Author

Michael Beres

"All I want for Christmas is . . . ?"--"Sister, if I've had impure thoughts of the mortal sin variety and I'm crossing the street on my way to Confession and the cement truck careening down the street runs me over . . . ?"--"So now I'm not going to Vietnam?"--"Who says I'm an environmental nut?"

The duck-and-cover Cold War, Eastern European roots, and environmental concerns shape my novels. I've got a couple degrees in computer science, math, and literature. I worked for the government, where I had a top-secret security clearance that pulled me back from Vietnam where I was about to be sent. Later, in the exhilarating private sector, I wrote dramatic documents about analytical software that's probably still being used to spy on you. So, I guess you could say my fiction is based on truth and therefore reflects our age of environmental uncertainty and political treachery.

A Canadian publisher published my first novel Sunstrike in the eighties, then promptly went out of business. Sunstrike came out when environmental and political conspiracies were considered tall tales. Today we know differently. Medallion Press published my "real" environmental novel Grand Traverse in 2005. In it I tried to create a realistic portrait of our frightening near future.

My 2006 release, political thriller The President's Nemesis, was (Ta-da!) compared to The Manchurian Candidate by Library Journal and dubbed "a nail-biting thriller" by Midwest Review.

Final Stroke (2007) is about health care scams, a detective who's had a stroke, and a plot to steal a Presidential election. Publishers Weekly said it had "awkward prose." But the detective in the book had a left-brain stroke and his speech center . . . never mind.

My latest novel, Chernobyl Murders, is about deadly radiation, a Soviet government on its last legs, and those good old madmen hungry for power. Because my father grew up in Ukraine, Chernobyl Murders hits close to home. Publishers Weekly said in Chernobyl Murders "the writing quality is a step up from Beres' last thriller, Final Stroke," so I guess that's a plus.

I'm a Chicago native recuperating in West Michigan. I'm a member of the Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, the Sierra Club, the Green Car Club, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and a few other organizations. I've driven a low-emissions hybrid car since the beginning of the technology.

I've had about 30 short stories published, some of them in: Amazing Stories, Amazon Shorts, the American Fiction Collection, Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, Ascent, Cosmopolitan, Ellery Queen, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Missouri Review, New York Stories, Papyrus, Playboy, Pulpsmith, Skylark, and Twilight Zone.