Unlimited Slaughter of Americans
by
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The Parkerton Examiner had a grand total of six employees and as Debra Dunn sat at her computer working on her story, the activities of the other five didn’t even register in her mind. As always, when she was writing, her concentration was total. And it never mattered to her if the subject was subtle, shocking, or anywhere in between; she invariably instilled it with her own personal touch. Her current article dealt with a guide dog that had saved its owner’s life when the sightless man was attacked near his home by a loose Rottweiler. Debra glanced at her notebook and then finished the part of the story where the man had described to her how his dog had died in his arms as he knelt on the sidewalk. When she had interviewed him at his home earlier that afternoon, she had cried right along with him. So much for professionalism. Now tears started once again to slide down her cheeks. She sniffed as she reached for a tissue from the box she kept on her desk. "Tough piece, Deb?" Jim Hopkins asked as he placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. Hopkins owned and edited the small-town daily. The teary-eyed reporter hadn’t heard him approach, but wasn’t embarrassed in the least as she turned to look up at him. "Broke my heart, Jim," she admitted. She dabbed at her eyes and then wiped her nose before tossing the tissue into her wastebasket. "As soon as I finish the sympathy section here, I’ll segue into my tirade about irresponsible dog owners and hope that some good might come out of this. That’s why I love this job so much. But that’s not news to you, right, Jim?" The publisher’s face took on a rather painful expression. "Is something wrong?" she asked. One of the female employees was walking by as Debra made this inquiry. She stopped and looked at her boss. It was no secret that the sixty-seven-year-old Hopkins had a history of heart problems. "Are you okay, Jim? Are you having any pains?" the woman asked with a concerned look. After a brief smile that both women thought was forced, he said, "Doc says I’m doing just fine. Just went to see him last week." The woman went on her way without looking convinced. "Debra, I’d like to talk with you in my office." "Right now? Or should I finish this up first?" She looked briefly at the monitor screen. Jim Hopkins could see how anxious she was to transfer her words from her mind to the computer, but he hadn’t the stomach for putting this off a moment longer. "Right now, Deb," he told her. She left the uncompleted article on the screen, saved it, and then followed her boss into his office. "Close the door," he said, and then indicated that she should sit in the chair near his desk. Debra wasn’t certain if it was her imagination, but he seemed to look ashen as he sat in his swivel chair behind the desk. He leaned forward and clasped his hands together as he placed them on the surface of his desk. After studying his hands for a few seconds, he looked up at Debra. He took a deep breath and then sighed. "Oh boy, I really hate to do this. I almost wish I could put all the blame on Tilly, but even though I’m doing this at her insistence, I have to admit that in my heart I know she’s right. In the end, it will be best for the both of us. You will be able to find a better job; you’re too damn good a reporter not to. Debra, I’m sorry that I..." "Tilly is making you fire me! But, Jim, I apologized to her about writing the story about her cousin passing all of those bad checks. Your wife told me not to worry about it. You were there. Remember how she said that even if you two hadn’t been on vacation and had known what I was going to write, she wouldn’t have asked you to kill the story. Tilly said her cousin deserved the notoriety as well as whatever legal punishment she’ll get. I can’t believe this. I really thought she appreciated what I’ve tried to do for your paper over the years. What hurts even more is that I always felt that she liked me as a person." "Ah, Deb, you’ve got it all wrong. I’m not firing you. Tilly and I both love you like the daughter we were never able to have. Debra, I’ve sold the Examiner; I signed the final papers today."
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About the Book
Working as a reporter on a newspaper in Parkerton, Indiana, suited Debra Dunn just fine. Although the man who owned and edited the paper had often advised her to seek out a better-paying job at a paper in a major city, Debra was not going to take Jim Hopkins’s advice. There was no way she would showcase her writing talent in some distant city and leave her father, Bill Overfield, a widower, to fend for himself. But when Jim sold his newspaper and retired, Debra became a syndicated columnist and was able to continue to live at home with Bill. As Debra’s column grew in popularity, so did her frustration over the senseless deaths brought about by the illegal use of firearms in the country. After a gunman murdered seven people in a Chicago supermarket, Debra targeted the owner of the company that had manufactured the semi-automatic pistol used in the massacre. Ryan Cordell felt he was being unfairly singled out since he was a legitimate firearms producer. He went so far as to invite Debra to his factory in his hometown of Thomasville, Illinois. But the reporter’s meetings with Ryan, his employees, and even his family did nothing to soften her stance.
Debra was only a few weeks away from getting married for the second time when Ryan showed up unannounced at her home. Because her actions had changed his life so dramatically, he was determined to do the same to hers.
About the Author
It is a well-documented fact that a fiction writer’s life experiences enhance the plots and characters that he or she creates. Kerry Deminski is a man who worked as a letter carrier for the United States Postal Service for three and a half decades, but also spent a lot of time before and during that period holding down other jobs as well. He worked as an armed guard for a detective agency, as a truck driver for a bookbinder, as a janitor, as a heating and air conditioning mechanic, as a theater usher, as a convenience store clerk, and as a factory laborer. While still a teenager in Appalachia, he spent three years working after high school and on weekends for an uncle in the trucking business, shoveling coal and delivering ice into hundreds of homes in that financially-depressed region. During these jobs, and others not mentioned, Deminski filed away in his mind all of the people he met and the things they said and did, hoping to draw upon these experiences to enrich the books he knew he would write someday. Now that someday has arrived, and the prolific author turns out one, sometimes two, novels every year. Kerry Deminski has also received royalties for song lyrics he has written; he has sold humor to Playboy Magazine; he has been granted U.S. Patent Numbers 5,755,438 and 5,788,706 for two of his inventions.