What is a Shout Out? A shout out is a public announcement of some accomplishment in your writing journey, whether you're a beginning writer or an accomplished author. Your membership to the Diamond Valley Writers' Guild leverages the strength of our mailing list to recognize our members and share your success. When is the Shout Out sent? There is no set schedule, but the shout out is sent around the end of the month. The deadline for the next shout out is announced at the monthly meeting! Did you publish a book? We would love to help promote your book by sending out an announcement, with a purchase link and book cover (in JPG format). If the purchase link has your book blurb or synopsis, we'll also include that in the shout out. If you wish to give people a discount code for your book, please include those details. The book MUST be available for purchase, NOT pre-order! Can I "shout out" other writing-related news? Sure, we always like to share our member successes. We just require a link to include so people can visit the blog, site or announcement. Some examples that we allow are... You've been short-listed for, or won an award for something you wrote. You wrote an educational writing-related blog post. You have a scheduled book launch event happening at a location. You will be presenting at an event or attending a writing event. By all means tell others of the event as they may be interested. Who can send Shout Outs? All active members are welcome to submit Shout Outs. When the email requesting Shout Outs is sent, simply REPLY to that email with the pertinent information in the body text (not attached as an external file). the blurb of what your shout out is or the blurb of your book a text link to your book sales page or external website with more information about your shout out the only attachment allowed is a JPG of your book cover (front cover only) If you're not currently a member of Diamond Valley Writers Guild, why not join and enjoy the perks of membership?

Meeting called to order by President Michelle Bassett at 6:38 pm PDT.

An organization called The Balducci Couture developed control of the textile industry used to support the global fashion industry. One of their sources of the fabric comes from Peru and Bolivia – from llamas and alpacas. Many in the fashion industry prize the wool from these beautiful animals. Over the past several years, a secret process surfaced that takes that wool and processes it to an almost silk-like quality. The organization had to find that formula and eliminate any competition that would potentially destroy their lock on this lucrative industry. Soon after Walter Donleavy purchased his llama and alpaca ranch in New Mexico, he received a call from a close friend from his past in South America and asked him to visit him in Bolivia. Walter never dreamed that this would take him on a perilous journey that would force him to rethink his life goals and could potentially expose his multi-million dollar empire. Rick went to Carrizozo, New Mexico, to manage Walter’s new San Lorenzo Llama and Alpaca Ranch. However, from the moment he arrived, he could already feel there were problems – he just didn’t know how much. Rick went to Bolivia with Walter to purchase another, but larger ranch. However, within twenty-four hours they were entrenched in a war that had global consequences if they were to succeed. In the process, Walter was kidnapped by the Cartel, who demanded a secret from him that had been handed down from the Chief of the Quechua Indian tribe in the early 1500s. Rick flew to Tel Aviv to meet with the person who was holding Walter hostage. Walter’s financial empire was in jeopardy, because certain people had found out about Walter's life before he came to the United States.

Throughout history, many dictators developed a primeval almost sadistic view of society and felt that power was for the taking. Some of these dictators went to the finest educators in the world and learned how to mesmerize their citizens, converting them to their own twisted ideologies. They began the process by corrupting the military generals, who controlled the work force and weapons that could control their people. One individual during World War Two, set in motion a contingency plan in the event he wasn’t successful in accomplishing his goal of ruling the world - and that was Adolf Hitler. Toward the end of the Second World War, Hitler ordered his Army to enter Prague. He moved his munitions factory from Berlin to Prague’s underground city, to avoid the Allied Bombings and also because the Russians were getting too close. To temper his paranoia, he created a back-up plan. That’s when he created - The Doomsday Device. As such he planned an apocalypse so devastating it was beyond description and one in which the world might never recover. Thirty-five years later, a letter surfaced reminding five people that the device could still be a real threat to the world and had to be disarmed. Rick Benedict was a professor at Brown University at the time. Little did he know that soon he was going to be embroiled in a world of betrayal and deceit that would shake the very foundation of his own beliefs.

Walter’s latest acquisition, a resort and casino in South Africa, proved to be another very worthwhile investment. However, from the first day he stepped onto the property to start the remodeling process, there was a group of people that had other plans for the resort – and those plans did not include Walter Donleavy. South Africa was a diverse melting pot of people from all over the world. Ever since diamonds were discovered there, people flocked into the country in droves. It was those people that helped to build the country and it was also those same people that built the luxurious hotels and later on gambling – Las Vegas style. It is very easy to get caught up in the power that comes with money. One such individual did get caught up in the madness because he wanted to be so much like his father. The difference was he wanted to do it in months instead of the years it normally took to achieve greatness. It almost destroyed an empire that took years to meticulously build. It required Walter to marshal all of his resources at his disposal to resolve this problem so lives, including his own, and his investment were not lost. In the process, he found a new ally that he would consider for future acquisitions. It was a plan that was so simple yet so devious and included officials in the government to pull it off. However, Rick Benedict felt something was wrong as soon as he walked onto the casino floor. He just didn’t know who all the individuals were, until he stumbled onto part of their plan. There were actually three parts to this operation and no one knew all of the entire plan, except three people. Steve turned around and waited for a moment until he heard a helicopter engine start up and saw it lift off from behind the building. He got out of his car and shot at the helicopter and emptied his fifteen-round clip, not sure if he hit anything. As this mystery unravels, one by one greed kicks in and each of the people involved is killed off – mostly to eliminate paying their share of a thirty million dollar prize. It was also to get rid of any loose ends before they got their money and took off for Pago Pago. Rick Benedict was that fly in the ointment with his ability to sense something was wrong – and he stopped the stealing. Along the way Liz was kidnapped when she was back on her boat in Rome – but she proved more resourceful than the kidnappers gave her credit for. When Rick heard that two attempts were made on her life, he was more determined than ever to find a way to protect her the best way he knew how. Walter also put his plan in motion to move his operation. He felt that in this day and age, with business interests all over the world, he could now manage it from anywhere. He gave Liz and Rick the news about his plans, which did not sit well with Liz. He was determined to proceed with his plans and start having some “Walter” time. He hadn’t figured out where he was actually going to move to, but he knew it was going to be in Europe. After World War II, when he jumped off from a Russian general’s train, he roamed through various parts of Europe, still hiding and trying to figure out what he wanted to do and where he wanted to go. Europe was really his home and as such he missed it.

In 1975, a plan was put in motion by a group of investors that would change the boundaries of the Pawnee Indian Reservation. Ten years of very careful planning and collaboration between factions in Florence, Italy; Las Vegas, Nevada; Cheyenne, Wyoming;, and Fort Collins, Colorado, would ultimately give them access to the Pawnee gold - but not mined by the Pawnee Indians. It was a plan so cunning that organizations in both the United States and Europe weren’t going to let anything stand in their way. However, the timings of these events were extremely crucial to its success. The Monarch Ranch was a key ingredient to its success, but when the new owner purchased the ranch two months earlier, they hadn’t counted on Rick Benedict, a Professor of European history, to be that fly in the ointment. It was a race against time to mine the gold and distribute it to certain parties in Europe and the United States before the Air Force in Cheyenne, Wyoming, could mount a major investigation surrounding the seismic disturbances.

It was a cloudy and damp night. A fierce storm had thundered in the night before. The streets glistened as the lights shone on them. The air smelled brisk and clean, like someone had just ordered the wind to come through to freshen things up. It was on this very cold and dreary night that Paul Mathews was preparing to scale the building at 3 Ponchikov Way. This was the building where Carl Fabergé constructed some of his most beautiful gold Fabergé eggs for the crown heads of Europe and Russia. His creations used jewels that were handpicked by him. Pearls from Japan, diamonds from London, blue sapphires from Australia, rubies from Burma, and emeralds from Colombia. Just before the revolt in 1917, when the Red Army stormed the palace, Tsar Nicholas II had hidden two of his most famous and personal Imperial Fabergé eggs in a secret space deep in the cellar of the Alexander Palace. He was going to retrieve them at a later date, along with the gold coins and jewels that he’d been secretly hiding over the past several months. However, later never came. These special Imperial Fabergé eggs, which would never be delivered to their intended recipients, also held a secret that would be devastating to Russia. The pair of the Imperial Fabergé eggs was almost lost until Walter saw a painting in the Rumyantsev Museum in Moscow while he was on tour with the Minister of the Moscow Museum of Archeology. Walter knew what this would mean to the European monarchy and consequently felt an obligation to get the painting at almost any cost. It was one of the four pieces of the puzzle to the location of the treasure that the Tsar had hidden. It was a bold and calculated risk to break into one of the most heavily fortified buildings in the world – Moscow Armory building’s top floor. There was a window in the corner office that belonged to General Stanislaw Ogorski. He was the last person that knew about the famous pair of Imperial Fabergé eggs called Constellation and Karelian Birch. The Tsar had originally confided in him when he gave him the painting. What the General didn’t know was the secret within each egg Some of the spoils that were handed down from the last surviving Romanov were the treasures the parents and grandparents accumulated from various wars and then inherited by the current generation. Their most prized possessions were world famous, like the Imperial Fabergé eggs that were made almost exclusively for the Romanov family, Nicholas I and Nicholas II by Carl Fabergé. The Romanov family spent millions on construction of opulent buildings, especially their own residences, which housed jewelry worn by tsarinas before Alexandra Feodorovna. However, they also harbored a secret that only exclusive members of the executive cabinet knew about. When Count Olav Stravinsky was born, he was quickly and quietly shipped off to live with cousins of the Tsar on Long Island, New York. He lived behind a heavily fortified gate in the estate once owned by a famous robber baron. He left his estate when he was six years old when he was asked by his father to visit him in St. Petersburg just before Nicholas II and his family were killed. Count Olav, and he alone, knew the dark secret of the matching Imperial Fabergé eggs that David R. Francis, the U.S. Ambassador to Russia, was to give to Kristina of the Habsburg Family in Austria and the other one to Woodrow Wilson, then President of the United States.

This is the story of a man who originally went to Australia to find a buyer to support his luxurious restaurants in Manhattan and Providence. Suddenly he finds that the Conclave he helped to craft, with four other industrialists after the war, was never accomplished. Now after thirty-five years he has to somehow make it right and get the millions that were stolen from three of the five industrialists. Walter had a son that he had never seen before suddenly show up at his estate after who has plans to kill him. A major bank in Germany was found to have counterfeit English banknotes and used as a deposit safekeeping. The counterfeit was created while he was at Sachhaussen concentration camp. Everyone had assumed that Hitler had either distributed it or destroyed it. Suddenly twenty million English pounds shows up stored in a Swiss bank vault and one of the largest banks in Germany is almost declared insolvent.

In 1945, a couple left the safety of their home and started that long trek from Budapest, Hungary to Bremerhaven, Germany. The war was almost over, but they went through cities that were still in ruin. They had little to eat and were always vigilant about anybody looking at them for fear of being caught. There one goal was to get on a boat that would take them to America. All the odds were against them surviving. However, the deep desire to be free and the love they had for each other they felt was enough. After three grueling weeks at sea and with handouts from fellow passengers, they finally got to New York. They purchased a kiosk, using up some of the money they saved. They felt the train stations might be a great location, so they set up their kiosk there. They found out very quickly that people liked their food. It was a simple hot dog on a french bun. Things were going well until they were asked to leave because they didn’t have a vendor’s license. But that didn’t deter them and after riding for days, they finally ended up in Billings, Montana. Thirty-five years later and after changing their name to Kenny and Sally Kellerman, they had a chain of twelve restaurants called the Three Forks Restaurant and Lodge. However, after having successfully built a thriving business, they faced the type of danger for them and their children they thought they left behind in 1945. After Walter Donleavy purchased the Monarch Ranch in Fort Collins, Colorado, he always want it to be a working cattle ranch and sell their beef to the local hotels and restaurants. Walter found The Three Forks Restaurant and Lodge in Billings Montana. One other suitor that also wanted to buy the business. They were going to use a deep and devastating secret in order to get what they wanted from the owners. Bradley Sheridan was a broker at the – the Benjamin-Veniamin and Hart brokerage firm. He managed billions of dollars through his firm for friends. One day he ended up with a major problem with the IRS, so he left the company. A month later one of his former bigger clients heard about his problem and offered him a job – that would turn his life upside down. He didn’t realize at the time who he was actually dealing with – until it was too late. The company that wanted to purchase the chain of restaurants had an ulterior motive. If successful, would make them all millionaires’ a hundred times over.

An organization called The Beefsteak Association located in New York wanted to purchase the Monarch Ranch Meat Processing plant in Billings, Montana. They already controlled all the meat-processing plants from Chicago to the East coast. They felt strongly that the Monarch Ranch could be a potential threat to their operation since the ranch was already supplying various major grocery stores. Walter took an interest in purchasing an existing restaurant, located in Mystic, Connecticut, which only served seafood. However, when he approached the owner, he was not met with resistance – but with information about himself when he was in the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp. He had a difficult time reliving that period in his life. However, something compelled him to listen to the man. At the end, he found out that they had a connection at the camp. Forty-five years later, he met the man that he didn’t pick for his group. He also reminded Walter something about himself that no one else knew. One morning Rick received a distressing call from Frank concerning the wool supply being shipped to their sister company the Balducci Couture in Tel Aviv, Israel. Suddenly the shipment sizes had dropped down to a noticeable difference. Horatio, was the General Manager of the St. Augustine Ranch in San Ignacio, Bolivia, had not called Rick and apprised him of any production changes. Rick, Frank, his CFO, and Don, his manager of the Monarch Ranch in Fort Collins, flew to Bolivia to find out what the problem was. Walter had reorganized responsibility for his companies at Monarch Enterprises between Liz, Rick and himself. Having accomplished that, he had building floor space that was too large for what was left of his organization. He decided to sublease the space to an electronics entrepreneur.

The year was 2004 – The Kentucky Revelation A friend of his invited Walter that he hadn’t seen in many years to come down to his thoroughbred horse farm. He was asking him to see the world-famous Kentucky Derby. In the early 60s, Walter had created a portrait for his friend Ted Cunningham, which still hung proudly in his library. However, it was more than a casual invitation. Suddenly Ted wanted Walter to perform a task that he had not done in over forty years. While it was exciting to be invited, and sit in the premier box seats, it also came at a stiff price. For Walter, the price was more than he was willing to pay. Walter had already felt that Ted had an ulterior motive for inviting him, Liz, and Rick to his house in Lexington, Kentucky, for the week. Once they finished dinner, Ted asked to have a private conversation with Walter about something that his great-great- grandfather had started after the civil war. In one calculated move, Ted had almost everything. He didn’t figure at the time that the person he made a deal with, also had somebody to report to as well. He hadn’t imagined that he was more ruthless than Ted.

It’s about a kid that grew up in New Jersey around 1930. He quickly learned how easy it was to be a gang leader, but at what a cost. He reluctantly went into the U.S. Army, and after a while, he liked it. After much specialized training, he was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant and reported to the War Department, which ultimately became the Pentagon. He was given small assignments to fix problems and get information for the Chief of Staff. As time went on, his assignments became more dangerous, and they took him all over the world. After completing over one hundred and eighty missions successfully, he was offered the position of managing the War College. However, after six years at the college, he decided to retire. While he settled down in Alexandria with his wife and three children, he stumbled onto something that had stayed dormant for over 25 years. This was not a sanctioned mission, so he had to tread lightly because of the political problems that would create a firestorm.