Portobello Book Blog

Earlier this year I raced through the Dark of Night trilogy by CS Duffy. They are brilliantly fast paced thrillers and when it comes to cliffhangers at the end of chapters, you won’t find many better! In Just Before Dawn, the author continues the story in the beginning of a new series. I’m pleased to be taking part in this blogtour which is one with a bit of a difference. Each day, you can read an extract from a serialised version of a prequel to Dark of Night by visiting several blogs over a week or two. If you haven’t already been following it, check the blogtour poster and begin at Chapter in My Life. Hopefully you are up to date and have read the extract which was on Seven Days a Week yesterday so here goes with my part:

As she walked home from Ruari’s, Lorna felt a tiny spark of hope that things would get back to normal with him. At least she’d have her friend, even if she had made an arse of herself playing at hotshot investigative journalist, she thought, cringing again as she remembered Kathleen Connolly’s scornful expression. One out of two wasn’t bad.

After the disaster of the afternoon, Lorna had made up her mind that she missed Ruari too much to be mucking about with all this broken hearted shite. So he didn’t fancy her. That was rubbish. Losing him as a pal wasn’t going to make it any less rubbish, so she’d picked up a takeaway from his favourite Chinese restaurant and banged on his door.

Her heart was thudding nineteen to the dozen and she had a horrible feeling her efforts to appear calm and collected made her seem like a slightly manic broken puppet. If I get through this without puking chicken in black bean sauce all over him I’ll consider it a success, she thought grimly, kneeling to unpack the containers on his wonky coffee table as Ruari brought through plates and forks and beers from his tiny kitchen.

When he sat down, a horrible silence hung in the air for just a second too long, then Lorna noticed the towering pile of PostIt pads on the coffee table and burst out laughing. Of course Ruari had a collection of PostIts. ‘I didn’t even know they made these any more, you total antique!’ she roared around a mouthful of prawn crackers.

‘Forgot napkins,’ Ruari muttered, dashing abruptly to the kitchen, and Lorna’s tummy twisted. Shit. Maybe he didn’t like being teased? But this was Ruari. They did nothing but make fun of each other. At least, they did before she ruined things by going and bloody falling in love with him.

‘We can just use the PostIts,’ she called after him, grabbing one of the pads and scribbling fanny on it, which made her feel a tiny bit better.

While Ruari was in the kitchen, Lorna had deleted Crowded Room, and Kathleen Connolly and Adam Flanagan’s numbers from her phone. Enough of this playing at Lois Lane, she told herself firmly. She wasn’t qualified to poke about something as sensitive as murder. She’d find something else to write about for her journalism class, something that was more in her league. Something about a lost cat or a scandal involving potatoes or something.

At the last second, she scribbled Adam Flanagan’s number on the back of the fanny note before deleting it, supposing that it was the grown up thing to hold on to a journalist contact, but as she turned into her road, she remembered shoving that note into Ruari’s freezer, and rolled her eyes. She’d thought it would be funny for Ruari to open his freezer and find an insult from her. Of course now she thought about it, Ruari’s freezer probably was the best place for her journalism career.

Lorna sighed. Just a couple of weeks ago, everything had been coming together. She had been so certain she could get her new career off to a flying start with the Dancing Girls Killer, had been equally sure that she and Ruari were on the same page, and now all of a sudden she had nothing. She’d failed miserably on both counts and as she unlocked her front door, she realised she was blinking back hot tears.

She’d kicked off her boots before the sight registered. As a cold dread slithered through her, Lorna turned around slowly, her heart thudding painfully. Her flat had been ransacked. Books had been yanked from shelves, her wee Ikea couch was upturned. The chest of drawers she’d found at a car boot sale lay on its side, clothes and knickknacks and ancient bank statements strewn all around it.

Her TV was in its usual place, the opal necklace her granny had left her was still on the bedside table. Ruari had warned her about bams off their heads breaking in and not even knowing why. That’s all this was, Lorna told herself fiercely as she sat suddenly on the floor, her legs trembling. Just random bad luck. Nothing was taken, there was no point in even phoning the police. But as she double locked the door from the inside, Lorna couldn’t quite shake the feeling that it was a warning.

 

Ohh – tense or what?! Make sure you visit Christina’s Bookshelf tomorrow to find out what happens next! 

Buying links

UK Store

Dark of Night: Episode One:  http://amzn.eu/d/62DeGhx

Dark of Night: Episode Two: http://amzn.eu/d/9ftE9Wp

Dark of Night: Episode Three: http://amzn.eu/d/5AFct03

 

Just Before Dawn: Episode One: http://amzn.eu/d/5jJwPju

Just Before Dawn: Episode Two (presale):

 

US Store

Dark of Night: Episode One: http://a.co/d/3eh05dK

Dark of Night: Episode Two: https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Night-Episode-CS-Duffy/dp/197351995X/

Dark of Night: Episode Three

https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Night-Episode-CS-Duffy/dp/1982959916/

 

Just Before Dawn: Episode One: https://www.amazon.com/Just-Before-Dawn-Episode-Darkness/dp/1720146950

Just Before Dawn: Episode Two (presale):

 

About the author

C.S. Duffy writes psychological suspense thrillers with a healthy dose of black humour. Her background is in film and TV. She has several projects in development in Sweden and the UK and her other writing has appeared in Elle Canada and The Guardian. She is the author of Life is Swede, a thriller that was originally written as a blog – leading several readers to contact Swedish news agencies asking them why they hadn’t reported the murder that features in the blog. She is the author of Dark of Night and Just Before Dawn, a thriller series set in Glasgow which was selected for a Spotlight slot at this year’s Bloody Scotland.

Find her at:

http://csduffy.com/

https://twitter.com/csduffywriter

https://www.instagram.com/csduffywriter/

https://www.instagram.com/writer.on.the.go/