The Reaper, the shadows, and A Time for Dying...

Everyone has a time for dying.

Some folk have a say in the matter. They can choose their time right down to the split second. Messy or not. Others don’t stand a chance.

The Reaper just comes out of the shadows, kicks in the front door, and doesn’t even bother to ring the bell.

Joseph Miller knew a thing or two about death.

He'd seen it up close and personal enough times to recognise the look, the smell and the sound of it.

He used to be a soldier, and he knew the injuries to the human body that war caused. Especially the kind caused by hand-to-hand fighting performed by desperate men who just wanted to live through the day. And the next day. And the next. Until it was time to go home.

He knew that the knife handle sticking out of his chest was in just the right place, at just the right angle, to inflict the kind of damage that there was no coming back from.

The double-edged blade had broken the surface of his skin, just left of the sternum, cut cleanly through muscle, slid neatly between the 3rd and 4th ribs near his left nipple, through the pericardium, to rupture the organ that lay between his lungs.

His heart.

Then it was ripped powerfully sideways and slightly up to inflict a catastrophic wound. Scraping the ribs in the process.

He knew all this in the space of a few seconds.

It wasn't true that your whole life flashed in front of you just before you died.

Joseph only had time for a couple of panic-filled thoughts. A look of surprise. A feeling of sorrow. And a moment of regret.

Then the knife was roughly pulled out, tearing more flesh. His chest cavity filled with blood, which spurted out to splash on his shirt front and the upper legs of his trousers.

Then his blood pressured crashed and he lost consciousness.

Then his lungs stopped working.

And his heart stopped beating.

Then, shortly after that, his brain stopped sending signals out to the rest of his body.

And the light went out in his eyes.

Then, right on cue, he evacuated the contents of his bowels and his bladder.

By the time the withdrawn knife was plunged into his brain through the top of his head, he was way past caring.

The time was 10pm.

It was Tuesday August 1, 2017.

In Stockport, Cheshire.

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You've just read an excerpt from my new debut crime novel A Time for Dying.

It’s available right now in paperback and ebook from Amazon, from my publisher Northodox Press, from Waterstones, and from all good high street book shops.

It’s dark, gritty, clever, dangerous, and a bit humorous in a serious way. In fact, it’s everything you want in a crime novel…and it’s not like any crime novel you’ve ever picked up.

That’s probably the best reason why you’ll find it difficult to put it down.

Well, until you pick up the sequel…