A rousing suspense thriller based on flawed law, intense romance, fierce territorial instincts, courage, survival, and Conquest!

Macom Farm in the Township of Prank, a hideaway hamlet in Connecticut, is as beautiful as it is sinister, as tranquil as Gettysburg before the battle cries. Prank has complicated social maladies, underlying secrets, and remarkable attributes as a developer's dreamland, seen by Sullivan Development as a singularly unique opportunity to build a magnificent city structure. Conquering the obstacles, though, devolves into a daunting contest no developer in history has been confronted with before..

Jason Lang recently graduated and newly hired at Sullivan, is appointed project manager in charge of exploring the viability of Prank—a seemingly benign career start that instead becomes his baptismal journey into chaos and mayhem. In due course, Jason teams up with Andrea Cole, a stunningly beautiful social analyst hired to evaluate the impact of such a project on the Prank population. Andrea and Jason find common ground and begin an intensely intimate and gripping relationship that struggles to endure many twists and ugly hardships.

If developers were to descend on Prank and disturb its anthills, the peaceful calm of rural living would be forever disturbed. But worse, a thriving local operation would be severely threatened, and that cannot be allowed to happen.

Macom Farm begins the story as an intense standoff between the developer, the townsfolk, and an unknown force with evil ambitions—a mixture of clever parry-and-thrust, legal maneuvering, cyber warfare, Flawed law, brutal murders, and perverse strategies.

Nothing happening is like anything that has happened before.

Contemplations, yes—a standoff of dreams contrasting with fears of disruption. Judging good versus evil depends wholly upon who's judging. It's hard to imagine a builder having a more nearly perfect opportunity than a vast expanse of virgin meadowlands, with access and proximity, and confined as a hamlet with unique independence from regulatory authority. A builder who dares to dream of what can be—vibrant, intense, and timeless—he has found a divine spark igniting his finest creativity. Yet it is hard to dismiss those who see a vacant meadowland as an exquisite remnant of virgin earth, lacking only the power to remain so—or those who regard those same meadows as a protective blanket—sacrosanct—Stay Away!

Jason Lang and Andrea Cole find their seemingly benign careers transformed from conscripts into militants. Mike and Leo Sullivan—principals at Sullivan Development—now beleaguered and distraught by devastating loss—have an agonizing choice they must make: whether to overcome adversity or succumb to it. Pushing against a stonewall to no avail accomplishes little but the expenditure of energy. Neither does procrastination in the face of danger. The high ground goes to those who get there first. So too, a first strike can immobilize a foe, wreak havoc, cause despair, disillusion, and abandonment of purpose. Although the buck stops where it began, the dilemma of reaching a decision to run, survive, or retaliate depends largely on the will and spirit of the team and upon the charisma of its leaders.

—Be prepared—the worst and best are yet to come!—

When a grand prize is up for the taking, winning becomes the main objective for all players, big and small—no matter by what means—by all means possible—especially, when losing is not an option. What remains of the fracases that began in Book 1, Macom Farm, and played cleverly as a chess game in Book 2, The Copper Goose, now continues onward to deepen the challenges for the characters remaining, who will require their utmost in cunning, an acute sense of when to duck and where to hide, and a heightened energy and will just to survive.

As El Mundo flexes its strengthening powers, as it attempts to overtake the playing field, exerting outright evil by applying its powers of dreadful fear intermixed with events of calculated mayhem, the reader is propelled ever deeper into provocative circumstances where only an excessive imagination might see through the rampage occurring at just beyond the realm of sensible reality. For, once the stampede is on—once the field is overrun—there is no stopping it thereafter. No way but downward, to the inferno of hell itself. A stampede acquires a life of its own—groupthink, lemmings leaping frantically, over the cliff, a maddening pileup at a door that is locked. Fears superseded by panic. No obstacles will arise that cannot be overrun, no walls can confine it—undisciplined, chaotic, no one's in command—for it is only the devil who's riding herd tonight. Some will drop, some will rise and some will die. Without order, without respite, even the goal itself becomes a muddied myth, lost in the melee—where turning the herd becomes the only remaining option.

By now, readers who have embarked on this chronicle and continued the journey thus far may have formed some premonitions of how the story should or might or mustn't end. Quite likely, the story will not end as you might imagine. Fragments of past events are woven with remaining and newly arrived characters, deepening their roles in a rising crescendo of conflict, resolution, and retribution.

However, as you read, think of yourself as the author and how you might end the story. While I have much of the ending outlined, there are always twists and possibilities that might add to its impact. If you are the reader most able to predict the ending or if you contribute a suggestion that becomes included in the finale, you will receive a full set of signed copies of the completed series.

You can email your predictions to this website—TomBaldwinAuthor.com. Addresses or phone numbers are not required. Multiple submissions are acceptable.

Please title your email submission with "Book 4—Finale Suggestion."