Red Thread

Red Thread

<b>It is a sweltering summer morning in New Jersey and an appalling sight awaits Ben O’Shaughnessy…</b><br /><br />When he arrives in ‘The Embroidery Capital of the World’ to drop the roughs off for some new products, he soon finds the body of a young sketcher, her slender form tilted sideways, her hands balled up into fists. <br /><br />And that’s not all - her mouth is crudely stitched shut with red embroidery thread.<br /><br />Ben, who also writes a gossip column as ‘Mr Knowbody’ for the <em>Jersey Journal</em>, is shocked and pained. <br /><br />But nobody appears to want to find out who murdered Nikki and why – no one except him that is.<br /><br />Though the embroidery business paid the rent, Ben’s secret life as Mr Knowbody kept him sane. <br /><br />Could Mr Knowbody unknot the thread?<br /><br />He certainly has more than a passing acquaintance with the seedy underbelly of glamour capitals like New York and his is a world where everyone is fighting to keep their head above water. <br /><br />It is a world of ultimate human exploitation, where the trappings of civilised life – local politicians, businessmen, law enforcement, the Church – are exposed as merely skin deep when Mr Knowbody starts poking his unwanted nose in. <br /><br />And when Nikki’s mother Hazel doesn’t seem to react when she learns of her daughter’s death, Mr Knowbody can’t help wondering…what secret could she be hiding?<br /><br /><em>Red Thread</em> is a riveting read, peppered with the humour and satisfyingly taut structure of Ernest Hemingway.<br /><br /><h2>Praise for Mark Rogers</h2> <br /><br />‘Chilling and intriguing in equal measures’ – <b>Thomas Waugh</b><br /><br /><b>Mark Rogers</b> is a writer and artist whose literary heroes include Charles Bukowski, Willie Vlautin and Charles Portis. He lives most of the year in Baja California, Mexico with his Sinaloa-born wife, Sophy. His work has appeared in the <em>New York Times, Village Voice</em> and other publications and his travel journalism has taken him to 54 countries.