Preview bookcover

Been preparing the cover of my next thriller 'Concealed'. Scheduled for publication May, 2016. I used one of my small abstract sandpaintings (Sand Tile, numbered AM 214122) as pictured above, as basis. The golden yellow coloration covers the deep violet, almost blood red background. It matches well with this thriller. Events happening in the present, are based upon a tragedy which happened many years ago. 

Extension

A more slender, elongated version of a previous artwork (Trembled). This version without sand, but including the nice basis seagreen - turquoise coloration. 

Only signed at the back so it can be hung either horizontal or vertical. It's all up to your imagination! (Or the available space upon your walls ofcourse...)

Order your print version here: Tremblongated

Rusty

In Dutch we say 'Oude liefde roest niet' (literally translated as: "old love will not rust"). The English however say: "Old love never ends". 

This painting shows a rusty coloration, created with acrylics and sand. The vertical band is inscripted with letters. The line "old love never..." has faded into the background. Almost unseeable. But it's still there. Just like the old love itself... 

Order your print here: Old love never ends

Paper Fish

A special release this week: the first book based on my blog "A Queer Fish". A collection of blog entries and artworks previously published in my blog, make a great giveaway. I have chosen the dark brown Acanthoplesiops cappuccino as cover model.

That's right: a fish named cappuccino. Hence the title "A cup of fish".The giftbook, 55 pages, can be ordered at amazon.com.  
Order your prints (framed, on canvas, metal  etc.) or printed matter based on the artwork in this book (cards, pillows and more) in my printshop. Check out the latest entry of my blog of fish by using the link on this page (top right). 

Trembled

Finished this fine abstract artwork. Started out with green and violet. After placing more and more layers of acrylics on top, I ended up with a nice seagreen - turquoise coloration. The light colored vertical band, next to the violet band, is made by dripping turquoise and moss green paint into wet sand.
Trembled (115 x 75 cm). $ 1075 / € 990. Click upon the link to order prints, pillows etc.

Dune

Few weeks ago my daughther and I made photos in a nature reserve on "Goeree Overflakkee", a former island which, as part of the Deltaworks, has been connected to the mainland many years ago.

One of the photos I made has been on my mind ever since. A red marked pole in the middle of yellowish vegetation at sea. I have made this, mainly yellow, abstract impression of it.
Dune (120 x 40 cm). $ 600 / € 550. 

Click upon the link to order prints, pillows etc. (or to buy the original).

Candles at Dawn

The dog has its own rythm. No matter what, I have to go out early. Not that bad this time of the year, as the autumn sunrise has a very special appearence. The light has to find its way through dark clouds and morning fog. It inspired me to make these two paintings:
Break of Dawn (50 x 40 cm) $ 250 / € 230. Picture left.
Light of Dawn (115 x 75 cm). $ 1075 / € 990. Picture below.

Click upon a link to order prints, pillows etc. (or to buy the original).

Light my fire

Great song by The Doors. However, their music has nothing to do with the title of this blog. The subject of this entry is: Lighthouses. Why Lighthouses? Because they are so characteristic for their environment. I've made a series of sketches of these solid lifesavers on paper (which I have stained between double glass frames) and on flat rocks. (See previous blogs). I just like the way the rough structure of the stone gives the painted sketches a great appearence.

Last Sunday I visited the local Lighthouse. I can hear you say: "What do you mean? Local Lighthouse?". Well that's one of the pros of living near the sea. You've got a lighthouse more or less in your backyard. Anyway, I dared to go into the local tower of fear and climb the endless stairs. Ehm...to understand this remark, I should tell you I am afraid of heights. Climbing a ladder with more than two sports already is a challenge to me, so you may imagine how much time it took me to crawl my way up the stairway to heaven. When I finally reached the top there was a man waiting (mind you it's not a very tall building, my fear just slowed me down more every step I made). The man welcomed me and showed me the door to the balcony. More like a small ridge if you ask me. A quick glance through the window, especially a glance down to the ground, was more than enough to make up my mind. This guy is never, ever going out that door! 

The man kindly repeated his question: "Aren't you going out?"
I said: "No, I'm afraid of heights."
The look upon his face was unforgettable. I guess he still wonders why someone would do so much trouble to go all the way up, and then stay inside. 

So, why on earth did I go up? To make a few pictures obviously. And to find out that the big light I expected to be there, and honestly I expected a light bulb about the size of my body, had recently been replaced by an ultra small super light bulb, hardly bigger than my thumb. I bet the man in the lighthouse does not forget the look on my face either.

One more...

Just one more. The original is sold, but prints are available. 

Check out the special gallery of Lighthouses at my printshop. 

ROCKet Fire

Continuing my efforts to find a way to paint those enchanting lighthouses in a more or less abstract style, I made these small studies on flat rocks (15x15 cm).

Turned out they became miniature, painted sculptures. Check out the special gallery of Lighthouses at my printshop. Both originals and prints are available. 

Marsh fire

Lighthouses are fascinating. Trying to find a way to paint them in an abstract style, I made some small studies on paper first.
I have stained the original sketches between glass, then framed them. These frames can either be hung on the wall or simply placed upon a table.
Check out the special gallery of Lighthouses at my printshop. Both originals and prints are available. 

Rockies

The outdoor season is here. Going to present my work at some artfairs and markets. Especially made these 'Rockies'. Flat stones, 15x15cm, painted at both sides. Back side a seahorse, front covered with the Banggai Cardinal, Pterapogon kauderni. Limited edition of nine, handmade artworks.
More details on this lovely fish in my blog; or order prints, mugs, Tees and more i my printshop.

Backside Rockies

Pterapogon kauderni, the well known Banggai Cardinal, painted on flat rocks.

Tropical heat

"Tears of a cloud" 40x40cm, Acrylics & Sand on Canvas.
Painting (or prints) available, again...

Friday we had the first tropical day of the year. It ended with thunder and lightning. As usual. The lightning bolts reminded me of a small abstract painting I had made, named 'Tears of a cloud'. Question was, as usual, where did I put it? Somehow it had found a safe place. It took me a long, long time to find it, as usual...
I know it was shown in an exhibition, guess in Belgium. And i know someone asked me to keep it apart. Well, the date on the back of the painting says '2010', so I guess I've waited long enough.
Sad how some people make promises they never keep. Tears of a cloud suddenly has another meaning...

Squared

Buy this item AM214132

Except for the old fashioned dictionary, yes it's a regular page turner to me!, I also use several websites to translate words. Best thing of these sites is they're not only useful to translate, they also provide additional information. If you're not a native speaker, like me, you will also need some websites to find synonyms. After all, if you didn't grow up in a country it's hard to understand the 'slang of the street'. 

For instance, when I first heard the song "Hip to be square", by Huey Lewis and the News, I didn't have a clue what the expression meant. 

One of the most helpful sites I have found is wordhippo. Unfortunately, when I looked for the meaning of the word 'square', I ended up with over 48 meanings. So sometime I need to use another source. Curious what the song is about? It's perfectly explained on Wikipedia. Or just listen to the song. After all that's what music is all about.
Oh, and 'square' of course also means four-sided or right-angled. Like the Sand Tile pictured above...

Ex Index

There was a time I was student at the P.A. Tiele Academie (The Hague) to become a librarian. Didn't work out that way. However I still benefit the lessons about classification. I have witnessed the transfer from old style Librabry Index Cards to full digital systems. Yep, those were the days. Pulling drawers filled with numerous index cards. Some of them still handwritten. Would 'The Raven' be indexed as 'The' or as 'Raven'? Or should you have a look at 'Edgar', 'Allen' or 'Poe'? 

DDC vs UDC. Dewey's Decimal Classification versus the Universal Decimal Classification. Lessons about information storage and retrieval. I have strolled the catalogue of index cards of the former Library at the Museum of Natural History in Leiden many times. By hand. Running my fingers along the thousands of index cards. Searching for new data on some of my favorite fish. Making xerograph copies using one of those huge copiers. I travelled by bike from Delft to Leiden. Everyone who has been at the old museum, will never forget the way it smelled. The strange scent of books and formalin. It will not become succesfull in any perfume shop...

Nowadays the cataloge of the library is available online. Part of Naturalis Biodiversity Center. No doubt Google will be of help too. 
I have started to make Index Reference Cards on my books. Including additional information like a list of characters, my inspiration and more. These are now used as basic datasheet in my blogs about my books, Flash Fiction and Short Stories. 

Some of my visits have led to articles in hobby magazines, for instance on the genus Megalamphodus. Pretty characids and popular aquarium fish which are now (re)considered members of the genus Hyphessobrycon. 
This article includes some of my first fish drawings published in an official magazine. I noticed I still used my initials (EM) instead of my present signature in those days. And, now that I come to think of it, some of my first photos of fish. I used color slides in those days. (Oh boy! Another piece of history...).

Megalamphodus rogoaguae, additional lines, to indicate outline of fins, 
from M. sweglesi. (Drawing published in Meinema, 1988) 

Tulipmania

Holland is well known for its cultivated tulips. The flower has become a national symbol used by the Tourist Office and many other organisations. But, just like other European countries, The Netherlands also has a species of tulip 'living in the wild'. 

These small tulips, known as Tulipa sylvestris, orginally grew in Italy. Around 1600 the flowers were imported from Bologna, Italy, to the northern European countries where they were planted in gardens and parks. They didn't stay there...The little bulbs with yellow flowers have spread themselves in many habitats, and have become part of the endemic nature. Thanks to the trade in tulipbulbs the Dutch are still leading the trade in these flowerbulbs. Mind you, this trade has lead to the first economic crisis in Holland in 1637, known as Tulipmania. The price of a single tulipbulb had raised to Hfl. 10,000, enough to buy yourself a house along the canals of Amsterdam (in those days, that is...). Alas, the market collapsed, leading many people to despair and even bankrupcy. Moralistic Dutch painters have since then used this Tulipmania as inspiration, warning people not to become greedy, like the monkeys in Jan Breughel's painting, a great persiflage. I guess even the Dutch are only human...

Anyway, those days are far behind us. Trading tulips is still profitable. Painting them as well. I made this funny image, used in my Skredch-blog, which is now available in a limited edition of 30 ID's (original, handmade copies), Acrylics on paper. I made a combination of the tulip and my Dutch Quixote Skredch-character upon genuine Dutch wooden shoes (see picture on top of this blog). Just for fun, but also to please my granddaughter.

Also available: Mugs, Tees and more fun stuff including the image pictured hereunder. Click here to visit my pintshop.

Kiss Kiss

Few years ago I made a couple of surrealistic paintings. Little did I know, I would be able to use one of these paintings as inspiration for a book cover. I wanted the cover of ‘Erratic’ (the erratic life of Porsche Gibeon) to summarize the things women like best: make-up and shoes. Referring to the profession of the protagonist Porsche Gibeon, Tee-designer, the cover design also had to be usable as print on a T-shirt.

Reducing stories into one image is something I use in my Skredch-blog. Events of daily life are reduced into drawings, or pictographs, based on one or only a few basic lines. A style resembling comics or cartoons, which I think is not appropriate for this ‘edgy romance’ novel. I had to think of something new.

Finishing the first book on Porsche Gibeon, I remembered my surreal artwork ‘Kissemee’: a woman symbolized by lips. (The picture on the left is published in our catalogue for the Holland Art Fair, The Hague, 2005). Using this remarkable image as basis, I have created the character pictured above, which only consists of shoes and lips. A perfect summary, realistic, reproducible upon Tees and providing possibilities to create similar images for future books in this series.

Kiss Kiss, is a collection of short stories by Roald Dahl, master of the ‘Tales of the Unexpected’. As admirer of this great author, I have used surprising twists as an important element of Porsche’s story. 

My surrealistic painting as published on the cover of our catalogue for the
Holland Art Fair 2005 (The Hague, The Netherlands)

ID´s

During the first years my wife and I were running our art gallery, we used to sell serigraphs, giclees and other kinds of copied artworks. Besides the orginal artwork of course. The number of copies used to be limited anywhere between 200 or 250. The actual number is mostly handwritten next to the artist´s signature. All in pencil. In other words, if the writing states 23/250, it means you have copy number 23 of a series of 250. So the series is limited... Except for an unknown number of copies, called the EA edition. This edition, the Epreuve d´Artiste, is supposed to be a test series for the artist to decide whether the colors and quality of the serigraph is according his wishes. The number of EA copies varies from only a few to ten...or more. When we learned that some artists made a re-runs of certain succesful series, in other words the limited number of 250 was raised with a second series of 250  numbered copies, we decided to quit selling these editions and focused our selling to original artworks. 

A few years ago more and more artists disapproved of the uncontrollable serigraphs. Large editions are nowadays out of fashion. Instead, artists have smalle series of prints made and then complete these copies with additional artwork. A simple serigraph thus becomes an original artwork, although the basis is still a printed copy made by a printer, not by the artist.

Quality of prints is amazingly good these days. Even regular desktop printers will provide high quality material. Nevertheless, I prefer to have smaller series completely made by myself. I call these copies ID´s, short for Identicals. Although they are not really identical, but more or less similar to the original. Every item is handmade and thus differs in colors and shape from the original. All editions in a series are therefor 100% original pieces of art. More valuable than serigraphs and nice to collect. 

Buy artprints, mugs, Tees and more of 'Lance' at my printshop

Flowerfields

While Vincent van Gogh moved down south, to be inspired by the sunflowers in France, many painters (not to mention millions of tourists) have come to Holland to enjoy the colors of the tulips. This time of year the flowerfields are showing their brightest colors. Most people will go to the area of Lisse with the famous 'Keukenhof', but I know there are more farmers growing tulips. Some of them are nearby, so who am I to let this moment pass by? A great opportunity to make some nice photos of Dutch agriculture. 

After enjoying 'the real stuff' I have made some artworks based on these fields with tulips. (Flowerfields I and II). 

Buy Flowerfields I

Buy Flowerfields II

Want to see more? There are some great videos on You Tube like this one taken by a drone flying over the flowerfields near Noordwijkerhout:

Tranquilizer

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New composition of four Sand Tiles. Contrary to my other mini abstract works, which can be combined the way you prefer, these four panels of 20x20cm are fixed on wood, creating one overall image. Vibrant red and orange colors covering layers of violet, yellow, green and blue.  

The title refers to a song by Dutch guitarist Jan Akkerman. ‘Tranquilizer’ appeared on the concept album “Eli”, Akkerman's fourth solo album, with mixed elements of jazz, pop and funk. It won the Dutch Edison Award in 1976 for Best Album.

During a major clean-up of our garage, a few years ago, I got rid of my old record collection, including this LP. A decision I sometimes regret although I do not have an old fashioned pick-up record player any more. So even if I still had mu LP's, listening would be impossible. Then again, looking at the covers was fun too. The unforgettebale cover of Pink Floyd's 'The Wall', the amazing artwork of Roger Dean on the covers of YES. And the YES-logo of course.

Eli has a simple cover. Aphoto showing Jan Akkerman and singer Kaz Lux. Well, o far for mourning about he good old days. We've got You Tube now. And guess what? The entire album is there for you to discover. So sit down and relax. Take your tranquilizer.

Natural expressionism

Made some photos in the dunes. A small nature reserve called 'Kwade Hoek' at the former island of Goeree-Overflakkee. The environment is inspiring and beautiful. The view disturbed by windmills along the dam (part of the Deltaworks). Nevertheless, it's a quiet place providing some interesting images. Vegetation near the coast is still yellow. The green colors of Spring have not yet arrived here. The bushes in the dunes haven't got their new leaves either, providing a great opportunity to have a close look at the barch of the trees. Nature creates its own expressionism. Superb pieces of barch overgrown with algae and moss. Soft yellow colors of the vegetation competing with the blue sky and the water of the North Sea; a bizarre construction of branches trying to keep the sand of the dunes in its place. Life near the coast is a constant process of change. Evolved in this tidal zone. Shaped by salt water. And all it takes is time. Yes, some of the best things in life are still free, but you have to take the time to enjoy them.

Chatter Chick

Buy this item AM214123

Last few weeks I've been working on a so called Chicklit-novel. A genre which, if written by men, is sometimes called 'Dicklit'. Nasty name, which doesn't encourage me to lay the 'lad on the table'. In fact the name Dicklit is used for male writers, writing about trivial stuff for men. You know, all those important things in daily life female writers will share in Chicklit, like lipstick, shoes, fashion and so on. But then for men. Right. I’ll keep Mister Dick in my pants...

Being father of two gorgeous daughters, the importance of all daily trivialities is clear to me. No matter how many thrillers I will write, they only read the ‘real stuff’: Chicklit.

“But there’s nothing happening” I always say. “Chicklit characters will chat every line of every page, there’s no action.”

Obviously, my idea of action differs the full 100 percent from the idea my girls have on the subject. “It’s about the most important things in life, Dad” they explain. Alright, I’ve got it: lipstick and shoes are life. So Chicklit is all about life.

“I can do that” I said. But I will make it likeable to men as well. The moment I said it, I realized, being a man, the genre title of my books might end up with something unwanted like DickChicklit, or ChickDicklit or, hell no!, Shemalelit. You can imagine my relief when I learned about ‘Edgy Romance’. Period! Done. No doubt about it. From now on I will write edgy romance.

Clamorous

Buy this item: Clamorous Coral

Anyone who likes snorkeling or scuba diving, like I do, knows how coral reefs can look like. Marine aquarists may experience the fabulous coralline colors in their home aquarium as well.

Coral reefs provide shelter to thousands of living creatures. The rock itself is mostly covered with a layer of algae, known as coralline algae. Eventually this becomes a beautiful, red crusted layer highly appreciated by hobbyists. In the marine aquarium it proves the water has ‘aged’, in other words your aquarium is ready for live stock. The crust layers grow upon anything, including pumps, windows etc. This can be annoying to an aquarist as removing the algae can be problematic and may require a daily routine.

Diving above the reefs, the current sways you back and forth. These waves provide the necessary movements for the corals as they are constantly providing new food supplies. The coral polyps, known to most people as the ‘little hands’, will grab the food out of the water. Of course divers usually go down under to enjoy corals and fish. I think the scenery of coral rock itself. The construction and the colors are creating a natural image which is worth to have a closer look. It inspired me over and over again.

The painting above is a triptych. Three panels of 60x60cm each (total length 180cm). It has the deep, crimson red and violet coloration which is also seen on coral rock. The water currents, bouncing in between the rocks, provided me the title. ‘Clamorous’ as in tumultuous, or disordered. The chaos of nature. I love it!

Fragile

The weekly paintings I make for my fish-blog, are usually studies, made of acrylics on paper. I bet you hardly recognize a fish in this creature at all. It's a so called seadragon, a relative of the well-known seahorses and pipefish. Fragile beauties, living along the coast of Australia, where they are considered endangered.

For these fish-paintings I use smooth watercolors paper. I think handmade watercolors paper is too rough for the details I like to draw. Basically I start out with a storyline for my blog. There are thousands of fish, so it will take me quite a while to run out of stories. And the best part is, every year 200 – 400 new species are described. How’s that for inspiration? Then I have to find a picture which includes the essential details (fins etc.) to create my own painted version. I start with a sketch (pencil drawing) to determine the right size. Then paint a few layers covering each other to obtain the colors I want. The process is a combination of techniques used for watercolors and acrylics. Like watercolor paintings I sometimes leave parts of the paper untouched, these parts are the natural whites. For other details, like the glancing eyes, I use white acrylics on top of the black eye.

I know I’m lucky to have many photos available to discover the details of a fish. In the old days, ichthyologists had to create technical drawings of the fish they described by using the real specimens saved in formalin. The blog entries I create usually are close to reality. But whenever possible I’m not counting every spine, ray or scale. So…back to reality. The queer fish in this blog is newly described. It’s named the Red Seadragon. If you're interested, continue reading my Queer Fish-blog for more details and the first description.

Inspired

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Where do you get your inspiration? A question commonly asked. The answer not as renewing as many hope for. “It just happens” is my usual answer. Does this mean I am incredibly creative? Guess not. I prefer to think of my ‘creativity’ as a result of experience. How’s that? Let me try to explain.

The mind is a wonderful thing. It can withhold us to finish any work we have started. Writer’s block if you like to give it a name. (Made a stupid blog about that in April, 2005. Don’t mind if you take a look, but beware! A writer’s block really is awful…). On the other hand, your mind can also encourage you to proceed. Your mind has a will of its own. It’s working while you try to do some other work yourself. It’s even working while you are asleep. It’s more creative than you can imagine you will ever be. Experience, other people call it. And that’s the dirty little trick that does the work. The more you practice the better you will become in whatever you want to be doing.

Out of experience I can tell you the best ideas I get, pop up while I am working. When I’m writing, I get ideas for new stories. When I’m painting, I get more ideas to make another painting. To put it simply, one thing leads to another. I pick up lines from the news (yes, even from the old fashioned newspaper), TV, music, even fragments of conversations, said by people passing by. All these nice, angry, stupid, crazy, silly, lovely thoughts remain stuck in my mind. They pop out by occasion. Unexpected, sometimes unwanted, most of the time it seems an uncontrollable process. But as said before, practicing unveils many thoughts at the time you need them. Your unconscious is your best co-writer or co-painter. Hack, the best co-worker you can imagine. If you like to make a note, or a sketch of anything of interest you hear or see so you can use it later on, be my guest. I’ve made tons of notes and sketches which all seem to disappear. Except for the ones is have used in my Skredch-blog. It seems most of the time I am lost in my own chaos. But, when not asked for, my mind is able to retrieve those things I never considered lost. Ideas just pop up in my mind. Experience? Practice? Let’s call it inspiration.

Realistic fantasy

Buy this item AM214129

“The plane, the plane”. Man how many times did I hear that annoying voice of Tattoo announcing the “new guest arrived”. Fantasy Island. Haven’t seen it for a long time now. Time for a rerun TV-guys? No, don’t bother. I didn’t ask. What I do want to know is: “where did the bloody plane land?”

I needed some information on airstrips or small airports everyone had forgotten about. After all, although I am writing fiction, things have to be realistic. In my mind I had planned a scene at an airport. In fact I had written the entire scene without knowing if the airport I had described really existed. For the record. Whether it would exist or not, was not a matter of life or death. As said, I’m writing fiction, so I can make up any airport I like. But then again, the real thing would make things a lot more convincing.

To my surprise the answer was easy to find. Unfortunately it was far more difficult to decide which of the abandoned airfields I was going to use. The website “Abandoned and little known airfields” by Paul Freeman, describes details of no less than 1,911 airfields in all 50 states of the US. History and mystery combined, so it’s said on the website. True stories and photos about days long forgotten. I enjoyed reading about those airfields. Some are still used, others partly or completely vanished. But all of them have a story worth to be remembered. Paul Freeman has made sure, these stories are remembered.

How about the Fantasy Island airstrip? Well, first of all it’s an island, guests were supposed to arrive by seaplane. The original series (1977-1984) was primarily filmed in Burbank, California. The coastline as seen in the opening scenes in fact is the coastline of the island Kauai, Hawaii. The plane with new guests arriving, was filmed in the lagoon behind the Queen Anne Cottage in Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Gardens. 

Social thriller

Buy this item AM214127

Crime fiction is divided into a wide variety of subgenres. Some writers specialize in a certain genre, like legal thrillers, in which the major characters are lawyers and their co-workers, psychological thrillers, based on a mental and emotional conflict between the main characters, techno trhillers, in which sophisticated technology plays a prominent part, but also erotic thrillers about...well, I guess you can make it up for yourself.

No matter the subgenre a writer uses, most include elements of other subgenres as well. I admire writers like George Orwell. (Nineteen Eighty-Four) and Aldous Huxley (Brave New World) for their powerful novels warning us of a future world where the state has become in complete control over our social life. Unaware of its real meaning, many people really think Big Brother is no more than a TV-format. The social message overruled by reality. TV-reality.

Gatorway is an exciting thriller, with a twist of humor, but mostly based on a social viewpoint. What if the drugs cartels will cooperate with terrorists, using high tech solutions to reach their goals? Having several plots ready to write, I was looking for a theme which could be found in all stories. What is my thriller subgenre? My preference for writers like Orwell and Huxley obviously had more influence as I imagined. In all manuscripts I’m working on, the social message is clearly present. Hence, the name social thriller was a fact.

A small, yet very important, aspect of thrillers is the presence or controversy of innocence versus a corrupt world. Corruption will be a main theme in the sequel to Gatorway, scheduled for publication February 2016. Although Gatorway is a story on its own, several clues have been given which have led to presently unsolved mysteries. Whereas these clues may seem to be coincidal in relation to the basic storyline, the unsolved mysteries are a prelude to the second book in this series.  “You ain’t seen read nothing yet!” 

Gatorway

Buy this item: AM214136
 (cover Gatorway)

Gatorway may seem to be an unexplainable title. But...is it? If you're interested or curious about the meaning of this title you will have to read my latest thriller, Gatorway. 

Story outline: a Dutch student, Dylan Timmers, believes he has found himself the best summer job anyone can imagine: lifeguard at Miami Beach. But nothing appears to be what he expected. A dead body and a small package found at the beach where Dylan is working, completely turn his life upside down. Dylan becomes mixed up in the obscenity and malpractices of terrorists and the drugs scene. Gatorway is a socialthriller, which uncovers a societal problem most people are still unaware of.

The storyline is based upon the question: "what happens when terrorist groupsand drug cartels are fighting over power?" Despite all efforts, governments are hardly capablein controlling these organizations.

I enjoyed writing the story. Included many, unexpected twists, a little romance, humor and a spectacular drone attack. Yep! Nano-technology meets ordinary crime. 

The cover is not based on the 'regular thriller' format. I wanted to use some of my own artwork, without the usual photos of weapons, blood, running people or staring eyes. (Or any combination...). After all, I’m an artist of ‘words and vision’. Does it make my thriller unrecognizable for readers? Maybe as a single book. However, I'm thinking beyond this title. Just like the mini abstract paintings at the beginning of each blog entry, I want my thrillers to be recognizable as a series. The cover of Gatorway is based upon the small painting illustrated in this blog. Only 20x20 cm (7.87 x 7.87 inch), mixed acrylics and sand on canvas. 'Sand tiles' as I explained in a previous post. Pieces of art not appreciated by everyone. But I like the way the paint creates mysterious patterns in the sand. It’s all part of the game. Doesn’t every thriller start with a mystery?