Hidden Sea, by Miles Arceneaux, EXCERPT - Lone Star Book Blog Tour
HIDDEN SEA
by
MILES ARCENEAUX
Genre: Mystery / Thriller / Suspense
Date of Publication: November 2017
Number of Pages: 384
Scroll down for giveaway!
Charlie Sweetwater saw Mexico—especially the Mexican Gulf Coast—as a spiritual second home. He’d worked, played and lived there for much of his life, and thought the country suited him better than anywhere this side of his home on the Texas Coast.Charlie figures Augie just went off the grid to do some well-deserved fishing, surfing and beer-drinking at the end of his trip. He’d done the same in his time. But as Augie’s unexplained absence grows, Charlie and Raul become increasingly alarmed and set off for Mexico to bring their boy home.
What they unearth is far more than the sum of their fears. The familiar and friendly Gulf of Mexico has turned into a hidden sea plagued by smugglers, human traffickers, crooked politicians and even pirates. And Augie is lost somewhere in the middle of it all.
Charlie and Raul must summon an unlikely cast of characters to aid them, including a hilariously dissolute ex-pat musician, a priest whose faith struggles against the rising tide of refugee migration, a Mexican tycoon who may have secrets of his own and a beautiful maritime “repo man”. At the end of their quest, as the deepest secret of all is revealed, Charlie Sweetwater learns that neither Raul and Augie, nor the Gulf of Mexico, nor even himself, will ever be the same again.
Praise for Hidden Sea:
“A riveting story from Texas that wanders down the cartel-invested Gulf Coast of Mexico and drifts across to lawless Cuba. The characters are as salty as the sea and the plot pulls you along as powerfully as the loop current.W.F. Strong, Stories from Texas, Texas Standard Radio Network
“Hidden Sea is a total blast: smart, funny, and riveting, with unforgettably colorful characters and a world so alive that you’ll swear you’re really there.”
Lou Berney, Edgar Award-winning author of The Long and Faraway Gone
“In Hidden Sea, Miles Arceneaux tosses us in the drink of a timely contemporary adventure tale with the Sweetwater clan, complete with pirates, slave ships, family secrets, and the mother of all plot twists, in his patented Gulf Coast noir style.”
Michelle Newby Lancaster, Contributing Editor, Lone Star Literary Life, NBCC Literary Critic
EXCERPT FROM HIDDEN SEA, CH. 15
By Miles Arceneaux
Charlie woke to the sound of waves breaking on the Playa de Chachalacas. He threw off the damp sheet and inhaled the pungent smell of the tropics: salt water, rotting seaweed, mildew, and something sweet. Frangipani maybe? He’d read that the Aztecs made potions from the flower to protect their warriors against lethargy, but Charlie never felt the need to try it. He believed a little lethargy was good for a man, even for a warrior.
He put his hands behind his head and watched the ceiling fan spin lazily from the ceiling, pondering whether or not to take a run on the beach before he showered. Maybe another time, he decided. He swung his feet onto the tile floor and went to the bathroom to run the shower. The hot water worked, but not the cold, and soon the entire room was filled with steam. His little beachfront motel might not have A/C or a television, but it was damn sure proud of its hot water. Hand-painted across the building façade in four-foot letters was Hotel Yoli - Con Agua Caliente!
Charlie checked his cell phone—still no coverage—and then he dressed and walked outside in search of breakfast, choosing an open-air restaurant with a nice view of the beach. While he sipped the strong black coffee and waited for the bowl of fresh ceviche he had ordered (the waiter said the fish had been caught that very hour), he watched the little town slowly come to life. A few delivery trucks rolled down the stone street, creaking under their loads. Roosters crowed and a solitary bell clanged away in the church tower. A lechero and his donkey clopped by with cans of fresh milk, followed by a knife-sharpener who announced his approach with a high-pitched whistle.
Beachside, a man planted umbrellas in the sand and put out lounge chairs for tourists who might or might not show up that day. A vendor pedaled by on a covered three-wheeled cart piled high with sunhats, plastic buckets, floats, and cheap sunglasses. At the RÃo Actopan delta, local fishermen cast their throw nets into the river current.
Chachalacas was like a hundred other villages along the Mexican Gulf Coast—part of the Mexico Charlie remembered and romanticized. It was the Mexico of his youth: peaceful, humble, relatively unspoiled, but also dirt poor and somewhat shabby. So far, the area hadn’t been overrun with planned communities and all-inclusive resorts. He hoped it never would.
Although it pissed Raul off to no end, Charlie had done his best to ensure that Augie appreciated the Mexican Gulf Coast’s funkiness, too, and he still harbored the faint hope that Augie might be holed up in one of these tiny off-the-grid beach towns with a beautiful woman—eating, drinking, fucking . . . completely oblivious to time and the outside world. Charlie had gone down that carnal rabbit hole before—usually in Mexico and mostly when he was around the same age as Augie—but of course he didn’t have parents fretting over him back home like Augie did. Even if the kid had been cavorting with a pack of Mexican TV weather girls, he would’ve found a way to call home by now.
The thought roused Charlie to finish his breakfast as quickly as he could so he could hit the road. He still had a job to do and he promised himself not to forget it as he drove his car to Roy Lee Rowlett’s wanton pleasure palace in Villa Rica…
“Miles Arceneaux” is the pen name of three long-time Texas friends. James R. Dennis is a former attorney turned Dominican friar who lives in San Antonio. Brent Douglass is an international businessman from Austin. John T. Davis, also of Austin, is a journalist and author. Together, as “Miles,” they have been featured authors at the Texas Book Festival, the San Antonio Book Festival, and the Lubbock Book Festival.
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GIVEAWAY! GIVEAWAY! GIVEAWAY!
Grand Prize: Autographed copies of all five Gulf Coast series books by Miles Arceneaux + a copy of Geoff Winningham's Traveling the Shore of the Spanish Sea -- The Gulf Coast of Texas and Mexico
Two Runners-Up: Each win an autographed copy of Hidden Sea
October 11-October 20, 2017
U.S. Only
10/11
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promo
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10/12
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Review
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10/12
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ICYWW #1
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10/13
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Review
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10/14
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Excerpt 1
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Author Interview
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Guest Post
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ICYWW #2
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Excerpt 2
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Playlist
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Review
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ICYWW #3
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