Reviewed By Liz

ISBN: 1-59414-635-7

Five Star
Hardcover - 4/1/08

VIRGINS AND MARTYRS - An Aria Quynn Novel - … A powerful bomb destroys a family planning clinic in the Northwest Florida town of Spanish Bay; as firefighters and other first-responders engage in a desperate attempt at rescue, a follow-up bomb, timed to catch them unaware, detonates with lethal results. … A 13-year-old girl collapses in a Spanish Bay shopping mall, suddenly and inexplicably displaying the marks of stigmata on her palms. within days, she has become the nexus of religious and social turmoil. But is she also the target of some darker, even monstrous, intent? … A single shot from a sniper’s rifle cores through bone and brain, signaling that the website threats of a fanatical gunman have become a horrific campaign of terror. … A disgraced television news reporter, desperate to obtain the story that can salvage his career, will betray anyone — even himself — to get it. These elements ignite in VIRGINS AND MARTYRS, a powerful thriller as timely as tomorrow’s headlines. Spanish Bay police detective Aria Quynn is a savvy investigator, if possessed of a dark cynicism and prone to occasional acts of startling physical violence. She is the product of tough streets and harsh life-experiences-loyal to her friends and her profession, scarred by her doubts and self-inflicted emotional wounds, Quynn –injured only slightly in the clinic bombing that killed her partner– is officially on the sidelines of a case that quickly is claimed by the FBI. But almost immediately, she finds herself unofficially tasked to determine whether the alleged “visions” of 13-year-old Maddie Shepard are somehow connected to this latest domestic-terrorist attack. Evidence points to the bombing as the work of the Centurions of the Lord, a violent anti-abortion organization– but more specifically, to Bobby Teasdale, the object of a nationwide manhunt since the sniper killing of another family-planning staffer more than a year earlier. As Quynn plunges ever deeper into the case, she finds herself enmeshed in a malevolent web of lies and betrayals that point to a conspiracy far more evil. Can she save Maddie Shepard from the forces which compete to use the girl for their own ends? Moreover, as the bodycount rises, Quynn is forced to confront her own personal crisis of faith– to wrestle with the demons of her own soul, including those of her own making.

Earl Merkel is the author of Virgins And Martyrs (Five Star 2008, under the name “E L Merkel”), Final Epidemic (PenguinPutnam/NAL), a Barnes and Noble national bestseller re-released in hardcover by Elmtree Press/Tifda Publishing in January 2008; and Dirty Fire (PenguinPutnam/NAL). Earl spent more than a decade as a journalist, columnist and commentator; today, he contributes to a variety of newspapers and magazines, usually after their editors have had time to extinguish the reader-reaction brushfires from his previous submissions. During his career, Earl has dodged gunfire, teargas canisters, and verbal brickbats as a journalist; spent years “comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable,” as an investigative reporter, newspaper columnist and satirist; and has advised some of the largest corporations in the world on the merits of open and honest communications — not always with success. As the “more” on the nationally broadcast talk-radio program Money & More, where he served as co-host and executive producer, Earl left the money-talk to the experts. He admits that he’s far more comfortable in other areas –talking with authors like Lawrence Block, Ken Burns, Robin Cook and Neil Gaiman about their books; arguing current events and politics with such guests as Steve Forbes, Jack Welch, Dick Morris, Oliver North and Newt Gingrich; and even cracking-wise with the likes of Mark Steyn, Neal Cavuto and Michael Medved– than he is dealing with financial matters. “In my own finances, I’m anything but a good example — but I’m a great bad example,” he laughs. Earl is also the author of The Infamous Chicken Little Article, which is rumored to have gotten him temporarily banned from the op-ed page of a major American newspaper –but which subsequently has become an underground classic on the Internet among journalists, and which is regularly cited in journalism-school classes when a dose of cold (but hilarious) reality is required.

Check out Earl’s web site at www.http://www.redroom.com/author/earl-merkel.com.

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