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A Thousand Bridges

"An amazing fore-shadowing of today's current political climate!"

A Thousand Bridges was released to critical acclaim in 1992 by Walker Books, NYC. In a hardbound edition, it received a coveted Starred Review in Publishers Weekly, who also chose the book as one of their Top Ten First Fiction of the Year.
     Fantastic reviews followed in publications like Kirkus Reviews, The San Francisco Chronicle and The St. Petersburg Times, among others. The Library Journal chose it as one of their top First Novels in the October 1992 issue, which had the effect of delivering  A Thousand Bridges to public libraries all across America. The Associated Press sent a lengthy review out on its news wires titled A Thousand Bridges Bats 1,000.
     Then, the division of Walker Books that released the novel folded. Times change.
     But this novel is as vital now as it was when it was first released. Kiki Olsen, a reviewer from Philadelphia, PA, wrote in a review published in the St. Petersburg Times Sunday edition, September 27th, 1992, that it was " an astoundingly articulate novel set in Florida..."
     She says of McDonald Clay, the protagonist,  "Mac is a supremely engaging hero. He is brave, honest, bold and begrudgingly romantic....The all-but-impossible mission McKinney sketched out for him is packed with action, desire, suspense and mystery.
     McKinney does a sensational job of putting his ‘it could happen here' story together, and much of his art lies in the economy of words. He is succinct and precise in moving the action and emotions, making it unnecessary for readers to slog through dreary, unnecessary descriptions."

 

 

 Available now on Kindle at http://www.amazon.com/A-Thousand-Bridges-ebook/dp/B0061YAU5Y

iTunes at http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/a-thousand-bridges/id475526637?mt=11

Sony at  http://ebookstore.sony.com/ebook/michael-mckinney/a-thousand-bridges/_/R-400000000000000529707

Barnes and Noble at  http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-thousand-bridges-michael-mckinney/1013957032

Now, a writer's blog at http://writinginbedsleepinginthechair.blogspot.com/

 

CHAPTER ONE

It was too damned hot to work, so Sheevers and I had sat on the sofa, close but not touching. She had been drinking from a large glass of iced tea, making little movements with her wrist that caused the ice cubes to swirl and tinkle, then opened the first two buttons on her blouse and rubbed the moist glass across her chest. I remember she handed it to me and when I put my lips on the rim I could taste her perfume. I made a face and she laughed, lifted the glass from my fingers, and stood up.
     "I'll get us a refill," she said, and I watched her until she disappeared through the doorway to the small kitchen.
     The morning paper lay unopened on the coffee table and I leaned forward with a groan, lifted it, and fell back against the cushions. We'd had a long night, partly working but mostly celebrating. Patty Sheevers was my new silent partner in the private investigations business I'd been building for almost three years in Palmetto Bay, Florida. It would still be called McDonald Clay Investigations, but now we were together at work as well as at home. She thought the two of us would be like the Thin Man, and I was beginning to believe it, too.
     A breeze slipped through the screen door as I unfolded my newspaper, and a cloud obscured the sun. The air felt cooler and I wished for rain. I heard Sheevers singing in the other room. The headlines told, for a second straight day, about a recent multiple murder at a local swimming hole. The press and police were calling it the Limestone Creek Murders.
     "Something's not right here," I said, looking at the color photograph of the scene. Sheevers sat on the coffee table, folded the paper down, and looked at the picture, grinning.
     "How can you say that?" she asked. "It looks like an ordinary murder to me."