ABOUT THE BOOK
Death and Taxes follows Mark Douglas, an ex-Marine turned IRS agent, who, along with auditing the weird and the profane, also spearheads weekend raids with his locked-and-loaded gang of government-sanctioned revenuers, merrily gathering back taxes in the form of cash, money order, or more often than not, the debtor's most prized possessions. Things turn ugly when Mark's much-loved boss and dear friend Lila is tortured and killed over what she finds in a routine set of 1040 forms. Enlisting his IRS pals - Harry Salt, a 30-year vet with a quantum physical ability to drink more than humanly possible; Wooly Bob, who's egg-bald on top with shaved eyebrows to match; Miguel, an inexperienced newbie with a company-issued bullhorn and a penchant for getting kicked in the jumblies - Mark hunts down the eunuch hit man Juju Klondike and the deadly Mongolian mob that hired him as only an angry IRS agent can. There will be no refunds for any of them when April 15th comes around. There will only be Death and Taxes.Book Details:
Title: Death and Taxes: Tales of a Badass IRS Agent
Author: Mark Zaslove
Genre: Thriller/Suspense
Publisher: Aperient Press (June 12, 2018)
Page count: 228
LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT WITH MARK ZASLOVE
A few of your favorite things: Astrophotography, scuba diving, fishing, my kid.
Things you need to throw out: The various bottles of Russian vodka in the freezer .
Things you need in order to write: A keyboard.
Things that hamper your writing: Neither rain, nor sleet, nor noise, nor phone calls can stop me .
Things you love about writing: It’s pattern-solving versus gestalt, so it uses both parts of my tiny brain.
Things you hate about writing: Payments: everyone thinks writers don’t need to be paid on time, like we don’t eat or something.
Hardest thing about being a writer: Finding how to write truthfully.
Easiest thing about being a writer: Everything else is simple .
Things you love about where you live: Born and bred in SoCal . . . the sun, the beach, the ocean breeze.
Things that make you want to move:
Kona, Hawaii calls to me.
Things you never want to run out of: Patience and electricity.
Things you wish you’d never bought: Too many to list, but the 5-string neck-thru Warwick bass I got in Iceland; now I want another one .
Words that describe you: Epigrammatic, physical, idiosyncratic.
Words that describe you but you wish they didn’t: Gullible, hopeful, spendy.
Favorite foods: Anything except . . .
Things that make you want to throw up: . . . Brussels sprouts
Favorite music:
Anything from old R&B to Punk, Blues to Gospel.
Music that make your ears bleed: Swedish Death Metal (although Kaamos and Dismember have their moments).
Favorite beverage: Soda water with lemon juice in it .
Something that gives you a pickle face: Anything super-sweet.
Favorite smell: Channel No5 .
Something that makes you hold your nose: Passing by the stockyards on I-5 near Coalinga, California.
Something you’re really good at: Pattern solving.
Something you’re really bad at: French .
Something you wish you could do: Speak French.
Something you wish you’d never learned to do: Professional Magic.
Something you like to do: Read.
Something you wish you’d never done: Too many to count.
People you consider as heroes: My father, truly good-hearted people.
People with a big L on their foreheads: People who won’t correct their ignorance or misconceptions – I consider that a sin.
Last best thing you ate: Sashimi at a restaurant in Hanover, New Hampshire.
Last thing you regret eating: An ice tea that was supposed to be unsweetened but wasn’t.
Things you’d walk a mile for: A good book, a good friend, exercise.
Things that make you want to run screaming from the room: Hypocrites.
Things you always put in your books: Strong funny characters.
Things you never put in your books: Stupid main characters – another sin.
Things to say to an author: I really liked your book.
Things to say to an author if you want to be fictionally killed off in their next book: I really didn’t like your book.
Favorite places you’ve been: Iceland, Barcelona, the Bay Area, Kona, Hawaii .
Places you never want to go to again: Coalinga, California.
Favorite books: All of them, but as I get older I get stupider, so I stick with thrillers/suspense, fantasy/scifi and then a good literary book every-so-often.
Books you would ban: Celebrity-written children’s books.
People you’d like to invite to dinner: Warren Buffet (I’ve talked with him before and he’s a hoot), Chrissie Hynde, Persi Diaconis, Ice Cube, Jane Goodall, Lynn Margulis, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Margot Benacerraf.
People you’d cancel dinner on: Any Kardashian or their relations or anyone they’ve ever slept with or supported them.
Favorite things to do: Read, be at the beach, astrophotography, hangin’ with my son.
Things you’d run through a fire wearing gasoline pants to get out of doing: PR, raves, PR, hobnobbing with nobs, PR, and . . . PR.
Things that make you happy: My son, a good single malt scotch, grocery shopping and stocking up the cabinets, reading .
Things that drive you crazy: Filling out forms; doesn’t matter, I’ll find a way to make a mistake on the first try.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Seriously, one can’t be too careful in researching authors in this age of false pretenses and fake appellations. So here goes…a long-standing writer/director/producer, Mark is a live-action and animation entertainment industry veteran, working in both movies and television. He’s done time – scratch that – created content for all the major studios, including Disney, Universal, Paramount and Warner Bros. A two-time Emmy Award winner for writing/producing, Mark also won the Humanitas Prize (for writing uplifting human values in television and movies – go figure). He also writes short fiction and right after college (where he studied astrophysics), he served as senior editor on various magazines including a couple for the notorious LFP, Inc.—Google it—but from there he went to “Winnie the Pooh,” so his karma is still cool.
Finally, one day, he got fed up with the rigorous structure of scriptwriting and everyone giving him notes and decided: “WTH! Time to stretch my legs, step on the gas and write a novel for the sheer fun of it!” And voila, almost before you could say “Death and Taxes,” the book was done. What’s more, it’s just the first in a series of fast-paced thrillers following the escapades of IRS agent Mark Douglas and his band of merry revenuers as they bring justice to those in great need of same, while collecting your Federal dollars along the way. Hey, for both Marks, it’s a living.
Connect with Mark:
Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads
Buy the book:
Amazon | Barnes & Noble
