Deal Sharing Aunt: Muffin Man by Stephan Collina Guest Post and Review

Publisher: Analytical Media, Inc. (October 1, 2013)
ISBN-13: 978-1480078062
Category: Political Thriller
Tour Dates: March, 2014
Available in: Print & ebook, 368 pages

The President’s wife has a premonition, setting in motion a transatlantic story of love, sex and betrayal.

Set against a backdrop of drug dealing, covert political manipulation and murder the Muffin Man is an authentic and atmospheric tale from the 1970s. Based on real events, the story begins with a premonition that leads to the formation of a secretive political organisation. The plot unfolds in twists and turns through the ordinary lives of innocents who are sucked into an accelerating and dangerous vortex of drug dealing, assassination and murder.

A former high-flying US Army Colonel, his alienated daughter, an accidental drug dealer, his beautiful but manipulative girlfriend and a corrupt police inspector all become sucked into the secretive organisation, initiating a succession of assassinations. Rewards lead to arrogance and an early death, or do they?

The “Muffin Man” motion picture is under development by Analytical Media. The scripting is now complete so expect further announcements soon.

Praise for Muffin Man:

“The Muffin Man is an authentic and atmospheric tale from the 1970s, mostly set in the UK and the east coast of the USA. The tale begins with a premonition that leads to the formation of a secretive political organisation, but the story unfolds in twists and turns through the ordinary lives of innocents who are sucked into an accelerating and dangerous vortex of drug dealing, assassination and murder that leads up to the present day. Solid writing and interesting plot. Good characters, dialogue and pacing. Worth a read.”-James A. Anderson, Author of DEADLINE, and The Scorpion

“I really liked the era the book was set in and enjoyed discovering the personalities behind various characters. My favourite was the inspector.”-Amazon Reviewer

“The novel is a complex story about the damaging effects of war on an individual and his family. One of the main characters `Ed’ has demons to wrestle with and this alienates him from his daughter `Anne’, who ends up running away and unknowingly working for her dad’s secretive organisation. There are several complex relationships throughout the novel, which all gravitate around drugs, sex, politics and cross between countries over time. My favourite character was David as he was likeable and reminded me of similar people I have met in my own life. I can only hope that their private lives are as intriguing and complex. All of the main protagonists were believable and were well developed. The story bounced back and forth between the UK and the US and there was sufficient twists and turns to keep you turning the pages. I particularly liked the ending and certainly didn’t guess it until the last few pages. I would recommend this book to readers who enjoy political themes, complex relationships between characters and twists and turns. I would certainly consider reading more books by this author.”-Lisa C., Amazon Reviewer

About Stephan Collina:

Stephan Collina grew up in the 1970s: a troubled time of recession, poverty, industrial disruption, political tension and terrorism. But for younger people, it was also a post-1960s wide-flared, drug-enhanced and extravagant-haired innocence.

Stephan later became a prominent businessman, acquainted with a number of high-ranking politicians. Stephen ran international technology businesses, spending a great deal of time in the USA and various European and African countries.

The Muffin Man grew from a combination of these unique experiences: his early knowledge of the sometime innocent business of drug dealing (although he never inhaled), and of the much dirtier businesses of covert political and military action, and of international business practices.

Stephan’s first novel explored the nefarious and complicated emotional and sexual relationships of a remote village in Wales, where he had spent his early years.

Stephan holds a degree in Philosophy. He is also a qualified commercial ship’s captain. He now lives quietly by the sea, and concentrates on his writing and related filmmaking activities.

Website: http://www.stephancollina.com/muffinman.html

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stephan.collinaTwitter: https://twitter.com/stephan_collina

MUFFIN MAN

Why did I write this novel?

There were two main strands to my preliminary thinking and preparation: firstly a desire to write a conspiracy novel and secondly, a wish to write one that grew or rather emerged from the characters rather than being event-driven.

To the first point, my preparations began with a feeling that the American counter-intelligence services must have known of the 9/11 attacks in advance, even if they knew few details. They must therefore have knowingly acquiesced, certain that it would help them to introduce the world to a new bugbear to replace the Soviet Union – terrorism in general and Al Qaeda in particular – one that would go on to justify a vast increase in their surveillance capabilities and expenditure.

This feeling was augmented by the (second-hand) knowledge that vast sums of money are routinely spent by the counter-intelligence services without detailed supervision, and that such monies have been available to protect America’s perceived Middle Eastern (oil) interests for many years. The Americans would have war-gamed various related scenarios repeatedly. Indeed the notion that the Americans would not have war-gamed this scenario as long ago as the 1960s (and concluded that covert action is required) is itself ridiculous. Such covert action would have to be international and hidden from Congressional review. Thus was established the essential theme of the novel.

As mentioned above the second aspect of the novel’s creation began with my desire to avoid the ‘Dan Brown’ style of storytelling, which I have never liked: thin or shallow characters about whom I cared little, driven by complex revelations and a rapidly escalating series of events. We all know that style is popular but it leaves me cold, unconcerned because of the lack of depth to the characters.

Hence I decided to write a novel about the people involved in the formation and establishment of such a secretive organization, describing what their ordinary and less-ordinary lives must be like or have been like and what led them to become involved. Starting from this viewpoint meant that the story and the depth of the hidden conspiracy would have to emerge from the smaller stories of their individual lives, rather than from a carefully choreographed plot. This established the essential form of the novel.

At the same time, I wanted to introduce some twists and turns, as is expected of the genre. Hence a sudden death has unforeseen long-term consequences, and the revelation of the true timeline is left to the end. The ending also leads towards a sequel that is already planned, one that adopts a more traditional approach for a thriller - showing in detail what those characters outlined in this first story subsequently did or must have done to protect their masters’ interests.

There was a final strand to the creation of the story: I also wanted to write about the drug culture of the 1970s and to use some of the scenes and characters I encountered at the time. This worked well as a background for the story, with the drug-dealers being blackmailed into joining the organization because of their activities, and fitted well with the desired twist at the end, which came to me early on in the actual writing process.

Once the initial research into locations and organizations was completed, the actual writing took a further two years to complete.

Buy Muffin Man:

Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk

My Review:

This was a good book that is being made into a movie. It might have been better if the author wrote it as a series. I say this because there was a lot of good stuff going on that did not get enough room. There seemed to be some plot information that was skipped over, and we got snippets instead. I applaud the author for his use of big words, but not everyone walks around with a dictionary, and I would recommend using more common words. This was based on real events and maybe the missing information is unknown, and the people involved really talked like this. I felt as though the author did a great job with Anne. I felt bad for her and am sure that there are many more children with parents that have ptsd. I also found it ironic that she ending up working for the same people as her dad, when in reality that is the life she was determined to run away from. I did enjoy this book, and will read more from this author. I am giving this book a 3/5. I was given a copy to review, however all opinions are my own.

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