Murder and Redemption in Honduras - Guest Post by José H. Bográn

José Bográn is an award-winning author of novels, short stories, and scripts for television and film. He was born in Honduras and he writes in both English and his native Spanish.  Although he’s the son of a journalist, he ironically prefers to write fiction rather than facts. Being an honest man, he tells us that he never tells lies, he only writes them. His genre of choice is crime fiction, but he likes to add a dash of others to the mix.

José is a member of Crime Writers of Color, Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, the Short Mystery Fiction Society, and the International Thriller Writers. He is also an assistant editor of the ITW emagazine The Big Thrill.

Please welcome José to Murder Is Everywhere as he takes us to Honduras and the exciting first novel in his successful series featuring Sebastian Martin.

I was born and raised in Honduras, Central America. My native language is Spanish, but I fell in love with thriller novels through the works of Ken Follett, Robert Ludlum, and Clive Cussler among others that I happened to read in English. I reckon my subconscious thought that was the language to tell stories of high stakes, thrillers and adventure. That is a convoluted way of explaining why I write in my second language. My first few novels emulated those of my writing heroes with the settings in far and distant countries, all across the romantic spots in Europe, like Paris or London, or across the Atlantic in the world’s capital that is New York, a city I wrote about ten years before I had the opportunity to first visit.

Then I wrote FIREFALL.

Here’s a short paragraph describing the plot of my third novel (originally published in 2013):

The problem with being reborn from the ashes is, you have to die first. After losing his wife and son in an air crash, former NYC firefighter Sebastian Martin is spiraling downward into alcoholic oblivion. Then his brother sets him up with a last-chance job investigating insurance fraud, but his new profession takes a deadly turn while investigating a missing person case in Honduras where he crosses path with an international ring of car thieves. Sebastian ends up strapped to a chair facing torture at the hands of a former KGB trainee who enjoys playing with fire on his victims to get answers.

Some reviewers have described the book as “smart and engrossing,” or “a painful path through the suffering and redemption,” but my favorite description is “Set against authentic and exotic backgrounds, FIREFALL is a pacy thriller.”

That’s right, somebody described my neck of woods as exotic. Eye of the beholder anybody?

For the most part of the 20^th Century, Honduras major export were bananas. O’Henry’s famously coined the term Banana Republic in a short story where he depicted a country like Honduras. He had enjoyed a prolonged stay in the area. The banana companies occupied large territories, and one of the two major exporters had its headquarters in the town of Tela, working under the deceiving name of Tela Railroad Company, because the company had built a railroad system to transfer the fruit from the plantations to the port.

The inspiration for my novel came one time as I drove through Tela and came across a sign that said “Rio Highland Creek.” Like that, in English. I marveled at the fact that a Spanish speaking country had named a few places in English due to the American company that did business there. Almost a century later, a Honduran novelist was writing in English…

Karma, revenge, serendipity? Take your pick.

For this novel, I incorporated bits from two cultures as I have two main characters, who must learn to work together, not unlike an odd couple of sorts.

The action of FIREFALL starts in Dallas, where Sebastian Martin works, but he soon travels to San Pedro Sula where he meets a local investigator, Gustavo Fonseca. Later their search takes them to the city of Tela where the climax occurs in the same spot where the story had its genesis, Highland Creek.

I had fun visiting Tela on several occasions as part of research. Some of those times I even took the family along as the city is an important tourist destination nowadays. The luxury resorts feature beaches with fine white sand, swinging palm trees, picture perfect sunsets.

Since its publication, the novel has garnered rave reviews, it became my first audiobook, and it has become a sort of author-guided tour of Honduras. Back in 2023, the then-president of Rotary International, Jennifer Jones, visited the city of San Pedro Sula, and I had the chance to give her a signed copy of FIREFALL, with the idea that she could know more about the country she had only spent a few hours in. 

But wait, don’t think that I forgot Spanish.

I’d never do that. If you check my website, you’d find that I have several projects—screenplays, flash fiction, and novels—that are in Spanish. My next novel will be out in 2025 and it will be in Spanish.

Nowadays I write in both languages, hoping that they complement each other instead of running parallel, or worse, running interference.

 

You can find out more about José and his work at:

Website: www.jhbogran.com

Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/JHBogran0

Twitter: https://twitter.com/JHBogran

Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/author/jhbogran

Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/c/j.-h.-bogran

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4307673.J_H_Bogran

Newletter: http://eepurl.com/NwCHb

 

 

My Poetic Reflection Upon Finishing a Manuscript For a New Series

Jeff—Saturday

Inspiration for this parody of Robert Frost’s great poem, “After Apple-Picking,” came to me a few years back when I'd finished the manuscript of a new book (a standalone that never came to be).

On the premise that if at first you don't succeed be as the wicked and don't rest until you do (or something like that), during Covid I undertook to write a different sort of book. One I'd been meaning to write for years.  But by the time I finished it, I'd moved on to a new publisher for my Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis series, and put that novel aside to concentrate on writing books #13 and #14 in the Kaldis series. 

Having had such a wonderful experience with the folks at my new publisher, I decided to show them the manuscript for what would be the debut novel in a new series. 

Cue the dancing cats and dogs, they loved it!!

On the occasion of such great news, I thought I'd repost this little ditty in the interest of giving the curious among you a window on how this writer feels at such a moment.

Here goes…

After Prose-Picking

My long, two-sided draft is staring up at me, 

A heavenly thrill. 

Though might be a plot line I didn't fill. 

What of it? And there may be yet to see 

Characters left out hanging on some bough. 

But I am done with story telling now. 

A sense of something missed is not a fright, 

The grip of slumber has me drowsing off. 

Yet, I still see my laptop screen in sight, 

It’s as if I’m caught in an endless class, 

Filled only with words and no time for sloth.

Held captive to words like whorey and crass. 

My laptop crashed, though my draft got a break. 

And I was well 

For I’d backed up before the curse befell. 

Now I could tell 

What form my dreaming was about to take. 

Manuscript pages appear and disappear, 

From front to blessed end, 

And every speck of my thoughts showing clear. 

This author surely wants to see a break, 

But feels the pressure of another round. 

That will soon come from my publisher’s end, 

Of comments based on where my seller’s been.

Plus then a mound 

Of load on load of edits coming in. 

But I have had too much 

Of manuscripting: Now I’m overtired 

From the great harvest I myself desired. 

There were seventy thousand words to touch, 

Cherish in hand, to sound, to let some fall. 

But all 

Those struck with worth, 

No matter if part used or spiked with stubble, 

I sent straight on to my word-mulching heap, 

For in such earth, 

One will find help with trouble. 

Such when thoughts seem asleep, if sleep it is. 

And words are gone. 

I don’t turn to the Bard for words of his.

I search through my mulch, for what lies thereon.

Frost covered and deep. 

—Jeff

Snow Time!

Shock. Horror. It’s that time of year again.

Scotland had to brace itself overnight with warnings of danger to life weather conditions. 

It’s a bit frosty. It went down to -4.

I think we just get confused when it stops raining.

Anyway, in what in now becoming a annual post, it’s time to celebrate the gritters again.  There’s 240 of them, based at 42 depots and everyone of them has a name.  If you are really keen, you can follow them  on a website and it shows you what gritter is where.

The website can get over 100,000 visitors a day.

Last year the Minnesota Department of Transportation started the same thing, as dod a few cities in Canada. They came up with Snowboni, Plowsaurus Rex and Sir SaltsALot.

And if you are stuck because you are behind a gritter, you at least get a wee titter at the name.

                                      

Here are the 24 25 names. Prepare to be amused.

· Mr Plow

· Gritallica

· Ready, Spready, Go!

· Sled Zepplin

· For Your Ice Only

· Gritt Scott!

· Frosty the Snow Plough

· Grit and BEAR It

· Mr Snow-it-all

· Mr Snow, Let’s Go

· Plougher O’Scotland

· BEAR Chills

· Polar BEAR Explorer

· Mrs McGritter

· Salt Shaker

· Olaf Snow Free Roads

· Sir Andy Flurry

· William Wall-Ice

· Sammy Salt

· Salty Claus

· Gritty Gritty Bang Bang

· Get a Grit

· Gritz Crackers

· Auntie Freeze

· Thistle do nicely

· Blizzard Wizard

· Snowmer Simpson

· Hagrit

· Salty

· Grit A Bit

· My Name’5 Doddie

· I Want to Break Freeze

· Mega Melter

· I’m shovelin’

· Always Be Grit-full

· Scotland’s Bravest Gritter

· Blizzard BEAR

· Basil Salty

· Polar Patroller

· Snow Dozer

· Licence to Chill

· Sir Salter Scott

· Snow Connery

· Nitty Gritty

· Grit-Tok

· The Incredible Ice BEAR

· Walter The Salter

· BFG – Big Friendly Gritter

· BEAR-illiant

· Gritly BEAR

· Brine Freeeeze

· Snow place like home

· Scoopy Doo

· Gritty McGrit Face

· Griticle Mass

· The Forth Gritter

· I’ve Grit a Crush on you

· Don’t go Grittin’ my heart

· Thistle gets through

· Sprinkles

· Oh my Gritty Aunt

· The Polar Bear Express

· Kevin Fridges

· Stone Cold Steve Frostin

· Keanu Freeze

· Polar Abdul

· Taylor Drift

· Sleeter Andre

· Skate Bush

Choices

 Michael - Alternate Thursdays

Governments don’t do things, people do things. I don’t know who said this, but I’m sure someone did. Unless it’s too obvious to be worth saying. Government may set policy, even provide guidelines and money, but eventually someone has to act on those. The success or otherwise of an initiative depends very much on how competent that person is and how committed they are to the initiative.

Let’s take two examples from South Africa. Up until a few months before the elections in May this year, South Africa was suffering from fifteen years of electric power problems culminating in rolling scheduled daily blackouts called loadshedding.

Eventually, with the national elections looming and the government watching its support shrink at pretty much the same rate as the electricity, the president set up a new ministry and appointed a new minister. Bypassing party structures, loyalties, and even financial considerations, the president appointed an extremely competent person and gave him a free hand. Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa is a civil engineer with two MBA-type degrees and a doctorate, and he has serious experience to boot. 

Dr Ramokgopa

Bypassing party structures, loyalties, and even financial considerations, the president appointed an extremely competent person and gave him a free hand. He rapidly made it clear that inefficiencies, corruption, and straightforward theft would not be tolerated whereas competence and success (as in keeping the lights on) would be rewarded. A couple of months before the election, the load shedding stopped. Cynics raised their eybrows, saying that the government was burning megagallons of diesel in emergency generators to look good for the election. “Just wait till the day after the election,” they said laughing. There has not been a single day of load shedding since then.

Queues at Home Affairs

After the election, the ANC had to take other parties on board to build a majority. That required handing over some ministries. It was the first time the erstwhile official opposition had been in the national government, and they were given the important Home Affairs ministry among others. Home Affairs deals with matters like citizenship, residence permits etc. It was a poisoned chalice of inefficiency. It had a backlog of about 250,000 cases open cases. However, the new minister was competent and motivated. This was a make or break assignment. He looked at the system and changed it, stepped hard on corruption, and expected everyone to work as hard as he did. After three months there was no backlog.

By contrast, the previous president Jacob Zuma was only interested in what he could personally get out of the job. Ministries were filled with yes-people who were rewarded with riches. He demanded absolute loyalty for the money and generally got it. The civil service took their lead from the top. The center could not hold.

The moral of all this is that the choice of the person heading an important instrumentality is crucial to its success. Competent governors appoint competent and respected people with expertise in the operation that they are required to guide. Despots, however, don't do that. Their interest is to stay in power so the key requirement they have of their ministers is loyalty. Competence may even be a disadvantage because the incumbent may be diverted to achieving the aims of his portfolio at the expense of the required absolute loyalty. We saw a suite of examples in the previous Trump administration when he tried to appoint some competent people to important portfolios. They didn’t last very long.

I think Trump 2.0 has learned the lesson that loyalty is critical; the rest is optional. For example, Matt Gaetz is a perfect choice for Attorney General. He’s a lawyer, available since he was forced to resign his seat in the House ahead of the bipartisan report on his "extramural" activities, and clearly has no other possibilities of employment. There’s no doubt that he’ll be completely loyal and focus on getting rid of any residual cases directed at the president elect by getting rid of the people concerned. Another appointment along the same lines is Linda McMahon as Education Secretary. The president elect wants the department gone. What better person than a specialist in TV wrestling for a wrecking ball?

The Treasury Secretary post is still open. The requirements are enthusiasm for tariffs and the false belief that the exporting country pays the tariffs. Some experience with money (preferably legal) will be helpful, but one mustn’t be too picky. Loyalty is the big thing. We await developments.

Abroad, and especially in Israel, Taiwan, and Ukraine, the question is how the new US administration will affect them. For mineral producers like South Africa and Australia, the threat to the world economy posed by punitive tariffs is a huge concern. In addition, South Africa has aligned itself with the BRICS group, which includes such players as Russia, China, Iran. It has also aligned itself with the Palestinian refugees. That amounts to disloyalty…