Guest Author: Christopher J. Lynch

I wrote for twenty years before I really discovered writing. By that, I mean that I was so focused on “making it” by getting a sale and being published, that I left my passion for what I was writing about on the shelf. It was a huge mistake that costs me two decades of work.

Along the way, I dabbled in many forms of the craft. I wrote a novel, a couple of screenplays, and several short stories. None of them sold, nor should they have. I racked up a growing pile of rejection letters, and not much else. 

It was only after I realized that I needed to write about what I was truly interested in, that I finally made that first sale. And then, it was another sale, and then another one. A year later, I had racked up five sales, all because I finally understood that selling was not what I should be focused on – loving what I wrote was. It was the “Ah-ha” moment that changed my life forever. 

Although I’ve written quite a bit of non-fiction, it was always fiction that was my first love, and crime fiction almost exclusively. With that in mind, I set out to write a short story about a professional extortionist that gets caught up trying to blackmail the wrong person. My main character was the type of man who could keep any secret – for the right price. It was not the sort of story that I thought would be an easy sale – if it would sell at all – and I knew I had an uphill battle trying to cultivate any sympathy for a protagonist who routinely makes people’s lives miserable. But I didn’t want to write just one more crime piece about a disgruntled ex-cop, or an overworked PI with a drinking problem. And, I stayed true to my philosophy of writing about what I truly had a passion for, not what I thought would be just another plain vanilla entry.

The original title of the short was “The Squeeze.” But the denouement changed all that when the main character, John Sharp, ends up losing his eye at the hands of some Russian mobsters and a crooked plastic surgeon. “The Squeeze” became “One Eyed Jack” and I had created a new character, one that I fell in love with.

I went on to create a novel of the same name and with the same character, a little older and a lot wiser now. These days One Eyed Jack keeps his distance from his targets by using a variety of clever high tech gadgets, as well as some good old fashion subterfuge. He has a comfortable lifestyle, a girlfriend, an IRA, and a business model that seems almost foolproof – until one very routine case goes awry.  

It was a run of the mill case of infidelity that should have been a walk in the park for him. After all, he had done hundreds of them. But it takes a sudden detour, and our dubious protagonist soon finds himself caught in a twisted web of double blackmail, commodities manipulation, and trying to save the woman that had once been his target.

One Eyed Jack is available as an e-book at Barnes and Noble 
     
And as an e-book and print version at Amazon

As a teaser, Christopher J. Lynch produced a great little video trailer where we are introduced to One Eyed Jack and to his modus operandi. 




One Eyed Jack also has a website that he steers his marks to. Check it out HERE – if you dare! 

You can see more of his writing and learn more about Christopher J. Lynch at his website: http://www.christopherjlynch.com