While her husband is deployed in Afghanistan, Jessica Ritter finds herself navigating the pitfalls of parenting on her own. That includes moderating her ten-year-old son's screen time—an obsession that hits a fever pitch when YouTube sensation Rainbow Dave releases an addictive new iPad game. Gavin knows he isn’t supposed to keep secrets from his parents, but when his achievements in the game unlock personal messages from Dave instructing him to embark on real world mini-quests, he can’t resist.

In the aftermath of an ambush that leaves her husband missing in action, Jessica grapples with fear and sorrow while clues to a threat closer to home evade her detection. Rainbow Dave, the charismatic host of Scream Time, is America’s cool big brother—a gamer who built a video empire on the strength of his personality. He is also the focus of a shadowy conspiracy hell-bent on sowing chaos with vast technological resources. Dave’s anonymous benefactors have granted him a glimpse of paradise between the pixels, and the real world hasn’t looked the same since. Now, wired with a head full of unholy revelations and a crate full of dangerous devices, he’s on a mission to help his fans “level up” at a live event. Scream Time is coming to town, and it may be too late to stop a deadly game.

A grieving husband. A missing child. A killer with motives as deep and twisted as the bloody roots of history.
One year after the brutal murder of his wife, Desmond Carmichael believes someone is stalking him and his four-year-old son following a hair-raising encounter with a hooded stranger in their placid New England town.

Across the country in the California desert, a severed head is found atop a watchtower at a Japanese internment camp memorial and FBI Special Agent Erin Drelick embarks on a manhunt that will lead her into the dark heart of the nation’s past.

Desmond fears that the wrong man was imprisoned for his wife’s murder, that the true killer is still at large. His in-laws and a local police detective have a different fear: that he has become too unstable to raise his own son.

When the child goes missing, Desmond must work outside the law to decipher the mystery of why his family has been targeted. But can he do it in time to save his son from a monster born in the dust of an American wasteland and hell-bent on reaping a whirlwind of vengeance?

Praise for Steel Breeze on Goodreads

★★★★★ “Tension from the first till the last page; well written; fast pace; what a great summer book!”

★★★★★ “Killer thriller! Read and be WOWED.”

★★★★★ “Wow! what a thriller. This book was a fast read and an excellent crime thriller.”

★★★★★ “I'm astonished by this author's versatility … The characters, the descriptions, the fast-paced action keeps the reader flipping the pages as fast as possible.”

★★★★★ “This book is full of suspense and action.”

★★★★★ “Douglas Wynne's second novel ranks right up there with one of the best thrillers I have read … The story will keep you wondering right up until the end.”

★★★★★ “Amazing suspense that kept me hanging on.”

“This thrilling read raised my blood pressure for sure.”

“It's an excellent thriller- taut and tightly-paced … The action moves very quickly in this book and the tension is maintained throughout.”

“Wow what a story. This one has you in it's grip from the very beginning and just when you feel you are coming up for air, it twists and turns and you're off on the ride again.”

"Steel Breeze by Douglas Wynne is an amazing find! … If you crave suspense, pick this up and start the ride...”

“A tale that gets under your skin, gets your adrenaline flowing, and just barely lets you come up for air before repeating the process again and again.

Miles Landry is trying to put violence behind him when he takes up work as a private detective focused on humdrum adultery cases. But when a Tibetan monk hires him to find a missing person, things get weird fast.

Charged with tracking down the reincarnation of a man possessed by a demonic guardian from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Miles is plunged into a world of fortune-tellers, gangsters, and tantric rituals. The year is 1991 and a series of grisly murders has rocked New York City in the run up to a visit from the Dalai Lama.

The police attribute the killings to Chinatown gang warfare. Miles–skeptical of the supernatural–is inclined to agree. But what if the monster he's hunting is more than a myth?

Proudly represented by Crystal Lake Publishing—Tales from the Darkest Depths.

Interview with the author:

What makes this Horror/Noir novel so special?

I’ve always been attracted to mashups of my favorite genres. I think what makes The Wind In My Heart special is that it takes the best of both worlds from crime novels and horror thrillers and adds a dash of the supernatural with a Tibetan twist. I’d like to think it’s a unique cocktail. 

Tell us more about your lead character.

Miles Landry is a private detective with a short fuse and a black sense of humor. He’s suffered some personal losses that have left him pretty hardened. He’s a pragmatic ex-military man who views the world with a skeptical eye. But he also tries to keep an open mind when his clients have an open wallet. So it's interesting to see what happens when a group of Buddhist monks hires him to solve a supernatural mystery. His world view is bound to clash with theirs, but he may learn something along the way.

Why should readers give this book or your work a try?

So much of supernatural horror and thriller fiction is based on Judeo-Christian premises. I wanted to explore a different perspective on gods, demons, and the afterlife, and to contrast that with a very American setting. The result is a violent, urban occult thriller with the voice of a classic noir. It’s a quick, entertaining read with some deep philosophical roots that have interested me for decades.