EXCERPT ~ TELEPHONE ROAD

Stalked, assaulted, and left for dead, Marlena thinks her life is over. Then she meets Destiny and they decide to take matters into their own hands. For these two, justice has a new meaning. 

It's called revenge.

 

 

Chapter One: Twenty-Three Steps

 

            When I walked into the long narrow art gallery behind my roommate, Joanna, it felt as if I were being funneled toward him. Preston Stevensen. Perfect hair and a smirk for a smile, he appeared to be the man of the hour. Even gazing at me over the head of a ponytailed patron in a slick, yellow shirt, he somehow made me feel like the center of attention.

            Twenty-three steps. 

            His eyes were on me the whole way.

            My name is Marlena Matthews. Joanna calls me Marlena “Miss Priss” Matthews. She thinks I’ve led a sheltered small-town life and she’s right. That’s why I felt so fortunate to be accidentally paired with her my freshman year. We were both serious students.

            Joanna’s friend, Antonio, is the one who invited us to the Visual Arts Gallery. He had several pieces of his beautiful high-glaze pottery on display.

            But nothing compared to Preston’s art. It took up the entire back wall. Every piece featured some sort of wide-slashed mouth or other wide-open gash. Some of the mouths were created from melted red lipstick and some were splash-painted on canvas; a couple were fashioned of metal, then shellacked onto blank mannequin faces made of charred or broken plastic. I overheard a girl walking ahead of us refer to the mouths as Freudian. “Yeah,” her companion snickered. “All about sex. Weird sex." They both laughed behind their hands.

            Twenty-three steps. Each one carried me closer and closer to the guy who would change my entire life. In hindsight it seems obvious that Preston’s art should have been a big red flag. But Joanna didn’t call me Miss Priss, The Sheltered One, for nothing.

 

http://www.5Princebooks.com/annswann.html

Amazon says YEAH, BUT I DIDN'T is a Hot New Release!

Wow! I kinda like that post title - my little novel is #7 on their Hot New Releases list. I can totally get on board with that.

I'm liking these early reviews, too. And to celebrate, head over to my other website and sign up for my Reader's List if you'd like a chance to win a hardcover copy, or if you just want to keep up with me. I've got two more new releases on the horizon. https://www.authorannswann.com 

K.C. Finn 

Review Rating: 5 Stars 

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Yeah, But I Didn’t is a work of teen fiction in the drama and coming of age genres, and was penned by author Ann Swann. Written with a mild caution for scenes of violence and an attempted sexual assault, the central plot focuses on the harrowing experiences of fourteen-year-old Benji Stevens. Falling into circumstances of emotional and physical trauma, a heart-breaking betrayal and a loss of faith in life, love, herself and everyone around her, it will take a real miracle for her to rise up again and be happy.

Author Ann Swann delivers a harrowing emotional tale that offers messages of hope and renewal of spirit despite some of the darkest times that life can throw at us. Suitable for teens and adults alike, one of the most accomplished things about the novel is how authentic teenage Benji is in her thoughts, weaknesses, actions, but also in her strength and growth later on. This is a highly realistic portrayal of the devastating effects that dark interventions can have on young, fragile minds, but also an admiration of the strength and power of regrowth that young people can have too. Overall, it sends a strong, hopeful message through highly relatable characters and a well-constructed narrative of support from all around. Yeah, But I Didn’t is an emotionally compelling and genuinely helpful work of fiction to create talking points for teens and adults everywhere.

Doctor Sleep Review

I was very fortunate to see Stephen King speak at George Mason University a couple of years ago (thanks Cuz!). He talked about writing Doctor Sleep, and he read from it. He said he knew it was risky to revisit the remains of the Overlook Hotel because, as he wrote in the author's note to the book, “I like to think I’m still pretty good at what I do, but nothing can live up to the memory of a good scare, and I mean nothing, especially if administered to one who is young and impressionable.”  I say Amen to that. I was a young, impressionable secretary when I first read The Shining. It scared the willies out of me. Working part time in a one girl office, I was all alone when I read it. And even though it was full daylight, I was quite certain the woman in Room 217 was coming for me every time the branch of a tree scratched across the old tin roof of my little freight company office.  But Doctor Sleep isn't that kind of a scare. In this one, Danny is grown, but he has suffered. And now he is being visited by a young girl who shines even harder than he ever did. And she needs his help to stop a pack of vampiric killers who prey on other kids with the shining.  The name Doctor Sleep comes from Dan's (no longer Danny, he's grown now) ability to help folks cross over to the other side--peacefully.  This is where King shines. Check out this passage from one of Dan's moments of helping an old guy cross over (I even marked the place, something I never do in books). This is King's version of seeing someone's life flash before his eyes--since he is connected to the patient, he sees what the old guy sees:  “He saw Charlie’s wife pulling down a shade in the bedroom, wearing nothing but a slip of Belgian lace he’d bought her for their first anniversary; saw how her ponytail swung over one shoulder when she turned to look at him, her face lit in a smile that was all yes. He saw a Farmall tractor with a striped umbrella raised over the seat. He smelled bacon and heard Frank Sinatra singing “Come Fly with Me” from a cracked Motorola radio sitting on a worktable littered with tools. He saw a hubcap full of rain reflecting a red barn. He tasted blueberries and gutted a deer and fished in some distant lake whose surface was dappled by steady autumn rain. He was sixty, dancing with his wife in the American Legion hall. He was thirty, splitting wood. He was five, wearing shorts and pulling a red wagon. Then the pictures blurred together … At times like this, Dan knew what he was for.” And this, my friends, is why I gave the book 5 Big Stars. Especially that line about the rain in the hubcap. (less)

Reader's Favorite 5 Star Review

Guess I wasn't done with the self-promtion after all.  But who could resist sharing such a wonderful review?  Not me, that's for sure . . . besides, I had to have a reason to display the awesome badge!

Book Review

Reviewed by Lee Ashford for Readers' Favorite

Stutter Creek by Ann Swann is a romance, brilliantly hidden within a suspense-filled tale of a psychotic, sociopath serial killer with a chip on his shoulder. It is also a classic tale of young love lost, and a life of regrettable what-ifs. Beth Evans is recently divorced, her husband having traded her in on a younger model. Her daughter, Abby, eloped and moved to Italy. Then, her father – the only parent she had ever known – died. Beth Evans had no one left to lean on. Needing to get away by herself for a while, Beth decided to revisit her father’s old cabin in the woods; well, HER cabin in the woods, now. Some of her best memories were tied to that cabin. One particular memory, which she liked to embellish a bit, was of the summer she was 14, and had met “Big John,” an 18-year-old, sun-tanned Adonis who was staying at a nearby cabin that year. She had often wished she were closer to Big John’s age; she had wanted him to think of her as a young woman, rather than a pesky little kid. In spite of all her many visits to the cabin, she had never again seen Big John.

Meanwhile, sociopath Kurt Graham was released from prison after serving five years. Kurt had hatched a plan while in prison: he was going to kill five young women who resembled the prosecutor who had gotten him imprisoned, one for each year of his life she had taken from him. Then he was going to let her know what he had done, so she would live in horror the rest of her life. Over the course of five years, he had considered and reconsidered every aspect of his plan, and he was certain it was now a fail-safe plan. Stutter Creek will grab you on page one, and not let you go until several hours have passed, and you finally read “The End.” Ann Swann has published several stories, in the romance genre as well as the supernatural. She has won numerous awards for her short stories. I will be surprised if she doesn’t win an award or two for Stutter Creek; this is one expertly crafted story, and one I recommend most enthusiastically.