David Mather (Chile) publishes CRESCENT BEACH

About the suspense novel Crescent Beach just published by David Mather (Chile 1968–70):

Cardboard-wrapped, forty-pound bales of marijuana called “square grouper” are flooding Florida’s Gulf Coast. Undercover State Trooper Rusty McMillan is sent into the fishing village of Crescent Beach to bust a key operator in the drug trade, and stem the area’s rampant smuggling. Expecting to deal with trailer trash, Rusty instead discovers the town is a hardworking community from an earlier era when life was simple and straightforward. He becomes immersed in the everyday life of shrimping, crabbing, and fishing, while at night he drinks beer, arm wrestles, and plays poker with the locals who become his friends. Rusty eventually gets the evidence he needs, but can he make the arrest? Either way he’s a traitor: to his job or to the community. But, before he can decide, the town is slammed by unexpected hurricane force winds and a lethal twelve-foot tidal surge. Rusty joins the men, women, and children in the life-and-death struggle with a ferocious storm that plays no favorites.

After graduating from Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts in 1964, then Bowdoin College in Maine in 1968, David Mather served with the Peace Corps the next two years in southern Chile where he was the most isolated Volunteer in his forestry program. Upon his return the United States, he built a cabin in the woods of New Hampshire where he has lived off-grid for forty-five years while founding and running a successful specialty lumber business.

He has written two other novels, One For The Road, and its sequel, When the Whistling Stopped, both of which take place in southern Chile and were published under the Peace Corps Writers imprint.

One For The Road is a coming of age novel that paints a vivid picture of a forgotten way of life. It is about a Peace Corps Volunteer’s heartbreaking romance with a beautiful young campesina in the lawless foothills of the Andes.

In When the Whistling Stopped, murder and intrigue follow a young couple’s quest to expose and punish the amoral pulp mill owner responsible for the death of thousands of black-necked swans. The twists and turns of this eco-thriller make it hard to put down. The author has done readings from his books in Florida, as far north as Gainesville and as far south as Key West, and in New Hampshire, Vermont, Ohio, and Illinois.

In 1999, David and his wife began spending winters in Horseshoe Beach on Florida’s Nature Coast. The town is a backwater fishing village and the area is fondly referred to by locals as the “Redneck Riviera.” As in his new novel, many of Horseshoe Beach’s residents went through the real life Storm of the Century in March of 1993. It was their stories, as well as their way of life, that inspired Crescent Beach.

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CRESCENT BEACH
(suspense)
David J. Mather (Chile  1968–70)
Peace Corps Writers
March, 2016
$14.95 (paperback), $7.99 (Kindle)