About the Book:
When a homeless war veteran is beaten to death by the police, stormy protests ensue, engulfing a small New Jersey town. Soon after, three cops are gunned down. A multi-state manhunt is underway for a cop killer on the loose. And Dr. Tessa Thorpe, a veteran's counselor, is caught up in the chase. Donald Darfield, an African-American Iraqi war vet, war-time buddy of the beaten man, and one of Tessa's patients, is holed up in a mountain cabin. Tessa, acting on instinct, sets off to find him, but the swarm of law enforcement officers get there first, leading to Darfield's dramatic capture. Now, the only people separating him from the lethal needle of state justice are Tessa and ageing blind lawyer, Nathaniel Bodine. Can they untangle the web tightening around Darfield in time, when the press and the justice system are baying for revenge? Justice Gone is the first in a series of psychological thrillers involving Dr Tessa Thorpe, wrapped in the divisive issues of modern American society including police brutality and disenfranchised returning war veterans.
Book Links:Goodreads * AmazonWho is Big Brother, really
Although much of the buzz has dissipated, there had been a lot of heated discussion concerning the government spying on its citizens as well as others around the world. Do we really have anything to fear (assuming of course we're innocent of anything illegal)?
In my opinion, (and you know what that's like if you've read my Opinions [link] post, the concerns are rather negligible for us ordinary slobs. But for high profile figures, there could be the potential for blackmail, a dangerous situation for politicians and policy makers. In that scenario, the democratic process risks being compromised. J. Edgar Hoover was infamous for this manner of wielding power, but he did not have today's technology available to him, and so his scope and reach were limited. Trump advocates are already accusing the media of these spy tactics in the campaign to undermine him, although it could be argued that sophisticated methods are not really necessary to make him look bad when his own mouth frequently receives his foot. But we're getting off track here - I have no wish to get into partisan politics.
So far, the government does not appear to be using this control over the commonplace Jane and Joe. We can rationalize to ourselves that it is unable to do so, because it's a bloated bureaucracy and the masses are so overwhelming as to make the idea untenable. Besides, the government has other means of control, not just laws, but influencing our minds through the media. " "Yes, Virginia, there is a government controlled media."
But the government's battle for our minds pales in comparison to the overbearing force that assaults us every day by the sales strategists of today's merchants. Through insidious stealthy algorithms, they track our every move in cyberspace, and have been doing so for a decade or more, keeping us in the unrelenting grip of commerce and consumerism. And since I am mainly addressing the bookworld, I will take some examples from therein.
How many of us get those Amazon emails that explain themselves with the line "Based on your recent activity, we thought you might be interested in this…" What is even scarier for me are all those books in the list by Anthony Bourdain, which causes me to ask, "Was I drunk? I don't remember browsing cookbooks."
How about those sidebar adverts from Barnes and Noble on your Yahoo email page, with a parade of books distracting you as you peruse your messages? As an author who frequently checks my book links on vendor sites, which instigates those particular books to appear, imagine my pleasure as I see my own books marching across the screen, secretly wishing everyone could see them. But alas, they are for my eyes only. Someone else will get a different procession of titles gliding past them based on what they had looked at. It reminds me of that film, Minority Report, where the bill boards recognize you by your eyes and display custom-tailored advertisements.
But it's not only the big firms who are stalking you. As a groundwater geologist, I had to procure equipment for my trade, obliging me to surf the web, and for months I had ads for resistivity meters and water level indicators from small esoteric companies popping up everywhere on diverse websites, harassing me like panhandlers who just wouldn't leave me alone unless I coughed up and clicked on them.
So really, who IS Big Brother?
The other feature of annoyance is repetition. How many times and in how many places do we have to be reminded of the latest film or book? Or when watching television, seeing the same commercials for a cell phone or brand of toothpaste, playing ad nauseam every 15 minutes.
And then the scary part - when the cyber entities gang up on you, the latest being collusion with your email accounts. I get emails from Yahoo with the subject " Nicholas, check out your most Personalized coupons, and in the body of the message, Top Deals Picked Just for You! On Gmail, as a header above my Inbox, there is Promotions, with a list of those beseeching my investment.
So who is to blame for this aggressive, in-your-face solicitation?
We are.
That's right. And although we can get annoyed and complain, companies still spend millions upon millions of dollars to employ such campaigns. The reason for them to do so is simple - it works!
The assumption these Big Brothers make, that we are empty headed, hedonistic consumers, can't be true. Or is it?
So beware, now that I'm marketing my new novel, you just might find Justice Gone springing out at you everywhere you go on the Web, demanding "Buy me, buy me, buy me!"
UPDATE - Just got an email from Amazon giving me personalized recommendations - my own books!
About the Author:N. Lombardi Jr, the N for Nicholas, has spent over half his life in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, working as a groundwater geologist. Nick can speak five languages: Swahili, Thai, Lao, Chinese, and Khmer (Cambodian).
In 1997, while visiting Lao People's Democratic Republic, he witnessed the remnants of a secret war that had been waged for nine years, among which were children wounded from leftover cluster bombs. Driven by what he saw, he worked on The Plain of Jars for the next eight years.
Nick maintains a website with content that spans most aspects of the novel: The Secret War, Laotian culture, Buddhism etc.
His second novel, Journey Towards a Falling Sun, is set in the wild frontier of northern Kenya.
His latest novel, Justice Gone was inspired by the fatal beating of a homeless man by police.
Nick now lives in Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Follow the Author:Website * Goodreads * Amazon 
