Today we welcome author Jon Black to the site with an excerpt from his latest novel Gabriel's Trumpet, published by 18thWall Productions, an award-winning publishing house that specializes in fantasy, science-fiction, and horror. In Gabriel's Trumpet members of two warring factions of psychical researchers (based on the battles that emerged due to the Margery Case scandal) are set on the case of a so-called resurrected man. Gabriel Gibbs, a jazz trumpet player, was murdered in New Orleans two years ago. Now, Gabriel is back … with a gleaming silver trumpet and preternatural musical talent.
it is primarily a mystery with occult and horror elements, there is also some significant Cthulhu Mythos material. And be sure to tune in tomorrow for an interview with the author We are also offering a chance to win one of three copies of Jon's book, full details of how to be in for a chance to win can be found below after the excerpt from the book. GABRIEL'S TRUMPET BY JON BLACK
The Ascending Glory Tabernacle, what remained of it, was a long, narrow box. A covered porch protected double doors at one end. An obelisk-like steeple jutted heavenward at the other. Faded whitewash peeled from weathered boards. Weeds, brambles, and sickly sunflowers grew on its grounds. Only the churchyard remained well tended.
There was no particular reason Marcus needed to see the tabernacle. The building itself had no specific bearing on his investigation of Gabriel Gibbs. The story of Gabriel Gibbs was another matter entirely. This place, and the now vanished clergyman who had ruled over it, were fundamental to understanding the young musician’s life. Perhaps he was becoming a romantic as he aged, but Marcus had needed to see the tabernacle. To make it real to him. Even now, he could almost hear singing coming from inside the ruin. A little too well, in fact. Though the morning had already started to swelter, a chilly tingle traveled down Marcus’s spine. Taking reins in hand, he turned the wagon away. Leaving the tabernacle behind, Marcus guided Figaro along the dusty rural path known as Old Terraplane Highway. He came to where a rutted dirt track intersected the main road, itself not much more than packed earth barely wide enough for two wagons to pass abreast. Though he had passed several such crossroads already, a massive, twisted oak set this one apart. As Marcus approached, other differences appeared. Opposite the tree were low mounds capped with grayed and weathered wooden crosses. Graves, Marcus realized. In archaic traditions, which it seemed had not fully died out here, those considered unworthy of hallowed ground were often interred at crossroads. If Gabriel Gibbs had died before the creation of a county cemetery, he might well have been buried here. Who had been laid to rest under those mounds? What stories would they tell? Marcus mused that he was indeed becoming a romantic. A strange assortment of objects adorned the tree, primarily candles and liquor bottles. But a few more puzzling items stood out. A heart-shaped locket dangled from a branch. A knife protruded from the earth at the oak’s roots. Nearby, a ragdoll slowly moldered from exposure to the elements. Cleary, this was the crossroad. The one whispered about in relation to Gabriel Gibbs. But what did it all mean? Marcus thought it a pity that Frazer’s Golden Bough never seriously treated the societies of the New World…and that the curmudgeonly Scottish anthropologist thought of folklore as something inhabiting the increasingly distant country of the past rather than infusing the living world all around him. Minutes beyond the crossroad, Old Terraplane Highway rejoined the main road. From there, a few more miles took him back to Terraplane, the town where his Gates County adventures had begun. Driving the wagon into the larger town, a chorus of church bells, both great and humble, flooded his ears. Marcus had intended to do some shopping here, but the ringing bells announced an unanticipated hitch in his plans. Stores in Gates County closed on Sunday. Nevertheless, certain items were essential for his activities. With a little looking around, and light fingers, Marcus “liberated” what he needed: canvas tarp, a crowbar, hooded lantern, pick, and shovel. “All in the name of science,” he told himself, hoping no one would suffer too much from his pilfering. Hanging the lantern from the wagon, he loaded the tools in its bed beside Bartholomew’s various deliveries for tomorrow. Not wanting awkward questions, Marcus covered his acquisitions with the tarp. He traveled eastward to the community of Venice, Gabriel’s birthplace. Arriving late in the afternoon, he found nothing more than a sad collection of tarpaper shacks and a company store serving nearby Venice Planation. When nobody there seemed to recall much about the Gibbs family, Marcus was only too happy to turn the wagon around. Darkness descending, he lit the lantern. Homeward bound, Marcus again passed the crossroad. By night, the gnarled oak assumed a sinister shape. Wind teased the tall grass atop unhallowed graves and caused the oak’s branches to reach for him. His skin crawled. The Delta had a power, one Marcus also encountered in remote pockets of New England, rendering the mundane damnably suggestive. Little wonder the region was so steeped in folklore. It didn’t make his final task, the real reason for his solo excursion, any more appealing. His pocket watch showed just after midnight as the wagon stopped beneath a faded wooden sign that proclaimed “Gates County Cemetery, Est. 1898.” Or it would have, had negligence or ghoulish vandalism not absconded with several letters, leaving behind only the “Gat s Coun y Cemeter.” Marcus hooded his lantern so it cast only a thin, directional beam. A wire fence marked off the cemetery grounds. To one side stood a small gate. Directly underneath the cemetery sign was another, wider gate. The “corpse gate,” as such features had been known until just a few generations ago, served those who only needed to use it once. Except, perhaps, in the case of Gabriel Gibbs. After cleaning his glasses several times, Marcus removed the tarp, revealing the crowbar, shovel, and pick in the wagon’s bed. To determine if a man documented as dead had returned to the living, Marcus had resigned himself, it was very useful to know what, if anything, his grave contained. Not allowing himself time to think, he set about the repellent task. As he carried his tools from the wagon, noises behind Marcus brought him to a halt. Horrified, he watched a figure emerge from the bushes. Of all the people he might have expected to encounter here, Aunt Mancie was not on the list. In the lamplight, the Gibbs family matriarch appeared far more vigorous and hearty than on her rocking chair. “Aunt Mancie, what are you doing here?” “How come you never asked me about Gabriel?” she challenged him. “You figure the crazy old woman doesn’t know anything?” He hadn’t realized it at the time, but her words held much truth. Marcus had the decency to look embarrassed. “Doesn’t matter now,” she said. “I reckoned sooner or later you’d turn up here.” “Why?” “If I wanted to see if someone was alive or dead, I’d look here,” she said plainly. “And, if you’re opening my grandnephew’s grave, it seems only proper that a family member bears witness.” “You didn’t tell the others?” “They might have stopped you.” “You’re not going to?” “Truth is, I’m curious, too.” Digging up a grave was among the hardest, dirtiest things Marcus had done. Taking a break to catch his breath, Marcus looked at his unexpected companion. “Aunt Mancie, do you believe it’s possible for people to come back from the dead?” “Almost anything you can say is possible. Whether it’s likely is another thing entirely. And, please, when we’re not on the porch you can forget about the ‘Aunt’ Mancie nonsense.” Hours later, he bent over the exposed coffin of Gabriel Gibbs, holding his crowbar. Standing over the hole, Mancie cradled the pick as if on guard duty. Guarding against what? Marcus didn’t ask. He was pretty sure he didn’t want to know. Holding his breath, he wedged the crowbar underneath the coffin lid and pushed down. The lid swung open smoothly, offering no resistance, as if it had been forced before. Discovering it to be empty, Mancie and Marcus exhaled in unison, whether out of surprise, relief, or a mixture of both. Not only was the coffin unoccupied, its upholstered interior remained unsoiled. As a physician, Marcus was familiar with death and what accompanied it. A body had not lain here, or not lain long enough for decay to leave its mark. “Mancie, would you pass me the lantern?” Taking the light from the matriarch, Marcus illuminated the coffin’s interior. His careful examination revealed dark hairs and a small fingernail ripped from its owner during some epic endeavor. Breaking out? Breaking in? That was the question. But someone had been here. If not Gibbs himself, then whom? And to what purpose? Marcus pocketed the samples, hoping his companion would not notice. GABRIEL'S TRUMPET BY JON BLACK
That’s the question confronting Dr. Marcus Roads, physician and investigator for the Boston Society for Psychical Research, in this Jazz Age supernatural mystery. Gabriel Gibbs, a jazz trumpet player, was murdered in New Orleans two years ago. Now, Gabriel is back … with a gleaming silver trumpet and preternatural musical talent.
Marcus’s superiors task him with a high-stakes investigation. Is it really Gabriel? Or is someone (or something) claiming to be him? From tracing the musician’s origins in the tragic Mississippi Delta community of Pilate’s Point, Marcus follows in Gabriel’s footsteps through New Orleans and into the mysterious deep bayous. Ending in Harlem at the height of its Renaissance, Marcus searches its streets for his ultimate goal: a face-to-face encounter with the trumpeter whose life threatens to consume his Marcus’s own. The latest work by award-winning novelist and music historian Jon Black, Gabriel’s Trumpet simmers in the music and musical scene of the 1920s. Having walked in the same footsteps as his characters, Jon vividly brings to life the great locations of America’s Jazz Age, putting readers right in the action alongside Marcus as he struggles to answer two questions… Who, really, is Gabriel Gibbs? And what is the truth behind Gabriel’s Trumpet? To enter the giveaway just follow the instructions on theis tweet
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