Chris Orcutt, NOT actual size

Born in the proud state of Maine, raised in New England and New York, Chris Orcutt wanted to be a writer since a summer afternoon at 13 when he read Casino Royale by Ian Fleming.

Orcutt’s short fiction has been published in over two dozen literary journals, and his nonfiction articles have appeared in magazines including Writer's Digest.

In 2003, Chris won the MOTA Emerging Writers Award, as well as 55 Fiction’s World’s Shortest Stories Contest.

As a former newspaper reporter for a weekly and a daily, Chris is accustomed to deadlines and working with editors. In 1992, he won a New York Press Association Award.

His favorite writers include Fleming, Raymond Chandler, James Cain, Robert Parker, Mickey Spillane, Jim Thompson, Gil Brewer, Alistair MacLean, Donald Westlake, Stephen King, John Lescroart, and Ernest Hemingway.

Orcutt’s day jobs have been many and varied: newspaper reporter, landscaper, laborer, waiter, parking valet (1 day), panhandler (also 1 day), high school history teacher, startup software company founder, web content consultant for Fortune 100 companies, technology manager for Merrill Lynch, college English professor, and freelance web designer.

THE RICH ARE DIFFERENT is his second novel.

A REAL PIECE OF WORK is his first novel.

When he’s not writing, Orcutt enjoys a few distractions including golf, tennis, acrylic painting, the Boston Red Sox, shooting, backpacking, books on spirtuality and self-improvement, travel, and his other website, NotWriting.com.

National Bestselling author Dave King says the following of Chris Orcutt's debut mystery novel, A REAL PIECE OF WORK: "Utterly engaging and suspenseful throughout. Stylishly written--nods to the classics of the detective genre--with great characters and plenty of wit and originality."

As a web and communication consultant, Chris Orcutt has provided writing, design and information architecture services to the following Fortune 500 Companies: Merrill Lynch, J.P. Morgan, Heineken USA, and PepsiCo.

As a working writer, Orcutt produces speeches, industrial scripts, and technical documentation.

* New York Press Association Award
* 55 Fiction's "World's Shortest Stories" Contest Winner
* MOTA 3 "Promising Young Writers" Winner
* Experienced teacher at high school and college levels
* Recipient of CUNY Baruch College's Distinguished Teaching Award
* Skilled, entertaining speaker

THE RICH ARE DIFFERENT: The second novel in the Dakota Stevens mystery series.

A REAL PIECE OF WORK: The first novel in the Dakota Stevens mystery series.

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SERIES CONCEPT:

Welcome to the world of Dakota Stevens, a world of mystery-adventures that combines the wit of Robert Parker and Raymond Chandler with the fact-based hyperbole of Dan Brown and Michael Crichton.

As a former FBI agent with experience in the field and the lab, Dakota is every inch the modern private investigator, using traditional “luck and pluck” gumshoe techniques, forensic science and information technology to solve his cases. He is tall, MIT-educated and always well-dressed. He is the James Bond of private detectives. And keeping with the larger than life quality of Dakota’s world, his “Watson,” Svetlana Krüsh, is a Ukrainian-American chess champion with runway legs, predator eyes and fluency in seven languages. Together they are a sophisticated and formidable team.

In Dakota’s world, the loss of a painting leads to a massive forgery scheme and a Nazi conspiracy; the death of a wealthy eccentric leads to a mock Old West town and a huge cache of gold; and the brainwashing of an Ivy League college student leads to an international white slavery operation. The plots are big, the mysteries intricate.

The Dakota Stevens series will be noted for its strong writing, engrossing readers on more than the level of plot by providing them with crisp, quotable dialogue; a vivid experience of place; and lush sensory detail--all rendered in language that is aesthetically pleasing without drawing attention to itself. The aim is to give the regular mystery reader or the busy traveler waiting on the tarmac an all-around enjoyable experience that more than justifies the book’s cost.

For a more detailed description of the series, please contact Krista Goering (contact info above).