Mark Bacon - The Woke and the Dead - Virtual Book Tour

Nostalgia City Mystery #5

Mystery

Date Published: 03-13-2025

Publisher: Archer & Clark

A public war between a governor and a theme park lights the fuse on a story of hate groups, murder, corruption, racism, and political espionage.

Ex-cop turned theme-park cab driver Lyle Deming finds the body of a park visitor during an LGBTQ event. The dead man catered gay weddings. Was it a hate crime?

Arizona governor Rod Gudgel, running for reelection, calls it a random shooting. He mocks Nostalgia City theme park for its inclusiveness, uses homophobic and racist slurs, and later challenges the safety of its rides.

Park CEO, “Max” Maxwell lambasts the governor’s prejudice and insensitivity, and the fight is on—in public and undercover. Maxwell drafts Lyle to investigate the murder while Kate Sorensen, his 6’-2½” public affairs VP, goes on the offensive in the media.

When an assault rifle attack kills and injures park employees demonstrating for gay rights at a Gudgel campaign office, Nostalgia City mourns, and Kate slams the governor’s unsympathetic response to the slaughter. While the FBI and sheriff’s deputies investigate the crime, the governor redoubles his efforts to regulate the park out of business.

Looking for a shooting suspect, Lyle gets a little too close to an armed hate group—with a possible connection to the governor. His lady friend Kate flies to Montana where she digs into the governor’s unseemly past uncovering a trail of malfeasance dating back two decades and arousing Gudgel allies who want to stop her at all cost.

With Lyle’s wry humor and Kate’s stick-to-itiveness the story moves quickly as mysteries and subplots multiply and loop together threatening the park, their relationship, and their lives.

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My first three mysteries were published by Black Opal Books with my debut novel earning recommendation from the American Library Association.

I started writing mysteries after a writing career in journalism and marketing. Prior to my novels, Ether Books of the UK published a collection of my flash fiction mysteries and many of my shorts have been published in online literary magazines. During my business career I wrote two books for John Wiley and Sons, one of which was a Library Journal Best Business Book of the Year. I have an MA in journalism and a golden retriever.

I write the kind of mysteries I like to read. I appreciate stories with twists, turns, and puzzles which appeal to the head. But I also like a mystery that appeals to the heart with a fast pace and challenges and threats that put the protagonists in peril.

Contact Links

Website: https://baconsmysteries.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/markbaconmysteries

Twitter: @baconauthor

Blog: https://baconsmysteries.com/blog-2/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1626841.Mark_S_Bacon

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