book about some other open cold cases in Massachusetts.

Reporting those details at the end of the first book set the stage for the opening chapter of Ferry, in which Rob and Jennie toss around ideas for another true life mystery book. They settle on two open cold cases involving a missing woman from the Vineyard and a girl who disappeared from a neighboring town. Their search for clues leads them to two new characters: Alvin Funderburk, Rob’s old-school editor at the Vineyard Daily Packet; and Samantha Ellsworth, a state police detective who investigated one of the cases.

So I had them meet with Alvin and “Sammie” to begin collecting information. From there, I allowed my imagination to take over and a story began to unfold. I opened my mind and asked myself some questions. What would Rob and Jennie think? What would they say and how would they say it? What would they do with the first set of clues? Where would it take them and who would they meet? I wrote it all down as the answers started coming to me, and before long, my thoughts had become a completed story. I went back then and filled in a few details.

As with all of my books, I didn’t know the ending of Ferry when I wrote Chapter 1, but I allowed the story to flow in a logical direction and eventually, the ending revealed itself in its own good time. To me, that’s a more natural way of writing than starting with an ending and then having to write a specific narrative to get there, although other authors might not agree.

So anyhow, the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard is on its way across the water as we speak, and it will reach the shoreline before you know it. I can’t wait for all of you to read my work and tell me what you think. I don’t know when it will roll off the press, but trust me, you’ll know as soon as I do.    

Excerpt #4, Sammie

Sammie
      Jennie met Detective Sergeant Samantha Ellsworth at 7:00 on Wednesday night at the State Police barracks in Edgartown, as planned. She greeted Jennie at the front desk of the police station and directed her into a spacious office with a large desk, three guest chairs, several file cabinets against one wall and photos of police officers—in and out of uniform—adorning another one. A third wall was consumed by a massive bookcase filled with books, thick three-ring binders, more photos, trophies, framed certificates and various other knick knacks symbolic of years as a public servant.

      A large stack of manilla folders sat on one corner of the desk. Jennie took them to be open cases that Sammie was working. There were two telephones, several pens of different colors, paperweights, a stapler, empty cardboard coffee cups and scraps of paper scattered over the desk top and around the edges of a calendar blotter pad filled with handwritten information. A brass nameplate mounted on wood sat on one corner of the desk and read S. R. Ellsworth, Detective.

      “So let me get right to it,” Jennie said. “I know your time is valuable, and considering the hour, I’m guessing you would normally be home right now. I’ve been reading news clippings and talking to some people about the Agnes Freeman case, so I know she went missing after failing to show up for work one day and hasn’t been heard from since. The stories I read said there were clues left behind but that police were never able to connect the dots. The stories never said what kinds of clues were found. I’m curious to know what those clues were, if you can tell me, because connecting dots is what Rob and I do best, and unlike you with your heavy caseload….” She pointed to the stack of folders on Sammie’s desk. “I have plenty of time on my hands.”

      “As I told you on the phone,” Sammie said, “I may be willing to provide you with some information, but anything I say from this point forward—as it relates to Agnes Freeman—will be strictly off the record unless and until I say otherwise. It has to be that way and as I recall, you agreed to that condition. I will allow you to take written notes but no recordings or photographs of any kind. If you have a recording set on your phone please turn it off.” Jennie didn’t. “Are we in agreement still?”

      “We are,” Jennie said, “but I believe there is one more condition that would only be fair to me. Someday, if everything goes well, this case is going to be solved and it will be a major media event when it does. At such a time, I would fully expect you or someone from your office to share the pertinent facts of the case with any and all reporters as part of your job, but there will be certain nuances—things you might say to me alone and the way you say them and the way they apply to my own investigation—that will belong exclusively to me, and you will allow me alone to use that information in the publication of my book. These are things that would not have to be shared with any Tom, Dick or Eileen who came sniffing around with a notebook and a recording device on their phone, nor would you be derelict in your duty as a police detective for withholding such information while still performing the basic functions of your job.”

      Sammie smiled broadly showing a mouthful of perfect white teeth. It was the first crack, if you will, in her all business, Jack Webb-style “just the facts ma’am” demeanor. “That was quite a soliloquy,” she said to Jennie. “I was impressed. If you write half as well as you speak, this is going to be one hell of a book.”