The Crazy Season by Jim Ody
Joel Baxter is infamous for solving weird and bizarre cases that others avoid. So, when he receives an email from a teenage boy Tim saying his town is cursed, he cannot turn it down.
“…I will more than likely be dead when you read this. There is nothing I can do about it. It’s the curse, and we’ve hit The Crazy Season.” Every 20 years, there are a handful of unexplained teenage deaths and it’s started again.
With the help of his straight-talking friend Melody, they set out to get to the bottom of the alleged curse. Everybody in Black Rock has secrets and nobody wants to speak.
The closer they get to truth the more Joel and Melody realise that their involvement is far from coincidental.
About the author.
Jim writes dark psychological/thrillers, Horror and YA books that have endings you won’t see coming, and favours stories packed with wit. He has written over a dozen novels and many more short-stories spanning many genres.
Jim has a very strange sense of humour and is often considered a little odd. When not writing he will be found playing the drums, watching football and eating chocolate. He lives with his long-suffering wife, three beautiful children and two indignant cats in Swindon, Wiltshire UK.
I have an extract for you!
Every time he saw his wife it took his breath away. The shrunken mound laid there motionless. She was attached to machines like she was the main computer powering them. That was something he liked to say to his mate, Kit. It gave her the importance that she deserved.
It was hard. He felt so much love, but there was a mix of pity there too. He hated that. She’d hate that. She was not one to join the pity-parade, instead subscribing to a pragmatic view of life that focused on what you could control and not dwelling on what you couldn’t.
“Hey, Beautiful,” he said walking over and placing a kiss on her cheek. It had taken him a few days to speak to her without crying. A part of him wished he’d still react that way. He hated to think he was getting used to her being like this, but of course he was. How could he not?
“I brought these for you. I know you love them.” He placed them on the side, the softness of the petals touched his skin in contrast with the hard-crackle of the plastic holding them.
“Silly, I know,” he added, and drank her in. The strong woman who was dying in front of him. The previously active person now needed to be manually moved and worked on to keep her joints and limbs supple and as mobile as possible. But there was only so much that could be expected here. Her muscle tone had softened.
He pulled out his phone and pressed the play button the same way he did on every visit. The same song.
He gulped in anticipation.
Sophie B Hawkins – As I Lay Me Down.
He sat down and held his wife’s bony hand as the lyrics to the slow song glided over them both. An invisible bond weaving its way around them. It transported him to another time. The memories of listening to it together on their first few dates. An explosion of anxiety and excitement. Then a wash of sunlight raining down on her as she swayed in a summer dress, and he could do nothing more than look at her in awe. The top half hugged her curves, whilst below the waist danced freely with her movements. He could never believe she’d wanted him as much as he’d wanted her. But that was fine. It didn’t matter. The fact she allowed him to stick around was enough, to share kisses, and intimate moments where their naked skin was pressed together, and they lost themselves in a world where only they existed. Memories flashed around him as he closed his eyes for a while: open windows with curtains flowing from an evening breeze and candles projected juddering shadows like dark fairies in the background. All the while, Sophie sang to them and only them. That’s how it felt then, and that’s how it felt to him now.
