Gene Genie

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I completed Gene Genie as the second in this series and felt I had moved my writing up a notch or two. I submitted it to Pegasus/Vanguard and they promptly agreed to publish it. This time the villain was an American evangelical sect that was abusing genetic engineering to bring about their prophesies and goals.

I asked Pegasus how they would support this new book and they said it would be just as they had for Still Water, so I withdrew it. I recovered my rights and they remaindered the balance of their Still Water print run.

So this Gene Genie cover art above was for a self-published release, I also revamped Still Water, with a new cover. Matt produced the artwork, giving them added value for me. I also changed my hero’s name from the rather pretentious Guy Quartermain to Tom Carter. Part of the desire to do this was that when you have a character called ‘Guy’ I found it confounded any use of the term ‘guy’ as in ‘a guy’, or ‘this guy’…

The Kindle blurb for Gene Genie…

Tom Carter, the celebrity life scientist, is back to battle with an aggressive religious cult.

Carter while striving to complete his latest book on archaeo-astronomy, finds his research of these dead peoples and their ancient beliefs is suddenly made larger than life by the new religious order.

Tom learns that Stevie Tasker, who helped him defeat the Brotherhood in ‘Still Water’, has been drawn right to the very centre of the cult. A disturbing childhood experience haunted Stevie for many years and this draws her to the Order hoping she can find some answers.

Samuel Shepherd, their Patriarch, preaches a confusing cocktail of beliefs woven around the prophesies of the books of Daniel and Revelations and some ancient truths he has discovered. Marsha Davenport is a brilliant geneticist, a wunderkind who could have succeeded in whichever field she chose to pursue. She sits at Shepherd’s right hand, mixing genetic cocktails to hasten his prophecies.

Tom’s challenge is to establish quite what is going on as the threats seem to emerge from all directions. From Bolivia through Carthage, Morocco, Thailand, France and Wyoming Guy pursues the Order to a denouement at the cradle of Mankind.