Beginning today, Tsubute, the second novel in my Seeds of Civilization series, is available in Kindle eBook format from Amazon. Tsubute joins Tractrix, my first novel, on the Kindle platform and we will be adding the third and final volume, Triangle, about this time next month.
To find all my eBooks, browse to www.Amazon.com and select Kindle Store from the Search drop-down list. Enter “Seeds of Civilization” (include the quotes) in the box to the right of the drop-down and click the small orange “GO” ball.
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Tsubute takes place almost entirely on the small Japanese island of Yonaguni where a real underwater “pyramid” was discovered by a scuba diver in 1987. Now commonly referred to as the Yonaguni Monument, this megalithic structure appears to have been built before the end of the last ice age, about 10,000 years ago, when the world’s sea levels were much lower than they are today.
Those of you who have read Tractrix will be happy to know that Frank, Tony, Linda and Jim are back! This time, a trip to Yonaguni to investigate the mysterious underwater pyramid involves the four friends in a case of murder and international kidnapping.
The maiden voyage of the team’s newly acquired Learjet begins with a dramatic landing in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska. After a run-in with Department of Justice agents in Tokyo, the team begins to think they should never have left home. When they finally touch down on Yonaguni, a Japanese-American exchange student befriends them and helps them get to know the tiny island of 1,200 people—and the dark secret being protected there. When a tsubute discovered outside the NWIDI headquarters in Seattle reappears on Yonaguni, it leads the NWIDI team to a startling discovery about the true nature of the island and its original inhabitants.
Why did I pick Amazon’s proprietary Kindle format for my novels?
I’ve been blogging here since mid-March but beginning today I’m switching to an abbreviated summer schedule. Instead of daily blogs, I’ll post news and information irregularly but 
Well, I guess I really spilled the beans yesterday when I mentioned that one of my new books was set here in Baja! I had intended to keep the locations secret until the books were released because how and where my characters end up is part of the fun. I’ll try to be more careful about the other 2 books and I’ll try not to tip you off as to which of the 3 books is the one set in Baja.
Great News! The Mantarraya Writer’s Association (that’s me!) has finally agreed to go back to work and make some real progress on the Parallel Ops series. I’ve been pretty lazy lately, and I had the 2-week period when I was without my own computer. That problem got resolved late Monday afternoon, but since then my evenings have been filled with the series finales of Lost and 24. Tonight it’s the season finale of Chuck and then things should get back to normal. I will try to have chapter 10 of The Informants and chapter 10 of the Guardians finished by Sunday night and then I want to get on a much more aggressive work schedule. There will be just 31 weeks left in the year and that means I have to write 2 chapters a week to finish by December 31st – where has the time gone? It seems like just yesterday that I was making excuses for not meeting my original deadline of December 31, 2009!
As I look down the road and plan the rest of 3 novels, I realize something I’ve probably always known. The more exotic the location, the more fun I have writing. Of the 3 stories I’m working on now, 2 are set in far away locations and 1 is set here in Baja and it’s that local story that I’m the least excited about working on. The plot is just as good and the characters get themselves in just as much trouble, but I don’t have the personal pleasure of researching locations and reading about places I’ve never been. I guess I never realized how much that exploration and discovery impacted my writing until now. This is certainly a lesson learned for me but I’m sure I’ll find a way to get out of my slump with the local story and move forward. By the way, the other 2 novels are currently taking place in Washington, D.C. and the Caribbean but I’m not going to say which book is in which location – you’ll have to read them to find out!
In Triangle, Frank, Tony, Linda and Jim explore the ruins with the help of an unmanned submarine (an ROV) brought to the site aboard a European undersea cable maintenance ship. During my research, I had the opportunity to tour such a vessel and see first-hand an ROV capable of carrying out all the tasks I describe in my novel. However, in my fictional account, a discovery made at the ruins sets the stage for the rest of the story and leads Frank and his teammates across the Caribbean to the stunning conclusion of the novel and the series.
Sophie Hoffman is a graduate student and self-proclaimed social activist currently working on her doctoral thesis in Northern European Languages at the Ludwig Maximillian University in Munich, Germany.
Sgt. Danny Miles is a young Marine assigned to the security detail of a major U.S. government research facility. A martial arts expert since he was six, Danny is a real life saver (literally).
Max Becker is a special agent with the BKA, Germany’s version of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. At the orders of his boss, the notorious Colonel Wilhelm Kruger, Becker is on a mission he is sure will end in failure and embarrassment.
Javier Reyes is the same character you met in Triangle, the final book in the 
Carlos Gonzales is a semi-retired underwater videographer and a volunteer with Sea Watch, a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting the oceans and their marine life. Carlos also served in the Mexican Navy and his experiences there prove to be a valuable asset.
Carley Quinn was born in a remote Mennonite community in the Orange Walk District of Belize. When she married a British construction worker her family disowned her and she hasn’t spoken with them since. After her husband’s untimely death, she spent three years fighting with the rebels in Guatemala.
Rob Jefferies was born in Gresham, Oregon and graduated from Oregon State University with a degree in Computer Science. Before retiring to the Caribbean in 2005, Rob owned a successful software development company that specialized in banking and credit union applications.
Erik Mueller served as a decorated member of the U.S. Army Green Berets during the Gulf War but gave up a promising career in the military to become a ruthless soldier of fortune for a paramilitary group known only as The Six.
And, finally, there’s Michael “Buzz” Edwards. He makes appearances in all three books of the Seeds series and he’s already mentioned in each of the first three books of Parallel Ops. In Seeds we never really knew which side of the fence he was on but in Ops there will be absolutely no doubt!
Jill Harris is actually a main character during the first half of Tractrix, until a government agent suggests she “disappear” for her own safety. Frank meets the tough ICU nurse when he first arrives in Las Vegas and he soon learns that her family and his investigation are intertwined. However, it is Tony who’s attracted to Jill and they develop a relationship that lasts through the end of the series.
Ben Kingston is an exobiologist employed by the Department of Defense who is brought in late in Tractrix to help Frank, Tony, Linda and Jim investigate the mysterious spheres that are the basis of the novel. Any more information about Ben would reveal too much of the plot, but suffice it to say that his isolated lab, dug into a hillside overlooking Area 51, contains an “out of this world” artifact.
“Fitz” and Susan Fitgerald, along with their dog Sandstrom, join the NWIDI team in the opening pages of book 2, Tsubute. Fitz and Susan are private jet pilots and Sandstrom’s primary role seems to be to pester and annoy Tony! Grrrr!
Bill Ito is a Japanese-American exchange student working in a small hotel on Yonaguni Island when the NWIDI team blows into town in Tsubute. Because of his perfect English and his extensive knowledge of the island, he becomes an unofficial team member until I’m forced to write him out of the story line in chapter 14.
Javier Reyes is introduced in chapter 1 of Triangle and remains a secondary character throughout the rest of the novel. Javier’s experience with a Mexican environmental group buys him a spot on the NWIDI team as they take to the ocean in search of the source of strange signals emanating from deep below the surface near Cuba. However, it is his resourcefulness that saves Linda’s life when they are sent on a covert mission deep into the island nation’s interior.
Miles Adderly is a retired U.S. Navy SEAL who owns and operates a hotel on Andros Island in the Bahamas. When Frank, Tony, and Jim show up, Miles seems to be both an ally and an adversary but a book in his library provides Jim with important clues about the origin of artifacts found near Cuba. After teaching Frank how to use exotic rebreather diving equipment, Miles remains with Frank “to the very end” of Triangle – and the series.
After successfully deciphering the messages on the mysterious black spheres in Book 1, Jim is instrumental in determining the origin and purpose of some ancient objects his team discovers deep inside a Japanese mountain in Tsubute. But it’s his brilliant work with the submerged artifacts of Triangle that finally brings him the public recognition that has eluded him in the previous missions.
Linda becomes a much more prominent character in Tsubute, my second novel, when she’s inadvertently stranded on a remote beach in southern Japan and must make her way back to civilization through an underground cave system. She plays an even larger role in Triangle, the third book, when she and a Mexican national named Javier Reyes are asked to sneak into Cuba undercover and investigate strange happenings on the northwestern tip of the island. Later in Triangle, Linda finds her soul mate and her life forever changes.
While in Las Vegas, Frank begins to assemble his team – the characters you will meet over the next three days – and he eventually forms a non-profit organization called NWIDI to pursue his life-long interest in ancient archeological mysteries. After their successful mission in my first novel, Tractrix , they head off to a tiny Japanese island in the China Sea to explore a 9,000-year-old underwater pyramid in Tsubute, and then to the Caribbean to explore the submerged ruins of an ancient city in Triangle, the third and final book in the Seeds series. While Frank is mentioned numerous times in the first three books of the Parallel Ops series, he doesn’t really have a speaking part. Maybe he’ll return in The Teachers, the final book of this series!
As the book opens, Tony is fleeing for his life from the very people he must soon challenge head-on. Having been out of contact with his former NWIDI team mates for more than five years, he sets out with a new cast of characters to confuse and distract The Six in ways only Tony could conceive. Using a live-aboard dolphin research vessel as cover, Tony and friends sail into the Caribbean and the jaws of the enemy to carry out their covert mission. The Guardians has my usual secondary plot and this one provides a glimpse of The Six and makes you wonder whether or not such a group could (or does) exist in our real world.
All this plot coordination requires some pretty careful planning, especially if I want to advance one of the stories quickly through time. To keep everything on track, I’m using a large chart and a consolidated Table of Contents spreadsheet where I track the dates and summary of events for each chapter in separate columns for each book. As I scan across a row I can see where each chapter is, book by book and I just have to make sure things are in sync when I insert an intersect. So far most of my intersects have involved only two books at a time but in Chapter 7 there’s a situation where the storyline in The Scientists, two separate storylines in The Informants and the storyline in The Guardians all have to be lined up within minutes of each other!
