Gregory Delaurentis
spent his adult life roaming from job to job, working for Lockheed in
California, various law firms in New York, and financial firms on Wall Street.
Throughout this period of time, he was writing—unceasingly—finally producing a
large body of work, albeit unrecognized and unpublished . . . until now. Cover
of Darkness is the first in a series of upcoming books that include Edge
of Darkness, Pale of Darkness and Cries of Darkness. These
novels follow the lives of three individuals who do battle bringing criminals
to justice, while they struggle to understand the complex relationships that exist
among themselves. This intriguing trio has absorbed the attention of Mr.
Delaurentis for the past year and a half, so much so he decided to self-publish
their stories to bring them to a wider audience. [AUTHOR’S DISCLAIMER: These
are works of fiction. Name, characters, places, and incidents either are the
product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance
to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely
coincidental.]
Here’s what Gregory
himself tells about his writing quirks:
One of my writing
quirks, and I don’t know if it’s a quirk or not, is that I love to write from
late evening to early morning. My biological clock is a little off, and I find
myself going to sleep early, before 8:00pm, only to wake up around 11:00pm and
begin writing until 5 or 6 in the morning. For some reason I feel sharper and
more capable of reaching my characters. I put a pair of headsets over my ears
and blast music of all kinds and type away. I am a very good typist so my words
appear as fast as I can think of them. And so I keep this frantic pace all
night long and into the morning without feeling the least bit fatigued.
You might guess that
around 6am I go to sleep, but no. I get up from the laptop and take a shower
and start my day and I feel energized to do whatever it is that I have to
accomplish. When I get home I go straight to bed and stay out after dinner
until I rise to write again. This schedule used to drive my wife nuts. She
would spend many nights alone in bed while I, in the next room, toiled under
the glow of the laptop screen, cranking out page after page of my current novel
at that time to her dismay. Now that I live alone, I feel that I have optimum
conditions to work under and it brings my life pleasure. I feel that I’m doing
what it is that I’m supposed to do, and when your life has this kind of certain
meaning it brings happiness that mere words can’t describe.
I guess, because of
this quirk, my writing borders on madness, but when one is uniquely happy, does
one really care?
Some
information on the novel:
Blurb
A high profile murder
of a Wall Street executive in Westchester pits three people against the
criminal underbelly of Manhattan nightlife. The key players are two ex-cops
turned private investigators—Kevin Whitehouse, whose sharpest tool is his keen
analytical mind, and David Allerton, a former Special Forces operative—and
Margaret Alexander, Kevin’s lover. In their search for a killer, they are
forced to travel to the edge of sanity and morality, while stumbling onto their
own confusing secrets as well. The Cover of Darkness is a gritty noir
saga that untangles a web of deceit in the course of tracking down a brutal
murderer.
Excerpt
The pool area was wide and reflected the sun on this hot summer day. It was edged with white marble so polished that it looked like pearl. Deck chairs lined the sides of the long pool, which was two lengths more than Olympic-sized. Outside the deck area was the carpeted lawn of the vast backyard, dappled with sun.
Hugh Osterman walked along the side of the pool wearing a heavy terry cloth robe and sandals. In his right hand, he held a martini glass. He ran his left hand through his sandy sun-streaked hair as he looked over his shoulder at the man following him.
“What’s going on? I don’t get it,” Osterman said, stopping at the end of the pool where the flotation chairs were kept.
“They said no,” the man replied. Considering the backdrop, he was incongruously dressed in a dark suit and tie.
“They said no . . . just like that?”
Osterman sat his drink down on the marble surface, and pushed a flotation chair into the deep end of the pool, sending it out and away. Then he peeled off the robe and dove smoothly into the water, emerging next to the floating chair.
“You go back and tell them that we aren’t pleased,” Osterman said sternly, pulling himself up and into the seat of the chair. “You tell them that Hugh Osterman wants to know what’s holding things up—what the problem is.”
The suit just stood at the edge of the pool, opening his jacket against the heat of the day. Osterman paddled to the side, and reached out and retrieved his martini glass. “I take it you have nothing to say about this?” he persisted, despite the other man’s silence.
The suit shook his head.
“Well, what are you waiting for?” Osterman said as he tipped the glass up to his lips. Suddenly, the bottom of the stem shattered. Osterman gurgled as he dropped the glass, blood bubbling from his mouth, an open tear in his neck. He jolted upright in the chair as the suit closed the distance between them, his Colt .38 Super still trained on its victim, its silencer smoldering.
Osterman slowly sat back as the suit pumped more rounds into Osterman’s bare, well-defined chest—the hot shells of his pistol ejecting out and striking the surface of the water, settling to the bottom. His life ended as his body tumbled from the floating chair, his blood a widening crimson slick roughly in the area where his body slipped through.
The suit popped his clip, slipped in a new one, and headed for the sprawling house.
Links
1) AMAZON
2) KOBO
http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/Cover-of-Darkness/book-SydhWnuMdEGT2jO97s6rDA/page1.html?s=znZMkhZzw0yjFAMp-WIkpQ&r=1
3) BARNES & NOBLE
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/cover-of-darkness-gregory-delaurentis/1115107265?ean=97809891857077
4) SONY READER STORE
5) SMASHWORDS
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/304457
I need my sleep, but I suppose you do sleep just at a different time.
ReplyDeletemarypres(AT)gmail(DOT)com
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Ms. Fleming for featuring my book on her blog today, and to also thank all those who participate by commenting. Have a wonderful day.
ReplyDeleteIt's my pleasure, Gregory!
DeleteIt's funny, Ms. Preston, I seem to fall asleep around 8:00pm and wake up around 11:00pm. Strangely I only need a few hours of sleep to feel refreshed for the day. I mean, these times are not set in stone, and sometimes I get more or less, but it seems to be enough to keep me creative.
ReplyDeleteIf it works for you, that's all that matters!
ReplyDeletevitajex(at)aol(dot)com
Thanks for sharing the great excerpt and the giveaway. Sounds like a great book. evamillien at gmail dot com
ReplyDeleteThank you everyone for stopping by and commenting. Have a great day.
ReplyDeleteNice excerpt. Thanks for the giveaway too.
ReplyDeletekareninnc at gmail dot com