These information documents for each of the official Trade Mark of Quality releases includes the known details for each genuine TMQ title. This includes the TMQ catalogue number, artist, record title, track list, musicians, venue, recording date, master tape and record matrix info and the other particulars for each album.
Nevada: America’s number one tourist destination… if you’re DEAD!
After surviving the first days of the zombie apocalypse, Sheriff Penny Miller and her friends relax in what’s left of Las Vegas. The Army asks Miller and her party to return to Crystal Place, the Top Secret base that was the birthplace of the zombies. Even though the mission is to recover data that may lead to a cure for the virus—and Miller herself—she’s pretty sure it’s a bad idea. The Army assures her that a crack team of mercenaries will be there to protect them every step of the way.
When Miller sees weird religious graffiti scrawled in blood on the concrete walls, she’s sure their chances of survival have just dropped to damn near zero. Again.
Sometimes it sucks being right!
“Zombies generated by a government scientist searching for super-soldiers meet up with a good-looking, foul-mouthed female Sheriff…and she’s packin’. Four stars.” —SF Signal
“Defines Laugh Out Loud funny. Often inappropriate, rude and utterly epic sarcasm from a completely rock your face off chick! Read this now! You won’t be sorry!” —Bookish Brunette
“It’s zombies. A mad scientist. An ass-kicking female sheriff out to save the world. A fun ride. One of the better novels of the undead. Recommended.” —Horror World
“Zombie thrillers loaded with sex and smarts.” —Jonathan Maberry
“A fun fully loaded brain entrails explosion of a high octane charged zombie story.” —More2Read(dot)com
Small town Sheriff Penny Miller and her friends Scratch, Terrill Lee, and Sheppard escaped from Nevada moments before a devastating nuclear explosion intended to eradicate the zombie plague. The Government’s plan didn’t work, and the undead are spreading fast. When Miller and her men find an abandoned hunting lodge in a remote village in Colorado, they’re hoping to steer clear of zombies, redneck survivalists, and panicked locals, and to simply ride out the winter.
Penny Miller just wants some peace and quiet, a glass of wine in front of the fireplace, and maybe some quality time with Scratch over the holidays.
Unfortunately, that isn’t Santa coming down the chimney—and this will not be a Merry Christmas.
“Zombie thrillers loaded with sex and smarts.”
—Jonathan Maberry, NYT Best Selling Author of Extinction Machine
“Defines laugh-out-loud funny.”
—Bookish Brunette
“From the opening line, I loved it. For a zombie fan like me, presses all the right buttons.”
—Stoker winner Joe McKinney, Author of Dead City and Flesh Eaters
“The dialogue and narrative crackle, and the expressions that come out of Penny's mouth are hilarious. Great combination of action, gore, horror and humor.”
Sheriff Penny Miller’s philandering ex-husband is convinced the cattle on a ranch north of Flat Rock are being attacked by blood-sucking bats. Miller brushes him off, since Terrill Lee has always been a conspiracy nut. When the rancher dies suspiciously, the property is sold to two eccentric women who open—of all things—a wine and knitting shop. Their odd little business brings tourist money to Penny’s sleepy little town, along with two teenaged drug dealers and a huge heap of trouble.
In Blood Desert, the thrilling prequel to The Hungry series, there’s a new kind of undead giving Penny a pain in the neck. Though the zombie apocalypse remains one possible future, Patient Zero has yet to be infected. In this here and now, Sheriff Miller ends up face-to-fang with deadly, ravenous vampires who are determined to take over the entire state of Nevada, starting with Flat Rock.
Readers of The Hungry zombie novels will love Blood Desert for its familiar characters, serious scares, and quirky black humor. The somewhat younger Sheriff Penny Miller is as funny, foul-mouthed, and courageous as ever. Readers both new and old are in for a real treat.
Most books about Bob Dylan try to explain the man, decode the lyrics, or solve the mystery.
Seeking Mirth and Beauty takes a different road.
Kevin Kane is not interested in gossip, biography, or proving what Dylan “really meant.” Instead, he asks a stranger and more interesting question: why do certain songs work on us so deeply when they do not explain themselves at all?
Written as a series of searching, personal, and often surprising musings, this book treats Dylan’s songs as works of art in their own right — not messages to be translated, but objects to be encountered. Like a painting, a sculpture, or a sudden memory, a song can stand outside ordinary explanation and still change the way we hear, feel, remember, and understand the world.
Moving through Dylan, Shakespeare, abstract art, old records, memory, physics, faith, and the creative process itself, Kane reflects on how art separates from the artist, how songs become fixed in us, and how beauty and meaning often arrive without asking to be solved.
This is not a biography of Bob Dylan. It is not a lyric guide. It is a book for readers who want to think deeply about music, art, memory, and the mysterious ways human beings make things that last.
Seeking Mirth and Beauty is for anyone who has ever heard a song and felt that something permanent had entered the room.
The Art of Being Foundis a clear, human guide to how creators and fans discover each other in the modern world. It is not a marketing manual. It is a practical way to understand how people actually move through the world, what they pay attention to, and why certain voices stay with them long after the moment of discovery.
If you make anything—stories, music, videos, art, ideas—you already know the inner tension between wanting to be seen and wanting to stay safe. This book helps you approach that moment with clarity instead of fear. It explains why the “fear of looking foolish” is so common for creators, why consistency matters more than volume, and how small, steady actions build trust over time. You will learn how fans look for the voices that feel like home, how emotional resonance works, and how to create a presence that is sustainable for you, even on difficult days.
Instead of pushing you to be louder, this book shows you how to become more visible in ways that fit your personality, energy, and creative weather. It also offers a realistic look at the roles of publishers, curators, reviewers, and the wider ecosystem your work enters—what they can do for you, and what will always remain yours alone.
Whether you are at the beginning of your creative life or many years into it, The Art of Being Found gives you a gentle, steady framework for showing up in the world without burning out—and for letting the right fans find you in their own time.
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<h1 class="element-title case-upper font-variant-normal"><span class="ttext">HOW FANS MOVE THROUGH THE WORLD</span></h1>
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<p class="first first-in-chapter first-full-width first-with-first-letter-f"><span class="first-letter first-letter-f first-letter-without-punctuation">F</span>ans do not move through the world in straight lines. Their attention wanders the way weather does—slowly, subtly, pulled by currents they scarcely notice. A fan’s path toward a work is never a single moment, never one dazzling encounter or one perfectly placed recommendation. It is a drift of instincts, curiosities, private rituals, and quiet affinities. To understand how works are found today, we have to step away from the mechanics of platforms and return to something older, more human, and far more enduring: the inner life of the fan.</p>
<p class="subsq">Every fan lives inside their own world of meaning. They have their own patterns of curiosity, habits of seeking, ways of moving toward the stories that will matter to them. Some wander through bookstores with the reverence of a pilgrim, touching spines, reading first pages (or last—or if you’re like me, somewhere in the middle), waiting for a spark.</p>
<p class="subsq">Others comb through search engines, pursuing faint trails of genre, theme, or mood until they land on something that feels like home. Still others follow the quiet echoes of conversation—an offhand mention in an interview, a reference in a podcast, a thoughtful essay that leads, almost incidentally, to the writer’s name. And many more simply drift through their daily lives until a sentence, an image, or a feeling catches them off guard and lodges in their mind.</p>
<p class="subsq">If we looked closely enough, we would see that every fan has a private ecology of discovery, built not from algorithms or formats but from the rhythms of their own personality. Some are seekers, scanning constantly for the next story, the next voice, the next emotional experience that will widen their world. Seekers hunt by instinct. They browse review sites, search phrases, and online nooks the way a naturalist explores a field: eyes open, senses attuned, always ready for a flicker of movement. They may never click “follow” on anything, but they pay exquisite attention to the patterns they recognize. A good sentence can stay with them for days. A compelling premise can prompt half an hour of research. A single footnote can send them searching for a creator’s entire backlist.</p>
<p class="subsq">Other fans move through the world more quietly. They are not actively searching so much as absorbing the signals around them. A quote shared by a friend. A novel mentioned in an article. A feeling they can’t shake after reading a passage. These fans aren’t passive—they are receptive. They allow the world to introduce works into their lives in their own time, trusting that what matters will find them when they’re ready. And when something finally does catch their attention, they approach it with a kind of tenderness, circling around it until they feel the moment of readiness settle in.</p>
<p class="subsq">And then there are fans who fall in love with a voice before they even fall in love with a work. They encounter a writer somewhere—perhaps years before the writer releases anything new—and they keep that voice tucked in their memory. Sometimes this is a deliberate attachment, an intentional act of “I want more of this person.” More often, it is the softest of recognitions, the barest sense of familiarity, the sort of feeling that grows without needing to be encouraged. These fans become loyal long before they become visible, and often long before the creator ever knows they exist.</p>
<p class="subsq">What all fans share, regardless of their habits, is the profound way they relate to stories and the people who tell them. Humans are wired to respond to voices. We are drawn to patterns of thought, to emotional textures, to narrative rhythms that feel compatible with our own interior landscapes. When a fan encounters a writer whose voice resonates, the connection is not merely intellectual—it is neurological, emotional, even somatic. As the research on fandom shows, our brains respond to characters, narrators, and creators in ways that mimic real empathy and real relationship. We fill in the gaps instinctively; we take on emotional textures unconsciously; we develop genuine affection for voices we have never met in person.</p>
<p class="subsq">A fan does not need direct contact with a creator to feel connected to them. They do not need a comment thread or a social media exchange. They do not need a newsletter reply. Connection happens internally. It is built from exposure, repetition, and emotional congruence—tiny signals that accumulate in the fan’s mind. Over time, these signals form a sense of the creator as a presence, a companion, even a guide. This is why a single sentence in an interview can spark attachment, or why a fan who has never once interacted publicly can still buy everything a creator writes the moment it appears.</p>
<p class="subsq">Fans also carry stories with them long after they close the book. They remember the feeling of being understood, the comfort of companionship, the joy of discovery, the surprise of insight. They return to those who gave them that experience, sometimes out of loyalty, sometimes out of longing, sometimes simply because the world feels a little more navigable in the company of a familiar voice. This is not fandom. This is the ordinary, enduring magic of human attachment.</p>
<p class="subsq">If we step back far enough, we realize that all fan behavior—seeking, drifting, researching, lurking, following, recommending—is part of a single, ongoing motion. Fans move toward the voices that feel like home. They move toward clarity, toward empathy, toward resonance. They move toward what feels real. And they do this regardless of the decade, the medium, the dominant technology, or the current fashion of discovery. Fans behaved this way in 1994, in 2009, in 2025, and they will behave this way long after our current tools have vanished.</p>
<p class="subsq">To understand fans, then, is to understand something simple: People want to feel something authentic. They want to be guided, surprised, comforted, challenged, delighted. They want to encounter a mind that speaks in a way that aligns with their own sense of the world. And once they find that voice, they want to stay close to it—quietly or openly, intermittently or faithfully, privately or publicly. This is the gravitational pull at the heart of reading—or consuming any form of creativity. It is not technological. It is not generational. It is not new.</p>
<p class="subsq">It is human.</p>
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25 Frozen, 1 Thawed (Murder and Mayhem in the Midwest) takes readers deep into the heart of unsolved and unforgettable crimes from America’s Midwest—cases as haunting as the winter nights they were born from. Through meticulous research and vivid storytelling, veteran journalist Bob Cyphers unravels the chilling details behind murders, disappearances, and mysteries that refused to fade with time.
From the quiet streets of St. Louis to small towns where everyone knows everyone—and no one will talk—these true accounts lay bare the human stories behind the headlines. A young mother gunned down steps from her home, her life cut short by a killer who may have been closer than anyone guessed. A teenager snatched from a bike ride and never seen again, her absence still echoing through her community decades later. A journalist-in-training whose promising future ended in a shallow creek, leaving two suspects and questions that still divide a town. And a sorority sister found beaten on her own front lawn just before Christmas break, in a case that still unsettles a college campus.
Blending compassion for the victims with a reporter’s drive for facts, Frozen doesn’t just revisit the evidence—it brings readers into the emotional center of each story. These are not distant, cold cases; they are stories of lives interrupted, families searching for truth, and communities forever changed.
Discover our Men's T-Shirt, crafted with sustainably and fairly grown USA cotton for an eco-friendly choice that doesn't skimp on style. Featuring double-needle stitching throughout, a seamless rib at the neck, and taped shoulder-to-shoulder construction for enhanced structure. Available in multiple colors, including Safety Green, which complies with ANSI / ISEA 107 high-visibility standards, this t-shirt is perfect for ensuring safety in high-risk environments or simply adding a vibrant touch to your outfit.
Made with sustainably and fairly grown USA cotton
Classic fit
Safety Green is compliant with ANSI / ISEA 107 high-visibility standards
Double-needle stitching throughout; seamless rib at neck
Fabric weight: 5.3 oz (midweight)
100% USA preshrunk cotton, Heather Gray is 90% cotton and 10% polyester. Safety Green is 50% polyester & 50% cotton.
Brand: Gildan or Fruit of the Loom
Imported product, printed & processed in the USA
THE FOLLOWING COLORS ARE CURRENTLY FRUIT OF THE LOOM BRAND: Yellow, Khaki, & Aquatic Blue
In this chilling collection, prolific short story writer David Dean turns his talents to tales of suspense and the supernatural. Nominated for Edgar, Derringer, and Barry Awards, as well as twice winning Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine’s prestigious Readers Award, Dean proves here that he’s no stranger to an even darker world than that of crime fiction. Her Terrible Beauty and Other Tales of Terror and the Supernatural offers a variety of stories that will amply demonstrate his talent for the terrifying.
A writer who decides to winter over at his family’s lake cottage discovers that an unsettling local legend contains much more than a kernel of truth, in war-torn Bosnia a company of Serbian soldiers happen upon a village like no other they have encountered… and wish they hadn’t, and a student of Edgar Allan Poe’s literature uncovers the real reason why three roses and a bottle of Cognac are left on his grave every January 19th.
Her Terrible Beauty and Other Tales of Terror and the Supernatural is the third volume in the collected short fiction of David Dean.
After decades of writing utilitarian copy for trade magazines, Tom Huttle believes that he is on the path to a glamorous new life when he completes the first chapter of his novel, The Pyongyang Paradox, featuring dashing hero Buck Samson. The novel might give Tom the confidence he needs to pursue the woman of his dreams, and fulfill his abiding conviction that he is destined for a life of action and romance.
Tom gets more excitement than he bargained for when the explosion of a top-secret satellite sends him to Buck Samson’s fictional world, just as Buck takes over Tom’s pedestrian life. For Tom, living a life of relentless peril and intrigue is a far cry from writing about it, and Tom’s normal world may not be ready for the likes of Buck Samson.
A rollicking blend of espionage, romance, and science fiction, The Pyongyang Paradox is laced throughout with Chris Westphal’s quirky brand of dark humor and psychological insight.
These information documents for each of the official Trade Mark of Quality releases includes the known details for each genuine TMQ title. This includes the TMQ catalogue number, artist, record title, track list, musicians, venue, recording date, master tape and record matrix info and the other particulars for each album.
These information documents for each of the official Trade Mark of Quality releases includes the known details for each genuine TMQ title. This includes the TMQ catalogue number, artist, record title, track list, musicians, venue, recording date, master tape and record matrix info and the other particulars for each album.
In Murder in a Sundown Town, author Alexandra Kitty looks at the shocking 1968 homicide of Carol Jenkins, a sweet and resilient 21-year-old woman stabbed in the heart on her first day on the job selling encyclopedias in Martinsville, Indiana. What seemed to be an easily solved homicide turned into a four-decade cold case and became a tragic story about racism, sexism, gossip, and walls of silence. It is a case of injustice and persistence that still leaves as many questions as answers. In an age of both “true crime” fascination and modern social politics holding equal attention, this book looks at an old case in a contemporary light. From the clues to its racial and gender politics, investigation, resolution, and cultural impact, the book takes an in-depth look at a young woman’s frightening last hours and why Carol’s case is as relevant today as it was in the ‘60s.
The Emperor of Japan is a pyromaniac, living in the orange groves of Echo Valley as he plots revenge against Tom Huttle, who he believes has ruined his life. Meanwhile, Tom is in Baltimore to collect a writing award, while his wife and her bawdy traveling companion have been kidnapped by terrorists in Cairo.
It’s up to Tom to save the day.
The third book in The Chronicles of Huttle is an intricately constructed black comedy that skewers everything from post-Cold War paranoia to sexual taboos to our fascination with youth, beauty, and celebrity.
Huttle to the Rescue is book three in the Chronicles of Huttle.
It’s the early 1990s, and Tom Huttle has abandoned film and television writing for a more stable, although far less glamorous, career as a business writer. When he finally sells his first book—Garbage—he believes that wealth and celebrity are just around the corner.
With his wife and son, he moves to tiny, isolated Echo Valley. The place seems ideal, until Tom learns that life there is dominated by Bagnoosianism, a crackpot religion presided over by the enigmatic Swami Bagnoose.
Tom’s wife soon succumbs to the cult’s allure, while his fragile son falls under the spell of a shifty conman from long ago in Tom’s life. Meanwhile, Tom’s agent makes increasingly bizarre demands for the book, and Tom nurtures a maniacal fondness for pink lemonade. And then things began to get weird.
In Huttle We Trust is book two in the Chronicles of Huttle.
Cottage Grove Oregon is a sleepy little town, but in the surrounding forests, an ancient nightmare is growing stronger. Dr. Joseph Hoffman, head psychiatrist at Cottage Grove Hospital, wants to believe he has all the answers to his patients’ problems, but there is a darkness within him that always lurks beneath the thin veneer of his competence. That veneer is about to crack.
In his Victorian home at the edge of the forest, his troubled memories hide in untouched rooms under a thick blanket of dust. He thinks he has them under his control, but as he delves into his patients’ twisted stories, the shadows of their insanity begin to follow him home. In order to see what is happening to him, Joseph must turn everything he knows about his past, and his reality, upside down.
As he gets closer to discovering the source of the malevolence that surrounds him, he feels his sanity slipping away. Joseph must uncover the truth before it consumes him. Something terrible is taking over, and he may be the only one who can figure out why.
“The author’s rich and dark psychological landscape shows a suspenseful tale of evil iconography, while providing room to create a mysterious world. The decisive intensity of the characters comes from the narrative’s beyond world experiences - A book well worth picking up!”
—Brian Perera, CEO of Cleopatra Records / Cleopatra Entertainment
Discover the songs and the history of one of the most successful pop rock bands ever, The Turtles, who had many, many Top 40 hits including “It Ain’t Me Babe,” “Let Me Be,” “You Baby,” “She’d Rather Be with Me,” “You Know What I Mean,” “She’s My Girl,” “Elenore,” “You Showed Me” and of course, the iconic “Happy Together!” All of their Golden Hits!
Authors Mark Arnold (Long Title: Looking for the Good Times; Examining The Monkees Songs, One by One and Headquartered: A Timeline of The Monkees Solo Years) and Charles F. Rosenay!!! (The Book of Top 10 Beatles Lists and The Book of Top 10 Horror Lists) have joined forces to cover the entire careers of The Turtles from their early days as The Crossfires, through their hit-filled years, into their break-up that led to most of The Turtles’ members joining forces with Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, to Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan’s years as solo artists under the guise of Flo & Eddie, and even their forays into children’s records.
Arnold and Rosenay!!! have reviewed every song and album, and interviewed many of The Turtles’ friends and associates along with most of The Turtles themselves, who have given startling new revelations that will surprise even the most hardcore fan.
Open the doors to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and to your library to add this book. This definitive Turtles compendium is as unique as The Turtles themselves.
“Welcome to the Incident Room. This is your Case Briefing.”
Congratulations on your first day as a police detective. You have been partnered with an experienced detective who will walk you through some of the toughest and most infamous crimes in American history. You will visit the crime scene, review the evidence, search for clues, interview witnesses, read the news reports, and decide with your partner who’s the most likely culprit and send the case off to the DA’s office. This is true crime in real time.
As you gain experience, you will be given more autonomy in investigating the cases. Your partner will be there to guide and observe you, but it will be up to you to not only decide who to prosecute, but also name the famous case based on the facts and circumstances. Your investigative skills will be challenged, and so will your knowledge of historical cases throughout the decades, from the late 19th century to the present.
Follow the evidence wherever it takes you, don’t jump to conclusions, and use the experience you gain through these investigations to make your case. Even if you recognize the case and think you know the answers, think again. These cases were selected to challenge and surprise you.
Now get to work.
5.0from 1 reader
Why All the Misdirection?
It is a cold December morning, and you roll up on the address, a house in an affluent suburb. The large custom homes in the neighborhood are decorated for the holidays. The patrol units are already there. The call is a kidnapping.
You have been partnered with Theodore “Ted” Miller for many months now and Ted has always taken the lead on your cases. Ted is short and stocky, balding on top and greying on the sides. He has always been a no-nonsense by-the-book detective and has been an effective mentor, providing you with a great deal of investigative knowledge.
You and Ted are still in the unmarked unit when Ted says, “Okay, we are going to put all that experience, education, and knowledge you have to work. I am going to test you. I am going to ask you your opinion throughout the case. I am going to assess your observation skills, your critical thinking, and your assessment of human behavior. I am going to let you take the lead on this case. You ready?”
“Yes, I am ready,” you say.
“Let’s go.” You and Ted open your doors and get out of the vehicle. Ducking under the crime scene tape, you walk up the front driveway.
You pause for a moment to look at the front yard. You both stand there and carefully observe the scene. noting that there are no foot tracks on the lawn or in the snow. The snow is sparse in some areas and does not completely cover the front lawn. Standing next to you, Ted asks what you think. You say, “Uh, if someone was traversing this area, leaving or coming into the residence, they should have made some impressions in the snow or in the wet grass.” You then inspect a window low to the ground. The window is slightly open, perhaps broken as it does not close completely, and when you look inside it appears to lead to a basement.
Ted asks your impressions. “What do you think so far about the outside of the residence?”
You say, “Erm, well, uh… I don't think anyone really came this way as there are no tracks in the snow, and even if the snow is scattered a little it doesn’t seem like anyone came in or left this way or went into or out of that window.”
Ted smiles and you proceed to the front door and walk up a couple of steps. The front door is ajar, and you carefully step inside. Just inside the front door is a small foyer, a living room is to your left with a fireplace in the corner, and the staircase leading to the upper floors is straight ahead.
You are introduced by a patrol officer to the lady of the house, the mother of the kidnapped child. Her name is Sylvie Garnier. She corrects the pronunciation, “Gar-nee-yay.”
Mrs. Garnier is, of course, very distraught and her face shows anguish. She is wearing a red, black, and grey fleece jacket and black velvet pants, an evening outfit. You ask to see the basement. She is cooperative and takes you past the stairs leading upstairs and around a corner to a set of stairs leading down to the basement.
You walk down the steps to the basement, and you ask to see the window that you inspected earlier. The woman leads you straight ahead into a room that has some toy train sets. You proceed into the next part of the room where there are storage racks along the walls, and shelves with art supplies.
She points to your right, and you see there is a piece of luggage below the open window. Sylvie mentions that the suitcase came from another area in this room where the luggage is normally stored. You move close to the window and inspect it further. The window is high on the wall towards the ceiling of the basement, and you see that it has a small portion of glass that is broken. You also see that the dust is not disturbed and there is a spiderweb that is still intact. Sylvie leaves you and goes upstairs, and you stand and survey the rest of the basement storage room.
“What do you think?” Ted asks you.
“Uh, well… there's no way, in my opinion, that anyone took a young child or would even think they could take a young child out through that window, especially by using that unstable piece of luggage. It also does not look disturbed other than being moved to that spot. My impression of that piece of luggage is that it is staging. It was put there to throw us off the track by the kidnapper. It was not used to enter or leave through the window.” You further state, “The point is not to say that the window was used by the kidnapper. It could have been. The point is everything in visual evidence says that it wasn’t.
“By the way,” you add, “I noticed that she has on makeup, and it looks like she is wearing what she wore last night to a party. And her hair is still together.”
“Interesting. That’s good. I might not have noticed that,” Ted says.
You go back upstairs and turn right into the kitchen off the main living room to find Sylvia there leaning against the kitchen counter. The first thing that strikes you is the black and white checkered floor. There is a lot of clutter on the counters of the kitchen, perhaps from recent meals. It is a small narrow kitchen with doors on either side and another door to a breakfast room.
You stand in the kitchen with Sylvie, who is looking very cooperative and expectant, as if waiting for your questions. You look over at Ted inquisitively. Ted says, “This is all yours, go ahead.”
Out of curiosity, thinking perhaps it was used in the search for her child, you ask about a flashlight sitting on a counter on the other side of the kitchen. “Uh, was that flashlight used last night or recently?”
The flashlight is large, heavy, black, and cylinder-like, like a policeman’s, typically known as a Maglite. From where you are standing it looks like an ordinary flashlight—no damage, nothing unusual about it.
Sylvie says, “I don’t really know where the flashlight came from. I believe it was given to us by a neighbor, erm, or someone. I am not sure why it is out and in the kitchen.”
You have an instinct that leads you to ask about a bowl with a spoon in it on the kitchen counter. “Is that bowl from yesterday?” you ask, initially as a matter of mere conversation, because there are a lot of various plates and dishes there.
“My son, before going to bed, often has a dish of milk and pineapples.”
“Did he have a bowl of pineapples last night?” you ask.
“No, he fell asleep on the way home last night. And we put him right into bed. Both of them fell asleep on the way home and we put them right into bed.”
You stand there in the kitchen looking at your feet for a second. Then you look at Sylvie and say, “Okay, now, where was the ransom note left?”
She guides you and Ted out of the kitchen through the door on the other side. Straight ahead, you notice what appears to be a home office. You follow her as she turns to your right and leads you down a short hall to the bottom of a spiral staircase. “This is where I found the note as I came down this morning.” These seem to be the back stairs, not the main stairs that are near the front door.
“Not the front stairs?”
“This staircase leads up to our bedroom and this is the way I come down every morning.”
“Was the ransom note found right at the bottom of these stairs?”
“Yes, right there,” she says, pointing.
You look around and see that there is a desk to your right, and to your left, there is a door that goes to a mudroom and eventually out to the garage.
You ask her, “Where did they get the writing pad and pen?” and she points out a drawer in the small desk to the right of the stairs. There are pens in a cup on the top of the desk.
You open a drawer in the desk and see some writing tablets. You take out a tablet, carefully handling the edges, thumb through it, then put it down on the desk. You do the same for the next tablet below it. You pick up the third tablet down in the drawer and stop after opening the cover. You inspect the first page, then pick up a pen and use it to turn to the second page. You inspect that page. After continuing to handle the tablet carefully, you put it down on the hall desk.
Ted sees the change in the look on your face and says, “Let’s step in there for a second,” pointing to the door that leads into the mudroom.
You walk into the mudroom so you and Ted can have a little conference. Ted asks you, “What do you think?”
As you begin answering Ted you draw a sketch of the first floor.
“I think…. First, back to the kitchen. It’s interesting about the bowl of pineapples. It was there but she said that her son did not have it the night before. And then there’s the big flashlight that she said she didn’t know how it got there in her kitchen. Also, it seems strange that the ransom note was on the back stairs. How did the kidnappers know she, or anyone, would come down those stairs to find it, and not the main staircase?”
When you retreat back to the hallway near the stairs, Sylvie is no longer there. You proceed down the hallway past the office, through the kitchen and a couple of rooms, to a police officer standing alone in a dining room.
“The note?” Ted says to the officer and looks over at you.
“Right, yes, can we see the ransom note, officer?” you say.
The officer hands you the note and you both view it together, quickly reading the long, rambling, three-page ransom note within plastic covers.
“What do you see?” Ted asks.
“Um, I think this would have taken a long time to write. It looks like a tablet was used and then placed back into the drawer underneath two others. One page shows indented writing as practice and the next page shows the indented writing of the full note. That writing looks like one of those pens on the desk, and they apparently put the pen back in the cup. The wording in the note is just weird. The requested amount is strange. Not a hundred thousand dollars but one hundred eighteen thousand dollars. Why is that?”
“What’s the deal with an ‘attaché’ and ‘exhausting delivery’?” Ted adds.
“Yeah, I don’t know. It says they will call between eight and ten this morning, so I guess we wait.”
You and Ted move over to the other door, and you can see from the dining room into the living room where the victim’s father, Jean-Claude Garnier, is there talking with another man. The officer followed you there.
“Who is with Jean-Claude?” you ask the officer. He tells you that is a friend of Jean-Claude’s, Mr. Rivers, who has come over to help. “That’s… that’s not supposed to…”
“Has anyone talked to the young boy?” you ask.
The officer responds by saying, “No. Jean-Claude prohibited it. No one wanted to go against that.”
Just then you see Jean-Claude and his friend leave the room, walking out the other door toward the stairs.
A minute later, Jean-Claude rushes back into the room carrying a bundle and places it on the living room floor. It is their daughter. The mother races into the room, along with Mrs. Rivers, Sylvie’s friend who has just arrived, as well as Mr. Rivers, and they all crowd around. You hurry over to them and observe what you can in the chaos.
You raise your voice. “Wait! Everyone move back! Do not touch anything! Don’t touch anything.”
Sylvie is kneeling down next to her daughter’s body. Sylvie’s friend, Mrs. Rivers, is trying to hold her back, but she is also kneeling, touching the child’s face with the back of her palm, and crying out.
You move in close and kneel down on the other side of the little girl. She is obviously dead, her body pale and stiff. She is wearing a long-sleeved shirt made of white sweatshirt-like material with an embroidered star on her chest. She is also wearing a pair of white long-john-type bottoms.
Her hands are out over her head with a white nylon cord lightly bound around her right wrist and flowing away from it. There is a similar cord around her neck that has a small, broken paintbrush twisted into it like it was used to tighten the cord.
“Please everyone,” you declare, “I know this is going to be difficult, but we need to preserve the evidence.” Everyone is frozen in place staring at the child on the floor. A white blanket that had been wrapped around her is now laying on the floor next to her.
“Officer,” you say, “please try to keep everyone from touching anything… get CSU on the way and make all the necessary calls.” You don’t want to seem callous by asking for the coroner in front of the family. You turn to the people there and ask, “Where was she?”
“In a room in the basement,” Mr. Rivers says.
“Show me,” you say, holding onto his elbow. “Please, everyone, don’t disturb anything while we’re gone.”
Mr. Rivers takes you and Ted back to the front entryway and down the stairs that lead to the basement. You follow Mr. Rivers down the stairs. This time, instead of going straight ahead into the train room, you walk through another door to the left that leads down a small passageway within the boiler room where there are several pipes and a water heater. It is relatively dark down here, the only light coming from a small window high on the wall above a chest freezer.
Mr. Rivers reaches up above the door, releases a latch, opens the door to a room straight ahead of you, and says, “In here.”
“Nobody checked in here before?” you ask.
“I did. Sort of. I looked in and it was very dark. This whole passage was very dark, and it is difficult to walk around down here. See,” he says, pointing, “the light switch is way over there. It is hard to find.”
You look around the room and see some racks with wine bottles. “That blanket?” you ask about a white blanket on the floor.
“She was wrapped in it.”
“And the nightclothes?” you ask, referring to a small pink nightgown lying spread out on the floor next to the blanket.
“That was just there.”
“What is that piece of black tape on the floor?”
“Oh yes, Jean-Claude pulled that off her mouth just before he picked her up.”
You move toward the back corner of the wine cellar and spot a red pocketknife on the floor. Ted’s eyes widen.
“Mr. Rivers, this pocketknife, did Jean-Claude bring that down to cut the cords?”
“No, that was already laying there.”
“Hmm,” Ted says.
“Have you seen it before?” you ask.
“I think I have seen young Bobby with it a few times.”
“Thank you. Okay, so you two just came down here and found her?”
“Yeah, it was kind of weird. Jean-Claude said, ‘I’m going to search again,’ but he came straight down here, opened the door, turned on the light, and saw her. And, ah…”
“What is it, Mr. Rivers?”
“Well, I swear he gasped before he turned on the light.”
“Thank you, Mr. Rivers.” He slips away down the passage.
“Good job,” Ted says. “You got a lot out of him. Let’s go back upstairs.”
You leave the wine cellar, go down the passage, and, stopping near the stairs, you draw a sketch of the basement.
After finishing your rough sketch you walk up the stairs to the first floor.
Jean-Claude, Mr. Rivers, Sylvie, and Mrs. Rivers are all standing in the living room. Mr. Rivers has his hand on Jean-Claude’s shoulder and Mrs. Rivers is hugging Sylvie.
You approach Sylvie and Mrs. Rivers. “I’m so sorry. May I talk to you for a bit?”
“Do you really have to?” says Mrs. Rivers.
You say, “Yes, I’m sorry, I must.”
You move past the fireplace and into the front room. Ted is standing next to you now, facing Sylvie and Mrs. Rivers.
Sylvie says, “All right.”
“Could we go over last night again, please?”
“Yes, we came home, she was asleep, and we put her to bed. I put a brand new pair of underwear and a sleep top on her, covered her up, and she went to sleep in her bed.... Then I got up this morning and found the note. And…” Sylvie puts her face into Mrs. Rivers’ shoulder.
“I’m sorry. But I have to ask,” you say, “Where was the blanket kept?”
“Oh, that was in the dryer.”
“Where is the laundry room?”
Mrs. Rivers answers for Sylvie. “The laundry room is down in the basement. To the left of the stairs.”
“The laundry room is near the craft room?”
“Yes. It is near the train room and storage area down there.”
Just then there is some noise at the front entryway. You look through the living room and see more officers arriving.
You meet them at the door. You look at Ted and then bark orders. “Alright, it looks like this is a murder. CSU, photograph everything, tag, and bag. Officers, scour this house for anything that might be evidence and protect it for CSU. Make sure the perimeter of the house is taped off. Officer Jackson, wait for the coroner and protect the evidence on the victim. Try to keep the family away. All right now. Everyone, let’s get to work.”
You look over at Ted and see him smile. “That was impressive,” he says.
***
You and Ted are sitting in your cubicle at the office, reviewing the case reports.
“The family has refused any interviews,” Ted says. “They got a lawyer as soon as we started the second search of the home.”
“Here is the 911 call. Listen.” You play the tape. “911 what is your emergency?”
“[Garbled] – Police.”
“What’s going on ma’am?”
“644 14th Street.”
“What’s going on there ma’am?”
“We have a kidnapping. Hurry please.”
“Explain to me what’s going on. Okay?”
“There. We have a… there’s a note left, and our daughter’s gone.”
“How old is your daughter?”
“She’s… she’s six years old. She’s blonde, six years old.”
“How long ago was this?”
“I don’t know; I just got the note, and my daughter’s gone.”
“Does it say who took her?”
“No, I don’t know. There’s a… there’s a ransom note here. It says SBTC Victory.”
“Do you know how long she’s been gone?”
“No, I don’t. Please, we just got up and she’s not here. Oh my god. Please.”
You stop the tape and add, “Dispatcher says she thought she heard voices, a young person’s voice, at the end there but couldn’t make out what was said. It is hard to tell anything.”
“Ah, the ‘ransom’ note. Quite bizarre if you ask me,” Ted says.
You have it in front of you and say, “It reads:
Mr. Garnier, Listen carefully! We are a group of individuals that represent (spelled wrong) a small foreign faction. We respect your business (misspelled) but not the country that it serves. At this time, we have your daughter in our possession (misspelled). She is safe and unharmed; if you want to see her again, you must follow our instructions to the letter.
You will withdraw $118,000. Make sure you bring an adequate size attache to the bank. I will call you between 8 and 10 am tomorrow to instruct you on delivery. The delivery will be exhausting so I advise you to be rested. If we monitor you getting the money early, we might call you early to arrange an earlier delivery of the money and hence an earlier pickup of your daughter.
Any deviation of my instructions will result in the immediate execution of your daughter. You will also be denier her remains for burial. The two gentlemen watching over your daughter do not particularly like you, so I advise you not to provoke them. Speaking to anyone about your situation, such as Police, F.B. I. , etc., will result in your daughter being beheaded. If we catch you talking to a stray dog, she dies. If you alert bank authorities, she dies. If the money is marked or tampered with, she dies. You will be scanned for electronic devices and if any are found, she dies. You can try to deceive us but be warned we are familiar with Law enforcement countermeasures and tactics. You stand a 99% chance of killing your daughter if you try to outsmart us. Follow our instructions and you stand a 100% chance of getting her back. You and your family are under constant scrutiny (again misspelled) as well as the authorities. Don't try to grow a brain Jean-Claude. Don't underestimate us, Jean-Claude. Use that good, southern common sense of yours. It's up to you now Jean-Claude! Victory! S.B.T.C.
“There are just so many things that are weird about this note,” you state, then continue, “First, it seems like it was written by someone that lived through the time of Patty Hearst and the SLA, the Chicago Seven, and all that. Like what is SBTC?”
“And what is ‘respects the victim’s business’ and ‘get some sleep’? Or ‘be rested’? What kidnapper says that? It is the middle of the night. They would already be asleep.” Ted sighs.
“It also seems like the misspellings are easy words but then they correctly spelled words like ‘adequate,’ ‘attaché,” and ‘hence.’ Hence!” you say, laughing.
“And,” you continue, “the talking to a stray dog, she dies, alert the bank, she dies. Along with don’t grow a brain. Doesn’t that sound like it is straight from the movies?”
“Yeah, it does. And the note implies ‘they’ are a group by saying ‘we’ but then the writer forgets the ruse and writes an ‘I’ and ‘my.’”
Then Ted adds, “The $118,000 is strange. Not one million, not 100,000. I checked and the $118,000 is exactly Jean-Claude’s recent bonus.”
Turning the pages, you say, “The whole ransom note is three pages. I checked with a friend at the FBI, and they think this is the longest ransom note on a kidnapping case in history.”
“What does Documents say?” Ted asks.
“Ah, yes. Documents. They say the note would take about 20 minutes to write. But they also say, unfortunately, that the broad fiber-tip pen distorts the minute details. And that they can eliminate everyone else in this case but not Mrs. Garnier.”
“Yeah,” Ted says, “but can you imagine the pressure a document guy would be under to ID someone in this type of case? I know I wouldn’t want to do it. He is wise to just report that it is very similar, and they can’t eliminate her.”
“Here is the postmortem report,” you say. “It’s nine pages long.” Flipping through the various pages, you continue, “A lot of doctor speak, but it comes down to strangulation as the cause of death. There was that ‘garrote’ around her neck. There is a large hemorrhage on the scalp, a blow that caused a brain injury to the head that most likely occurred before strangulation or death.
Ted says, “Here on page seven, it says, ‘small intestine contains fragmented pieces of fruit material which may represent fragments of pineapple.’
“There is one strange line on page nine that I am not sure what it means,” you say. “It says, ‘focal interstitial chronic inflammation.’”
“Looking at the evidence reports,” Ted says, doodling on them with a pencil, “I see that they found the other part to the broken paintbrush used for the garrote in a plastic craft tote box near the wine cellar.
“And they found some fibers similar to Sylvie’s clothes on the tape that was supposedly over her mouth. It says the fibers on the tape are consistent with her fleece jacket.”
“I also see here in the report that upon examining the tape, they got the impression that it was put on the victim after death. They are not sure, but it looks like it.” You say, “I’ve got a report here. I don’t know how much credence to put into these neighbor interviews, but one neighbor remembers seeing lights on during the night and a light off in the front room that is usually on all night.”
“Another neighbor remembers hearing a scream at about two a.m.”
“You know,” Ted says, “according to dispatch, only four minutes elapsed from the 911 call to police arrival, and yet the parents were both dressed.”
You add, “Yeah, they were fully dressed in what looks like something they wore the night before, at that. Why lie about getting dressed in the morning?”
Ted adds, “Then there is the blanket that was in the dryer. Who knew where that was? And wrapped around her just like a mother would do.”
You respond, “And why lie about the pineapple thing? Why lie about what she was wearing when she went to bed?”
“The staging here is quite weird. It is like staging within staging,” Ted says.
“Listen,” you continue, “if you are in the middle of a kidnapping, you don’t write a three-page 20-minute ransom note while you are in the house. You don’t leave the note by the back stairs. You don’t kill the victim in the house. And you don’t fake or stage an elaborate kidnapping to disguise a murder.”
“That’s the way I see it,” Ted agrees. “If you accept that there has been a lot of staging, staging always means misdirection, and you have to accept there has been lying, like lying about putting her right to bed. Lying is always done by the guilty, so it must be someone in the family who committed the murder. No intruder would stage the suitcase, the garotte, the tape, the long ransom note, et cetera.”
“That’s right. It’s not only staging, but also evidence fabrication. It is unlikely the craft-made garotte is what caused the strangulation. It was fabricated to account for it. The note, the tape, the luggage, the cord—all fabricated.”
After a long pause, Ted says, “Well, we have hashed out the evidence. Overall, what do you think?”
“Here is what I think,” you say. “This is speculation, but I think the children didn’t go right to bed and were not asleep when they got home. Bobby was given some pineapple and milk. For some reason, the little girl took the bowl from him and ate some of his pineapple. He got angry and hit her, perhaps with the flashlight, or maybe she was pushed against the sink. She didn’t die right then but maybe went into convulsions caused by the brain injury. In order to get her to be quiet and stop squirming, he strangled her, and she died. He probably did not intend to go that far. Then the parents came in and saw the situation. Like I say, speculation.”
“But to blame it on an intruder they used the rest of the night to create this ruse. They were in a state of panic knowing that they had just lost their daughter and did not want to also lose their son. They put the suitcase under the window, made the garotte from Sylvie’s craft supplies to account for the strangulation, placed her in that semi-hidden wine cellar, and lightly tied her hands. They got the blanket out of the dryer, and for some reason placed a nightgown next to her. Then they sat down and used the notepad and pen at the desk to write the long ransom note. Including the exact amount of the bonus.
“Then, after everything was prepared, things were put back in their places like the pad and pen, except they forgot about Bobby’s Swiss Army knife and the flashlight. After perhaps even disposing of a couple of items like the tape and the cord, Sylvie called 911. Because they never undressed, they were fully dressed when the first officer arrived four minutes later.
“They would not let anyone talk to Bobby, for good reason. When no one found the victim after a few hours, Jean-Claude couldn’t stand it any longer. So, he went down into the basement and brought the victim upstairs.”
“I’ve got one for you,” Ted says. “What about the DNA they found on the underwear?”
“Sylvie said it was a brand-new package. It’s not in fluid so it is most likely touch DNA. I’m betting it would match a packager in a factory somewhere. If they never get into the system, we may never know whose DNA it is.”
“Yeah, but it’s DNA. People are going to pay a lot of attention to that,” Ted reminds you.
“I get it,” you say. “You got to look at this from a total perspective. If we have a case where you have a murder, a gun is at the scene, a bullet matches the gun, a casing matches the gun, a suspect owns that gun, he is seen that day with the gun, the suspect hated the dead guy. So, all the evidence we have points to that guy. And let’s say they discover foreign DNA on the gun, Should you throw out all your evidence and not prosecute the guy because of the foreign DNA? No. Here, once you recognize the staging and all the things meant to misdirect us actually came from right there in the house—the flashlight, the garrote, the blanket, the note, the pens and pads, even the luggage are all from within. Nothing really points to the outside. Except the DNA.”
“You can’t let one thing overrule everything else.”
“Right you are. But I know this is going to be hard for the DA to come to grips with,” you say. “We’ve got this prominent family who just lost their daughter, and perhaps their son committed the crime. To what end will charging the young boy accomplish? He’s a minor, so we know how that goes. If you charge the parents for their part, that would look really bad politically because they just lost their daughter. To what end would that bring justice for the murder?”
“I sure wouldn’t want to be in the DA’s shoes,” Ted adds with a finality.
In Shadow Lane, prolific short story writer David Dean examines the lives of children who find themselves in unfortunate circumstances. Nominated for the Edgar, Derringer, and Barry awards, as well as twice winning Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine’s prestigious Readers Award, Dean shows his command of short fiction and his attention to the plight of children left to their own devices. Shadow Lane is a collection of eleven stories that will make you think twice about turning your back on a child.
An orphaned teenage girl living with her grandmother discovers something terrifying in the older woman’s past, and gains a new and terrible understanding of her own circumstances; a young boy trying to fill the emotional gap his father’s absence has left takes up stealing, but finds that some things are better left where they are; and a nine-year-old boy’s search for his missing friend turns murderous when he gets too close to the truth. These and other stories of children, both endangered and dangerous, fill the pages of this suspenseful collection.
These information documents for each of the official Trade Mark of Quality releases includes the known details for each genuine TMQ title. This includes the TMQ catalogue number, artist, record title, track list, musicians, venue, recording date, master tape and record matrix info and the other particulars for each album.
These information documents for each of the official Trade Mark of Quality releases includes the known details for each genuine TMQ title. This includes the TMQ catalogue number, artist, record title, track list, musicians, venue, recording date, master tape and record matrix info and the other particulars for each album.
It’s 1984 in West Germany when U.S. Army Counter-Intelligence Agent Conrad Vogel gets a routine assignment—a background check on a low-level enlisted soldier. Expecting little to come of it, he soon uncovers the GI’s relationship with a German barmaid—a barmaid who knows much more than she should and people that she shouldn’t, and what appeared to be routine suddenly becomes anything but.
With the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact nations still a potent threat to the Free World, and terrorist bombings and assassinations in full swing against military personnel, Conrad sets out to unravel a web of espionage, betrayal, and murder.
Small town Sheriff Penny Miller and her outlaw friend Scratch managed to survive a nuclear blast in Nevada and a brutal attack on their peaceful lodge in Colorado. They head for Los Angeles, looking for a fresh start. It seems the citizens of Southern California remain blissfully ignorant of the coming war. They believe zombies are simply an urban legend.
As usual, there’s no rest for the wicked. When they find themselves in a suspiciously run Malibu rehab facility, Miller can't relax. She knows the gore is about to hit the fan. It seems that Miller can sense when zombies are near. And they’re almost always near.
When all hell breaks loose around them, Miller and Scratch must survive deadly experiments, resist an ongoing government conspiracy, and battle another horde of ravenous zombies. And that’s just for starters.
Sheriff Penny Miller of Flat Rock, Nevada, has always done her duty. On the first night of the zombie apocalypse, she swore an oath to protect her friends from the ravenous hordes. However, now that the virus is rapidly spreading to the rest of the country it has become clear that Miller and her friends, Scratch, Sheppard, and Rat, are winning battles but losing the war. And that’s just not good enough for Penny. Too many people have already died.
Determined to stop the maniacs who have been funding the research that created the undead, and with the key to stopping the virus in hand, Miller and crew embark on a long and dangerous journey north. Their route cuts through the very heart of zombie occupied territory, but this time they are out to end the apocalypse once and for all. Unfortunately, the elite committee of government officials who control the Super Soldier program knows exactly where Miller and her friends are headed, and they are determined to capture or kill them at any cost.
Sheriff Miller doesn’t stand a chance. Of course, lousy odds never stopped her before. She gives the order to move out.
