Aspen Mountain Press Releases Suspense/Thriller Birdman by Jack Teeter
Friday, June 29th, 2007
Blurb:
When John LuMac told the dean that Dante Coalson was involved in a pot ring, Dante was kicked out of college and lost his chance at a major league baseball career. Now revenge drives Dante, but just how far will he go?
Excerpt:
The fireflies have come up out of the grass and the sun’s about gone down, but I’ve not moved from this chair. Rocking soothes my ninety-year-
We had us some crowd there for a while, didn’t we? Five or six sheriff’s cars, the ambulance, two TV satellite trucks, and traffic stopped going both ways down on the blacktop with gawkers leaning out their car windows. It’s just me and you now, Missy; you and your notebook and your tape recorder, wanting a story for your newspaper.
Well, the ice in this glass has long since melted. Take a good look around out here and then we’ll go in the house and get us a fresh drink.
Take notice, Missy, of those charred barn doors lying cockeyed on the ground. Today wasn’t the only time we had us some excitement out here. That other time, three years ago, they hauled my son Dante off to the penitentiary. What a day that was. We had people spying on us from the hillside across the road and sneaking up through the woods. Dante’s birds were screeching their heads off.
The fellas from the DEA cleaned out the barn that day, all but the yard tractor and a John Deere pull-behind wagon. Dante sold all his exotics out of the greenhouse, nothing in there but the leftover stench. There’s a concrete bunker out back in the woods. If we get around to it later, you can take the key and have a look at what’s out there.
It’s about dark, let’s leave all that for now and go inside. If you’d care to eat, I’ve got pinto beans simmering and fresh-made cornbread. No? Well, I’m hungry. There’s a pitcher of tea in the fridge or something stronger up in the cupboard. Fix whatever you want and sit down. You can watch me eat.
‘The Birdman’, everybody will be wanting to know all about the Birdman—how he came to be such a brute and all. Well, it won’t be no short little newspaper story, Missy, not by a damn sight.
Birdman. That’s what my eldest son made up to call himself. I named him Dante on account of I went through seventy-two hours of hell giving birth to that boy. That was in nineteen and thirty-seven and it’s clear up in the new century now. A whole hell of a lot of time and mischief has passed. Flick on that recording machine and I’ll tell you all about Dante Coalson, the Birdman.
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