Contests/Venues

Chesapeake Style Magazine

Member Showcase: July 2009

John Atkinson

Author of  newly-released

Dark Shadows Red Bayou

This is Atkinson's second book and his  second Interview with Talk-Radio host Neale Steele on XTRA 99.1FM. Tune in Monday, July 13th at about 8:05 A.M.. If you miss the live broadcast, You can replay it beginning on July 14th here. 

About the Book

(excerpted from a five star review by Malcolm R. Campbell, author of  "The Sun Singer")

Somebody is killing prostitutes in the swamp.

To Sheriff Coles Bleu, the "job was everything; never mind the formalities of protocol. By his rules, he always got the bad guys. His office achieved the highest crime-solving rate in Louisiana. Now, that record was being threatened."

Coles Bleu, Bennett Morgan and Francis Lovain grew up together in a small town in the delta country around Lake Pontchartrain. Coles grew into a 300-pound, brute-force sheriff who rules his county with an iron hand; he's both loved and feared, and he likes the South because that's where people know how to work together and get stuff done. Bennett's family had money, and as a stockbroker, Bennett still has it, along with his Rolex, large house, analyst and a powerful new convertible. The troll-like Francis, who lives in the swamp, sports platinum-capped teeth and a face not even a mother could love.

The swamp, and its Put-In-Ditch channel where the bodies are being found, live and breathe through Atkinson's haunting word pictures as a wonderfully chilling location for this tightly written thriller. Francis loves the swamp, Bennett fears it, and Coles views it pragmatically as the place he went fishing as a kid and the place the murder investigation is luring him now.

Bennett thinks Francis knows something about the murders because Francis knows everything about the bayou. While Coles is inclined to give their strange childhood friend a little more slack, he concedes that Francis' friendship with the Goocha, the shaman of the swamp, is disturbing. Plus, there aren't a lot of leads and the last thing Coles needs is either New Orleans reporters or the Feds sniffing around his domain asking questions and causing trouble.

The killer believes he is doing the Lord's work, showing wayward women the error of their profession. Like the other predators in the bayou, he kills with cold efficiency because the injunction is built in to his psyche. Then, too, there's the voice inside his head urging him to move ahead with the Holy task, but without his disparaging, profane language:

When, or if, this killer is stopped, depends greatly on the strengths and weaknesses of three characters whose lives are more obstinately tangled together than the vines in Red Bayou. These men, the novel's rich location and non-stop action, and the liberal doses of off-beat humor make this dark mystery a satisfying experience.

"A tight thriller with off-beat characters and a scary location" Malcomb Campbell, June 2, 2009"

About The Author

Born in Richmond, VA, Atkinson’s days are devoted to writing. His short story entitled "Voodoo Man" won first place in adult fiction at the 1998 Chesapeake Writer’s Conference. Since then, he has authored a novella (Mercy Me), and two novels. Timekeeper and Dark Shadows Red Bayou.
 
 "Voodoo Man" was published "In Good Company (Volume 5)". This collection of short stories is available for purchase from Live Wire Press. Many of his other short stories have appeared in Chesapeake Bay Magazine and in area newspapers.
 
 John's first book, Timekeeper, a gripping novel chronicling Atkinson's incredibly gutsy "trek across America" at age 14, was released  in January 2008 by Fisher King Press and has been nominated for the 2009 Library of Virginia award in fiction!

Atkinson lives with his wife, Renee, and his canine mistress, Norma Jean, on Gwynn's Island in Mathews County, Virginia.

For more information about the book, and how to order it, Click Here