Series Spotlight: Code Blue by Jamell Crouthers

Code Blue by Jamell Crouthers

The Code Blue: An Oath to the Badge and Gun series chronicles a police officer named Gary who has been on the force for a few years. He soon is entrenched in a lot of lies, corruption, racism and agendas being pushed by his superiors. The question throughout this series is whether he as a good cop becomes part of the corruption or does he report it?

Part of this series features his son Gary, Jr who is a young teenager wanting to be like his father and go into the police force. He soon learns through the news daily that the police force is not what it
really is. Gary ends up having to share the truths of what goes on at work and the relationship between him and his son changes because of it. Now it becomes up to Gary what he is going to do about what goes on at work.

Title: CODE BLUE: AN OATH TO THE BADGE AND GUN – Part 1

Author: Jamell Crouthers

Publisher: Independent

Pages: 87

Genre: Poetry prose/literary fiction

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Police Chief Bulletin #1

My fellow police officers, thank you for
your hard work,

Putting your life in the line of duty
every day.

This will be the first of many bulletins
that I will be sending,

Your supervising officer will be having
meetings about my bulletins.

I want to address an issue that’s been
going on in our community,

There have been too many minorities
driving in our neighborhoods.

I’ve been told by residents that they’re
scared and afraid of them,

I don’t know exactly why as I am not in
the streets everyday.

In order to get control of our community
again we must pull over cars,

Any car that is expensive and they look
out of place, pull them over.

Find a reason to pull these cars over,
whether it’s a tail light,

Or they can be driving too slow, too fast,
failure to signal when changing lanes.

There are certain cars to look for, especially
tinted windows,

Ferraris, Bentleys, Mercedes Benz,
Lamborghinis, you get my drift.

You know the procedure, asking for a
driver’s license and registration,

Make sure that you’re assertive in your
behavior and taking control of situations.

I want officers to be partnered up in the
cars while you’re on duty,

We need to conduct these pullovers between
7pm and 5am daily.

It seems to be that at night these
minorities are driving through our neighborhood,

Even if you recognize cars and know who
these people are, pull them over.

I can’t have our citizens of our community
constantly calling me about this,

So let’s clean this up as soon as possible
and I want it tracked how many you do.

I want three done a week amongst partners
and body cams will show that,

If you have to agitate a driver to
escalate a situation, do it.

Cars swerving means they must be drunk or
high so sniff out the car,

Find a purpose and reason to search the
car without a warrant.

I appreciate your time in reading this
bulletin,

If you have any questions or concerns,
please consult your supervising officer.

Police Chief

Case #1-Pull Them Over

I just read the bulletin sent from the
police chief,

I’ve been on the force for a few years and
I’m speechless reading it.

My name is Gary and I’m a favorite in the
community as an officer,

But I’m starting to realize my police
department is changing quite a bit.

This is my journey and reflection of cases
I’ve been part of,

This is my diary of my life as a police
officer on the force.

These cases were over a span of a year and
they had a huge impact on me,

It started to make me question my oath as
a police officer.

This becomes a battle of code blue,
paycheck and pension,

Versus what’s right for the people in my
community I’m sworn to protect.

I have a son named Gary, Jr. who knows
what I do for a living,

He prays everyday before I leave for work
that I come home.

He knows I do it to protect the community
and do what’s right,

Not to be an authoritarian with a badge
and gun on my holster.

I give respect when respect is given to me
by people,

I’m not any different than others and I
was never part of a power trip.

Well….until I was given direct orders to
become meaner and tougher,

I was backed into a position of doing
what’s told by my boss versus what’s right.

My commanding officer called me into his
office at the beginning of my shift,

He told me that it’s time to cleanup the
neighborhoods that we patrol.

Little did I know what he truly meant even
though that bulletin was serious,

I didn’t see anything wrong with the city
and towns we patrolled.

Title: CODE BLUE: AN OATH TO THE BADGE AND GUN – Part 2

Author: Jamell Crouthers

Publisher: Independent

Pages: 89

Genre: Poetry prose/literary fiction

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Title: CODE BLUE: AN OATH TO THE BADGE AND GUN – Part 3

Author: Jamell Crouthers

Publisher: Independent

Pages: 99

Genre: Poetry prose/literary fiction

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______________________

Meet the Author

Jamell Crouthers is a poet, author, blogger and podcaster who has taken on a journey of writing in the prime of his life. He has been writing poetry since the age of 13 but never thought he could utilize

his talent to tell stories and write books. He is not the traditional author as he writes his books in poetry format with a focus on storylines and societal issues.

After publishing 11 books (so far), his goals and plans are to continue writing books on taboo subjects that aren’t discussed enough in today’s world and bringing those main subjects to the forefront. Jamell’s blogs tackle societal issues, how he writes his books, his journey as an author and some motivational blogs that will get you to focus on your goals. His goal and moniker is, “to change the world, one book at a time.”

Website Address: www.aquarianmind.info

Blog Address: www.aquarianmind.info

Twitter Address: www.twitter.com/aquarianmind1

Facebook Address: www.facebook.com/aquarianpoet1

First Chapter Review: The Norfolk Mystery by Ian Sansom

I received a digital copy of this book through Partners in Crime Virtual Book Tours.

BLURB:  Love Miss Marple? Adore Holmes and Watson? Professor Morley's guide to Norfolk is a story of bygone England: quaint villages, eccentric locals—and murder …

It is 1937, and disillusioned Spanish Civil War veteran Stephen Sefton is broke. So when he sees a mysterious advertisement for a job where "intelligence is essential," he eagerly applies.

Thus begins Sefton's association with Professor Swanton Morley, an omnivorous intellect. Morley's latest project is a history of traditional England, with a guide to every county.

They start in Norfolk, but when the vicar of Blakeney is found hanging from his church's bell rope, Morley and Sefton find themselves drawn into a rather more fiendish plot. Did the reverend really take his own life, or is there something darker afoot?

A must-read for fans of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, and Charles Todd, this novel includes plenty of murder, mystery, and mayhem to confound.

COVER: The cover attracted me to the book in the first place. Then when I read the synopsis, I knew I wanted to read it. The color scheme of this cover, the quaint setting, and the flash of a red car all make this a winning cover in my book.

FIRST CHAPTER: The reader meets narrator, Stephen Sefton, who sets the stage for the story he is about to tell and what brought him to meet Professor Swanton Morley.

KEEP READING: While I don't mind a steady paced mystery or a slowly developing one, the  first chapter of The Norfolk Mystery by Ian Sansom is all backstory, setting the stage so the reader gets to know Sefton better. It's not my favorite way to start a book. One can't deny Sefton is an interesting narrator; and perhaps as the story moves along and Sefton and Professor Morley are deep into the mystery, all the backstory will turn out necessary. Right now, however, I'm considering how far away I am from getting into the thick of things.

I've continued with The Norfolk Mystery out of curiosity. Right now I'm close to the end of Chapter Four. Each chapter has revealed just a tiny bit more of the prequel to the mystery: Sefton's interview with Morley, which leads to their working together, the popularity of Morley who is also known as The People's Professor, and Sefton's journey to meet up with Morley in Holt to start his new job. Just like I found in A Place to Die by Dorothy James, the author spends a good deal of time shaping his characters and allowing the readers to get to know them well. That's a plus for character-driven readers such as myself. I'm just hoping the death of the vicar comes along soon so that the mystery gets the attention for a while. I think once that happens, I'll be turning the pages quickly.

Book Details:
Genre: Mystery/Detective
Published by: Witness Impulse
Publication Date: 11/12/2013
Number of Pages: 212
ISBN: 9780062320803

Purchase from Amazon of Barnes and Noble.

I received a digital version of this novel from the author through Partners in Crime Virtual Book Tours. This review contains my honest opinion, which I have not been compensated for in any way.

This post first appeared at The Book Connection.

Guest Blogger: Sheila Dalton, Author of The Girl in the Box

Caitlin Shaughnessy, a Canadian journalist, discovers that Inez, a traumatized young Mayan woman originally from Guatemala, has killed Caitlin’s psychoanalyst partner, Dr. Jerry Simpson. Simpson brought the girl, who may be autistic, back to Canada as an act of mercy and to attempt to treat her obvious trauma. Cailin desperately needs to find out why this terrible incident occurred so she can find the strength to forgive and move on with her life.
Inez, whose sense of wonder and innocence touches all who meet her, becomes a focal point for many of the Canadians who encounter her. As Caitlin struggles to uncover the truth about Inez’s relationship with Jerry, Inez struggles to break free of the projections of others. Each must confront her own anger and despair. The doctors in the north have an iciness that matches their surroundings, a kind of clinical armour that Caitlin must penetrate if she is to reach Inez.

The Girl in the Box is a psychological drama of the highest order and a gripping tale of intrigue and passion.

What do Daniel Defoe and Robinson Crusoe have to do with me? by Sheila Dalton

Daniel Defoe wrote his first novel, Robinson Crusoe, when he was sixty, and went on to write seven more novels, that’s what.

I’m sixty-one (sixty-two by the time you read this), and I’ve just had my second literary novel published, a “whydunnit”, The Girl in the Box.

I’ve had ten books for kids published, and a YA mystery, Trial by Fire, but I confess I thought I was getting a bit long in the tooth to have had only two adult novels published by such a late age.

But Defoe gives me hope. Not only was he sixty when Robinson Crusoe first saw the light of day in, but he also managed to invent the British novel in the process. His was the first literary work in the English language to use brand new, imaginary characters in a totally original story. Up till then, authors wrote about mythological figures only, and retold legends .

I can’t top that. But what I can tell you is it’s never too late to realize your dreams. I’m actually a relative youngster when it comes to novel publication. My friend, author Linda Hutsell-Manning, wrote her first novel for adults at the age of seventy, That Summer in Franklin. And the author of The Chamomile Lawn, Mary Wesley, published her first adult novel when she was seventy-one after her husband died, and went on to sell three million copies of her books, including 10 best-sellers in the last 20 years of her life!

An interesting wrinkle (if you’ll pardon the expression) to my own story is that The Girl in the Box was inspired by a trip I took to Guatemala, over thirty years ago. I went with a girlfriend for a protracted stay in that country during the decades-long Civil War there. As an aspiring writer in search of experience, I took a notebook with me. Thank goodness, as I really needed it to refresh my memory when I was finally able to process what I saw and heard and use it to create a novel of psychological suspense.

Sheila Dalton was born in Hillingdon, England and came to Canada when she was six. She is married with one son, and is” a willing cat slave to two furry friends”. She loves animals, singing, drawing, research, and travel, and has spent time in Central America, Europe and Morocco. She has written picture books, non-fiction for children, poetry and fiction for adults, and has worked as a freelance editor and writer, a librarian, an artist and crafter, and a barmaid in an English pub.


You can find out more about Sheila and her work at:
http://www.sheila-anne-dalton.com/
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/611332.Sheila_Dalton
https://twitter.com/#!/Sheladee
http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Girl-in-the-Box-a-novel/166826139999771

This post first appeared at The Book Connection.