“In this highly engaging first novel Yeager draws on his vast international and local environmental experience as both a citizen activist and senior government official to weave a tale of international intrigue with a surprising finale on Virginia’s eastern shore. The story unfolds through powerfully crisp dialogue further spiced up with surprisingly relevant references to such esoterica as west Texas country music of the fifties.” ~ William Eichbaum, Former Senior Environmental Official in Pennsylvania, Maryland and the United States Department of the Interior
Winner – American ¬ Fiction award for best adventure novel in 2021
chilly winds
Taz Blackwell, former environmental negotiator and now a trouble-seeking drinker and romantic charmer, tries to find a new life and love against a backdrop of espionage, corporate plunderers and devious diplomats.
Escaping a failed marriage, Taz has moved to the island of Chincoteague on Virginia’s Atlantic Coast, where he explores friendships with a cast of small-town misfits and romance with a beautiful but wary divorcee. Meanwhile, he fights a corporate land-grab of a traditional black community on the shore and a shady billion-dollar mining play in the international Arctic.
Why is a Chinese mining conglomerate stealing the land underneath a traditional black community on Virginia’s eastern shore? Why is the Russian Ambassador to Iceland trying to open southern Greenland to mining? Why does Taz interest the ambassador’s beautiful mistress?
The answers are in Chilly Winds, a tour-de-force that will appeal to mystery lovers, adventure addicts and espionage fans everywhere.
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Reviews
“Mix yourself a gin and tonic, settle into your beach chair, and transport yourself to Virginia’s Eastern Shore via Chilly Winds, a novel by Brooks Birdwell Yeager. Taz Blackwell is a kind-of-retired negotiator of environmental treaties for the State Department who keeps getting called back into harness and sent overseas to gather intel on nefarious doings involving the Russians and rare earth minerals. Meanwhile, back home on Chincoteague, he stumbles into domestic intrigue and a nasty mining company. Throughout, his romantic life is, well, complicated. Yeager is a deft and entertaining narrator. He knows the corridors of power in DC, he knows his birds and the shore’s bars and restaurants, and he obviously knows more than a little about how international environmental affairs are conducted. And he’s a dandy writer. Chilly Winds is way more than a beach book, but like all good beach books, it’s awfully hard to put down.”
“In this highly engaging first novel, Yeager draws on his vast international and local environmental experience to weave a tale of international intrigue with a surprising finale on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.”
“Heart-pounding international intrigue and gritty rural town life dripping with real-life detail that will keep you reading until the very last page.”
“Yeager has produced something remarkable, a tale that is both charmingly picaresque and utterly grounded that captures the high-stakes dynamics of international Arctic politics as well as the local color of life in a small coastal town.”