Cover reveal and blurb for Point of Crisis: Book Three in the Perseid Collapse Series

Posted on by Steven Konkoly

Getting close to the end now. With a launch date set for July 20th, I thought it was time to reveal what I’ve been slaving over for three-month, in between boat work, garden prep, yard prep, spring school festivities, dance recitals, book revisions…a little sleep here and there. Poor me, right? Not really.  Take a look at Jeroen ten Berge’s knock out design for the third, and possibly the last installment to The Perseid Collapse series. I haven’t decided if this is the last Fletcher adventure. Truly, that’s up to you—the reader. I will return to the Black Flagged books next, no matter what you say. I promised, and I keep my promises. A teaser blurb follows the cover, so keep scrolling. I’m extremely excited about this story.

1114 Steve Konkoly ebook POINT OF CRISIS_3_4L

 

“In the aftermath of the brutal attack on his family compound, Alex Fletcher embraces his rapidly expanding role within the New England Regional Recovery Zone (RRZ). Fueled by a limitless drive to protect his family and a rekindled sense of duty, he enlists the reluctant aid of a local militia commander—to help ease the public’s fears of a federal government takeover and maintain civil order within the Security Area (SA).

As Captain Fletcher digs deeper into the government’s plans, he starts to question the federal government’s intentions—and capability to stabilize the situation in New England. With the region’s major port facilities destroyed and the nation’s electrical grid crippled, Alex can’t envision how the government can supply the camps throughout the winter. He predicts a human cataclysm, with several hundred thousand desperate refugees marching north—into Maine.

At the same time, Alex learns that Eli Russell has started to rebuild his militia. Obsessed with finding and eliminating the psychopath that attacked his family, Alex scours the back roads to find him before he can destabilize the tenuous security situation in southern Maine—unaware that Eli’s plans are far more personal.

With the world swiftly unraveling around him, Alex will face his most difficult decisions ever…”

Black Flagged Vektor

Posted on by Steven Konkoly

Black Flagged Vektor is finally in the hands of my editor and several beta readers, leaving me in that awkward phase, where I find myself waking up at 4:30 in the morning and watching You Tube videos for 30 minutes, followed by Facebook for another 30…then finally on to something related to writing…sort of. Blog updates. Book reviews. Tardy emails. The list more or less confirms that I’m lost without a book in the works. I still have some work left to prepare Vektor for a mid to late June launch, but it’s not the kind of intense industry that surrounds spinning a story.

Once the story board comes down, I stare out of the window a lot, turning to my computer sporadically. I gave myself one important thing to accomplish this week, among dozens of smaller tasks. Vektor’s synopsis or book blurb. This is often harder to write than a full chapter of the story itself. How do you condense the book into a summary that draws readers into the book, without giving away plot twists? You spend three days of wringing your hands over it, constantly coming back  to change a word, shorten a sentence or trash the whole thing.

I started this on Monday and have been $@#!ing around with it ever since. I think this is nearly the last iteration. Let me know what you think.

Black Flagged Vektor:

“With the recent bioterrorism threat to the United States neutralized, and Dr. Anatoly Reznikov in custody, CIA Deputy Director Karl Berg proposes a permanent solution to prevent future bioweapons attacks against the West.

A covert raid by General Sanderson’s Black Flag unit against Vektor Labs, deep inside Russia…to destroy a program that should have ended with the Cold War.

The U.S isn’t the only country looking to tie up loose ends. The sudden abduction of a CIA officer in Stockholm exposes the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service’s (SVR) ruthless campaign to discover the truth behind the massacre of an elite Spetsnaz team sent to silence Reznikov.

When the SVR investigation takes a turn that could threaten the mission against Vektor, Berg goes “off the books” like never before. Through an intricate web of unsavory alliances, deviously orchestrated political maneuvers and shockingly brutal black-ops action, Karl Berg will set in motion an unstoppable chain of events with the potential to ignite a new Cold War.

Black Flagged Vektor continues the series’ tradition of gritty, unapologetic storytelling, plunging readers even deeper into the murky, shark infested waters navigated by covert operators and their puppet masters.” 

Black Flagged Character Teasers

Posted on by Steven Konkoly

Enjoy this sneak peek at the key characters in my upcoming release, BLACK FLAGGED...available in mid-October. The final back cover blurb is also ready. Thanks for the input, everyone.

FINAL BLURB

You can always check out a sample of Black Flagged here:

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Three of Black Flagged

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Daniel Petrovich

Who is Daniel Petrovich? Very few people know the real truth behind this question, and Daniel likely says a little prayer every night wishing each and every one of them a fatal heart attack. In Black Flagged, the reader will meet Daniel behind a sleek, brushed metal desk, buried in MBA level work at Zenith Semiconductor. He’s been hiding here for a few years, trying to forget the past, and build a new life with the woman he loves.

Unfortunately for Daniel, some secrets carry a debt that can never be repaid, and certain acquired skills will always hold their value, even in a down economy. Daniel Petrovich will be asked to perform one last mission by his former mentor, General Terrence Sanderson. It’s an easy job for a highly trained operative like Petrovich…a simple killing, right across town, and all in the name of national security. With the promise of a clean slate, Daniel agrees. What could possible go wrong?

Special Agent-in-Charge, Ryan Sharpe

As the Agent-in-Charge of Task Force HYDRA, Ryan Sharpe just received the worst possible news imaginable. All eight of HYDRA’s investigative suspects were murdered last night, literally leaving the FBI with a dead investigation. Someone just put Al Qaeda’s domestic funding network out of business, without any warning, and the FBI doesn’t have much time to figure out why. Ryan Sharpe will lead Task Force HYDRA into a frightening day, focusing on the nebulous organization behind the killings, and desperately scrambling to seek answers. Nervous about the possibility of an impending terrorist attack, pressure from the Beltway puppetmasters will mount on Sharpe, forcing him to adopt tactics not found in the FBI’s operational rule book.

Karl Berg, Assistant Director Counter-Terrorism Center, National Clandestine Service

Karl Berg has been around the CIA long enough to have a “friend” in nearly every dark shadow cast by the U.S. government…and oddly enough, most of them owe him a favor or two. Karl is a player within Langley. Long ago a foreign operative himself, he’s not afraid to bend the rules, or manipulate the scenes for the CIA’s benefit….or his own. While the FBI desperately chases its own tail from Maine to Washington D.C., trying to uncover the true agenda behind the sudden murder of eight suspected Al Qaeda financiers, Karl will stumble upon a ghost from the past. A ghost that will ignite a thirst for revenge that can only be satisfied with blood. Berg is about to call in a few big favors, and ignite a deadly rampage with the D.C. Beltway.

Brigadier General Terrence Sanderson, U.S. Army (retired)

General Sanderson is exactly the kind of soldier you want on the front lines of the war on terror, watching over us long after we’ve tucked ourselves safely into bed at night…unless you have a problem with the trampling of the Geneva Convention and most laws, international or domestic. Disgraced into retirement after the operational details of his controversial Black Flag surfaced on Capitol Hill, Sanderson is back, and he’s not about to let the Pentagon, or a few government agencies stand in the way of his time-tested brand of patriotism. Backed by a wealthy, hidden cartel of “Patriots,” and some…a lot of blood money “confiscated” during Black Flag’s operational heydays, the good general is about to set in motion a series of events that will leave the FBI, CIA and most of Washington D.C. speechless.

Special Agent Justin Edwards

Movie star handsome, Ivy League educated, born to wealthy parents; Justin Edwards is a rising…well, maybe just a star within the FBI. What’s not to like about Justin Edwards? Most agents find it difficult to look beyond his perpetually elitist and arrogant attitude, and all of the female agents are tired of trying to get him to look above their chests. Only family connections have stemmed the tide of his misogynistic conduct, and kept him in Bureau for this long.

Justin’s not a complete loss to the FBI. He’s a solid investigator, and in the aftermath of the HYDRA murders, he finds himself bathed in foul breath and distasteful cologne…cramped into a briefing room at the dawn of a very long day for the FBI. Under protest, he accepts his assignment to lead the on-scene murder investigation of Mohammed Ghani in Maine. Feeling that he should have been assigned to a more important, cosmopolitan location, Edwards goes through the motions, unaware that he stands at a deadly and violently unpredictable crossroad. One that will define his future at the FBI…if he survives.