Unlikely Beast: A Novel by John Lavrinc

Jack Martin, a true gentleman, with anxiety issues, is involved in an incident with one of his neighbors, and as a result, he installs cameras to keep watch on the neighbor’s daily activities. Susan, Jack’s wife of fifteen years, does not approve of his spying ways and their marriage suffers because of it. After many years their marriage ends in an amicable divorce and they both start new lives. While meeting College friends in Laughlin, Nevada, newly single Jack begins to change. A sinister entity seems to have taken over him, and he becomes an unlikely killer, an unlikely beast. At first his victims are bad people, the scum of the Earth, but eventually, as he starts to lose his mind, his victims become those closest to him. Weaved in the death and destruction in the book is a Laughlin Detective, Karl Schulz and his wife, Sandra who dream of adopting a pregnant Latina teen in order to give her and her baby a better life.

Most of the story takes place in Laughlin, Nevada. Boulder and Wheat Ridge, Colorado. Palm Springs, California and a small community in the Mojave Desert named Lake Tamarisk. This book has been in my head for several years and it is a great relief to finally put in on paper. The original idea for the story came from a trip to Laughlin, Nevada with my wife, and her family, who were attending a school reunion at the time.