Counting on Trust, Audio Book
by Mary Ferguson Powers
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GENRE: Mystery/Suspense
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BLURB:
In this suspense-charged, touching novel, Counting on Trust, information is stolen from a U.S. genetic engineering company (Omniprotein) by an employee promised payment by a Chinese general who wants to profit from selling the company’s technologies in the military region of China he commands.
• To force quick payment the thief attacks fellow employees and threatens to continue until his money arrives. Will his next targets be: young lovers, computer geek Gabriel and gorgeous biologist Selena, who are discovering loving sex while trying to overcome post-traumatic effects of Selena’s girlhood rape.
• Company president, Eleanor, who’s determined to keep some privacy and intimacy although her job’s high profile and her husband, Charley, has just had prostate cancer surgery.
• Venture capitalist, John, who plans to duplicate Omniprotein’s facility in China and reunite with his ex-wife, fashion designer Ziyi, who returned to Shanghai after their only child died.
The personal stories of these couples explore how privacy, intimacy and trust are changing in our social-media age. They paint a compelling portrait of our time.
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EXCERPT
Excerpt – Bad Day - https://www.facebook.com/countingontrust/videos/2207571426229974/
A Word With the Author
1. Did you always want to be an author?
I think yes, but I became really interested in writing novels during my academic career when I came to see it as a way to highlight important issues of our time in a fictional story format. I have been writing for over 15 years, since before my retirement from faculty life.
2. Tell us about the publication of your first book.
I published my first novel Each Unique and Fascinating in 2012. This takes place in the Pacific Northwest and involve themes of love and coming of age intermixed with eco-activism. The writing was fun, but when it came time to publish the book, there were so many things to learn about the publishing process and details to plan out. It was also a little scary, having your work out there and wondering how others would react to it. It was definitely an adventure! But I had a s lot of support from my husband and family, as well as great people who helped me through the publishing and marketing process. In the end, it was a very satisfying experience.
3. Besides yourself, who is your favorite author in the genre you write in?
Although my latest novel was nominally a thriller, it was really more about relatonships – as are my previous two books. In that sense, I would have to say my favorite author and biggest inspiration for writing is Jane Austen. I appreciate the way she deconstructed relationships and the social norms around relationships, romance and marriage in her day. She had the courage to interpret, critique and comment upon the British landed gentry in her time, especially as regards things such as the dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favorable social standing and economic security.
My latest book follows three couples of different ages and backgrounds, each struggling with issues of trust. I wanted to draw a good picture of how easily trust can be broken and how difficult it can be to restore that trust.
4. What's the best part of being an author? The worst?
The best part of being an author for me is creating the characters. Like many writers, my characters are built up from an amalgam of people I have known at different points in my life. I like to mix and match physical traits, personality, temperament, and behavioral quirks. Often I will exaggerate these a bit to provide more depth and interest for my readers. Then I like to give each character a backstory that provides a rationale for their behavior. Lastly, I decide how they would probably interact with each other based on all that, and make adjustments. I like to think of it as being a chef: you might have a recipe of sorts, but the real fun and creativity comes with experimenting and tweaking until it you get something that feels right.
The most difficult part of being an author for me is marketing and promoting a work. It requires a completely different mindset and always feels a little foreign to me But it is an important part of being an author these days.
5. What are you working on now?
I’m currently taking a break from my writing due to the recent, sudden death of my husband of 54 years. Before this happened, I had been sketching out a few ideas for the next book. But those will have to wait for a while.
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Themes of novels by M. Ferguson Powers reflect the author’s varied interests, including preservation of the natural world and its creatures;
Challenges of building and maintaining loving relationships in a culture with decreasing respect for personal boundaries and privacy
Influences of globalization on world events and how the U. S. and other nations relate to one another
Public policy issues such as controlling the military-industrial-political complex and requiring the health care industry to be more respectful of its clients
The need for cooperation across governments, cultures, and societies to address global challenges such as climate change
Developments in business and university administration and management
Powers has taught microbiology, headed a university office of research, served as executive director of two university-business partnership programs, and co-authored two books on university administration. She has a bachelor of science degree in bacteriology from The Pennsylvania State University, a master’s in experimental psychology from George Mason University, and a doctorate in educational leadership from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul.
She lives on an island near Seattle with husband David R. Powers and their two shelties. Her first novel, Each Unique and Fascinating, about a bullied young girl whose father has gone to war, was published in 2012. OrcaSpeak, a novel of relationships and suspense, was published in 2013, and its prequel, Counting on Trust, was published in 2017.
Website: http://www.mfergusonpowers.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Counting-on-Trust-452725141841646/
Buy Links for audio book:
https://bookmate.com/audiobooks/m9qwmqtu
https://libro.fm/audiobooks/9780985794668
https://www.downpour.com/counting-on-trust?sp=349165
https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/audiobook/counting-on-trust
https://www.hoopladigital.com/search?page=1&q=counting+on+trust&scope=everything&type=direct
https://www.audiobooks.com/audiobook/counting-on-trust/399403
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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION and RAFFLECOPTER CODE
A randomly drawn commenter via Rafflecopter will receive a digital and an audio copy of the book.
Thanks for hosting!
ReplyDeleteGreat cover!
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