NBtM Tour & Giveaway for Price of Justice by Alan Brenham

Join author Alan Brenham on his Name Before the Masses Tour for Price of Justice, presented by Goddess Fish Promotions, from January 28 – April 15, 2014.  Please leave a comment or question for Alan to let him know you stopped by.  Alan will be awarding a $50 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour, please be sure to leave your email address with your comment.  You can follow the rest of Alan’s tour here, the more stops you visit, the better your odds of winning.  My review for this book will post by tomorrow. 

Crime and Texas - Why I base my books in my home state by Alan Brenham

Many sources I’ve read and studied say to write about what you know, at least when getting started writing novels.  With over seventeen years’ experience as a Texas police officer and detective, coupled with even more years as a criminal law attorney - prosecutor and defense - in Texas, writing crime fiction seemed a logical next step.

Being a former police officer and detective allowed me to develop contacts within the Texas law enforcement community. Those contacts enabled me to have ready sources to use for research. For example, when you’re not quite sure how a conversation between a drug buyer and a dealer might be written, having an experienced narcotics officer as a contact makes life so much easier; ditto for researching murder cases via homicide detectives.

I’ve gotten considerable help from the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit, an ATF agent on explosives, and a pathologist for autopsies and medical aspects of death investigations. A local police crime lab director provided extensive assistance regarding lab capabilities and crime scene searches.

Admittedly, at the risk of dating my law enforcement experiences, DNA wasn’t even on the board nor was voice graphs, GPS tracking, microphones clipped to an officer’s uniform, or computers. Looking back on it, we used fingerprints and witness statements and persuasion to make cases.

My time as an attorney enabled me to apply Texas law and courtroom realities to my novels. All the cases I worked both as an attorney and as a police officer provided me with ample ideas for scenes and plotlines for my novels. Having spent several years as an attorney with the Texas prison and parole agency gave me another fertile arena for ideas for my novels.

Now, with two books under my belt and more to come, I’ll continue to use Texas as a home base for my protagonists and plotlines. Knowledge of and familiarity with a locus are wonderful tools to have at a writer’s disposal. 

Price of Justice

By Alan Brenham

Publisher:  Black Opal Books

Release Date: November 16, 2013

Genre: Mystery/Crime Procedural

Length: 291 Pages

ISBN: 978-1626940833

ASIN: B00GYGDZ5G

Buy Links: Amazon │Barnes & Noble Black Opal Books 

About the book: 

His focus is on solving the murders—until the unthinkable happens…

Recently widowed, Austin Police Detective Jason Scarsdale works to solve the murders of two pedophiles, while trying to be both mother and father to his five-year-old daughter. During his investigation, Scarsdale is forced to navigate between the crosshairs of two police commanders out to get him. Drawn to Austin Police Crime Analyst, Dani Mueller, who has also suffered tragedy, Scarsdale fights both his attraction and his suspicions that something just isn’t right…

She is hiding a secret, one that could not only cost her a job—it could end her life…

Dani hides a deadly past. After her daughter was brutally murdered, Dani exacted her revenge then changed her name and fled to Austin. But if her secret ever gets out, she knows there is no place she can hide from the murderer’s vicious family.

Pulled into a web of malice and deceit, Scarsdale and Dani discover the value of breaking the rules. Then just when they thought things couldn’t get worse…they do.

Today Susan’s worst nightmare would become a horrible reality, and I knew exactly how she felt when she walked past me on her way to the witness stand. The jurors’ eyes scrutinized her every step as she neared the witness chair just like the jurors in Burton’s trial did to me. That chair sat behind a white pine modesty panel, next to the judge’s elevated bench. Susan would be center stage like I had been two and a half years ago.

She seemed to be trying hard to maintain her composure, but I could tell by the way she shifted in the witness chair, the way her hand alternately covered her mouth and toyed with the gold cross dangling around her neck, that she was anything but composed. Testifying was a nerve-wracking experience. No, actually, it was a terrible experience—it had been for me and it would be for Susan, too.

I figured Susan’s heart must be in her throat by now. Her stomach churning so bad she probably wanted to vomit. The loss of a child was a terrible hurt that a mother never recovered from, and having to relive it in front of a room full of strangers, staring and hanging onto her every word, would make it a hundred times worse. I hoped for Susan’s sake the system worked this time. It didn’t for me.

My name is Dani Mueller and I used to be a defense attorney and crime analyst in Sacramento, California, under another name—Karla Engel. But all that life was gone now. Seven years practicing law and a life—a once happy life I shared with my ten year old daughter, Katarina—wiped away by a maniac’s sick frenzy, a maniac named Doyle Burton.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Alan Brenham is the pseudonym of Alan Behr, an American author and attorney. He served as a law enforcement officer before earning a law degree. He worked first as a prosecutor then defense attorney for the next twenty-six years. His travels took him to several European and Middle Eastern countries, Alaska and almost every island in the Caribbean. While contracted to US military forces, he resided in Berlin, Germany for a few years. Alan and his wife, Lillian, currently live in the Austin, Texas area. He has authored two crime fiction books, Price of Justice and Cornered, and is working on a third titled Rampage.

Links: 

website:  http://www.alanbrenham.com

Don't forget to leave a comment or question for Alan to let him know you stopped by.  Alan will be awarding a $50 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour, please be sure to leave your email address with your comment.  You can follow the rest of Alan’s tour here, the more stops you visit, the better your odds of winning.