This morning, I am featuring mystery audiobook, The Bones of Amoret, by Arthur Herbert! Check out the book, learn about the author, read a guest post from him, & be sure to enter for a chance to win a prize in the book tour giveaway at the end of this post.
Book Title: The Bones of Amoret - A Novel by Arthur Herbert
Category: Adult Fiction 18+, 320 pages
Category: Adult Fiction 18+, 320 pages
Length: 10 hours, 59 minutes
Genre: Mystery, Suspense
Publisher: Stitched Smile Publications
Release Date: April 2022
Content Rating: PG-13 - no sex, explicit or otherwise; almost all violence is off-screen; mild profanity
Genre: Mystery, Suspense
Publisher: Stitched Smile Publications
Release Date: April 2022
Content Rating: PG-13 - no sex, explicit or otherwise; almost all violence is off-screen; mild profanity
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About the Book
In this enigmatic follow up to his critically acclaimed debut novel The Cuts that Cure, Arthur Herbert returns to the Texas-Mexico border with this saga of a small town’s bloody loss of innocence.
Amoret, Texas, 1982. Life along the border is harsh, but in a world where cultures work together to carve a living from the desert landscape, Blaine Beckett lives a life of isolation. A transplanted Boston intellectual, for twenty years locals have viewed him as a snob, a misanthrope, an outsider. He seems content to stand apart until one night when he vanishes into thin air amid signs of foul play.
Noah Grady, the town doctor, is a charming and popular good ol’ boy. He’s also a keeper of secrets, both the town’s and his own. He watches from afar as the mystery of Blaine’s disappearance unravels and rumors fly. Were the incipient cartels responsible? Was it a local with a grudge? Or did Blaine himself orchestrate his own disappearance? Then the unthinkable happens, and Noah begins to realize he’s considered a suspect.
Paced like a lit fuse and full of dizzying plot twists, The Bones of Amoret is a riveting whodunit that will keep you guessing all the way to its shocking conclusion.
Read the Guest Post
Thank you, Angela, for granting me the privilege of posting on your blog!
My name’s Arthur Herbert and I’m the author of the newly released mystery The Bones of Amoret. Bones is my second novel and was much, much more fun to write as my debut, an inverted mystery titled The Cuts that Cure, was in part about exorcising some demons. Bones, on the other hand, was just pure story-telling, and doing so through the voice of a main character whom I absolutely loved.
The premise for Bones is that it’s an interview with Doctor Noah Grady, a garrulous old-timer who spent his entire career practicing in the small Texas border town of Amoret (a fictionalized version of Alpine, Texas). A reporter from an El Paso newspaper has travelled to Amoret on the 40th anniversary of the disappearance of Blaine Beckett, a prominent but unpopular Amoret citizen. The mystery of Blaine’s disappearance was never solved and has apparently become something of a D.B. Cooper case in the region over the intervening years. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear there were multiple possibilities as at various turns it appears the culprits may have been the incipient cartels, various locals with a grudge, or even Blaine himself. Whenever one sets out to write a mystery, there’s always a nagging critic in the back of one’s brain giving voice to insecurities: does this or that twist work? Are the clues too obvious? Not obvious enough? Is the explanation, the big reveal, believable? Well, I’m happy to report that based on the early reviews, readers and listeners seem to think I nailed it.
I’ll thrown you one little Easter Egg here. As I mentioned above, the town of Amoret is a fictionalized version of the real Texas town of Alpine. Alpine is home to about 6,000 people not counting the 2000 students who attend Sul Ross University. I needed a town close to the Mexican border that contained a small college for the plot (Blaine Beckett is a professor at the school prior to his disappearance), and so the choice of Alpine made sense. In fact, anyone who has spent time in that region will quickly realize from the geographic references of highways and directions that it’s Alpine I’m discussing. But fictionalizing it had two benefits. The first is just the pragmatic need to add or delete details about the town that wouldn’t make sense. The second though, had to deal with the choice of the town’s name. And that was where I had some fun.
For those unfamiliar with the name, Amoret is a character from Spenser’s The Faerie Queene who represents married love. Amoret is married to Scudamour but is kidnapped by the evil Busirane on her wedding day. Busirane shackles her and begins attempting numerous charms and enchantments to make Amoret fall in love with him, all to no avail as her love for Scudamour is too great. In the end she is rescued by the warrior princess Busirane and returns unsullied to her husband.
I’ll admit that at first glance the literary theme of married love would seem strange as an anchor for a mystery that has elements as dark as those found in Bones. And I don’t want to give you the wrong impression (trust me, Bones isn’t some egg-heady piece of literary fiction that could have been xeroxed from the MFA thesis of a hairy-legged Oberlin graduate student whose Prius has a bumper sticker reading “God is coming back and boy is she pissed”). I never lose sight of the fact, after all, that my job first and foremost is to entertain you with a good yarn. But when you see how strong the pulls and pushes of married love are throughout the book, you’ll see why naming the town for her brought a smile to my face.
I’d like to end by thanking you, the reader, for giving me a few minutes of your day. I know that there’s literally a million other ways you could spend your time, or authors you could read. I know I’m supposed to use words for a living, but I can’t find the ones that adequately express my gratitude to you for making this dream possible. Until next time, stay safe.
My name’s Arthur Herbert and I’m the author of the newly released mystery The Bones of Amoret. Bones is my second novel and was much, much more fun to write as my debut, an inverted mystery titled The Cuts that Cure, was in part about exorcising some demons. Bones, on the other hand, was just pure story-telling, and doing so through the voice of a main character whom I absolutely loved.
The premise for Bones is that it’s an interview with Doctor Noah Grady, a garrulous old-timer who spent his entire career practicing in the small Texas border town of Amoret (a fictionalized version of Alpine, Texas). A reporter from an El Paso newspaper has travelled to Amoret on the 40th anniversary of the disappearance of Blaine Beckett, a prominent but unpopular Amoret citizen. The mystery of Blaine’s disappearance was never solved and has apparently become something of a D.B. Cooper case in the region over the intervening years. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear there were multiple possibilities as at various turns it appears the culprits may have been the incipient cartels, various locals with a grudge, or even Blaine himself. Whenever one sets out to write a mystery, there’s always a nagging critic in the back of one’s brain giving voice to insecurities: does this or that twist work? Are the clues too obvious? Not obvious enough? Is the explanation, the big reveal, believable? Well, I’m happy to report that based on the early reviews, readers and listeners seem to think I nailed it.
I’ll thrown you one little Easter Egg here. As I mentioned above, the town of Amoret is a fictionalized version of the real Texas town of Alpine. Alpine is home to about 6,000 people not counting the 2000 students who attend Sul Ross University. I needed a town close to the Mexican border that contained a small college for the plot (Blaine Beckett is a professor at the school prior to his disappearance), and so the choice of Alpine made sense. In fact, anyone who has spent time in that region will quickly realize from the geographic references of highways and directions that it’s Alpine I’m discussing. But fictionalizing it had two benefits. The first is just the pragmatic need to add or delete details about the town that wouldn’t make sense. The second though, had to deal with the choice of the town’s name. And that was where I had some fun.
For those unfamiliar with the name, Amoret is a character from Spenser’s The Faerie Queene who represents married love. Amoret is married to Scudamour but is kidnapped by the evil Busirane on her wedding day. Busirane shackles her and begins attempting numerous charms and enchantments to make Amoret fall in love with him, all to no avail as her love for Scudamour is too great. In the end she is rescued by the warrior princess Busirane and returns unsullied to her husband.
I’ll admit that at first glance the literary theme of married love would seem strange as an anchor for a mystery that has elements as dark as those found in Bones. And I don’t want to give you the wrong impression (trust me, Bones isn’t some egg-heady piece of literary fiction that could have been xeroxed from the MFA thesis of a hairy-legged Oberlin graduate student whose Prius has a bumper sticker reading “God is coming back and boy is she pissed”). I never lose sight of the fact, after all, that my job first and foremost is to entertain you with a good yarn. But when you see how strong the pulls and pushes of married love are throughout the book, you’ll see why naming the town for her brought a smile to my face.
I’d like to end by thanking you, the reader, for giving me a few minutes of your day. I know that there’s literally a million other ways you could spend your time, or authors you could read. I know I’m supposed to use words for a living, but I can’t find the ones that adequately express my gratitude to you for making this dream possible. Until next time, stay safe.
Buy the Book
Meet the Author
Arthur Herbert was born and raised in small town Texas. He worked on offshore oil rigs, as a bartender, a landscaper at a trailer park, and as a social worker before going to medical school. He chose to do a residency in general surgery, followed by a fellowship in critical care and trauma surgery. For the last eighteen years, he’s worked as a trauma and burn surgeon, operating on all ages of injured patients. He continues to run a thriving practice.
He's won multiple awards for his scientific writing, and his first novel, The Cuts that Cure, spent ten days as an Amazon #1 Best Seller. His second novel, The Bones of Amoret, will be released on April 1, 2022 through Stitched Smile Publishers. Arthur currently lives in New Orleans, with his wife Amy and their dogs.
connect with the author: website ~ twitter ~ facebook ~ goodreads
Enter the Giveaway
Arthur Herbert was born and raised in small town Texas. He worked on offshore oil rigs, as a bartender, a landscaper at a trailer park, and as a social worker before going to medical school. He chose to do a residency in general surgery, followed by a fellowship in critical care and trauma surgery. For the last eighteen years, he’s worked as a trauma and burn surgeon, operating on all ages of injured patients. He continues to run a thriving practice.
He's won multiple awards for his scientific writing, and his first novel, The Cuts that Cure, spent ten days as an Amazon #1 Best Seller. His second novel, The Bones of Amoret, will be released on April 1, 2022 through Stitched Smile Publishers. Arthur currently lives in New Orleans, with his wife Amy and their dogs.
connect with the author: website ~ twitter ~ facebook ~ goodreads
BONES OF AMORET Audiobook Tour Giveaway
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