ABOUT THE BOOK
Spoiled brat William Dunby doesn’t want to grow into the shape of his older brother and only half-minds being kidnapped from the scene of the latter’s bachelor party. His kidnappers are a handful of chain-smoking vagabonds in search of enlightenment, Casanova Rockefeller – the reincarnation of his esteemed namesake – and their pet Viking, Orvar, who stumbled through a dimensional rift nearly a millennium ago and now rides along in their ice cream truck. All things considered, it could be worse and William may actually have a good time for once in his life.
Olaf Ury, vampire and lawyer, is having a bloody hard day on the other hand. His only high-profile client just realised Olaf knows too much about his criminal activities – money laundering, fraud and arms smuggling, to name just a few – and has dispatched a faux-Texan vampire hunter to thrust him into oblivion. Now this down-on-his-luck, undead lawman must go on the lam, and hitching a ride aboard the first ice cream truck that comes along seems as good a plan as any.
Susanna Crane and Andy Helfgott, detectives with the least respected, most ridiculed and frequently disregarded back-alley branch of Scotland Yard, would really rather be working on their main case – one involving money laundering, fraud and arms smuggling. But when their chief inspector tells them to focus their efforts on the kidnapping of his best friend’s son, they’re obliged to follow orders.
‘Champions of the ZigZag’ is a coming-of-age story told along a paranormal road trip posing as a whodunit. Religion and superstition are subjected to the scrutiny of its characters, as these narratives are gradually interwoven. Along the way, they’ll encounter God, Satan, Bigfoot, the Easter Bunny, vampires and demons, and – if they’re lucky – the origin of the entire universe will be revealed in all of its eruptive majesty.
The author humbly hopes that ‘Champions of the ZigZag’ may delight fans of Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett and Joseph Heller, as he is a huge fan himself.
ABOUT ME
Hi, I’m Leon. I’m a digital project manager by day, aspiring writer by… well, for most of the rest of my life.
Writing has been a passion of mine for a couple of decades now. I have four completed novels under my belt, and a metric tonne of plays and short stories, but nary a tome in any bookshop anywhere to prove it. Naturally, when I read about the novel competition on the Nerdist website, I jumped on the chance!
Creative projects of one type or another fill most of my spare time. When I don’t write, I either podcast as “Ponken”, the creator/host of Who Back When – we review classic and new Doctor Who – or I find excuses to make YouTube shorts – an ongoing process is to convince my co-stars to join me in a sequel to the Star Trek fan film we made at uni.
If you think you’d like to read Champions of the ZigZag, please do pre-order a copy. If it doesn’t make it to the top-5, it won’t cost you a penny and/or cent. And if it does, you’ll be supporting not just me and my near-lifelong dream, but by association my other creative endeavours as well.
Either way, thanks for reading this far!