Good morning everyone! Please welcome author Ashby Jones to Full Moon Dreaming! He is here to talk to us about his new release, The Crossing. Ashby will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN GC to one randomly drawn commenter via Rafflecopter during the tour. The more you comment, the better your chances of winning. To find the other stops on his tour, go here. Don't forget to look for the Rafflecopter at the end of this post!
The Crossing
by Ashby Jones
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GENRE: Historical fiction
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BLURB:
The
Crossing is a powerful and haunting love story of surprising discovery set in
Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen during Prohibition. Its mission seeks to reconcile
love and guilt, grief and promise. Set apart from other stories, it combines
history, fact, surrealism, and reality into an ever-recycling boost of the
human spirit.
Irish-born Johnny
Flynn, a former British soldier, is banished from his homeland and sent to
America on a ship so riddled with disease that he realizes the voyage was meant
to murder him. When he survives the trip, the captain forces him to walk the
plank into the Hudson River. Miraculously, Johnny is rescued by a rumrunning
Irish gang, the Swamp Angels, and given a job running whisky in Hell’s Kitchen
just as Prohibition makes liquor a hugely profitable, dangerous business.
Fighting for his life
and livelihood amid the denizens of the Manhattan piers, Johnny is plagued by
the memory of his lost lover, Nora, whose father, the famed Irish
revolutionary, James Connolly, met his death through a firing squad that
included a reluctant gunman named Johnny Flynn. Nora’s last words to him, when
she learned of his betrayal and left him, “I love you, Johnny Flynn”, echo in
his heart, leaving him pulsing with guilt, yearning, and the hope that she
might yet forgive him.
Johnny drinks hard.
One night, drunk on the floor of Hailey’s speakeasy, he encounters a seeming
apparition on stage, the ghostly Esme, an Irish singer who suffered unspeakable
horrors at the hands of the British Black and Tans. Johnny is dazzled by her.
She is not only a singer but a healer, teaching poor and afflicted children to
sing and gather hope at an old theater called The Woebegone. From Esme Johnny
learns how to overcome the desire for revenge, only to discover that she, too,
clings to her own dark dream of retribution.
Hell’s Kitchen,
Johnny discovers, is thronged with people whose damaged hearts ache for
revenge, repentance and love. As he grapples with taking responsibility to help
others resolve this overwhelming dilemma, he learns that Nora is coming to New
York to advocate for Irish independence. As he confronts her and soon
thereafter receives a piercing love letter from Esme, the story comes to a
turbulent climax.
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EXCERPT:
“My God, let’s get this sack off you,” one said. “Two stones
inside? They threw you off, did they?
“Thank you,” Johnny rasped, barely able to move and
unwilling to answer. “God, thank you.”
A man with a scared face leaned closer. “You sound Irish.
Well then, God may have had something to do with saving you, mate.” The man
pointed to Liberty. “After all, how could something that large have made it
across the Pond without His help?”
“Where … where are …” Johnny couldn’t finish.
“We’re headed to Hell’s Kitchen,” the voice answered. “They
call it Satan’s playground, though some say God’s been seen there having a
drink or two. We’re the Swamp Angels, rum-runners, who keep Him supplied.”
Johnny could not feel his lips move as he attempted to
smile. He looked up at the sky, bound for America at last. The boat inherited
the flow of the water and so too did he.
He struggled to remove a small cross from his pocket. It was
made of the finger bones of the baby twins whose skeletons he’d pried from
their mother’s ossified grasp. As if memories were flowing through the bones,
they were warm to the touch. Before following Bile’s order to throw the
skeletons away, when he was searched before boarding the ship, he’d slipped the
tiny bones into his shirt pocket and later knotted them with a bootlace. The
tiny fingers clasped each other in the shape of a cross. He’d sworn to keep it
with him always, as a reminder that forgiveness for killing another, regardless
of the side one was on, stood forever apart from the seeker. And for those who
had served on a firing squad, though justifications could be had, not even with
love as powerful as he and Nora had shared, could forgiveness be found.
“My name’s Seth, mate, and the young insect by me we call
Locust. What’s yours?”
“Johnny,” he whispered.
“And your last name?”
“Johnny,” he replied and closed his eyes. If he had no full
name, maybe he would not be pursued in this new world. Maybe he could find a
new beginning, a purpose which could not be taken from him, neither by his
guilt nor his longing for Nora.
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Ashby Jones
has been writing historical novels for 50 years. With degrees in Literature and
Clinical Psychology; Creative Writing at UCLA under the guidance of Leonardo
Bercovici. Jones previously published: The Angel’s Lamp in 2017 which was well
received and reviewed by the Irish Times. Jones’s passion is writing literary
fiction that attempts to understand mankind’s never-ending battles with irony,
tragedy, blatant contradiction, and the anomalies of love. Such is the focus of
'The Crossing', a stand-alone sequel to 'The Angel’s Lamp', his first novel. He
studied under such notables as William Hoffman, a best-selling author, and
years later at U.C.L.A. under Leonardo Bercovici, a highly regarded
screenwriter.
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/ashby_jones
Amazon Author
Page:
https://www.amazon.com/Ashby-Jones/e/B01N2YR769/ref=dp_byline_cont_pop_ebooks_1
Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14394032.Ashby_Jones
Buy Link:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1592110894/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1
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