Writers Write

By Andrew Howell

INTRO TO WRITERS WRITE

An aspiring young writer named Harry Wells falls for Margaret Kennedy a socialite he meets while they are attending Cornell University. A romantic at heart, he is smitten by her apparent style and beauty while blind to her many faults. This will grow to haunt him in the years to come. They marry after graduation and all is right with the world until the other side of the bride starts to come out. While Harry gains success and fortune as a writer he drifts apart from his wife until an inevitable clash sends him spinning. More sinister details emerge about the past of Margaret Kennedy-Wells as the story picks up the pace with a series of surprising developments.
Filled with humorous twists and tangles throughout, including a seductive and alluring sexual Blonde Brazilian in Wicked Weasel Bikinis as a tenant, Lawyers around every corner, New Porn Starlets, An ex-Military South African CEO of a Global security company and his sweet auburn haired sister, along with The worlds best Bourbon, all add up to a well-tailored, compelling read. The author creates very original, entertaining, and memorable characters that draw you into a well scripted storyline.


THE KANSAS CITY KENNEDYS

This second story is an action packed tale about the Racketeers and Organizers that set up the first major gangs in Kansas City in the early 70s. It takes you into a world of, Card Sharks turned Mob leaders that have New York connections with established Irish and Italian bosses. Their antics, their Gangs and their Girls highlight this well written and explosive piece of literary work. It ties in the origin of one of the key characters from WRITERS WRITE and sets the stage for the upcoming novel BLACK DOVE.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris AU
• Release date: Mar 24, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503503472

Andrew Howell

Andrew was born in the USA at 8500 feet elevation in the mountains of Colorado. Along with growing up as a Navy Brat in the USA, he has traveled the world as a construction professional living in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, KSA (Saudi Arabia) Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Chile, Peru, Greece, Iraq and Colombia. This broad exposure to Global cultures provides a colorful backdrop for many of his stories. He has been writing for more than 20 years and covers a variety of genera’s. In addition to “Get out of Denver & Scramble” He currently has three other books published. “Writers Write” was published in late summer 2014 and “Writer on the Storm” will be out in October 2014. His fourth book “The Night Rider” is due out near the end of the year. The sequel to Scramble “Armageddon with a six Iron” will be finished in early 2015. He continues to work full time as a Corporate Manager while adding to his existing inventory of literary work on a monthly basis.

Book preview

Hey There

Ola,

I wasn’t sure how to start the introduction to this book, so I thought we might have another chat. First on the agenda, I believe a big thank-you is in order to those of you who bought my first book Get Out of Denver. It has done surprisingly well to this point. As you know, if you’re one of those that I am thanking, the book actually contained two stories. (If you haven’t bought the book yet but plan to do so in the near future, I thank you also! If you don’t plan to buy anything and just opened the cover to take a peek, then by all means please read on and perhaps I can change your mind…) The second story is called Scramble, and the cover is on the back of the book. Again, to my pleasant surprise, Scramble is getting more press than the original story. The two-stories-in-one-book concept was an idea my publisher had and I didn’t know any better. By the time the book was ready for print, I had learned so much about the publishing biz I might have gone another way. I am glad I did not. I am now being told by readers that the two-story approach is a nice surprise, and the second story may spin off on its own, as there is a sequel working. It is called Armageddon with a Six Iron. It begins in Belek, Turkey, and at least three of you out there might want to pay attention.

As you can see from this book, I have stayed with the two-story approach. However, these two stories Writers Write and The Kansas City Kennedys are connected. There is actually a third book that is well under way called Black Dove. It ties into the stories in this book but stands alone like one of the mighty Egyptian pyramids. Thank you, Davy… tips hat.

So, what are you listening to these days, music-wise? I have to admit that some of the new stuff is surprisingly good and very fun. Music is a topic that we can talk about for hours, but I will try to limit it to a few valuable minutes, just twixt us . . .

Currently, you will find me watching/listening to several relatively new artists.

Speaking of new . . .

John Newman: His first album is a smash with Do You Love Me Again? and Losing Sleep. The actors and the dancing in DYLMA provide great backdrop to a great new song. The girl and guy picked to be the lead couple have excellent chemistry between the two of them, and the video is outstanding. The director of this video ought to win something. All of the songs on his CD are great to listen to.

In the last few weeks, I was introduced to some really great new stuff by a very good friend… Thank you, Peter… tips hat. I should never have taught you how to play darts… or cards. The new music includes:

Megan Trainor’s All About the Bass. I love it! What a great song! And my four-year-old daughter, Ziva, pulls it off pretty well. She really loves dancing to it when she is not running around singing the songs from Frozen.

Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off is one of my new favorites and shows the range of talent that Miss Swift has. I think she surprised a ton of folks with this one. When she started out in her career and was opening for Brooks & Dunn on the road, she became part of their famous road show escapades and I saw the humorous side of her. Even back then, she was a very talented comedienne. Her actions in this video are totally classy and pretty hilarious. She is showing the ability we all should have to laugh at ourselves. The lyrics really bring in a solid message. Shake it off, shake it off… I shake it off… and she does it with a positive vibe, emphasizing her strength of character; nothing gets to her. I love the line I’m lightning on my feet… that’s what they don’t see. The song is a starburst of energy from one very classy young star.

Pharell Williams’s Come Get It Bae, Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah . . . he’s been around awhile and he climbed up a notch in Robin Thicke’s Blurred Lines video. Then he left him behind and blasted into his own orbit with Happy. But this one, Come Get It Bae . . . Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah.

Nicky Minaj’s Anaconda, sorry, yeah, I watched it… sorry again, yeah. I liked it.

Enrique Iglesias’s Bailando, like it, watch it.

Crazy, Stupid, Love, like it, watch it.

Blake Shelton’s remake of the Gambler, like it a lot… watch it… a lot, still lose at cards a lot… listening to it.

Darius Rucker’s Momma Rock Me . . . is my new favorite that he does, but he has taken country music by storm and has produced so many great songs in the last few years… I love Homegrown Honey. He has come a long way since Hootie and the Blowfish… indeed.

Billy Currington’s God Is Great and Beer Is Good… and People Are Crazy, what else needs to be said?

My son Jarod downloaded some great new stuff for me on my phone, well new to me anyway: Breaking Benjamin, Three Days Grace, One Republic, Linkin Park, Seether, The Heavy, and a ton of great new Music. He surprised me by also downloading some U2, Aerosmith, AC/DC, Bon Jovi, Nickelback, and the Beatles. That’s right. He just turned sixteen and loves many of the Beatles songs. Perhaps there is hope for the world… You Say You Want a Revolution . . .

Bear with me a bit longer please, as I am going somewhere with this.

In between, I have been collecting some of the real great, timeless, ageless stuff from the 1960s and introducing them to my younger friends. They love them! It just proves again that good music is indeed timeless. Some of the stuff I brought to them includes:

Edwin Starr’s War, say it, say it, say it again, yeah… Good God, y’all.

The Ventures’ Apache, Wipe Out, Tequila.

Elvis’s Suspicious Minds, live in Las Vegas when he was at his best, in his early days; the great Elvis stuff when he was on the way to becoming… The King. Elvis never got to meet his son-in-law Michael Jackson. What interesting dinner conversations they might have had! Just imagine: Hey, have you tried these green ones? They go really good with the yellow and purple ones. . . . Say what you want about either of them, but you cannot take away their kingdoms. History will record them into divided columns, with one being the addicts and the second as immortal icons that died tragically young… and that will be enough. The rest is… just the rest . . .

Exordium and Terminus: In the year 2525 . . . Hey get this. As I am writing this in Dubai, I am in Room Number 2525 at the Yassat Gloria Apartments and have been for two months! No kidding; ask Vince and Peter. They can verify. Vince needs a map to find the hotel apartment even though it sits on Sheikh Zayed Road, but he can confirm I am indeed in Room 2525. The Grand Conqueror does go to great lengths to make new friends!

Barry Mcguire’s Eve of Destruction, need I say anymore?

Don Mclean’s American Pie, although many of them had heard the song before, they did not have any idea what the song was about.

Grand Funk Railroad’s We Gotta Get Out of this Place, yep, it’s in every movie ever made about Vietnam except The Green Berets with John Wayne.

I can’t go to long without breaking out some Chris Le’Doux’s 8 Second Ride (again one of my daughter’s favorites) Hair Trigger Colt .44 or The Ride.

I really like the soundtracks from the series True Blood. Many of the songs are very good: Shake & Finger Pop, Leaving Lake Charles, Frenzy, and my favorite TB jam is by the group Eels, their song Fresh Blood. I mean, c’mon, listen to the lyric: After the fire, before the flood… Sweet lady, I need fresh blood. How cool is that?

Justified, the series is awesome and the music is as good as any for that type of prophetic country you can find. It rivals David Childers in its freshness. You will never leave Harlan alive . . . good stuff.

In between, there is Shakira, Duffy, Nickelback, Grace Potter & the Nocturnals (Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah…) Shania Twain, Billy Currington, Rihanna, Alicia Keys, . . . Like I said, we could chat for-e-v-er about music.

But I really am going somewhere with this.

I have never been a big dance club guy, and I was born a wee bit too late for disco. Oh, I dance all right, just not with the moves and rhythm like they do today. Saturday Night Fever came out in 1978 when I was fourteen. Yeah I had a copy of the album, but it faded fast. I listened to some KISS but never became an army fan by any stretch… Then the 1980s hit, ringing in a wealth of fresh new sounds. Boston, Foreigner, Poison, Def Leppard, Stevie Winwood, Bruce Hornsby & the Range, REM, Warlock, Bruce Springsteen, Timbuk Three, Corey Hart, Patty Smyth, Fabulous Thunderbirds, ZZ Top, Van Halen; then Van Hagar after dumbass David Lee left, Loverboy, and John Cougar, among many others.

Although Big Johnny Cougar earned his stripes well into 2000, he started in 1980 with the single I Need a Lover, but his first album (not trying to date myself by using the word album, but I guess it’s too late for that) was actually called Nothing Matters and What If It Did. On this album, his big hit was Aint Even Done with the Night, but he also had a song called Cheap Shot. It was always one of my favorites. It contained the lyric The record company is changing my name now… na na na, Nana, na na. Mr. Cougar did so well in his aspiring career as a musician that in November 1983, he got his name back. When he released his killer album UH-HUH, it was released under his full name of John Cougar Mellencamp. Hats off to you, sir… tips hat. He also gets big marks for Scarecrow. That CD with Cherry Bomb and Check it Out (Yeah, I could look it up, but as I have said before, this is a conversation, so it should be semi-spontaneous at least) and Big Daddy. I love Key West Intermezzo and Wild Night.

The 1990s were good too, some really great stuff, but as I am going somewhere with all of this, we shall save them for another time. After all, I do have another two books in line to hit copywriting in the next three months. This is what happens when you collect material for twenty years before you start to publish. It’s working out great for me by the way . . .

We have arrived.

Since I like so many different styles of music and I don’t want to limit myself to one type, I have asked the question, Why should I write in only one or two genres? I like most of my stories. Some I really enjoy, however from a genre perspective, they are all over the map. I have had the discussion with my publisher and my colleagues about which genres are best for me, which way should I go, and you know what? I have no idea which way to go. So I continue to chase genres. I recently completed a short story called I Am Judas Iscariot. It was a bit different from my previous work, and a colleague gave it high marks and immediately dumped it into the historical fiction genre and said it worked well for me. The story will be in my collection of short stories called The Book of Andrew to be released this summer. In my ever so brief conversations with my son Jarod, he still says to stop thinking about it so much, as no one is going to buy the books anyway. Maybe next time I see him, I will show him the book sales records. Of course, then he will want a car, Morgan will want a new computer, Logan will want money for a new game system, and Ziva will want another trip to Atlantis; parenting, the job you can never retire from… nor would you ever want to.

So unless you, the readers, tell me different, then I will continue to chase genres and be all over the map, as it seems to be working pretty fair for me. My friend Rob told me in 2005 I was a random abstract thinker and that I am like a crow going after every bright shiny object I see.

Interesting, perhaps I will set a trend as a genre chaser. That’s kind of a catchy moniker.

Could be a story line there… Also, in keeping up the trend I began in my second book, I will give $1 for every copy of this book I sell to the orphanage and single mothers’ home run by Ernie and Robin Breaux in Honduras.

WWW.ERINTERNATIONAL.ORG

Later, Gators,

PS: My promoter just set my Website domain as www.andrewhowellauthor.com

Now what were the odds of that?

1. In the Beginning

H arry met Margaret (not Sally) in their junior year of college at Cornell.

From his first glance, he was infatuated with her. She was tall, lithe, and elegant, dressed extremely well, and carried herself with the style and grace of a Kennedy. In fact, that was her name, Margaret Kennedy, not of those Kennedys, although with her brown hair, slim figure, and high cheekbones, she had been able to at times take advantage of the possibilities and used her ID a bit in some small upstate towns for free hotels, dinners, etc.

She was actually from the Kansas City Missouri Kennedys, a substantially different branch of the clan.

Harry didn’t care where she was from. Whenever he saw her walking across campus in a sleek summer dress that would be clinging to her lithe form, her sweet face, her smile, he would literally melt inside. Harry knew that Margaret also had fiery drive and was extremely sharp-witted. During one class, he watched her verbally butcher a female economics professor over the issue of the value of international currency rates and investments regarding exchange rates. She also had a hint of wildness beneath her green eyes, a hint of darkness. Harry found her incredibly attractive. Sometimes her eyes were very cold, but she was irresistible to him nonetheless.

They met formally one night at a sorority social gathering. Margaret was impressed with Harry’s conversation skills and tie selection, while Harry was simply impressed with Margaret.

They began to see each other after that night, casually at first, but as they got to know each other better, the relationship was a