BOOK INFORMATION
TITLE – HOOK
AUTHOR – K.R. Thompson
GENRE – Fantasy/Fairy Tale/Adventure
PUBLICATION DATE – January 1, 2015
LENGTH (Pages/# Words) - 300 Pages/78,000 words
BOOK SYNOPSIS
Archie Jameson dreamed of adventure.
Today, it found him.
Caught in a chilly October storm, he ducked into a tavern,
hoping to escape the rain. What he found, was a room teeming with pirates.
Shanghaied by the most elderly of the lot, Archie awakens to discover that he
is serving on a ship captained by the fiercest pirate ever to sail the seven seas--the
man known as Blackbeard.
Through a series of thrilling twists, Archie finds himself
captain of another of Blackbeard's ships, the Jolig Roger. In an attempt to
flee danger, his ship becomes lost beneath uncharted stars and arrives at a
mysterious island.
Determined to save both his crew and the woman he loves,
Archie will make decisions that will forever seal his fate.
For in Neverland, not all is as it seems.
BUY & TBR
LINKS
EXCERPT
The breeze picked up and was bursting insistent, frigid
puffs that threatened to dislodge his hat. Archie clamped one hand on top,
squishing it down around his lean face as he resolutely lengthened his stride
and marched on, determined to make it home before the storm set in.
He'd almost made it to the corner, to the place where he
normally made the left on N. Westburl, and then a right onto 43rd, followed by
a various assortment of other long deviations that would get him safely home,
when a large crack of thunder shook the air. He decided that just this once he
might consider taking the most direct route, albeit dangerous, foreboding, and
possibly life-threatening. He stopped right on the bend of the street,
uncertain for a split moment, until the next jolting crack of thunder made up
his mind for him. He headed straight along Market St that followed the length
of the Thames River, hoping that the seedy individuals who lurked around the
pier were as mindful of the storm as he and would not cause him trouble on this
particular evening, for even though he was quick-witted and could talk himself
out of most troubles, sailors tended to be a harder breed of people. They were
a sharp and cunning lot, and Archie did not know if he could outsmart anyone
else that day and didn't wish to press his luck.
He made it past the pier, hesitating just long enough to
glance at the small boats tied to the dock. There were obviously people about,
and so far he had been lucky enough not to encounter any of them.
But one final ground-shaking crack and the tinkling sound of
bells changed it all. The clouds overhead clashed and he ran for the shelter of
a nearby tavern, barely escaping the torrent of rain.
Archie had never been in The Captain's Keg before. He
stopped just inside the door and let his eyes adjust to the dark, smoke-filled
room. He realized that not only had he run into the very people he wished to
avoid, but that he also had a new problem.
These men weren't just sailors.
He was ready to run back out and take his chances of
drowning in the street, when he heard the same tinkling of bells from earlier.
This time, it sounded like mocking laughter.
Well. He might very well be losing his mind, but a coward he
was not.
He straightened to his full height—all six feet and four
inches of it—and removed his crumpled hat with a flourish, tucking it under his
arm. He walked proudly down the three steps that led into the heart of the
tavern—to a bar, teeming with pirates.
A couple of heads turned at his arrival and those who met
his solemn, blue gaze were quick to drop their eyes back to their drinks. His
spirits momentarily lifted, Archibald nodded to himself more than to anyone
else in particular, a slight smile playing on his lips. He was holding his own.
Still erring on the side of caution, he scanned the length
of the bar, finding three open seats. Two were between rather burly,
shifty-looking blokes with tattoos. The third seat, nearly on the end of the bar,
sat betwixt an elderly gentleman with longish white sideburns, a round belly,
and spectacles to match that sat precariously upon a rather bulbous nose. The
gent on the other side was scrawny, his clothes in tatters, thin face in a
scowl as he stared at a leaflet of paper before him. Even though he sat still,
there was a nervous energy that pulsed off the small man. He gave Archibald the
impression of a jittery, starving squirrel.
Archibald decided his best chances lay between the old man
and the squirrel and so he took his seat, nodding in a genial fashion to the
old man, whose watery blue eyes barely gave him a passing glance. The squirrel
didn't acknowledge his presence.
"What'll it be, mate?" the barkeep asked.
Archibald bit his lip to keep from laughing. Every drink in
the tavern was the same yellowish liquid. Why the bald man standing behind the
bar bothered to even ask such a mundane question was beyond him. Perhaps he was
daydreaming again. He did do that a lot and at times it seemed real. "'Tis
all ale, is it not?"
"Aye, but will it be single or double ye'll be
havin'?"
Archibald lifted a single finger and waited for his drink.
"Ye'd have much better luck with rum, I should
think," the old man said quietly as he stared down into his own glass,
"The ale's watered down. Not fit for a fish to drink, it isn't."
One dreg out of the glass, and Archibald was quite certain
the gentleman was more than right. It tasted like something poured from an old
boot. Not that he regularly drank from old boots, mind you. Thank heavens he
hadn't ordered twice the amount of the vile stuff. Deciding it better not to
even bother asking for the rum, which most definitely hidden beneath the
counter and out of sight, he tossed a couple of coins down on the scarred
wooden bar, and sat looking down into the remnants of his glass, listening to
the patter of rain on the tin roof.
A strange thought came suddenly. For a bar filled with
pirates, it was most unusual. It was rather quiet, an odd comment here or
there, but otherwise there was nothing but silence. Surely they weren't all
sitting around listening to the rain. Archie couldn't figure it out. But he
knew one thing, these people certainly weren't living up to his expectations of
the loud, fearless persons he always thought pirates to be.
The squirrel on his left shifted around on his stool,
staring even harder at the parchment. Sweat popped out on a face that was now a
color that reminded Archie of the paper in the print shop, a colorless, pasty
white. Good for paper, not for squirrels.
"Well?" a low, deep voice rolled out from a dark
corner and broke the silence so suddenly that it startled Archie. "Give us
the news then, Harper."
Ah, well now. Things may get lively yet, Archie thought,
casting a quick look to the corner from where the voice rumbled. It was too
dark to see the man who sat against the wall, but Archibald got a good look at
the pair of worn, dark leather boots propped up on the table, and the curling
wisps of cigar smoke that floated up to the rafters.
"It says a r-roy, royy…" the squirrel named Harper
stuttered, the paper shaking in his hands.
"Ach! The man canna read it anymore than the rest o'
us." A complaint hurtled from one of the tattooed blokes at the opposite
end of the bar.
As if he were getting more anxious, Harper tried again, his
voice in a near squeak, "A royy-alll…"
Archie spied the lettering, and against his better
conscience, whispered just loud enough that Harper would hear, "A royal
pardon is offered to those pirates who surrender on or before the fifth of
September, this year of 1718." He waited as Harper relayed the message,
then continued, "Being limited to crimes committed before the fifth of
January. All other crimes committed after such date, will be considered for a
death of hanging."
Archie sensed the old man on the other side of him shuffle
about, as if he were searching for something on the insides of his pockets, but
Archie's attention was fixed on the squirrel he saved. Harper turned and gave
him a toothless, yet thankful, smile and set to guzzling the contents of his
glass as quickly as possible in an effort to calm his shaking nerves.
"Well, that counts us out, lads," a dark chuckle
came from the corner, "'No pardon for the likes o' us, I fear. We all be
hanged."
"Aye, but they must catch us first. I won't be finding
me neck in a noose," a shout rang out, followed by the murmur of agreement
from all the others as they lifted their glasses in salute.
Feeling rather in-tune with the pirates, Archibald picked up
his glass as well and toasted the luck of the now boisterous lot, draining the
last contents of his glass. Some small part of his brain noted that while the
ale was certainly vile before, it also became bitter the longer it sat. The
bitterness left nearly as soon as he noticed it, having been replaced with a
rather calming sensation.
Pirates truly weren't a bad lot, he thought sleepily, just
people like everyone else. They were only misunderstood. He turned to convince
the elderly gentleman on his right of exactly that, when the darkness came and
took over. The last thing he heard was the old man chuckle, singing softly,
"Yo-ho, me mateys, yo-ho…"
***
"Careful now, lads, mind the poor lout's head, aye?
He'll be having a dreadful headache come morning without any extra bumps ye'd
be givin' him along the way."
The voice was familiar—rather achingly so—though Archie
couldn't quite seem to get his faculties in order to remember who the owner of
the voice was. The few times he could open his eyes, nothing at all made sense.
It all came and went in blurs with distorted figures he couldn't quite make
out. The darkness came and went, so in the end, he figured it better to keep
his eyes shut for the time being and try to concentrate on other things, foggy
and confusing as they might seem. He thought he was being drug along the rough
boards of the pier, and while that familiar voice seemed to care about the
condition of his head, his legs and backside seemed to be another matter
entirely of which the man cared not a whit as they bumped him along each
splintering plank. Luckily, the drug slipped in his drink deadened the pain,
and he only registered the faint, odd pricks and scrapes where the wood had its
way with his flesh.
"He's got hair like black candles, he does," a
crackling voice snickered by his head.
"Aye, Smee, are we taking this poor soul aboard for his
long locks? Did the Cap'n order you fetch him a wifey, then?" another
voice chimed in, followed by raucous laughter, and a low retort from the man
named Smee that Archibald couldn't make out.
"A good bit heavier than he looks," the first
voice by his head huffed, "Slow ye down a bit, Murph. I'm losin' my grip.
Oh drat, there he goes!"
And those were the last words Archibald ever heard on the
shores of bonnie England as his head hit the pier and the darkness crept over
him once again.
AUTHOR BIO
K.R. Thompson lives in southwest Virginia with her husband,
son, three cats, and an undeterminable amount of chickens.
An avid reader and firm believer in magic, she spends her
nights either reading an adventure or writing one.
She still watches for evidence of Bigfoot in the mud of Wolf
Creek.
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Thank you so much for featuring Hook on your beautiful blog. I appreciate it so much! :)
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