Happy Sunday! I hope you’re all having a relaxing weekend full of the things you love the most (be that books, family, something else…). I am delighted to welcome you to the blog today and to today’s #R3COMM3ND3D2018. Joining me on this fine Sunday is author Eamonn Griffin who is on the brink of releasing his second novel, East of England, which is set to be published by Unbound on 24th January 2019.

If you haven’t come across #R3COMM3ND3D before then allow me to explain. #R3COMM3ND3D2018 is where I invite bookish folk to choose three must read books to recommend to the rest of us. The sky is the limit, providing the books chosen were published this year in 2018. Maybe the sky isn’t the limit after all…..

Here are Eamonn’s choices…

Jackrabbit Smile by Joe R. Lansdale (Hap and Leonard #11)
This is the 11th of Joe Lansdale’s Hap and Leonard series of comic East Texas thrillers, and the quality control is as good as ever. It’s a pleasure to revisit our luckless anti-heroes, and this newest adventure has plenty to please fans of the series, and of the recent TV adaptation.

The Outsider by Stephen King
After a local teacher is arrested for the rape and murder of a boy he couldn’t possibly have committed, an investigation begins. King’s a master craftsman, and this book, which although stand-alone, connects in ways to his recent Bill Hodges trilogy and delivers mightily on the promise of those three predecessors.

The Anomaly by Michael Rutger
Rutger is a nom-de-plume of Michael Marshall Smith, who also writes as Michael Marshall. In whatever name he’s writing, he’s an expert at delivering finely-crafted genre entertainment, and The Anomaly is no exception. The story concerns a camera crew and presenter on a journey to the Grand Canyon to film a documentary about unexplained phenomena. When on the trail of a Victorian-era explorer who left behind tantalising clues of a great mystery, the crew find something potentially earth-shattering. To say more would do the book a disservice. The Anomaly is cracking entertainment, and well-recommended.

Thanks so much for your great choices, Eamonn. I adore Stephen King novels but I haven’t read one in a long time now. All three of your choices sound great so they are all going on the wishlist!

If Eamonn has managed to tempt you, or if you would like to find out more information about the books he recommends, please see the following links:

| Jackrabbit Smile by Joe R. Lansdale | The Outsider by Stephen King | The Anomaly by Michael Rutger |

About Eamonn:
Eamonn Griffin was born and raised in Lincolnshire, though these days he lives in north-east Wales.

He’s worked as a stonemason, a strawberry picker, in plastics factories (everything from packing those little bags for loose change you get from banks to production planning via transport manager via fork-lift driving), in agricultural and industrial laboratories, in a computer games shop, and latterly in further and higher education.

He’s taught and lectured in subjects as diverse as leisure and tourism, uniformed public services, English Studies, creative writing, film studies, TV and film production, and media theory. He doesn’t do any of that anymore. Instead he writes fulltime, either as a freelancer, or else on fiction.

Eamonn has a PhD in creative writing with the University of Lancaster, specialising in historical fiction, having previously completed both an MA in popular film and a BSc in sociology and politics via the Open University. He really likes biltong, and has recently returned to learning to play piano, something he abandoned when he was about seven and has regretted since.

About East of England:
Dan Matlock is out of jail. He’s got a choice. Stay or leave. Go back to where it all went wrong, or simply get out of the county. Disappear. Start again as someone else. But it’s not as simple as that. There’s the matter of the man he killed. It wasn’t murder, but even so. You tell that to the family. Especially when that family is the Mintons, who own half that’s profitable and two-thirds of what’s crooked between the Wolds and the coast. And who could have got to Matlock as easy as you like in prison, but who haven’t touched him. Not yet. And like Matlock found out in prison, there’s no getting away from yourself, so what would the point be in not facing up to other people? It’s time to go home. East of England blends a rural take on the noir thriller with a fascination with the British industrialised countryside that lies east of the Wolds, between the Humber and the Wash. Unlit byways rather than the neon-bright and rain-slicked city. A world of caravan parks, slot machines, and low-rise battery farms. The flatlands of the east coast; decaying market towns and run-down resorts, and the distant throb of offshore windfarms. Where the smell you’re trying to get out of your clothes is the cigarette taint of old phone boxes and bus shelters, and where redemption, like life, is either hard-earned or fought for, one way or another.

| amazon.co.uk | amazon.com |

Eamonn’s Social Media Links:
| Website | Twitter @eamonngriffin | Facebook | Unbound |

If you would like to take part in #R3COMM3ND3D2018 then you need to get a wriggle on. At the time of writing, there are only 10 places left for this year. Here’s the form, don’t delay!