By Sue Duffy
1st in The Red Returning Series
Genre: Fiction-Spiritual/Thriller
Espionage
See Info. Below on Ms Duffy's Giveaway!!!
Link to buy the book: http://ow.ly/8B9HT
Cover Rating:
This is a beautifully rendered cover. There's no doubt about the book's being a novel of intrigue. The deep reds are indicative of fury, energy and the Kremlin, which is featured in the background. I love the hint of the musical score in the background, as well, which tells us that music will play a big part in the story...as does the title "The Sound..." The exotic-looking woman is serious and her face as it is off-set on the cover, gives space and equal importance to the message of the other imagesl. The script used for the book title is elegant. Sue Duffy's name is nicely highlighted at the top banner of the novel, and the indication that this is the 1st in a series mark at the bottom of the cover is a clever touch. Beautifully designed cover that relays all it needs to to get a reader interested. I'm ready to read, aren't you? Rated: A
Author Profile:
Sue Duffy is an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in Moody Magazine, The Presbyterian Journal, Sunday Digest, and The Christian Reader. She is the author of Mortal Wounds (Barbour, 2001) and Fatal Loyalty (Kregel, 2010). Sue has also contributed to Stories for a Woman’s Heart (Multnomah). She and her husband, Mike, have three grown children.Don't forget Sue Duffy and her publisher are offering a GIVEAWAY on her site for a Kindle Fire and her book now and until February 11th.
Summary :
After losing everyone she loves, concert pianist Liesl Bower has nowhere to go but to escape into her music. Searching for the peace she usually finds in her concertos and sonatas, Liesl can’t shake the feeling that she is being haunted by her past . . . and by someone following her. When she spots a familiar and eerie face in the audience of a concert she’s giving for the president in Washington, DC, the scariest day of her life comes back to her with a flash. It has been fifteen years since Liesl watched her beloved Harvard music mentor assaulted on a dark night in Moscow and just as long since the CIA disclosed to her that he’d been spying for Russia. She had seen that man--that eerie face--the night Professor Devoe was attacked. And now he’s back--and coming for her.
On the run and struggling to rely on the protection of CIA agent Ava Mullins and handsome newspaper reporter Cade O’Brien, Liesl learns she is the prey of an underground cell of Russian KGB agents determined to restore their country to its former Soviet might. But what she doesn’t know is that she is in possession of something--a piece of sheet music--that Russian intelligence is now frantic to find. Inside that music is a secret code, the hidden transcriptions of her deceased mentor, that clearly identify a Russian mole operating inside Israel’s Department of Defense, a mole with enough power and access to execute a daring assassination that no one would see coming.
Caught in a deadly conflict between American and Russian undercover agents, this innocent young pianist is just trying to survive her own personal trauma. Through it all, Liesl must learn that no matter how dark her world grows or how fiercely her enemies pursue her, God is still in control--if only she can yield herself to His grace.
You may find out more on Sue Duffy's Giveaway by visitng http://litfusegroup.com/blogtours/text/13452833
Let's Get To Know The Author Better:
Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters. More than I care to admit. It’s pretty scary when you fit comfortably inside the head of your villain. But I couldn’t birth any character without imparting my DNA. That means I’m a little bit of everyone. A little Sybil-like.
When did you first discover that you were a writer? When my ninth-grade English teacher told me I was. So I became an advertising copywriter, newspaper writer, and magazine writer. And then I discovered I liked to make things up—not a respectable trait for a journalist. So I shifted into respectable fiction and conjured my first novel.
Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading. In fiction, I used to read only Frederick Forsyth, Tom Clancy, Robert Ludlum, Patricia Cornwell, John Le Carre, Ken Follett, and other high-suspense authors. Some of my women friends thought that strange. So I tried some of the sweeter, softer novels they liked—and decided to find new friends :-)
Now, though, my reading list is all over the place, from Joyce Carol Oates to Ted Dekker.
How do you choose your characters’ names? I was driving through the mountains alone when the storyline of my first novel sprang to mind. I pulled over as soon as I could to make a few notes and realized I was in a small cemetery. I took my characters’ names from the tombstones in front of me.
Since then, the names have come from more conventional sources: seed catalogs, legal notices, members of Congress, Olympic athletes, obits, phone books, old movies, cartoons. You know.
What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of? Professionally: the publication of my first book. Personally: the publication of my first book. Mortal Wounds, in 1998. My second novel, Fatal Loyalty, was released last year. And now Kregel is launching my new series with the release of The Sound of Red Returning.
Here's the Dame's Review:
Very rarely will I pick up an inspirational novel having to do with espionage. What!? God and spying? Yet, there is much to be said about that very topic in history altogether, and in our own national history now and in the recent past. Prayerful men and women have guarded our country and the well-being of our people for centuries, and it's good when someone with the creative mind and writing skills of Sue Duffy takes up her proverbial pen and reminds us of that. "The Sound of Red Returning" is an excellent suspense novel, and it's not to be missed.
From the first gripping chapter until the last, you will find yourself flying through this book. I was surprised how much it caught my interest. I'm a huge fan of Nelson de Mille's early works in this genre, so a very hard-sell on nearly every woman author trying to break through on spy novels, and; jaded as I was, I tried "The Sound of Red Returning" with one eye squinted. How surprised I was to find that I really liked it.
Sue Duffy is an excellent writer. She has developed a very spine- chilling story and given us a female protagonist to be proud of. I loved her snappy dialog, her character development and the suspense she created. Great spy novel that gives us wonderful musical references, as well.
For a journalist who likes to "make up stories," I'd say Sue Duffy does very well for herself. I highly recommend this surprising and suspenseful novel. Perhaps changing my mind about women who write spy novels...
5 stars
Deborah/TheBookishDame
*I was given a copy of this book for an honest review on my part.
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