The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.
The Boaz Safecracker, written in 2019, is my seventh novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.
Book Blurb
Fred Martin, a 1972 graduate of Boaz High School, returns to his hometown after practicing law and living in Huntsville for over thirty-five years with two goals in mind. First, to distance himself from the loss of Susan, his wife of thirty-seven years who died in 2013 of cancer. And second, to partner with his lifelong friend, Noah Waters, to crack the safes of Elton Rawlins and Doug Barber, two men who got under their skin as high school football players.
Little did Fred and Noah realize the secrets the two old Mosler safes protected. Who murdered three Boaz High School seniors in the fall of 1973? Is a near-half-century-old plan to destroy Fred’s sister and steal the inheritance from a set of 44-year-old illegitimate twins still alive and well? How far would Fred’s mother go to protect her family?
What starts out as an almost innocent prank turns life-threateningly serious the more Fred learns and the more safes he cracks. All the while, he falls in love with Connie Stewart, his one-date high school classmate who may conceal a secret or two herself.
Chapter 31
Monday was a holiday, not a State holiday, but one Alfa had instituted many years ago to honor its founder and his family. I spent most of the morning working with Dad in his garden and reliving last night with the lovely Connie. I couldn’t tell you a single song we had sung during the music time as we shared a songbook, nor did I remember any specifics from Pastor Caleb’s sermon on the power of prayer. But I did recall every second I spent on Connie’s couch after we returned with a half-gallon of Brier’s Black Walnut ice cream we bought at Walmart after church. This morning, sweaty and dirty from pulling weeds from a long row of peas, I was proud of myself for initiating a long passionate kiss after following Connie back to the kitchen with our empty bowls. I had been totally surprised she had returned my passion. I’m beginning to think that her sex life has been so-longed suppressed that once it is unleashed, I might have to seek out what is commonly known as ‘the little blue pill.’ I must have had a strange look on my face because Dad kept asking me if I was okay.
A little before noon I returned to my cabin and showered. I laid down across my bed and picked up Angela’s 1971 journal. I had been reading a few pages every night for the past two weeks. It had been my way of forcing myself to get through all three books of her mostly teenage girl ramblings.
In November 1971, I recognized a growing frustration, almost anger, she was developing over her Sunday School teacher’s persistent emphasis on prayer and its importance to every young person desiring a close walk with Jesus. His name was Farris Pauly and he was a local used car dealer. Apparently, his favorite Bible verse on prayer was John 15:7: “If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” Pauly routinely argued that all a true believer had to do was ask and she would receive. It never failed that he emphasized that the requester had to be in the right relationship with Jesus for this promise to be fulfilled.
From Angela’s writings, there was no doubt a proper understanding of ‘abide’ had often led to heated arguments in the high school youth department, especially in Pauly’s tenth grade class. One example she shared concerned the death of fellow student Brandy Peterson the night of Halloween 1971. It seemed the young girl had been seriously injured in an auto accident after witnesses had observed her staggering around the Piggly Wiggly grocery store. They said she appeared to have been drunk as a skunk. Angela and the entire youth group had staged a three-day prayer vigil for Brandy as she lingered at Boaz-Albertville Hospital. Angela had written: “I know I did everything I could possibly do to be in right relationship with Jesus, yet Brandy died. Prayer sucks.” Less than two weeks later, Angela shared that an autopsy of Brandy’s body revealed she had ingested a drug known as methaqualone.
I got up and walked to the box I had stored at the top of the kitchen’s pantry. I thought I had seen a similar name on one of the bottles I had taken from Doug’s safe. I was right. There were two bottles labeled “Quaalude-300.” I recalled the Google article I had read that stated the drug produced barbiturate-like effects. It could depress the central nervous system, reduce heart and respiration rates, and numb the fingers and toes. I took my iPhone from my pocket and conducted another quick search. This time my query was “Quaalude-300 and accidental deaths.” Google found an article titled, “More Quaalude deaths from injuries than overdose.” Here, I learned that actual overdoses of the widely abused sedative produced a drunken-like stupor.
I returned the bottles and box to the top shelf and walked back to my bedroom. In December 1971, Angela and her four closest friends, Rebecca, Johnny, Allan, and Tommy, were all members of Ricky Miller’s school club known as The Brights. Angela was the only one of the five who wasn’t allowed to attend the meetings because of her parent’s command, but she nonetheless spent time with the Biology teacher/secular activist. She wasn’t exactly clear how she was able to have private meetings unless it was after school. Angela shared how she had talked on several occasions with Miller about Farris Pauly and his insistent claims about the power of prayer, and its importance to sincere Christians.
In reading Angela’s journal through the end of December 1971, I gathered that he had challenged her and her four friends to do their own investigation into the authenticity of prayer. Within several journal entries Angela had written what Ricky Miller had told the five of them. Things like, “prayer works equally as well as coincidence,” and “John 15:7 is possibly the clearest and strongest indictment of the Christian faith. Either there is no Christian who truly abides in Jesus, the Bible is lying, or God’s Son is wholly incapable of fulfilling his promise. Either way, prayer doesn’t work.”
Ricky had encouraged the five to start attending Prayer Meeting every Wednesday night at First Baptist Church of Christ. He suggested at least one, maybe two, of the five attended while the others attended his brother’s youth group sessions. Ricky instructed Angela and her friends to record every prayer request that was made, especially those by the adults in Prayer Meeting, and then to monitor the results. He even gave them a form he had developed to record their findings.
Angela’s entry on December 31, 1971 revealed her internal struggle with her faith. She summarized what her and her four friends had done all during the month of December and how eye-opening it was to learn that, at best, prayer worked only about fifty percent of the time. One thing she noted, I thought it was brilliant, that out of all five of the prayer meetings either her or one of her four friends had attended during December, the boldest prayer was one made by Nancy Frasier, the librarian, for her granddaughter’s left arm to be restored to full health. It seemed the girl had fallen out of a tree house and not only broken her arm but injured it so severely she would lose all practical use for the rest of her life.
Other than Nancy’s request, Angela shared how no adult at prayer meeting ever prayed boldly. No one asked God to grow back a leg that had to be amputated. No doubt Angela was truly impacted by the death of Brandy Peterson back in November. Angela referenced that horrible event once again as she closed out her December 1971 journal. She pondered two questions: “if John 15:7 is true, why didn’t Brandy survive?” and “out of all the hundreds of local folks who were praying for her survival, was not one of them truly abiding in Jesus as required in this Bible verse?”
At 4:30 p.m., I had to get up and move. I had read enough of Angela’s ramblings. I changed into a pair of more comfortable shorts and a tee shirt and headed out for a long walk. I passed the barn at the back of the cabin on my way to Martin Road and couldn’t help but think about the twice-stolen jewelry and coins resting comfortably in an army surplus box beneath a ton of hay. This prompted me to ponder where my and Noah’s vendetta against Elton Rawlins and Doug Barber was going to lead. I surmised there was a long-suppressed story hidden somewhere among the clues that we had taken from the two Mosler safes. I felt an electricity surge along the bottom of my spine like it was a signal to seriously consider cracking another safe or two to determine whether they, too would divulge some aspect of the story that seemed to be loosely coalescing in my mind.
The Pencil Driven Life 