Showcase: Flashback to the Dragon by Terri L. Powers

 

Book Description

Publication Date: August 28, 2012

A serial killer is loose in the city of Seattle stalking women in the downtown area near Elliott Bay. Detective Nate Cliff ton is assigned to the Monroe case, tagged with that name by the newspapers because the victims all look like 1950's pin-up models. Nate is relentless in his hunt for this smart killer who keeps eluding police to fulfill his bloodlust. Meanwhile, John Carpenter's peaceful life is changed forever following a terrible car accident. Awakening from a coma, John now has an ability to see events from the past - to flashback. During one such flashback into the past, John sees a distinctive tattoo when he witnesses a murder in an alleyway near Pike Place Market. Who can he trust? He certainly doesn't want to involve his family, so he turns to Nate. Nate is skeptical of John's newly acquired ability at first. Will the detective believe him, or will John become the number one suspect in the investigation into the brutal crime? When John sees the tattoo for a second time in another flashback, Nate must learn to use the past to alter the future. Another woman will die if the killer is not stopped. The clock is ticking. John must learn to accept his gift, and then learn to use it as he becomes mixed up in the hunt for a serial killer. Will John Carpenter end up a hero, or will he end up dead?

TERRI L. POWERS:  In her words...I’ve always had an active imagination, dreaming up entire scenarios before I even opened my mouth to make a statement, dreaming up imaginative people and events just for the fun of it, living out the life of a superhero in my head.  I do it because it’s fun, and it’s how my brain works.  There is no controlling it so I go along for the ride.  Wheeee.

It was a natural transition to putting words on paper.  First in diaries after I got tired of recording the real stuff that was going on, then I had a little fun with journals.  The breakthrough came when I wrote a four-part, short story based on the BBC Network series, Torchwood, a world created by Russell T. Davies as a spin-off from the Doctor Who franchise that he was piloting at the time.  Like many Torchwood fans, I was upset with losing a dear character, Ianto Jones, so I rewrote the ending of the third series of the show to bring the character back (hey, lots of people did the very same thing).  That developed into the short story, Past, Present, and Future, which I self-published, or submitted if you will, on a site that houses fanfiction of this nature, A Teaspoon And An Open Mind: A Doctor Who Fan Fiction Archive.  This brings me to where I am today.

I live in a small village near a larger city (so it’s not like we have to grow our own food or sew our clothing) in Michigan with my wonderful husband (who hopes I’m the next J.K. Rowling – he’s just so cute), a beautiful daughter (who is tons more mature than I’ll ever be), and a cat named Clockwise (she got her name when my daughter was in Kindergarten learning how to tell time).  I’ve recently taken advantage of an early retirement and can now turn to writing as my creative outlet and secret passion. 

Favorite Authors:
Dan Brown, Daniel Silva, Dean Koontz, Edgar Allen Poe, Iris Johansen, J.A. Konrath, J.D. Robb, James Patterson, Janet Evanovich, Jefferey Deaver, John Sanford, Lee Child, Patricia Cornwell, Stephen King, the team of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, the team of Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan

And Some New Authors I’ve Recently Discovered and Enjoy:
Kirkus MacGowan, Michael R. Hicks, Robert Cornell, Tim Greaton, William R. Potter

Q.  What inspires your writing?

A.  My imagination. By that I mean that when I'm not writing, I'm visualizing stories in my head - when I see a stranger with an odd expression on their face, or when I glimpse an awkward moment, or when I see an old, run down house and begin to wonder how it came to be in it's current state.

Q.  What is your favorite thing about being an author?

A.  The satisfaction that comes from crafting the perfect sentence or paragraph; when the writing becomes everything I had hoped or dreamed it would become.

Q.  What is the toughest part of being an author?

A.  Marketing my work. Taking a 50,000 word story and crunching it down into a 25 word description. Moving outside of my comfort zone and finding readers.

Q.  If you could not be author, what would you do/be?

A. I would work in a bookstore. When I retired this was what I wanted to do, but then I started writing and put working in a bookstore on hold.

Q.  What would the story of your life be entitled?

A.  There's a Silver Lining Around Every Dark Cloud

Q.  What is your favorite book of all time?

A.  I left this blank until I finished the entire questionnaire because it is the hardest question to answer. But the book that immediately came to mind was one I read when I was a teen, J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit

Q.  Which character from ANY book are you most like?

A.  I don't see myself as obsessive as some of my favorite characters. I see some of me in Stephanie Plum, Kay Scarpetta, and Eve Dallas, but not to the extremes that some of these women push themselves. But I admire Plum's humor, Scarpetta's culinary skills, and Dallas' no-nonsense pursuit of the truth.

Q.  What character from all of your book are you most like?

A. John Carpenter

Q.  What is your favorite season?

A. Spring

Q.  What inspired your book cover(s)?  Or what is your favorite book cover and why?

A. John's flashback. My favorite book cover is 'Lena Rivers by Mrs. Mary J. Holmes, published by the W.B. Conkey Company. I do not know the exact year of this version of the book, but I have loved the cover for over forty years because the oval picture in the center looks like a daguerreotype depicting a woman's profile. I still have the book and have collected many others with the same type of cover style.

Q.  Tell me something funny that happened while on a book tour or while promoting your book.

A. I've never been on a book tour, and I'm a little green as far as promoting at this time. I did, however, stop at a garage sale during my usual walk to the cemetary and got to talking to the homeowner about the reason for my walk, to find names for my book, and I sold one to her.

Q.  Are you working on something new?

A.  I'm editing book two of the Flashback series starring John Carpenter and Detective Nate Cliffton.

Q.  Anything you want to say to followers of this blog or those that are just stopping by?

A.  Read anything you can get your hands on whether fiction, non-fiction, magazine, or hardback, softcover or ebook - never stop reading.