Character-driven fiction set in Vermont and Quebec
Books by J. Kilburn: genre-breaking crime fiction, coming-of-age tales, family drama, and police procedurals
Titles by J. Kilburn
WHAT REVIEWERS ARE SAYING ABOUT NOVELS BY J. KILBURN:
READERS' FAVORITE gives J. Kilburn's second novel BEFORE 5 stars!
"...the dialogue (in BEFORE) is probably among the top 1% in its sarcasm and authenticity... Nell Zink and the novel Nicotine come to mind.“...
- Jamie Michele for READERS FAVORITE, January 2022 - 5 stars!
InD'tale Magazine says:
"Mr. Kilburn is a master at character development!"
"... the world here is rich and full of compelling characters...." - Independent Book Review on Heaven's Door by J. Kilburn
"...deftly crated... recommended...." Midwest Book Review on BEFORE by J. Kilburn
SELF-PUBLISHING REVIEW gave Kilburn's first book 3.5 stars!
"...a brutally raw and riveting look at the inner workings of a fictional Canadian biker gang, Heaven’s Door by J. Kilburn comes in swinging and rarely stops...."
CLICK for direct links to reviews or to purchase an E-book:
More praise for fiction by Vermont writer J. Kilburn:
MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW recommends BEFORE for library shelves:
"... especially and unreservedly recommended for community library General Fiction collections..." - Julie Summers for Midwest Book Review in May, 2022 Issue of MBR's Reviewer's Bookwatch
J. Kilburn's first novel compared to the Sons of Anarchy television series:
"In the same way Sons of Anarchy gives us an intimate look at characters who play by their own rules, J. Kilburn's novel (Heaven's Door) gets up close and personal with unpredictable and often dangerous people." - INDEPENDENT BOOK REVIEW , 2020 Editorial Review
INDEPENDENT BOOK REVIEW featured BEFORE by J. Kilburn:
"...exceptional.... BEFORE nails the depiction of a small town.... Kilburn weaves this teenage story with threads of secrets.... the tension is thick."
- Manik Chaturmutha for IBR
IND'TALE MAGAZINE calls HEAVEN'S DOOR "heart-stopping!"
IND'TALE gave this harrowing road trip 4 STARS! "A heart-stopping tale of good versus evil." (July/August 2020 Edition, review by Alison Ellis)
READERS SAY:
Authentic! "Author J. Kilburn, where did you do your time?!" (Ed, a local reader)
"This is Literary Fiction!" (Illustrator Ardelia Huntress, M.A.)
"A six-hour reading marathon... I couldn't put it down!" (Pam, a Beta Reader)
Novels by J. Kilburn:
Think you know the kids next door? You sure about that?
A dark and daring debut... Read some crime fiction with teeth!
A dark and daring debut... Read some crime fiction with teeth!
Independent Book Review says:
"...Exceptional...Excellent...Refreshing..."
and "BEFORE nails the depiction of a small town with its gossip and rumors."
- IBR Featured Review, June 2022
BEFORE by Vermonter J. Kilburn takes your average teenagers, gives them family and community, and then plausibly and seamlessly drops them into international intrigue in a small New England college town. These teenagers go about their sweet and sordid adventures blissfully unaware of their role in larger and more complicated regional events. BEFORE is a Coming-of-Age story, but it's also a story about international Organized Crime and the role that small-town folks, your neighbors, your loved ones, and even the Honors Student next door might play in that dark and dangerous world.
Coming-of-Age / Crime Fiction - 500 pages - 2022
ISBN # 9780578379180 (Paperback)
ISBN # 9781005477080 (EPUB)
PUBLISHER’S CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION INFORMATION:
LCSH: Teenagers - Fiction | Parenting - Fiction | Organized Crime - Fiction | Career Development - Fiction | Moral Development - Fiction
BISAC: FICTION / Action & Adventure | FICTION / Coming of Age | FICTION / Crime
A dark and daring debut... Read some crime fiction with teeth!
A dark and daring debut... Read some crime fiction with teeth!
A dark and daring debut... Read some crime fiction with teeth!
InD'tale Magazine calls HEAVEN'S DOOR, A NOVEL a "heart-stopping" tale of crime and suspense!
Two opposing and mutually-exclusive lives meet for just a moment at a time and in a place where one of them shouldn't be. The fallout of this moment leaves a woman on the run from Organized Crime, and takes readers on a frantic plunge into the dark streets and back alleys of a richly-described criminal underworld.
This riveting and disturbing biker fiction tale introduces the TOPDOGS Motorcycle Club, a fictional gang of modern-day outlaws who take us for a journey on the darker side of the road less traveled. Novelist J. Kilburn brings readers to the dark side of seedy streets in this international tale of adventure, terror, and crime set in Montreal.
Crime/Horror - 120 pages - 2020
ISBN # 978-0-578-32352-7 - paperback
ISBN# 978-0-578-67036-2 - EPUB
Coming soon:
A dark and daring debut... Read some crime fiction with teeth!
Coming soon:
No title or cover yet, but the next book is in editing. Stay tuned!
A young police officer has met the Girl of his dreams and thinks he's hot on the trail of a promising law enforcement career, too. A lot can happen between those starry-eyed plans and life itself, so there are going to be a few bumps along the way... especially that big bump right there at the start!
Advanced Reader Copies likely to go out sometime in 2024...
Meet J. Kilburn:
Aspiring Vermont writer J. Kilburn is the author of two novels and one feature-length newspaper article. Kilburn's narrative style has been compared to those of Joyce Carol Oates, Virginia Wolfe, D.H. Lawrence, Hunter S. Thompson, and Nell Zink. His subjects and almost cinematic descriptions of setting have earned his work comparison to movies and television shows like Sons of Anarchy, Tin Star and Twin Peaks.
Kilburn lives a quiet and private life on the shore of America's sixth Great Lake. He has lived and worked in Vermont, Massachusetts, Illinois, and Minnesota. During these travels, Kilburn has dabbled in law enforcement, private security, emergency medicine, truck driving, and horse-logging. Other occupations have included at-risk youth mentor, big-city process server, park ranger, and industrial wastewater treatment operator. Along the way, he's pedaled to 14,000 feet above sea-level in a major bicycle race, been marooned overnight on a deserted island, ridden a motorcycle from Chicago to Thunder Bay, and hiked Vermont's highest peaks to watch sunsets on both the longest and coldest days of the year. He currently maintains plastics processing machinery for a major manufacturing company.
When not at work he and his wife enjoy life around a little urban farm complete with greenhouse, garden, and mini-barn. Their current flock is composed of four chickens and a cat named Sierra Feral.
Facebook: Author J Kilburn
cerealnovel.com
What started as a short story became a book, and then a whole saga: stories about undercover policing and organized crime, but also about family, coming-of-age, romance and friendship. Each novel is independent of the others, but they all revolve around the same two communities: a small college town, and the Organized Crime underworld of a major port city. The cast of characters is common to each place - each character somehow has skin in the game in both places. The bright sunny streets found in one chapter mesh and turn with roiling dark edges that come in the next. That was hard to do, but important: We are not islands. We sometimes participate in both worlds, whether we know it or not. That the reader can be both disturbed and entertained by one of my books... that means I got it right. The novels are complex and full of surprises - just like life itself.
- J. KILBURN
CLICK for direct links to reviews or to purchase an E-book:
www.cerealnovel.com - Northfield, Vermont, USA
Who is the "Cereal Girl" behind the cerealnovel.com trademark image?
Who is the "Cereal Girl" behind the cerealnovel.com trademark image?
Who is the "Cereal Girl" behind the cerealnovel.com trademark image?
Click on image to go to ParentUp.org for resources relating to parenting At-Risk teens. (Direct Link / Leaving cerealnovel.com)
The young woman portrayed in the pages of some of these books, as well as in the Imprint Trademark image, represents the extended victims - those who forever wait for a missing or murdered law enforcement officer to walk back through the door.
The characters in the HEAVEN's DOOR series are fictional players on a stage where events are far too close to the real. We would all do well to remember the police officers, detectives, agents and others who face these horrors in our stead, in the sworn pursuit of the Rule of Law that we ourselves vote into existence. We citizens generally vote but once a year, if that. Those who protect and serve must then enforce the Will of the People and face the dangers that come with that charge on a daily basis. And yes... someone waits for each of them to safely return each and every day.
Need a Bad Guy for your crime fiction series? Create one!
Who is the "Cereal Girl" behind the cerealnovel.com trademark image?
Who is the "Cereal Girl" behind the cerealnovel.com trademark image?
HEAVEN'S DOOR, a Novel
by J. Kilburn
Read some crime fiction with teeth!
This riveting and disturbing biker fiction tale introduces the TOPDOGS Motorcycle Club, a fictional gang of modern-day outlaws who take us for a journey on the darker side of the road less traveled. Strut on the sidewalks of Montreal with high-rolling underworld magnates while their minions flit in and out of back alleys in service of dark needs, big money, and ruthless territorial competition. Read about how the Quebec Chapter of the club got its start; how some fun-seeking motorcycle enthusiasts lost themselves to the seductive, yet dangerous world of gang violence and organized crime.
Inspired by actual events in Quebec and northern New England over the last forty years, these fictional Bad-Boy bikers take readers into the dead-end streets and darkened alleys of a world best visited from the safety of a favorite reading chair.
CEREALNOVEL.COM and the Publisher:
Who is the "Cereal Girl" behind the cerealnovel.com trademark image?
CEREALNOVEL.COM and the Publisher:
Fiction by Vermont writer J. Kilburn is published in Northfield, Vermont, USA by James K. Mossman III and promoted on the CEREALNOVEL.COM website.
Contact:
The Author/Publisher retains all rights to the works. Interested in distribution?
Contact the author at:
Many thanks to the talented Illustrator Ardelia Huntress.
Thanks also to Smashwords and GoDaddy.com!
Writing a story, and then a book , and then publishing, then turning it all into a brand of books which I had to learn to market... well, it's been a long and winding road. But there's been a lot of fun and adventure along the way, for the author-publisher as well as for readers! And I've gotten a lot of help, for which I am grateful:
Like the website? Thank GODADDY! the GoDaddy Website Builder made creating this whole thing a snap - even for a first-timer!
Thanks to SMARTSIGN LLC for manufacturing that old-style, pre-DOT "winding road" sign, and for permission to reproduce a photo of the sign on the cover of one of my books!
Thanks to PIXABAY, a royalty-free photo-sharing website, and the photographers who make their own work available there... both the ARC and the Retail covers of BEFORE look awesome thanks to your photos!
Thanks to the Editorial Reviewers and their readers, who've provided insightful and important encouragement, feedback, and sometimes critical comment that is nevertheless helpful!