Jump Cut
by Libby Fischer Hellmann
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GENRE: Mystery
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BLURB:
Hired
to produce a candyfloss profile of Chicago-based aviation giant, Delcroft,
Ellie is dismayed when company VP Charlotte Hollander, the architect of a new
anti-drone system for Delcroft, trashes the production and cancels the project.
Ellie believes Hollander was spooked by shots of a specific man in the video
footage. But when Ellie arranges to meet the man to find out why, he’s killed
by a subway train.In the confusion, she finds a seemingly abandoned pack of
cigarettes with a flash drive inside that belonged to the now dead man.
Ellie has the drive’s contents decrypted, but before long she discovers she’s
under surveillance and thrown into the middle of a situation filled with
drones, hacking, and Chinese spies that put her life and those she loves in
mortal danger.
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Excerpt:
The sun winked off the frozen surface of Lake Michigan the
next morning as I drove south to McCormick Place. During one of the most brutal
Chicago winters in decades, the smudge of purple clouds tinged with pink and
gold hinted that the fury of winter might—just might—have peaked. I parked in
the overpriced lot, bought half a dozen cups of overpriced coffee, and carried
them into the massive exhibit hall.
The crew was setting up lights and shades, and Mac was
behind the camera framing shots. MacArthur J. Kendall III owns a production
studio in Northbrook. He started out shooting sweet sixteens, bar mitzvahs, and
weddings, but parlayed that into corporate videos. We’ve worked together for
nearly twenty years, from the days of two-inch video, to one-inch,
three-quarter, and now digital.
Mac’s name, salt-and-pepper hair, button-down shirts, and
penny loafers scream WASP, but the nasty scar running down his left cheek saves
him from total Episcopalian infamy. He tells people he was attacked by a
Mexican drug lord and made me swear never to reveal it was from a car accident.
I went up to him. “What do you need me to do?”
“You have the shot list?”
I nodded and pulled it out of the canvas bag that doubles as
my purse. We went over it. He gestured to the main area of the Delcroft booth,
which featured a large projection screen with the company logo on both sides,
and about twenty chairs arranged theater-style.
“What time’s the first presentation?”
Teresa Basso Gold, our client contact, had told us to be
prepared for a series of short remarks by Delcroft executives touting the
company’s latest innovations.
I checked my watch. Barely six thirty. “The doors don’t open
until nine, and Teresa said not to expect anyone until ten. But you can get
some establishing shots, if you want.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Mac said and strolled over to confer
with the crew.
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Libby Fischer
Hellmann left a career in broadcast news in Washington, DC and moved to Chicago
35 years ago, where she, naturally, began to write gritty crime fiction. Twelve
novels and twenty short stories later, she claims they’ll take her out of the
Windy City feet first. She has been nominated for many awards in the mystery
and crime writing community and has even won a few. *
With the
addition of Jump Cut in 2016, her novels include the now five-volume Ellie
Foreman series, which she describes as a cross between “Desperate Housewives”
and “24;” the hard-boiled 4-volume Georgia Davis PI series, and three
stand-alone historical thrillers that Libby calls her “Revolution Trilogy.” Her
latest release, The Incidental Spy, is a historical novella set during the
early years of the Manhattan Project at the U of Chicago. Her short stories
have been published in a dozen anthologies, the Saturday Evening Post, and Ed
Gorman’s “25 Criminally Good Short Stories” collection.
* She has been
a finalist twice for the Anthony, twice for Foreword Magazines Book of the
Year, the Agatha, the Shamus, the Daphne and has won the Lovey multiple times.
Author of
Compulsively Readable Thrillers
Google+:
google.com:+libbyhellmann
BUY LINK:
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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION
Libby will be
awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter
during the tour, and a $25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn host.
