Richard La Plante – författare

Three young women have been brutally assaulted and murdered in the city of Philadelphia. Lieutenant William Fogarty, a time-toughened cop hardened by personal tragedy, is shocked by the brutality of the crimes. His only lead comes from medical examiner Josef Tanaka. Half Japanese and half American, Tanaka, a skilled practitioner of the martial arts, claims to recognize the method used in the attacks: a karate strike known as nukite, or spear hand. Fogarty has nowhere else to turn.

An unlikely combination, Fogarty and Tanaka, forced together by circumstance and neither completely trusting the other, conduct a desperate hunt, trawling the city streets of Philadelphia and into the dangerous underbelly of the killing arts.

Pursuing the Mantis, a creature who uses the flesh of his victims in a sadistic, macabre ritual of self-purification, Fogarty and Tanaka endanger the lives of those closest to them as they inch perilously close to the precipice of their own worst fears and weaknesses.

“Never again,” Richard La Plante promised after he and his new wife completed building their family home in East Hampton, New York. But he did not keep his promise. Instead he bought twenty acres of raw land on a mountaintop located three-and-a-half thousand miles away in a small town that he had only visited by Internet … and the nightmare began.

Richard and his wife were soon dealing with a house in New York to sell, a massive loan to pay off for the newly purchased land, dishonest builders, some of the most stringent building codes in America, and the economic collapse of 2008. With no general contractor, because they had decided to save money by doing it themselves, La Plante and his wife face an empty bank account, a black widow spider infestation, and a large wooden frame with no windows. With two young sons to raise, a stony silence between them, and a marriage counselor who says in sagely fashion, “There’s only one answer: finish the house,” the La Plantes stumble from hilarious disaster to not-so-hilarious disaster to ultimate success.

Never Again is a seven-year chronicle of trial and triumph, both warning and an inspiration to anyone trying to build a dream.

Midway between the satire of Spinal Tap and the pathos of American Beauty lies the schizophrenic state of mind known as Hog Fever. On the surface this is the story of a man, a motorcycle, and a teetering bank balance. But lurking beneath, occasionally visible like threads through faded denim, is the story of a man in search of freedom—or at least one last stab at it.

Motivated by the emasculating success of his British screenwriter wife and a love of Easy Rider and The Wild One, Robert Lourdes, a struggling American author on the cusp of forty, finds solace in the Harley-Davidson legend. Robert’s last-ditch attempt to become part of his wife’s world ends in disaster when she blatantly co-opts his idea for a screenplay during a dinner party for a hideous Hollywood producer.

The arrival of Gabriella, a beautiful Italian production assistant with a Harley of her own, stirs in Robert the first tremors of a long-dormant passion. Confused and lacking the confidence to shed the marital skin, he takes further refuge in shiny accessories, rallies, and bigger Harleys, culminating in a 1,700-mile pilgrimage to a major biker rally in Marbella, Spain.

Hog Fever is Robert’s comedy of errors as he embarks on a tattoo-and-testosterone-fueled quest to find himself.