Blog Archives
Balance of Evil
Balance of Evil by Kim Rozdeba is a globe-hopping political thriller about Scott Barton, a retired mining executive whose post-heart-attack drift is detonated when he finds a titanium USB on a beach in Cabo San Lucas. What begins as curiosity turns into a conspiracy involving a secret Cold War pact, FIST, that suggests world powers have long been choreographing conflict in the name of “balance.” Scott and his wife, Colleen, are pushed from Mexico to Canada, Israel, Europe, and beyond, pursued by intelligence forces, money networks, and the awful realization that history may be less accidental than advertised.
I found the book most alive when it fused geopolitical paranoia with the worn intimacy of Scott and Colleen’s marriage. The chase mechanics are brisk, but the emotional engine is quieter: two people who have become strangers inside the same life suddenly forced to rely on each other with almost feral urgency. Colleen, in particular, gives the story a welcome edge. She’s not merely the frightened spouse or convenient sidekick; she is damaged, observant, funny, irritating, and often sharper than Scott when survival demands it. Their relationship keeps the novel from becoming only a dossier with explosions.
The conspiracy itself is audacious, sometimes deliciously so. Rozdeba leans into big, barbed ideas: covert superpower cooperation, manufactured instability, shell companies, assassinations, intelligence tradecraft, and the moral rot of “peace” maintained by violence. The exposition can feel heavy, as if the novel wants to brief me as much as thrill me. But I was drawn in by the book’s momentum and its appetite for scale. It has that old-fashioned thriller confidence: airports, aliases, dead drops, cryptic files, and the sense that every polished hotel lobby may contain a predator.
I think the target audience is readers who enjoy political thrillers, conspiracy thrillers, espionage fiction, and historical secret-history novels. Fans of Dan Brown’s puzzle-box momentum or Robert Ludlum’s institutional paranoia will recognize the terrain, though Rozdeba gives it a more contemporary anxiety about disinformation, authoritarian drift, and hidden money. Balance of Evil is a restless, high-stakes debut that treats peace not as a condition but as a contested battlefield. A thriller for readers who like their conspiracies vast, their heroes bruised, and their secrets radioactive.
Pages: 376 | ASIN : B0GND3M1W7
Fear of the Unknown
Big Lies follows an astronomer whose discovery of an asteroid careening toward our planet reveals an even more devastating crisis here on Earth. Where did the idea behind this novel come from?
I previously worked with several government agencies, and during that time, I witnessed events that unfolded quite differently from how they were presented to the public. Information was sometimes deliberately distorted or framed in misleading ways. It was shocking at first, and it stayed with me.
I began to think about telling a story from the perspective of someone who firmly believes in science and facts—someone grounded in reality—who is suddenly forced to confront hidden layers of the world that most people never see. I explored the idea of what an ordinary person, armed only with general public knowledge, would do if they were pushed to uncover the truth behind events often dismissed as conspiracy theories—but which, in this story, turn out to be real.
From there, I gathered various conspiracy concepts and shaped a narrative around them. Big Lies was born from that central question: What if it were all true? And what if the protagonist experienced it firsthand?
What role does fear play in shaping both institutions and individuals in the story?
Fear—especially fear of the unknown—plays a central role in both individual behavior and institutional control. One of the most unsettling forms of fear is the loss of trust in the systems and people we rely on most.
Big Lies explores what happens when those institutions—ones that shape our lives and promise stability—are revealed to be built on manipulation or hidden agendas. When the structures we depend on begin to fracture, it forces individuals to question everything they thought was certain.
To me, the most terrifying realization is not external danger, but the possibility that the life we trust is built on layers of half-truths and lies. That psychological shift is at the core of the story.
Were there particular books or films that influenced your approach to this story?
The X-Files and the Deus Ex series were major influences, especially in their use of conspiracy theories and hidden truths. I was fascinated by them as a teenager—the sense of uncovering secrets and confronting deeper fears left a lasting impression on me.
However, those stories typically follow trained professionals—agents or operatives—who have the tools, authority, and support to investigate the unknown. They can act, defend themselves, and call for backup.
With Big Lies, I wanted to remove that safety net. I placed an ordinary civilian at the center of the story—someone without special training, resources, or protection. Thomas Jeffries is not an FBI agent like Fox Mulder or Dana Scully, nor a cyber-enhanced operative like J.C. Denton or Adam Jensen. He is simply a scientist caught in something far beyond his control.
That vulnerability was important to me. He must navigate events as they unfold, relying only on his intelligence, moral compass, and determination.
Can we look forward to more work from you soon? What are you currently working on?
Yes, I’m currently working on several books simultaneously. My next major release is a cosmic science fiction horror novel titled Ghost Planet, which I’ve been developing for the past seven years. I’m aiming to release it within the next few months.
In addition, I have three other titles in development.
Author Links: GoodReads | Amazon
Inside the secretive halls of elite councils and engineered media narratives, Jeffries is tasked with engineering a cosmic escape for the elite while preserving the illusion of safety for an oblivious world. As he uncovers the truth about ancient bloodlines, synthetic political leaders, and pre-selected survivors, he’s also charged with finding a new home off-world for a civilization that may never know the sky is falling. With everything at stake, Jeffries must weigh the exodus of the few against the future of the many.
Big Lies is a dark, gripping thriller about the cost of knowledge in a world built on deception. Perfect for fans of Deus Ex (elite conspiracy), Altered Carbon (privileged immortality), and Don’t Look Up (satirical apocalypse), this is a chilling ride through the machinery of control—where truth is a weapon, and survival is a privilege reserved for the chosen—unless one man can rewrite the rules.
Big Lies
Stephen Wayne’s Big Lies is a science fiction thriller that starts with a clean, high-stakes hook: astronomer Thomas Jeffries discovers a massive asteroid on a collision course with Earth, only to find that the real crisis is not just the object in space but the hidden machinery of power on Earth. From there, the novel opens into a conspiracy-driven story about elites, manufactured reality, and the moral cost of survival, before landing in a final stretch that reframes the threat itself and turns the focus back to human choice, family, and freedom.
Wayne doesn’t ease into his ideas. He throws them on the table and lets them spark. That choice gives the novel an aggressive, sometimes feverish energy that fits the thriller side of the genre well. I felt that especially in the early scenes with Bailey and the false front of political power, where the dialogue is less about realism in the narrow sense and more about stripping varnish off institutions until only appetite and control are left. That directness can feel heavy-handed, but I also think that is part of the point. This book is not trying to whisper. It wants to make you sit with ugly possibilities and ask how much of modern life is performance.
I was more interested than I expected to be in the author’s choices around Jeffries himself. He is surrounded by grotesque power, yet the emotional center keeps circling back to his wife Carol, his daughter Amanda, and the question of what decency looks like when the system around you is rotten. That gave the novel a steadier heartbeat than I first thought it would have. Some of the conspiracy material is extreme by design, and readers will probably either go with that wavelength or resist it hard. I found the book strongest when it stopped trying to top itself and simply let people talk, doubt, and choose. The late turn with the asteroid works because it shifts the story from doom to perspective. It is a neat science fiction move, but also a human one. Small error, huge consequences.
I’d recommend Big Lies most to readers who enjoy conspiracy-tinged science fiction thrillers, apocalyptic suspense, and stories that push hard on questions of media, power, and manufactured truth. Readers who like their thrillers provocative, talky, and morally sharp will likely find plenty to chew on here. For that audience, this book absolutely has an audience, and I can see it sticking in their head long after the last page.
Pages: 188 | ASIN : B0G3XGPBDN
Transatlantic Communication
Mr. Gobscheit follows a semi-retired US Naval officer and diplomat as he finds himself pulled back into the world of espionage and geopolitics when an old friend comes calling. Where did the idea for this first book in your thriller series come from?
I attended a literary conference in Dublin and then toured the island extensively, learning its history and current issues. I stayed where the first transatlantic communication cable landed and wrote early mornings in the homes we stayed at, incorporating much of the character of the owners.
Why was it important for you to weave personal relationships throughout the intelligence narrative?
My background as a retired naval captain and former diplomat gave me the perspective to view matters going on from multiple dimensions.
What research did you do to understand the vulnerabilities of the undersea fiber-optic cables and digital infrastructure?
Extensive research from multiple sources and contacts.
Where will Book 2 in this series take readers? Can you give us a glimpse inside?
Jack Gobscheit resurfaces in selling rare earth mineral deals and exploiting his relationships with Russia, Ukraine, and the USA. He ends up buying US citizenship and supporting the candidate who shared his transactional ideas, ultimately becoming the US national security adviser charged with getting Greenland for the President.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Website | Amazon
Mark Jamison, once a master negotiator persuading nations to join NATO, is called back to action by naval intelligence for a mission like no other. Tasked with protecting the vital undersea communication cables off Ireland, Jamison faces a race against time as Russian forces threaten to sever America’s lifeline to Europe.
Undercover in the Irish defense ministry, Jamison must navigate a minefield of political intrigue, ruthless oligarchs, and a boss entangled with Russian spies. But as he fights to pull Ireland into NATO, he discovers a shadowy figure with ambitions to dominate communication beneath the seas—and beyond the stars.
With alliances on the brink and enemies at every turn, Jamison must risk everything to preserve global security.
Perfect for fans of Tom Clancy and political thrillers with real-world stakes, this gripping tale will keep you on the edge of your seat.
Change Is Inevitable
A Real Collusion follows a mid-level ad guy who looks back on his best friend’s wild rise and fall as a grassroots political candidate that took on America’s two-party system. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
I’ve been frustrated and angry about the US government’s dysfunction and the broken two-party system for a long time. Leading into the 2000 election, I consulted with the Committee For A Unified Independent Party on their fundraising and also wrote a song called “Bush And Gore Suck.” My band, Channeling Owen, played at a rally in NY for John Haglin, a third-party Presidential candidate. Somewhere along the way, I guess I started wondering what it might take for a third-party candidate to really get traction, and it occurred to me that it might need to be a mistake or an accident…..
The novel suggests that systemic change is incredibly difficult. How did you balance storytelling with the book’s more exposé-like elements?
That’s kind of my thing. I get excited about fighting injustice, and if there’s any truth to the pen being mightier than the sword, perhaps it can make a difference. In my previous book, The Organ Broker, I painstakingly explained how the organ donation system in the US is broken, what I believe caused it, and what I think the remedies could be. Rather than provide an academic paper on that (although I did write a magazine article for Everyday Health), I explained it through the eyes and experiences of a character named New York Jack. In A Real Collusion, I have tried to explain and dissect the dysfunction in our government through the eyes and experiences of two regular guys who almost take down the system.
How did your background influence the authenticity of the media and political scenes?
In 2005, I launched a natural soda brand, which I ran as CEO for six years. I also briefly ran a social-mobile technology company, and learned a bit about marketing and, in particular, digital marketing. I suppose that informed the scenes at the marketing agency but frankly, in my mind I think I imagined the look of it to be akin to the boardrooms I worked in when I first started my career on Wall St. The political scenes—as well as the discussion, policy statements, etc.—were born out of my genuine and passionate interest in political reform and the things I learned when doing some work for an independent political organization twenty-five years ago. Shit, I’m glad you asked. I thought I had just made it all up!
Do you see A Real Collusion as a warning, a mirror, or a conversation starter?
I think it is all of those things. I actually love what your Editor and Reviewer said about the book, making him feel, “Sad, angry, but also weirdly hopeful.” That is exactly how I feel. Like so many Americans, I feel angry about the broken system, the way politicians are self-serving and also choose party over country. I feel sad, and even exhausted, when it seems to never change. Yet, I do think that not only can things change, but that change is inevitable. The problem with change, or long-term evolution, is that it sometimes moves too slowly to be seen easily, or to benefit an individual within his or her own lifetime. I try to think about the timeline being humanity’s, and not my personal one of 80 or 90 years, and I continue to hope that things will get better and we will end up with a system of true and free democracy, with a government whose genuine goal is to serve the interests of the collective citizenry.
Author Links: GoodReads | Website | TikTok | Instagram | Amazon
From the author of the bestselling novel, The Organ Broker, (hailed by Lee Child, New York Times # 1 bestselling author of the Jack Reacher series as, “Exciting and thought-provoking–the perfect package”) comes, A Real Collusion, a stunning political thriller and expose.
A Real Collusion is a David Vs. Goliath(s) story about a man who accidentally becomes the leader of an independent political movement that nearly takes down the two-party system in America, while exposing a conspiracy that affects the results of the 2016 election. It explores universal and deeply human themes of loss, and the tension between justice and power. In the opening sentence the narrator points out that, “Ordinary people often do extraordinary things.” The characters in the book do, and the action is driven by the fantastic events of a unique political satire. It is also the heartfelt story of regular people struggling with lost love, alienation and nearly universal disaffection who find strength in enduring loyalty and friendship
This is the story of John Campbell (a regular guy from the lower east side of Manhattan) as recounted by his friend Skip Winters. Skip becomes John’s campaign manager and later, a congressman in his own right. He narrates the stunning-but-plausible story of how John Campbell and The American Coalition race to popularity, raising over a hundred million dollars from grassroots contributors—and become a threat to the political duopoly of the Democratic and Republican parties. The book sprinkles in references to real events from recent history, and real political leaders including Trump, John McCain, and more. This imbues the novel with a sense of realism, albeit one of an alternate reality. Skip discovers a deep-seated conspiracy within our political system whose leaders orchestrate a murder, destroy his friend and tip the scales of the election. The novel turns out to be Skip’s exposé of the secret collaboration between the two major political parties in our country—a cooperation to protect the duopoly that is, in part, real.
Choices Impose Responsibility
Drinking From the Stream follows two young men in 1971 who are on the run and attempting to escape their pasts by traveling to East Africa, where their personal reckonings unfold alongside violence. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
Sometimes great events touch us deeply.
In June 1972, when I was twenty-two years old and hitchhiking across Africa, I was sitting in a student cafeteria at the University of Luanda reading the International Herald Tribune. Angola was then a Portuguese colony, but armed African guerrillas in the countryside were fighting to overthrow white-minority rule. I had been hosted at the Zaire border by conscripted Portuguese soldiers who had seen combat with MPLA guerrillas. An article caught my eye that morning about ethnic killings in Burundi. I had been within fifty miles of Burundi, having hitchhiked from Ethiopia through Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda, then to Zaire (Congo) and Angola. The article described a bloody uprising in late April 1972, where Hutu rebels had used pangas — machetes — to kill hundreds of unsuspecting Tutsi citizens with the idea of sparking a civil war to end Tutsi rule. Even more shocking were the slaughters by the Burundi army that followed. It turned out that unemployed Hutu school teachers — unable to find a job in Tutsi-ruled Burundi — had led the revolt. Burundi’s solution to the unemployment problem was to kill all the educated Hutus they could find. The Tutsi-led army countered the Hutu death squads with a much bigger, much better-organized ethnic bloodletting of their own, killing any Hutu who had completed the fourth grade. Tens of thousands were already dead, the report said, and the killings were gathering momentum with no end in sight. By 1973, well over 200,000 Hutus had been murdered.
This made a deep impression on me. How could so many people be murdered so quickly? More importantly, why was the world ignoring it? And why and how did it come about? What if I had decided, as was entirely possible, to visit Burundi myself? And if I had, I would have been on the spot when the killings broke out. What then? The entire African continent seemed to be on a bloody run. A year or two back, peace had been restored to Zaire, formerly the Democratic Republic of the Congo, after ten years of mayhem and revolt. Mass ethnic killings were in full swing in 1972 in Uganda, when I was there, led by the Ugandan army under Idi Amin. Rwanda had seen bloody spasms of anti-Tutsi violence even before independence in the early 1960s. And all of southern Africa, not just Angola, was in revolt against white minority rule. The 1994 Tutsi holocaust in Rwanda was still twenty-two years away.
This is a coming-of-age novel, but a harsh one. What does “growing up” mean here?
I spent three years in Africa when I was quite young. I worked construction jobs in the bush and at line camps, I bumped into white supremacists. Basically, they were American nazis. I kept my distance even though they sometimes tried to recruit me. They spoke openly of violence against Jews and Blacks. Listening to them made me extremely angry. They had no idea I was Jewish. But what would happen if I weren’t Jewish and one of them thought I was? That was the inspiration for Jake Ries.
The characters discover that their choices impose responsibility that must be faced and borne; there’s no magic that will make it disappear, and its weight increases over time. Knowledge imposes its own burden. And it doesn’t matter if they never wished to make those choices or learn those things in the first place. Maybe they never asked for them, but they still can’t put them down.
What scenes were hardest to write—not technically, but ethically?
This may sound funny, given the extent of political chicanery in the plot, but the parts of the book that gave me the most trouble were working out Karl’s relationships with his girlfriends, first Helen, then Swee’Pea. Karl might have been conflicted about both those relationships, particularly in combination, but I wanted to present them as believable dilemmas not only for Karl, but for both women, while trying to be fair to all three.
What lessons from the 1970s feel disturbingly contemporary?
What I see today is that resentments never cease, that humanity is easily misled and memories are short; that peace is fragile, something not to be taken for granted; that politicians can seduce thousands, or millions, to contemplate unspeakable acts; that the great issues of the past, which we thought were finally settled, are never really settled; and that active individuals following the ancient moral codes or their own personal compass to judge right from wrong can do a great deal of good.
Author Links: GoodReads | Website | Amazon
Jake Ries, a twenty-two-year-old Nebraska farm boy turned oil roughneck, turns fugitive when he unintentionally kills a homicidal White supremacist on an oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico. On the run, he meets Karl Appel, a restless Oxford dropout and former anti-war activist struggling with his own personal demons. Together they throw caution to the wind and plunge into the Ethiopian and East African hinterland, where they discover that dictatorship and mass murder are facts of life.
The Cost of Competence
Stealing Stealth follows a CIA officer tasked with protecting a new stealth technology who must enlist the help of a brilliant thief to stop it from falling into the wrong hands. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
I wrote the initial draft of this story when I was deployed in Afghanistan. I was constantly in this battle with what is said and what is left unsaid, in an intriguing chess match with men who were both my ally and not at the same time. To capture this specific paranoia, I thought of the mid-1970s. We often look at the Cold War through the lens of the 80s. That was the end. But just before that, everything was messy. The Church Committee was exposing CIA secrets, Vietnam had just ended, and trust in institutions was crumbling. I wanted to drop a “Boy Scout” character like John Olson into that moral grey zone and force him to work with someone like Gabrielle Hyde, who represents pure, chaotic individualism. The stealth technology itself was the perfect catalyst because it represented a revolution in warfare that terrified everyone. The idea that a plane could be invisible to radar felt like magic in 1977.
There was a lot of time spent crafting the character traits in this novel. What was the most important factor for you to get right in your characters?
Competence. Nothing kills a thriller faster than characters who make stupid decisions just for the sake of the plot. I wanted Olson and Hyde to be masters of their respective crafts. When they fail, it’s because they were outmaneuvered by a smarter opponent, not because they were making bad choices. I also wanted to explore the cost of competence. For Olson, his dedication to the CIA cost him his personal life. For Hyde, her tragic youth led to brilliance as a thief, but it also left her isolated. The most important factor was ensuring that even when they were enemies, they respected each other’s skills. That mutual respect is the engine of the book.
How did you balance the action scenes with the story elements and still keep a fast pace in the story?
My background in special operations taught me that real action is rarely a continuous two-hour firefight. It’s hours of tension followed by seconds of chaos. I tried to replicate that rhythm, but with a better balance. Also, it is important that the reader cares. 1970s politics and game-changing aircraft technology are complicated enough, but I needed the reader to feel that pressure. Then, as the tension built through briefing room politics, the surveillance, and the planning, the reader finally felt the stakes. The pacing comes from the pressure cooker effect; the clock is ticking, and the walls are closing in. Then I added the guns.
What is the next book that you are working on, and when can your fans expect it to be out?
The next book is Arctic Fire, releasing in April 2026. It is a tonal shift from the spy world of Stealing Stealth. It’s a Neo-Western Noir set in the Alaskan wilderness, following a female Marine veteran who uncovers a conspiracy in a small, frozen town. Think Wind River meets Sicario. After that comes Eye of the Caldera. It’s a high-octane disaster thriller inspired by incredible true events and a declassified CIA operation. It drops in the Fall of 2026.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Website | Amazon
At the height of the Cold War, America’s revolutionary stealth technology could tip the balance of power. Now the race to control it threatens to derail a critical nuclear treaty between the world’s two superpowers.
Soviet operatives are close to acquiring this game-changing military secret. CIA Officer Olson has just seven days to protect America’s biggest technological advantage from falling into the wrong hands. His only hope lies with the brilliant thief he couldn’t catch: Gabrielle Hyde.
Inside the secretive Skunk Works facility, nothing is what it seems. Hyde and Olson discover Moscow isn’t the only enemy. A traitor from within is thwarting their every move. With both the FBI and KGB closing in and bodies piling up, Olson faces an impossible choice: follow orders from an agency that no longer trusts him or follow Hyde into an elaborate con against his own government.
From a decorated Air Force Colonel with 26 years in special operations and field command comes an authentic Cold War thriller where the greatest threats wear familiar faces.
Trust no one. Question everything. And never underestimate Gabrielle Hyde.
For fans of David McCloskey’s Damascus Station, John le Carré, and Daniel Silva, Stealing Stealth is a high-stakes heist where the only way to protect freedom is to steal its deepest secret.
Wrath and Reckoning
When I picked up Wrath and Reckoning, I expected a tight political thriller, and that’s exactly what I got. The story follows Max Kenworth and his team as they chase after the elusive mercenary Bart Madison and a missing nuclear weapon. Layered into that chase are power-hungry politicians, corrupt deals, shadowy agencies, and a relentless undertone of betrayal. From Arlington Cemetery to Central America to secret meetings in hotel rooms, the book moves quickly. Every chapter pushes the stakes higher. It’s less about quiet deduction and more about the terrifying weight of what-ifs: a nuclear device in the wrong hands, politicians who gamble lives for power, and operatives caught between duty and survival.
I really enjoyed the book’s pace. Parker doesn’t give you room to breathe. Scenes cut fast, and dialogue snaps like a whip. Sometimes it felt like a military briefing, other times like eavesdropping on a whispered conspiracy. That intensity pulled me in. The writing style is direct, sharp, and often blunt. I liked that honesty. You don’t get purple prose here. You get grit, strategy, and straight talk. The moments between Max and Danya, or Gail’s uneasy alliances, offered glimpses of vulnerability that I craved more of. Those human flashes made the gunfire and secret deals hit harder.
Madison is a ruthless figure, and Parker paints him as cunning, resourceful, and frighteningly pragmatic. He’s the kind of character who makes your skin crawl because he feels believable. Meanwhile, the politicians strutted like clowns, reeking of smugness and deceit. Part of me enjoyed that exaggeration. It made the story’s critique of corruption unmistakable. The line between good and bad sometimes felt too sharp. Still, the moral weight of the book, how power twists people, how ambition corrodes, landed with me.
Wrath and Reckoning is the kind of book I’d recommend to readers who like high-stakes thrillers with a military and political edge. If you want a story that keeps the throttle down and doesn’t let go, this will scratch that itch. It’s not for someone looking for subtle literary flourishes or deep psychological portraits. But if you want a fast, tense, and conspiratorial ride, Parker delivers. I closed the book feeling unsettled, a little wired, and already wondering what Max Kenworth will be up against next.
Pages: 249 | ASIN : B0FKRYGQD9
