Thursday, February 8, 2024

Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse

Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse
Never for Glory: Josh Kavanagh Thriller, Book 2 by Lloyd Lofthouse

Publisher: Three Clover Press (June 25, 2023)
Category: Action, Suspense, Thriller, Love Story (but NOT a romance)
Tour dates: January 11-February 22, 2024
ISBN: 979-8988505709
Available in Print and ebook, 293 pages

  Never for Glory


Description Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse


He’d give his life for his country. But this time, it’s personal.
 

Josh Kavanagh burns for vengeance. Parachuting with no backup into a lawless area of southern Venezuela, the Special Ops legend is intent on hunting down the rogue agent who put his wife in a coma. But as soon as he gets feet on the ground, the loyal protector discovers he’s dropped into a trap… and a sex trafficking operation run by the Russian mob.

Fighting his way out and desperate to rescue the victims with minimal body count, Josh plans a daring raid on a remote ranch. But after learning the identity of the mastermind behind the hit on a former lover, the talented operative takes the law into his own hands on a hell-bent solo mission for revenge…

Will Josh’s single-minded thirst for justice finish on the wrong side of a gun barrel?

Never for Glory is the pulse-pounding second book in the Josh Kavanagh thriller series. If you like determined heroes, tough conflict ripped from the headlines, and page-turning action, then you’ll love Lloyd Lofthouse’s pursuit of payback.

Review Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse

Review by Suzie

A no nonsense tale of guts and glory!

This is the second book in the 'Josh Kavanagh' series by Lloyd Lofthouse and this book packs twice the punch of the first! This time, Josh Kavanagh quite literally begins the novel by falling from the sky. Parachuting into southern Venezuela, Josh's main target is a known sex trafficker by the name of Damien Bran.

Now, Bran is a slippery guy and Josh finds this out the hard way pretty quickly when he loses track of him in the jungle. But, while Josh does not find Bran, he does find a barn full of Bran's living victims-- dozens of children that have been brought into the country to be sex trafficked and are being kept in cages.

The situation is bleak, made all the more so by the traps and land mines surrounding the building and the gang of criminals one building over. Josh has to think quickly, and he needs the help of his partner and his former lover-turned sex trafficking victim advocate, Mia. The two of them have a lot of history to work out together, which is made even more complicated by the feelings that Josh still has for his comatose wife.

If you think all of this sounds exciting, you should know that this is just the tip of the iceberg with this novel!

Lofthouse spins a tale that is equal parts action and heart, with just the right amount of mystery thrown in for good measure. You definitely don't need to have read the first book in this series to enjoy this one, as Lofthouse also gives you everything you need to know right up front.

'Never For Glory,' was a slam dunk for me, and I'm sure that it will be a great read for anyone who enjoys a good thriller. 5 stars all around!

Interview Lloyd Lofthouse

Suzie: What is your favorite scene in the book? Why?

Lloyd: Two scenes in Never for Glory are tied for my favorite spot, and they both include Adrienne. When Josh first meets this new character, she’s locked in a cramped cage meant for dogs, and is being trafficked into the illegal, global sex industry. In chapter 12, while rescuing her, Josh is impressed by how calm she is and the fact that she sees humor in her situation, as they are trying to disarm an IED buried under her cage (an improvised explosive device powerful enough to kill them all in an instant).

When writing that scene, I never intended to elevate any of the rescued children to become permanent characters in the series beyond that chapter, but Adrienne impressed me and Josh into becoming a regular, who ends up with a major role in this book and the next one in the series, Fiddling with Death.

The second scene starts with Chapter 28. A short time after the rescue, Josh was severely wounded. The only reason he’s still alive is because of Adrienne, who refuses to let him die. He sees himself as a burden and contemplates suicide to give her a better chance to survive the mess they’re in.

Suzie: Where do you get the names for your characters?

Lloyd: Most of the character names come from Writers Digest’s Character Naming Sourcebook, second edition. After I determine the family history of a character, often back to that family’s roots, I look up the country of origin. While I’m looking at those names, I’m also paying attention to what they mean.  For instance, Adrienne’s full name, the one she chose, not what her parents gave her at birth, is Adrienne Odelette Avice. Since Adrienne is one of Mia’s super fans (Mia’s a famous French singer in the novel who also secretly rescues trafficked children). When Adrienne legally changed her name at 16, she went with French, not Portuguese, her first language.

Adrienne means dark

Odelette ­- little singer

Avice - warlike.

Why did she change her name to this one?

Well, she’s melanin-rich, stands less than 5-feet tall, is a popular busker in Brazil with a successful YouTube channel, and when needed, she won’t back down. She’ll fight.

Suzie: How completely do you develop your characters before beginning to write?

Lloyd: I’m a pantser, who only develops characters with more depth after I know they’re going to stick around. Josh was born from a prompt in the Wednesday morning, VA, PTSD support group I belong to that uses writing as therapy to help us manage our trauma. The prompt that gave birth to the Josh Kavanagh thrillers was about a combat vet coming home. The revised results of that first prompt turned into The Patriot Oath’s first chapter. A week later, the results from the second prompt, heads or tails, continued Josh’s story.  At the end of chapter one, he flips a coin to find out how he’s going to reconnect with his high school sweetheart Rachel.

After that, I wanted to explore Josh’s life in depth, and kept writing. Now I’m about halfway through writing the third thriller in the series.

Eventually, as a character takes on a life of their own, I have to stop and create a detailed character profile that sometimes reaches back before their birth into their family’s history. A lot of the details in those profiles never make it into the story, but they help me understand what makes each character tick.

Suzie: How has your being in the Marines and seeing combat influenced your writing?

Lloyd: Being a former US Marine and combat vet living with PTSD has influenced my writing quite a bit. I started writing seriously in 1968, and it wasn’t until recently that I realized most if not all the major characters in my fiction are traumatized. Writing about someone else suffering from PTSD trauma has helped me manage mine.

Writing “provides a safe place for random thoughts, feelings and experiences that would otherwise clutter your mind. Putting words down on paper become cathartic and your mind becomes calmer and clearer.” — PTSDUK

And since combat vets aren’t the only people that have been damaged, the traumas my characters live with, that define who they are, runs the gamut. “This could be the result of experiences such as war, physical assault, or sexual assault. It's also possible for a natural disaster or other traumatic experiences to cause PTSD.” ­ — The Bridge to Recovery

Another major influence is from the other combat vets in my VA PTSD support groups, both women and men.  And yes, some women in that group have also been in combat—one of them was an Explosive Ordinance Disposal Specialist (EOD) for more than a decade. I asked her once why she didn’t stay in a few more years until she reached 20, so she could retire with some benefits. She replied, “I got tired of being blown up.” She’s tougher than most of the men I know.

Suzie: What writers have you drawn inspiration from?

Lloyd: There are many. For thrillers, I think James Lee Burke’s Dave Robicheaux series is at the top of the list. Other writers would be: Ursula K. Le Guin, Tolkien, Frank Herbert, Anne Rice, et al. I’m a fan of vampire books, too.

Suzie: What was your first job?

Lloyd: I was 15, and washing dishes for minimum wage, about 30 hours a week, nights and weekends in a May Co. department store’s basement coffee shop restaurant during three of my four high school years.  

Suzie: What do you do when you are not writing?

Lloyd: When I’m not writing, I’m exercising or working on the fixer upper I live in that I bought back in 2016. That house was in such terrible shape, my offer was the only one the seller got. It took three months working 12 to16 hour days before I moved in.  Even then, I started out living in one room while working on the others, until the day came that the house was livable again. I’m still working on improvements. This neglected house was used as a rental for 40 years before I bought it.

I have enough tools and skills to build a house from scratch if I live long enough.  That’s on my bucket list. My dream house, well, I couldn’t build it alone. That’s for sure. I’d have to hire someone else to work with me.  The latest project was turning my bed into a storage bed. I’m almost done with that one. Next task, lining the inside of the storage area with aromatic tongue and grove cedar planks.

Suzie: What books are you reading at present?

Lloyd:  Here’s a short list of the most recent books I’ve read that are still sitting in my to-be-reviewed stack: the curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon, Fugitive Telemetry by Marta Wells, The Mystery of Mrs. Christie by Marie Benedict, Centers of Gravity by Marko Kloos (I’ve read the entire series), A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles, Z, A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Anne Fowler, and Tom Lake by Ann Patchett.

Suzie: What are you currently working on?

I’m working on Fiddling with Death, the third thriller in the Josh Kavanagh series, and a science fiction-fantasy-paranormal series called Becoming Merlin, that I’ve been serializing on Amazon Vella. The subtitle for the first book in that series may be called Fugitives.

Suzie: What is your writing routine like?

Lloyd: My daily writing goals mean I have to work at least one hour or more a day.  Usually, it’s more. I also belong to three critique groups, and one of the three is the VA, PTSD support group I mentioned earlier. Before I share what I’m writing, I also run my rough drafts through ProWritingAid.

What I write and share with the combat vets does not always end up being published and seen by anyone else. For instance, here’s a haiku chain poem I wrote for the PTSD support group about my life from birth.

The Six Ages of Lloyd

 Gasping to inhale

Sentenced to death at three

No way doctors said

 One MD said yes

Too many jabs, no athletics

Never ending years

 

Stupid at Seven

He’s too dull to read or write

Two Ed judges said

 

By ten, a reader

Mom proved dumb experts wrong

Escaping in books

 

At nineteen the one

Said, Lloyd, you are healed

Free to live your life

 

He joined the Marines

Bootcamp was a living hell

Vietnam better

 

He turned twenty-one

With bullets and bombs flying

Trauma a shadow

 

Five decades slipped by

Surviving booze and fast food

Him haunted by ghosts

 

Reaching seventy

With baggage, three divorces

And PTSD

 

Him living each day

Combating many demons

With the feel good four

 Note: The feel good four are hormones our bodies produce naturally:

Dopamine, serotonin, endorphins, and oxytocin. You can boost levels of these hormones with some simple lifestyle changes, like diet, exercise, and meditation, and possibly improve your mood in the process.” — Harvard Health

 Naturally increasing the production of those four feel-good hormones is one of my major weapons in managing the PTSD I live with.

 Thanks so much for taking part in this interview! Suzie

You are welcome. Thanks for having me as a guest on your blog. Lloyd

Never For Glory by Lloyd LofthouseAbout Lloyd Lofthouse

Multi award winning author, Lloyd Lofthouse is a former US Marine (1965—1968) and combat vet managing PTSD. After the Marines, he went to college and earned a BA in journalism and later an MFA. After working as a nightclub maître d, he taught English and journalism in a public high school. For his first published novel, My Splendid Concubine, Lloyd visited mainland China several times to learn more about that country’s people, culture, and history. 

 He’s the author of the award-winning novels My Splendid Concubine, Running with the Enemy, The Redemption of Don Juan Casanova, and the memoir Crazy is Normal, a classroom exposé. His short story, A Night at the Well of Purity was named a finalist in the 2007 Chicago Literary Awards. 

Websites: http://lloydlofthouse.org/ & https://thesoulfulveteran.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/lflwriter
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Lloyd-Lofthouse-168775989838050/

Buy Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse

Amazon

Giveaway Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse

This giveaway is for 3 ebook copies and is open to the U.S. only.This giveaway ends on Feb 23, 2024 midnight, pacific time. Entries accepted via Rafflecopter only. a Rafflecopter giveaway

Follow Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse

Teddy Rose Book Reviews Kickoff Jan 11 Excerpt

Carole Rae’s Random Ramblings Jan 12 Review

Ellen Goodreads Jan 16 Review

Mike Goodreads Jan 18 Review

Kari From the TBR Pile Jan 26 Guest Review- Gud Reader & Excerpt

Linda Lu Goodreads Jan 30 Review

Denise GoodReads Amazon Feb 6 Review

Dawn Bound for Escape Feb 7 Guest Review- Sal

Gracie Goodreads Feb 8 Review

Suzie My Tangled Book Skeins Reviews Feb 9 Review & Interview

Book Girl Amazon Goodreads Feb 13 Review

Teddy Rose Book Reviews Feb 14 Guest Review-Mark

Liam Goodreads Feb 15 Review

Kathleen Celticlady’s Reviews Feb 16 Guest Review- Laura & Guest Post

DTChantel Amazon Feb 19 Review

Bee Book Pleasures Feb 20 Review & Guest Post

Smitty Goodreads Feb 22 Review

  Never For Glory by Lloyd Lofthouse

1 comment:

  1. Thanks so much for hosting Lloyd. I am so glad you enjoyed 'Never For Glory'!

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for your comment. It is very important to me. Know that while I might not reply directly to your comment every time, I certainly read it and appreciate it.