Chi-town meets Great News Town

This weekend the Windy City welcomes the return of the book that  spawned this serial killer serial. Great News Town will be featured at the Printers Row Literary Festival, one of the largest book festivals in the country. The story began in the Chicago suburbs back in the 1980s with a series of murders in Joliet. From 2-6 p.m. Sunday, author Sue Merrell will be signing copies of Great News Town and One Shoe Off in a tent sponsored by the Chicago Writers Association.If you stop by, be sure to say you read about it on GNT: The Serial Killer Serial.

Chapter 111

Josie was so excited as she pulled into the parking lot behind the ceramic shop that she started shouting as soon as she entered the open back door.

 “He did it! Kevin made a goal!”

But when she stepped from the bright sunlight into the dim stairwell leading down six steps to the studio, she saw something that silenced her enthusiasm.

 “Barb?”

She could make out a figure crumpled at the bottom of the stairs.

 “Su, help me,” she hollered as she rushed to Barb’s body.  “Something has—”  

As she rolled her friend over, horror grabbed the voice from her throat. Barb’s head lolled back like a rag doll that has lost some of its stuffing and blood gushed from the grotesque red smile just below her chin. Barb’s eyes were open wide in disbelief.

Josie wanted to scream but no sound would come. Her mouth moved as if trying to pump up words from deep inside. She turned and saw blood and broken pieces of half-finished pottery everywhere. Penny lay awkwardly over the table, her head surrounded by the puddle of blood that oozed from her throat.

A moan pulled Josie’s attention to the right and she could see a pair of feet sticking out of the bathroom.  Josie stumbled over Barb and the chunks of shattered Christmas tree and fairly fell on Aggie in the bathroom. There was hardly any blood on her, no seeping streak of red across her neck, just a perfectly round hole in the middle of her forehead.

 “Aggie! Aggie, can you hear me?”

The old woman was unconscious but moaned again.

 “I’ll get help.” Josie headed for the phone at the front counter. As she started through the shelves of greenware, she passed Su’s body, bent in half, looking perfectly delicate except for the circle of red that surrounded her. Josie didn’t slow to check her but stumbled on to the phone, looking back in horror to see her footprints tracking through the blood. Her footprints and someone else’s.

She ran right into him, a mountain of a man standing at the register, one purse dangling from his neck, one at his elbow, and his hands stuffing dollars from the register into the third purse.

Josie squealed in surprise and Malcolm chuckled with macabre satisfaction. Josie turned and ran, past Su slumped against the greenware, around Penny teetering on the table. She was just about to leap over Barb at the base of the stairs when a huge arm encircled her waist and yanked her into the air.

 “No! Put me down,” Josie screamed, finding her voice at last. She flailed her arms and legs wildly as Malcolm whirled her around, laughing as though playing with a squirming child. In her fight to break free, one of Josie’s jerking feet found its mark in the big man’s groin, and he threw her to the floor as he bent in pain.

Josie crawled a few feet to the base of one of the rolling pottery shelves. Without thinking, she grabbed one of Barb’s gigantic porcelain bowls, whipped around and hit the still bent Malcolm Jones in the head. He stumbled backward a few steps, enough that Josie probably could have made it up the nearby stairs, but an odd rage possessed her. Unaccustomed power heightened her senses and a strange feeling of invincibility vanquished any fear.

 “That’s for Barb,” she thought as the bowl shattered. Then she turned and grabbed one of Penny’s gnome cookie jars, so big that it took two hands for Josie to pick it up.

 “And that’s for Penny,” she screamed as she threw the heavy piece. It glanced off the madman’s back.

 Malcolm shot up to full height and growled like an angry bear. No longer was he having fun. His switchblade glinted in his right hand and he lunged at Josie, barely nicking her leg as she ran around behind the shelf, grabbing pieces of pottery and slinging them as she went. Even Su’s dainty butterflies, which could sting no more than a mosquito bite, sailed toward his advancing hulk. Aggie’s delicate designs bounced off his shoulder and exploded on the floor.

In the rage that gripped her, it seemed that each of her dead friends was placing weapons in her hands. The china shop was avenging itself on the bull.

Amid the pelting of pottery, Malcolm slashed at Josie, pushing her back to the wall by the shelves of heavy greenware until she was trapped in a corner. She had nothing more to throw and no outlet for escape. Malcolm paused to laugh at his triumph.

“Father, help me,” Josie breathed, looking into the madman’s eyes.  Pressed against the concrete block wall, she reached an arm behind the shelves of  greenware. She felt something solid, a water pipe, and pulled.

 Just as Malcolm stabbed toward her with all his weight, Josie disappeared, slipping into the imperceptible space between the shelf and the wall as miraculously as a newborn emerges from a ten-centimeter opening.

Frustrated, Malcolm poked at her behind the shelf but his beefy arms were too big to reach her as she slithered up the backs of the metal shelves.

Through the shadowy greenware, Josie could see Malcolm straining like Hercules to pull the shelf away from the wall. Feeling the shelf start to move, Josie grabbed a water pipe overhead and straightened her legs, pushing against the top shelf with all her strength. The unit wavered and then toppled forward with a thunderous crash.

Dangling from the water pipe like a kid on monkey bars, Josie saw a streak of movement through the torrent of ceramic shards. Malcolm Jones had escaped.

No longer thinking of her own safety, Josie dropped to the floor and started after him. Beyond the register she could see that the front door was open. Had it been standing ajar before? She couldn’t remember.

She ran to the door and looked both ways but could see no one. She was turning back into the room to call police when Malcolm slammed her head into the doorframe, practically knocking her out.

 “Where you goin’, bitch?” he whispered with eerie calm. He pulled her back into the room, closed the door, and bolted it. 

 “It’s my turn,” he said pushing her up against the counter. Her face was bloodied now, one side swelling where she had hit the doorframe.  His lips curled into a hideous grin, but his dark eyes lacked the fire of madness Josie had seen before. Instead, as he lifted the knife to her throat, she saw sadness in his brown eyes . . . and hesitation. Two words flashed into her mind, words Duke had said when she wasn’t listening but that somehow had stuck with her for their incongruity.

“Good boy,” she choked out. “Good boy.”

Startled, Malcolm lessened his grip enough that she slipped under his arm and tried to run back into the studio.  He grabbed her wrist. She whirled around and threw one last piece of pottery, the heavy earthenware vase that Su had said could be a hammer.

Perhaps it was her aim, or the way Malcolm jerked to one side, or maybe it was a guardian angel’s doing, but the vase missed Malcolm entirely and sailed like a vandal’s brick through the plate glass window at the front of the store. The lights seemed to flicker as the glass shattered in slow motion, the break creeping in all directions with a crackling noise as it painted  a spider web on the pane.

The shock seemed to stop Malcolm and Josie for a split second. Then Malcolm’s fist exploded into Josie’s face, and everything went black.

COMING JUNE  12: The final confrontation. Who will survive? Josie? Malcolm? What will be the final play that makes all the pieces fit?

Chapter 110

When no one answered Barb’s question, Su Le went to investigate. Perhaps she had a customer. Barb and Penny turned their attention to their projects and Aggie closed the door on the restroom.

Suddenly, Malcolm burst into the studio, his big arm wrapped around Su so her upper body almost disappeared in his grip. In the other hand, he held a small gun.  

 “Oh, my God,” Penny said.

 “What the—” Barb jumped to her feet.

 “Sit down and shut up!” Malcolm said in a gruff voice.

 “No way, you bum.” Barb lunged across the table. Malcolm tightened his grip on Su and met Barb’s forehead with his gun.

 “No, please, no!” Su said. “Just take the money and go.”

 “You! Take that tape over there and tape that bitch’s mouth shut.” Malcolm pushed Su in the direction of a roll of duct tape sitting atop the boxes of clay.  Barb locked eyes with the determined man and saw a spark of madness that made her step back.

 “I’ll be quiet,” she said.

 “Tape her mouth,” Malcolm repeated. “And her arms, too. Over here, sit over here.” He tapped the back of one of the metal folding chairs with his gun.

Su pulled a little bit of tape off the roll, then told Malcolm she needed to get the scissors. She walked to the cabinet by the back door and Malcolm followed her. When she opened the drawer a little, he yanked it from her hand and sent the contents spilling across the floor. She screamed and jumped away from him.

 “Pick up the scissors,” he said pointing to a pair in the middle of the floor. “Just don’t try anything stupid.”

 “No, no,” Su said, holding her hands up. “We not do anything stupid. You take the money now. You go.”

 “Tape up your friends first,” Malcolm said motioning with his gun.

Su did as she was told, first Barb and then Penny, a strip of tape across the mouth, a couple of  bands around the arms and the back of the chair. Penny was whimpering. 

 “We mothers,” Su said. “She has little ones. You no hurt mothers.”

 “No one’s going to get hurt if you do as I say,” Malcolm said, his voice rising.  “Now bring me the purses.”

Su picked up the two purses on the floor by Penny. Suddenly she remembered Aggie in the restroom. Her eyes caught Penny’s.

 “Bring ’em here, and that one, too.” Malcolm indicated Barb’s small purse hanging on the back of the chair.  Su took the three purses to Malcolm. Hers was in the front room, under the cash register, but maybe he wasn’t counting.

Malcolm hung the small purse over his neck and opened up one of the bigger ones.

 “Okay, let’s empty that cash register into here,” he said, handing the purse to Su. She was walking forward hesitantly to take the outstretched purse when the restroom door opened.

Lightning fast, Malcolm spun and shot toward the unexpected sound. The bullet hit Aggie smack in the middle of the splotch of green paint on her forehead. The force blew her body back into the tiny restroom.

 ‘Now, look what you made me do,” he grumbled.

What happened next seemed in slow motion, each reaction, each movement seeming separate and yet somehow all happening at once.

Penny jumped up with so much adrenalin that she fell, chair and all, across the table, sending a half-painted Christmas tree crashing to the floor.  Su took advantage of the distraction to lurch into the aisles of greenware.

 “Damn bitches,” Malcolm shouted, turning to chase after Su. His big arm reached out and grabbed her long ponytail. She screamed as he pulled her to the ground.

 “Stupid, stupid,” he said with an evil chuckle.  He yanked Su up until her face was just under his goatee and looked her in the eye.  Pulling a switchblade from his pocket, he slashed her throat with such force that he almost severed her head.

 Violence seemed to feed him like stoking a flame, and he roared with delight.  Penny was rolling helplessly about amid the soft clay pieces on the table and couldn’t see what had happened to Su, but Barb could see and started pushing herself backward in the chair, trying to get away.

Malcolm grabbed Penny by the hair.

“Look at the mess you’re making,” he chided, and slit her throat, too.

“Now, who’s going to clean this up?” he said, as he headed toward Barb.

COMING JUNE 5 -- When Josie returns from the soccer match, what will she find in the ceramic studio? 

Great News Town on Kobo

Canadian fans, there's great news. Great News Town is now available on Kobo. If you've only caught a few chapters in GNT: The Serial Killer Serial and you want to get the whole story, you'll find it available in paperback and various ebook formats. Kobo is the latest addition. Welcome Kobo fans!

The end is near!

      Can't you just feel it? The excitement mounting? The solution to the Cornfield Killer murders is close. The two-year serial will end on June 19.That's 10 more chapters. Don't miss one! Think you know how it will end? Go ahead. Post your comments. See if you can beat Duke and Josie.

Did we mention -- Honorably?

Great News Town is highlighted in the current issue of Writers' Digest Magazine as an honorable mention in their Self-Published Book Awards. You'll find it listed under Genre Fiction. That covers a huge assortment of books so just making the mentioned-at-all list is quite an honor. You can get a taste of Great News Town right here... not only this week's chapter but up to 10 earlier chapters in the archive! The mystery is just about to be solved!

Happy New Year!

Faithful readers of GNT:The Serial Killer Serial are well into the second year of the weekly serial and nearing the climax of the tale. But, don't worry, your new friends in Jordan live on.  Great News Town is the first book in a mystery series. All your favorite newspaper characters return in One Shoe Off. The third book in the series, Full Moon Friday, will be released in June. It's going to be a great new year!