Sophomania

When Detective Inspector Nathaniel Thomas is presented with an anonymous letter and three unexplained deaths in less than twenty-four hours, he realizes that his idyllic home village Crottendorf masks a turbulent reality. Summoning his trusted colleague, DS Ann Collins, Thomas begins to unravel what quickly becomes an overwhelming mountain of conflicting evidence.

So many secrets. So many lies. So many attempts to cover things up.

All is not as it first appears and it proves a lot harder to pin down the killer who prides himself on being more than one step ahead of the DI.

A deeply rooted family tragedy, greed and vengeance are at the core of this crime novel. The twists and turns of Sophomania leave you wondering to the very end who the real murderer is—or if there may actually be more than one killer on the loose in the anything-but-sleepy village of Crottendorf.

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Excerpt
DI Nathaniel Thomas shook the content of the envelope onto his kitchen table and prodded it with the back end of a spoon. It felt rubber-like. He pushed it over to the other side since tiny blobs of dried mud clung to it. Just as he wanted to pick the gummy thing up – surely some Halloween leftover – he hesitated.

He switched on the torchlight of his mobile phone and prodded it some more. Carefully, he began to scrape away several pats of mud.

Thomas leaned in closer, eyeing the oblong object in front of him from different angles.

Razor-thin, parchment-like skin spanned the entire length of what looked like a piece of bone. He put his splayed hand next to it, but when realisation struck him, it was too late.

Where usually a plate with his food stood, lay now the mummified bone of a crooked finger.

Hello … And who might you belong to? Where is the rest of your body? Are you alive or dead? Perhaps not a joke, after all.

A dozen similar questions caused a jumble in his head. He felt suddenly giddy with excitement. The lack of brainteasers at work and the summer heat had made him sluggish.

Still, he wasn’t sure what to make of this. The finger did look real and human, though the bone was a bit shorter and thinner than his small finger. The deprivation of humidity could easily make it shrink, he knew. Thomas picked it up with a piece of kitchen towel and held it into the sunlight. There were three phalanges of the finger (a thumb consisted of only two phalanges, while all other fingers had three). He wondered where the bone had been kept.

Something else inside the envelope suddenly caught his eye, and only now did he notice the neatly folded piece of paper. He fished it out and smoothed it onto his knee. A message revealed itself in the same typewriter print used for his name and address. He delicately turned the paper over, but it was blank on the other side.

He read the message with interest. Curiouser and curiouser …


Author Bio –

Danielle Zinn is a German author, born and raised in a small village in the Ore Mountains/Germany where not only her debut crime novel Snow Light is set but also her second book, Sophomania.

She holds a BA (Hons) degree in Business and Management from New College Durham/UK and has settled down in Leipzig/Germany where she works as a Financial Controller at an IT Consultancy.

She was introduced to the world of English literature and writing from an early age on through her mother – an English teacher. Over the last years, she circumnavigated the globe and loves visiting her friends scattered all over the world.

Social Media Links –

Twitter: @DanielleZinn4             https://twitter.com/daniellezinn4

Facebook: Danielle.zinn.7           https://www.facebook.com/danielle.zinn.7