New Publisher/Same Great Books

Posted on by thefensk

A few months ago my publisher announced they were winding down their business. Closing? It was definite.

My initial horror transitioned into survival as I pondered how I might respond. They expressed an intent to lessen those fears by nudging their full list of authors toward self-publishing. To that end I’ve recently parted amicably with them.

It’s a small publisher, more on a traditional model than vanity press or hybrid press. Basically that means our books have been professionally edited and formatted and have enjoyed good production values. And we are being given those excellent products to follow our own path in the publishing world. No worries here of shoddy “self-published” books.

So my books have been republished under my own imprint, but they’re the same books I published through the previous entity. This is why I say “new publisher, same great books” … because they are. The only differences are on the Title and copyright pages … with information updated to represent the new publisher: me!

If you are new to me and my books, these links might be helpful: https://linktr.ee/author_tfenske

I encourage you to check me out on Amazon (link contained above).

Need more food for thought? Try these tiny glimpses:

The Fever blends mystery, obsession, and high-stakes adventure into a taut tale where one man’s search for lost gold teeters on the edge of madness. The truth may be elusive, but gold fever never dies …

A Curse That Bites Deep plunges readers into a chilling tale of mystery centered on a deadly secret that refuses to stay buried. It’s a gripping sequel where the past has claws and it’s coming for full circle for our hero Sam Milton.

Lucky Strike is a tense, twist-filled thriller where every lead could be a breakthrough or a trap, centered around a world of vengeance and mystery where secrets run deep.

As Sam and Smidgeon search for a missing man they have never met, Penumbra explores the thin veil of sanity in a tale of suspense that leads readers into a realm where perception twists and truth is as elusive as the bruja magic that seeks to protect them.

Set against the backdrop of The Civil War, The Hag Rider blends historical fiction with a spine-tingling supernatural twist as a young soldier confronts the realities of war despite dealing with an otherworldly force that haunts him even as it protects him.

Harmon Creek is a gripping Southern noir that unearths the chilling consequences of a politically driven murder, where racial injustice simmers beneath the surface and those in power will do anything to keep their secrets buried.

AI? Insight or Plaything?

Posted on by thefensk

Image by jcomp on Freepik

Let’s start with plaything. I asked one engine to create a new author bio for me as if written by a paranoid schizophrenic.

Forgive me, but I like it! And so on point …

————

Thomas Fenske is not just an author—he is a shadow in the literary world, weaving coded messages into his novels that they don’t want you to read. He operates from an undisclosed location, possibly deep in the Texas wilderness, where he evades surveillance and continues his quest to expose the hidden truths buried in everyday life. His books, disguised as mystery and adventure fiction, are actually meticulously crafted blueprints for those who know how to decipher them.

Fenske’s works, including The Fever, A Curse That Bites Deep, and Lucky Strike, contain subtle warnings about forces beyond our control—messages encrypted within the prose for those wise enough to see beyond the words. He is known to communicate in ways that bypass traditional channels, using carefully placed anomalies in his text to reach those attuned to his wavelength.

Despite attempts to suppress his work, he continues writing, knowing that the truth must be revealed. He rarely appears in public, possibly due to the ever-watchful eyes of them—agents of the unseen order that monitors his every move. Some say he doesn’t sleep. Others claim he only writes in the dead of night, when the frequencies of control are at their weakest.

If you have found this bio, know that it is no accident. Read his books. Follow the clues. And most importantly—trust no one.

——-

Thomas Fenske is an author living in North Carolina USA but grew up in (and mostly writes about) Texas.

Latest Project: Time Travel?

Posted on by thefensk

Okay, it’s not really time travel. Or is it?

It’s more an excursion into resurrecting old technology, to wit, video tape cassettes. Ah, VHS, the technological marvel of the 1980s, then the standard we all lived by in the 1990s. An entire industry grew around this until it dissolved into relative obscurity in the new century, replaced by DVDs and later even Blu-Ray, both of which have now been displaced by digital streaming.

My wife and I have a daughter, now in her late 30s. She was a dancer. Well, she still is. But growing up in the 1990s, having a committed dance student tended to generate a LOT of video tapes. Figure eleven to twelve years of dance recitals. Then, a substantial number of years included annual performances in The Nutcracker. Then there were rehearsals, especially dress rehearsals. Oh, let me digress. The performances were professionally videotaped, but these tended to include the entire stage. Videotaping the rehearsals allows doting parents to focus on their child. Anyway, we were talking about volume. The Nutcracker company she performed with almost always had two casts giving two students a yearly shot at some of the primary roles. That means TWO videotapes per nutcracker year.

These things have been languishing on a shelf for years and I have recently been convinced to start converting these aging relics to a rather more stable storage medium. I bought a dvd recorder years ago with this very thing in mind. Procrastination took over and alas this was never done. Fast forward to last week and we (my darling bride and me) jointly decided that we shouldn’t put this off any longer because who knows how the heck long VHS tapes will continue to be viable.

Now, there are services that perform these actions for you. They are not cheap. Given the sheer volume, I relented on some of our more precious memories to give the service a try … the total cost for ten tapes approached $150. We probably have at least 40-50 other tapes and the kicker is, many of them are only partially used. Some likely have only a few minutes or 10-20 minute segments. We were pretty awful about marking and using up entire tapes. So I decided I would do most of them myself. For that same $150, I bought a refurbished combo unit from eBay. Luckily it came with a 1 year warranty. I say luckily because I immediately had to send it back because it didn’t work. Now, it’s been returned and I am happily dubbing tapes to disk.

This kind of brings us back to equipment. VHS has been pretty dead for about 20 years. I have an ancient machine that still works, although I hadn’t fired it up for at least that long. I don’t trust it. This is why I bought the other unit. I feel the same about the dvd recorder. It’s at least that old. I also had an old dvd player that’s probably 15 years old. I figured I need that if I want to copy the dvds I make, but I don’t 100% trust it so I just bought a used dvd player as a spare. I’m keeping my eye out for used vhs as well. They simply don’t make low end ones anymore, and the ones they do make are expensive — apparently there are hobbyists the same way there are vinyl record hobbyists. And to make copies you need a TV that works with them. I’m doing this work in my office and I actually use a tv for my computer monitor but it’s a new TV … it only has HDMI inputs. Luckily, I had a spare very small portable tv to use as a monitor. The two dvd recorders have HDMI outputs in addition to the older standards, so I can review on the bigger screen if I need to. There is something one has to remember through all of this: VHS is not the sort of high definition we are all used to these days. What you end up with is lower definition recorded on higher definition medium. Still, it’s tolerable.

Now, why am I dubbing to disk and not directly to digital? Well, for one thing, it works better. I had bought a setup a while back to do that … but it did a poor job of copying the files from the vcr. I found it worked much better from a dvd source. Night and day. It’s also a better archive medium. No one knows how long they’ll last but I’m betting quite a while.

These performance recordings are the easy ones. The VHS camera we bought to film our little darling used VHS-C, which is a smaller version of tape that needs a converter to play in a standard player. The camera has been well stored and seems in good condition so I’m using it as the player to transfer the tapes. We at some point received a mini-dv camera as well. Those tapes always needed to be converted which until now always seemed like such a pain. Well, it still is, but they’re going to dvd as well. We don’t have quite as many tapes because that was supplanted by iPhone recordings. I think that’s going to be another project entirely.

Anyway, this is where I am now, scrounging those little shoved aside yellow/red/white cables stuck in the back of drawers and in unmarked boxes, boxes where I still might also find some misplaced VHS-C or mini dv tape. I still have the two ancient vcr/dvr recorders set up as a reserve, but the newer unit seems to be working well now, and it still has most of its year warranty left.

I reasoned that this is very near what a time traveler has to deal with, fiddling with old technology, in my case relearning skills lost through disuse. And there are surprises. We found a tape we made using a borrowed full-sized VHS camera. One of the oldest tapes we have … 38 years. We hadn’t watched that in nearly that long … it brought tears to my eyes seeing our sweet 1 year old daughter her teen-aged brothers and my lovely darling bride.

Impacts

Posted on by thefensk

I created this graphic to promote my true-crime fiction HARMON CREEK. The story is written around a true event, the death of my wife Gretchen’s great uncle in 1930. Earl Swanger was a candidate for DA in a rural Texas county when he died mysteriously two weeks before the primary.

The death was officially declared an accident within 48 hours despite the three stab wounds found during the autopsy. He was found in his wrecked car near a bridge that crossed Harmon Creek.

Her family was devastated and always felt it was murder. The novel gives a fictional explanation for the events I uncovered through my research, as I attempt to answer the many unanswered questions that arose while reading the newspaper accounts

With the holidays approaching, I’m reminded of a bit of family history I read after the book was published. Gretchen found a family letter, written by Earl’s sister Pearl to Lily May Swanger, Earl’s widow. Pearl considered her sister-in-law to be her sister for the rest of their lives.

This letter was written Christmas Eve 1930, not six months after Earl’s death. Like most letters of the time, it’s full of chatty nuances about seasonal preparations and news of family members. But a few times she mentions the death.

Once, it’s to say she tries not to dwell on it and they shouldn’t mention it, evoking Depression-era stoicism. But she goes back to it again. A neighbor graciously lent her family a radio while the neighbor was out of town. She mentioned listening to a spiritualist’s radio show, and wishing she could contact him to ask him about Earl.

She then says something startling.

“I don’t think it was that woman at all, I think it was all political.”

In my research, one fact stood out. There was a woman mentioned, having at one point been in the car shortly before the ‘accident,’ but, she says, she got out to ride with another friend she realized was following them. Well, that was the first story. It changed two more times.

This woman is never mentioned by name, but one thing is obvious: she and her ‘friend’ were the last people to see Earl Swanger alive. Pearl’s little statement, validated my fictional premise, although in extension I figured the woman and man were players in the political intrigue that resulted in Earl’s death. That’s how I wrote it.

So this season, I’ll be thinking about Gretchen’s grandmother and great aunt’s continued grief during that 1930 Depression Christmas.

What really happened down by Harmon Creek? Read the book.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B2JQ96N5

94 Years Ago Today

Posted on by thefensk

On July 9, 1930, an apparent one-car accident resulted in the death of a local attorney in Walker County, Texas. 

At the time of his death, Earl ‘Buddie’ Swanger was a candidate for district attorney in the upcoming primary election. His death was officially declared an accident within forty-eight hours, despite the medical examiner’s mention of stab wounds and reports of the mysterious involvement of a woman and man, both unnamed. The woman had apparently accompanied Swanger as he traveled to a campaign event. The woman admitted she had been a passenger in his car because she needed a ride. According to her first statement, she requested Swanger stop and let her out when she became aware her original ride was following them, but her story changed several times. Later statements involved alcohol and accusations of impropriety.

Swanger’s body was discovered in his car, which had rolled down an embankment on the approach to the new bridge spanning Harmon. Creek. This bridge was still under construction and stood adjacent to the old bridge. The local sheriff theorized the ‘stab wounds’ were the result of protruding nails from a smashed railing. The medical examiner begrudgingly changed his determination of murder under protest.

Although this candidate’s death generated a lot of statewide news interest, and the state dispatched a Texas Ranger to investigate, the woman and man were never named, and their changing stories were never fully corroborated. The news story lingered for a couple of weeks, then died just as surely as poor Earl Swanger had died on that steamy July night. 

Earl Swanger was my wife’s great-uncle and this story never left his family’s memory. Earl Swanger doted on his wife and was a chaste and sober man in all respects. Family letters confirm this. The presence of the woman in his car was out of character for him so there must have been some seemingly innocent explanation. Family letters also point to political intrigue and the family had no qualms about calling this a murder. It was 1930 and there is no reason to doubt the local political machine was corrupt and this was what had prompted Earl to run for office. But people in this time also didn’t push back as much as they do now. Life went on, with or without justice.

My novel HARMON CREEK takes a new look at this incident, creating a fictional backdrop to explain many of the questions that arose in my mind while researching the news accounts of the day. My fictional premise revolves around motive: I think the murder was likely an incidental result of a different plan entirely, a plan that went very wrong. In this fictional account, the corrupt incumbent, intent on holding onto his personally lucrative office, sought to subtly discredit his opponent with an illusion of impropriety, recruiting a small-time petty crook to do just that, lured with the promise of deferred prosecution. 

But these things are never quite as simple as they seem and after the woman managed to get into Swanger’s car using some ruse, something went wrong. Prostitutes of the time were often armed with ice picks. They were small and light, easily concealed, and easy to use. The DA’s coercion was a strong motivator, so fear of failure would have been enough motivation for her to panic and then threaten Earl to keep driving, then to lash out at him when he balked. This certainly would have caused Earl to swerve and stop. Her boyfriend, part of the conspiracy and following closely behind, would have stopped as well and it is easy to assume a confrontation ensued. Of course, it did not end well for poor Earl Swanger, leaving these two with one more problem: What do they do now?

Stage a wreck and then drive off, of course

The thing about conspiracies is the fact that what the planners want most of all is to cover their tracks. Complications must be dealt with. The actors are criminals after all, and more crimes are the most expedient solution to criminals, especially regarding loose ends. And they didn’t even know about the eyewitness. Yes, there was an eyewitness, Claude, a local black man, who was a recent client of attorney Swanger. When the two murderers drive off Claude rushes to aid the mortally wounded Swanger.

Before he dies, Swanger implores Claude to protect his wife, and to keep quiet about what he saw, because he’ll be blamed for the death if he comes forward with what he saw. 

This is where the story in HARMON CREEK really takes off: the death of Earl ‘Buddie’ Swanger was a catalyst for what was to follow. True crime or crime fiction? How about a little of both?

HARMON CREEK is available in all eBook formats and is also available in paperback. Look for it on Amazon or you can get your favorite bookstore to order it.

https://books2read.com/u/mYQPdw

Cleo

Posted on by thefensk

We lost a beloved pet friend, Daisy, on January 28. We woke up and she was stretched out on the living room floor. We were devastated and were resolved to skip getting another dog for a few months.

Daisy

Dog grief is a strange thing. We couldn’t resist checking several shelter websites by Jan 31. Daisy had been a hard luck rescue and we felt the best way to honor her memory was to pursue another hard luck rescue. On Feb 1 we saw this picture.

Cleo at the shelter

This poor baby looked so lost and forlorn we knew we had to meet her so down we went to the shelter. But we couldn’t meet her. When she was picked up as a stray they found out she was seriously injured. When we arrived she was still in recovery from her injuries, the worse of which was a large deep bite wound just below her ear. It was so deep at first they thought she’d been shot! The bite had fractured some bones in her jaw and they didn’t know if she’d be able to eat. If she couldn’t eat the prognosis was euthanasia. She ate.

We couldn’t go to the shelter on February 2 due to some medical appointments so we called. They said she was still in isolation but she was doing well and would be available for us to meet on the 3rd and to come on down.

We got there when they opened and they brought her out. She’d still been in the medical wing. The technician carried her and put her down, then she looked up at us and rolled over for us to rub her tummy. We were hooked.

She’d recently had puppies and she had an additional bulge in her lower abdomen. The shelter spays or neuters all dogs & cats but she had to wait two weeks until her bite wounds healed to be spayed but we took her home as a “foster-to-adopt” which theoretically would change after the spay was complete.

The first photo I took of Cleo

Veterinarians volunteer on a rotational basis and the first and second spay appointments were successively postponed because the vets knew this was no routine surgery and not enough time had been set aside the first two times: they determined she had two inguinal hernias.

When that surgery was complete, they decided they needed to address her other serious health issues, determined by pre-surgical examination. She had serious dental issues and she was heart worm positive.

After a two week recovery from her surgery, she went in for what turned out to be NINE extractions. They also determined that she had already lost ten teeth. Good thing dogs have 42!

She recovered from that and is eating very well. She’s been on an antibiotic protocol that is a prelude to getting the multi-shot heart worm protocol that begins at the end of this month.

Through all of this, she’s been a trooper and is an absolute joy. You wish they could tell you their stories. She’s 100% genetically a beagle, although her dapple patterns mean that somewhere way down the line some ancestor acquired the merle gene. That means that dog breed purists don’t consider dogs like her, pretty as they are, to be ‘pure’ Beagles.

What we think: she was used as a hunting dog breeder (Beagles are used a lot in NC hunting) and the hernias were a result of her latest pregnancy (or multiple pregnancies). We think she was abused because she still shies away when you reach down to pet her head. Her dental issues are probably a result of long term confinement … it’s called cage-biter syndrome. All conjecture. Our theory is that the previous owners well knew she’d developed the hernias and abandoned her as soon as her puppies were weaned. An alternate theory is that she was abandoned or escaped before she gave birth and she was injured trying to save her pups. No puppies were found with her. She’s still officially a foster-to-adopt until the heart worm treatments are complete.

There is no way of knowing her truth, but that’s all behind her and we love her.

Long Time No Here

Posted on by thefensk

Sorry to have been so quiet for so long. As I like to say, Life Intervenes. I’m in the process of getting back on track and plan on posting with more regularity.

I’d still like to invite you to check out my books at tfenske.com, eBooks are now available for Nook, Kobo, and at a lot of other sites. Sadly, they are no longer available for Kindle Unlimited. That’s a long story so perhaps I’ll share it sometime. Paperbacks are only available through Amazon. Not as long a story but still somewhat sad since many people don’t like to shop from them, but alas, that’s where my publisher is focused right now.

I’m also in the process of transferring an existing domain here. My old web service provider basically doubled their price, but the domain was updated in January and I kind of like that domain. My social media mogul of a daughter had convinced me to come up with the more professional domain I mentioned above, so the web page was redundant. But this blog still had the same old WordPress address, so hopefully all will go well and soon this will have it’s own address. The process was deceptively simple, so I’m sure I screwed it up somehow.

This heads us back to the “life intervenes” statement I made starting this post.

img_9761

While on that subject, meet Cleo, the latest addition to our clan. She’s a rescue, dog from unknown origins, a stray picked up in Burlington NC seriously injured on January 31. She had several bad bites, including one that left a hole in her neck that they at first thought might have been a gunshot wound. We took her on as a foster-to-adopt and trust me on this: she is one of the sweetest dogs ever.

She still has some problems to overcome though. During the setup to be spayed, they found she had two inguinal hernias and also needed serious dental work and she was heartworm positive. She’s currently recovering from her surgery, hence the donut (she just looks thrilled, doesn’t she?). Dental work scheduled for next week. She’s already started the heartworm regimen. The shelter is handling all of this. Hopefully, after that, her 2024 will start looking up.

She had obviously recently nursed puppies, so we assumed the hernias were caused by pregnancies, perhaps several. She’s a beagle with marvelous ‘blue tick” merle patterns that indicate a cross to achieve that look. We suspect she might have been in a puppy mill of some sort, possibly trying to get pups with that same pattern. My theory is that they knew about the hernias and she was put out rather than deal with them. Then again, she’s pretty smart and quite adept at detecting weaknesses in an enclosure. Ten minutes at the dog park snd she had already found three spots along the fence line that showed weakness.

So, anyway, that life intervened stuff can be good.

Adios to a Friend

Posted on by thefensk

I said goodbye to Gypsy this morning. She was fourteen and was always a loyal and loving companion. She was an awesome cat.

We rescued her along with four siblings from one of our out buildings in 2008. We gave away three and kept Gypsy and her litter brother, Dobie.

She was a feisty kitten. We’d feed all five all at once and she was always first to the feast where she’d lay claim to “her” pile of food, straddling it and hissing and spitting; it was hilarious.

She’s been an exemplary cat , very opinionated and headstrong. Example, when she was still a kitten I found her sleeping among the branches of the Christmas tree.

She loved her naps and spent a lot of time snuggling with me.

Most of all I’m going to miss her kisses. That’s right. Miss Gypsy (as I often called her) absolutely loved to give me kisses, right on the lips.

Adios, my sweet girl, I’m already missing you.

Thomas Fenske is an author living in North Carolina. https://tfenske.com