Chanticleer Book Reviews

Author: harvey-a-schwartz

  • SPOTLIGHT on GLOBAL THRILLERS High-Stakes Thriller, Chillers, multiple Killers – CIBA Thriller Books, Book Awards, Best Thriller Books

    SPOTLIGHT on GLOBAL THRILLERS High-Stakes Thriller, Chillers, multiple Killers – CIBA Thriller Books, Book Awards, Best Thriller Books

    It’s come down to this…

    You’re good at deadlines… cutting the right wire under pressure is nothing. You can take down dozens of bad guys with just your wit and some duct tape.

    You can certainly make this deadline!

     

     

    Our new deadline for the 2020 (only) in the  CIBA GLOBAL THRILLER  Awards is October 31, 2020, at 11:59 p.m.

    (*Beware, my friends, for the Global Thriller Awards deadline next year will be one month earlier ~ September 30, 2021! …tick, tick, tick!)

    ENTER TODAY!

    Avanti Centrae pulled the trigger just in time and brought home the CIBA 2019 GRAND PRIZE in GLOBAL THRILLERS Book Awards for SOLSTICE SHADOWS – A VanOps Thriller!

     

     

    The First in Category Winners for The 2019 Global Thrillers are: 

     

    • Randall Krzak for Carnage in Singapore
    • Courtney Leigh Pahlke for Life Force Preserve
    • Jett Ward for Execute Order
    • Nicole Mabry for Past This Point
    • Avanti Centrae for VanOps: The Solstice Shadows
    • Joanne Jaytanie for Salvaging Truth, Hunters & Seekers, Book 1

     

     

     

     

    In 2018, Michael Pronko won the Global Thriller Awards with The Moving Blade.

     

     

    The 2018 Global Thrillers First in Category Winners are:

     

    • Magenta is Missing by Richard Garis
    • Dangerous Alliance by Randall Krzak
    • The War Beneath by Timothy S. Johnston
    • The Sunken Forest by R. Barber Anderson
    • Never Again by Harvey A. Schwartz   
    • Beyond Control by  Lawrence Verigin

     

     

     

    Sara Stamey took home the Grand Prize in 2017 for The Ariadne Connection

     

    The First in Category Winners for 2017: 

     

     

     

    Here are some winners that came before: 

    From the 2016 CLUE Awards:

     

    From the 2015 CLUE Awards:

    • Blended Genre: Timothy S. Johnston – The Tanner Sequence: The Furnace, The Freezer, The Void
    • Espionage/Spy: Michele Daniel – The Red Circle

    We also had Cybertech Thrillers and Political Thrillers such as John Trudel’s Raven’s Resurrection and the Raven’s Series.

    Here’s your assignment, if you choose to accept it…

     

    Submit your Thrillers in the following categories by October 31, 2020,  for a chance to bring home a First in Category WIN the 2020 CIBAs in Global Thrillers – or a Grand Prize – or maybe even the Overall Grand Prize! 

                • Historic
                • LabLit
                • Science Fiction
                • Dramatic
                • Action/Adventure
                • CyberTech

    If you never enter, you’ll never know!  

    Follow this link and enter today! 

    Tick Tock…

    (For light-hearted, cozy, or classic Mystery and Suspense entries see our Mystery & Mayhem Awards and for Thriller/Suspense/Hardboiled-Detective series, please see the CLUE Awards)

    Don’t delay! Enter today!

  • NEVER AGAIN by Harvey A. Schwartz – Alternative History, Terrorism Thriller, Historical Thriller

    NEVER AGAIN by Harvey A. Schwartz – Alternative History, Terrorism Thriller, Historical Thriller

       

      Given recent world events (from COVID-19 to the murder of Floyd George and the subsequent civilian marches, even the boomeranging price of oil), Schwartz’s tale of Holocaust II is far, far too believable to be a work of fiction.

      Imagine Tel Aviv being virtually obliterated by an atomic bomb; imagine one woman—a former NYC TV journalist—as the last one standing with three atomic bombs of her own  – complete with the codes and crew to use them in the Negev Desert; imagine deciding to send one of those WMDs to obliterate Damascus. Imagine saving one of those bombs to fight another day: even if that fight happens to be in the USA.

      Welcome to Israeli minster Debra Reuben’s evaporating world. Soon joining her on this incredible journey is Israeli Navy officer Chaim Levi who happens upon a luxury yacht in Spain –  only to have it become the means of transport across the Atlantic to Massachusetts once he makes acquaintance with Reuben—the remaining bomb safely stowed on board.

      Once stateside, it’s a matter of what to do with the radiation-oozing device. Fortunately, there are many in the Jewish community ready to help, from civil rights lawyer Ben Schapiro (also a sailplane—upscale glider—enthusiast), militant activist Abram Goldhersh and his pacifist wife, Sarah. Together, they set their minds against the president of the United States (Lawrence Quaid) and his somewhat estranged, more sympathetic spouse, Catherine. With more people arriving to join the cause, gather to join a huge protest march slated in front of the Washington Monument. But Quaid and his hawks soon decide to send over 400,000 Jews (mostly Americans—all declared “enemy combatants”) to 21st-century concentration camps.

      Schwartz’s inventive fiction feels as if it’s been ripped from today’s headlines. When this review was first penned, the Toronto Star’s front page shouted this: “Trump Threatens to Use Military Force.” We all know what happened next. Never Again might be too close for comfort for some, but others may find the story cathartic. The writing, itself, is strong and well-balanced with more than a few end-of-chapter cliffhangers. Schwartz’s novel is well worth a read—especially now as his fictional vision slips closer and closer to fact.

      Never Again won 1st in Category in the CIBA 2018 Global Thriller Book Awards.