In Augusta, Maine, a historic nor’easter and something more sinister unearth secrets buried deep in the town’s past. With time running out, three lives collide in a desperate fight for survival, where truth becomes a casualty and redemption comes at a cost.
Billy Stevens, a quarry worker haunted by loss, is drawn into a web of betrayal when a brutal crime pins him as a suspect. Jessica Michaud returns to care for her ailing mother, only to find herself hunted by a vengeful ex whose chilling threats awaken old wounds. And journalist Andrea Kearney digs into a local dynasty’s corruption as the storm’s fury mirrors the rising tide of violence.
“Born On Monday” is a gripping tale of resilience, moral ambiguity, and small-town sins — a literary thriller that will keep readers breathless until its haunting conclusion. Award-winning author Richard R. Becker delivers a gritty thriller that digs into identity, perception, and the human condition.
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Perhaps I will one day, but I have never included author notes or acknowledgements in my books. The closest I’ve come to doing so was including one in “Born On Monday.” Ultimately, I decided not to add any more pages and let the story stand on its own.
It wasn’t until I was midway through the first few book interviews ahead of my release that some people might appreciate some insights into how this book came together. And, along with that, a brief explanation of my brand of fiction that sometimes bends and blends history and reality to create as authentic an atmosphere as possible, even if the Augusta, Maine, in my book is merely an imperfect reflection of the real one.
The Bear Paw, for example, doesn’t exist in downtown Augusta just off the Kennebec River, even if it feels like such a bar should exist there. Neither does Windsor High School, attended by many principal characters. Their rival school, Cony High, does exist, but it’s only mentioned in passing. Conversely, there has never been a Pine Bluff Village trailer park, even if it is a commingling of trailer parks in the area. Yet, the storm, the 2017 October nor’easter, really was the worst windstorm in Maine’s history.
Interestingly enough, the storm becomes yet another antagonist in the book, but it wasn’t the reason I chose Maine for “Born on Monday.” The storm, like so many things that happen for authors, was a happy accident. I was looking up weather to help ground the story’s sense of realism and stumbled into what can only be called a happy accident. It went on to inform so much of the book’s climactic ending.
So why Augusta in the first place? The most straightforward answer is that it is the setting of the initial spark — a short story called Time Capsule, first published in my short story collection, “50 States,” in 2021. It was the thirty-seventh short story in the collection, and I needed a location in Maine. Augusta fit the nature of the story, which initially began as an exploration of how people who stay in a town after high school tend to feel the same as compared to those who change after they leave for parts unknown.
In the story, Billy Stevens is the one who stayed. Jessica Michaud is the one who left. We never learn the reasons behind the why in the short story, but it’s well established that, much like his physical presence, Billy’s feelings for Jessica are as fresh as the day she left. Her feelings for him, however, aren’t much more than a distant memory and maybe an annoyance.
The details of why they broke up didn’t even occur to me until I wrote a follow-up short story called Fallen Idols, which was first published in a digital companion to “50 States.” It featured ten stories that carried a few of those in “50 States” forward, including Time Capsule.
By that time, I already knew “Born on Monday” would be my second novel (but not its name), even while I was tied up with my debut novel, “Third Wheel.” I had even told a friend of mine, mentioning that I would find it interesting if someone followed Jessica back from New York City, giving Billy a shot at redemption, if not reconciliation. This friend surprised me by openly sharing her stalker experience and it eventually became interwoven into several months of my own research into stalker psychology.
As it turns out, stalkers are exceptionally frightening not only because of the threat they pose, but also because of the general indifference of law enforcement despite their pervasiveness. Stalking happens to an estimated four percent of women and two percent of men every year, but only 30 to 50 percent of those cases are ever reported. Of those reported, fewer still ever result in outcomes favorable to the victims. Weak evidence, credibility issues, policy gaps, bias, resource strain, and legal barriers all contribute to the startlingly low rates of intervention, let alone protective action or arrests. As many survivors point out, few people take it seriously until it’s too late.
It was from this plot line correction that I began to build something that touched on several literary themes: identity and the impact of trauma, the cost of silence and complicity, isolation despite interconnectedness, and redemption through truth and action, to name a few. And it was in interweaving these themes over the top of small-town dynamics, that I was able to develop something so special.
Unlike my first novel, which was a labor of love in exploring my own experiences as much as the fictional tale I created, “Born On Monday” was a labor of love born out of the craft. This novel, more than any other work, surprised me so often, from journalist Andrea Kearney becoming a principal player to the twist at the end. (I didn’t see that one coming either.)
But isn’t that what makes writing so incredibly breathtaking? We begin with a spark and fan the flames until they warm us, our spouses, our editors, and beta readers (of whom I am all forever grateful).
I hope you have the chance to let “Born on Monday” warm you, too. It is available on October 21, wherever books are sold. Good night and good luck.
