Steve Stranghoener

Die-Abolical Steve Stranghoener

This is a psychological thriller, a trip into the labyrinth of a deranged mind. It's not about how such heinous acts were committed but why? Emmer Long has led a tortured life having been bullied since early childhood. His unfortunate existence has been marred by tragedies rivaling Job's. His father was murdered, mother committed suicide and the only love of his life was brutally raped and murdered. Awkward, clumsy and painfully introverted, Emmer relied on his one saving grace: superior intelligence. Although his parents were barely educated and worked menial jobs, they blessed their only son with an off-the-chart IQ that he was able to translate into tremendous academic success. What better place could there have been for such a pedantically private person than a veterinary medical research lab. Not at just any facility but the St. Louis Zoo where he could specialize in his preferred field of herpetology.

Besides brainpower, Emmer picked up something else from his gene pool or perhaps his unfortunate environment growing up: undifferentiated schizophrenia. It drove him to isolate himself from the rest of humanity as much as possible. Instead, he preferred friends in low places, that is, the kind that slithered along the ground. They grew so close that Emmer, in the manner of a demented sort of Dr. Doolittle, took advice from his scaly friends. Their advice was deadly and diabolical.