Historical Fiction Mystery Thriller
Date Published: 01-26-2026
Publisher: Bearss Lair Books
Dan Driscoll is consumed by gambling debt, cornered by bookies and loan sharks, forced to bet on one last scheme. When things turn violent and two people are shot, his best friend, Stan Neumann, swallows what he suspects. He can’t risk divulging a closely-held family secret.
Then a body washes up on the Lake Michigan shoreline, and the lake gives Dan what the bookies never would: a way out. Authorities call it an accident and list him as the drowning victim. For Dan, it’s an escape route delivered in black ink.
He becomes a ghost, an imposter, a chameleon. But lies don’t stay buried.
As America is pulled into World War II, Stan enlists, choosing duty on his terms before the draft can rewrite his life. In Pearl Harbor, one chance encounter dredges up a name he thought was long buried.
War changes everything, but it doesn’t erase unfinished business. And
when the truth demands to be heard, how long can a stolen life stay buried
before the past comes to collect?
Q: Could you tell us about any research trips you took
for this story? Which places did you visit, and what made them essential to
your writing?
A: First, one of the tasks I enjoy the most is doing
research for a book. To me, it’s all about “the hunt” … finding the evidence,
and sometimes, along the way, new content for another story.
Since my novel begins in 1940 and primarily takes place in
West Michigan, I needed to make sure the details about places and events were spot-on
accurate. To accomplish this, I made numerous trips to the Oceana County
Historical and Genealogical Society located in Hart, Michigan, and the Muskegon
Public Library in Muskegon, Michigan. Both have an incredible group of
volunteers who helped me find and navigate their volumes of resources. Since
this was the area where my parents and relatives were from (Shelby, Michigan),
it also helped having a last name they recognized.
While in West Michigan, I also visited the various locales
that were integral to the novel, talked with the owners or their managers, got
some additional background history, and any interesting stories that might lend
to their “character.”
The Stony Lake Tavern*, Stony
Lake, Michigan
The Red Rooster Tavern*, Muskegon,
Michigan
The Michillinda Beach Lodge*,
Whitehall, Michigan
Continental Motors, Muskegon,
Michigan
The Shelby Area District Library,*
Shelby, Michigan
The Silver Lake Sand Dunes, Mears,
Michigan
Part of the story took place at
the South St. Paul, Minnesota airport which, during WWII, was part of the Minneapolis Naval Air Station.
This is where one of the main characters, Stan Neumann, served in the navy as
an aviation machinists mate, servicing aircraft used for training cadets. I
interviewed one of the curators at the Commemorative Air Force hangar that
houses a WWII aircraft museum to learn details of the airfield back in 1943.
Q: What’s the strangest thing
you’ve ever had to research online for your book?
A: It would probably be the
research I’m doing for a new historical fiction murder mystery that I’m currently
working on. The main character is a novelist who is enamored with death and
dying. To achieve a sense of realism in
his writing, he delves into how to suffocate someone without leaving any
evidence. This means I need to research how to do this. I cannot help think if
there was ever an incident where someone had to track my Google search strings
and history files, they might wonder “what’s this guy up to?”
Q: What research (history,
mythology, science) goes into your world-building?
A: Without a doubt, it’s built
around history … local, national, and bits of trivia thrown in. I did a fair
amount of teaching before I retired in 2017. This has carried over into my
first novel, “Cain’s Chameleon.” The reader will notice I use the END NOTES to
explain or provide additional historical information about a particular place
or event mentioned in the storyline.
Q: Have any of the people
you’ve known, past or present, left a lasting impression on your writing
journey? If so, we’d love to hear about a memorable experience that stands out
to you.
A: Without a doubt it would have
to be my father, Joseph Ward Bearss. Unfortunately, that impression occurred
posthumously.
I grew up knowing very little
about my father’s military service during WWII.
Like other veterans returning from the war, he spoke very little about
what he did or where he was. I know he served in the U.S. Navy as a flight
instructor at NAS Minneapolis, then in Laramie, Wyoming. He later trained to
become a radar intercept officer and served aboard the aircraft carrier the USS
Essex and the USS ENTERPRISE. I was never quite sure what he did on an aircraft
carrier. As he aged, he would divulge little snippets of some events. A couple
of these are included in “Cain’s Chameleon.”
I can say I “blame” my father’s
secrecy for getting me into writing novels. Why conducting some genealogy
research during COVID, I stumbled across a declassified military document that indicated
my dad reporting for duty aboard a navy destroyer, the USS Bullard on 01 July
1945. He never mentioned being aboard this ship. I called my sister and asked
if she knew anything about this. “No…dad was on the ESSEX.” I told her the
record showed him transferring from the ESSEX to the BULLARD.
That was the “hook”. Thus began a
2-year research project tracking down my father’s military journey. What made
it a greater challenge was the National Archives in St. Louis, Missouri was
closed due to COVID. I could not access his official records. Me and the
Internet were on our own.
I also used my parent’s photo
album, an interview with my dad’s youngest sister (my Aunt Donna) who was still
alive and had a clear memory of most details. I also made various trips around
the country. But what was most useful was their hometown weekly newspaper, The
Oceana Herald. I was able to track my father’s whereabouts using the Local
News column. Families would submit a short blurb of events, gatherings, or
short announcements about their friends and relatives. “Mr. & Mrs. Herman
Ladegast and their daughter Katharine were guests for Sunday dinner at the home
of Oscar and Vera Newman.” Or, “Ensign Ward Bearss began flight training with
the U.S. Navy in Corpus Christi, TX. He will be there through March 1943.” One
might think of these announcements as the Instagram or Facebook of the
1940s.
The campus newspaper where my
father attended college, Western State Teacher’s College in Kalamazoo,
Michigan, was another helpful resource.
The culmination of all this
research came together in my first book, “Undisclosed Stories Discovered:
Honoring the World War II Military Journey of Lt. Joseph Ward Bearss, USNR.”
Only 250 copies were printed. All
were given away to family members, relatives and friends who knew my parents as
well as all the librarians, archivists, historians, aviation enthusiasts, and
museum curators at libraries, WWII museums, airports, and historical societies
across the country. I took a one-week road trip delivering many of these
personally to thank these research collaborators who, up until that moment,
were names on an email list. That part, to me, was the icing on the cake.
So, it was my dad’s nature of not
talking about himself that led me to this writing adventure.
Q: Do you write in the same
genre all the time?
A: Based on my track record … a
whole n=3 … and my passion for history, I would say, “yes.”
Q: If so, have you ever
considered writing in another one?
A: Yes, actually. I’ve thought
about topics that come up in conversation or during research and think they would
lend to a good short story in a different genre.
Q: Which character,
supernatural or human, do you enjoy writing the most, and why?
A: Without a doubt, it’s the
trouble-maker, the antagonist, the villain, the deceiver.
Why? First, I can put more unexpected
twists and turns into his/her malevolent character. Second, I think readers
like to experience a character with deviant flaws who makes poor decisions and
goes further and further down a rabbit hole. Plus these types lend to tension,
cliffhangers, and the unexpected “didn’t see that one coming” in the story.
While author Mark Bearss was setting the stage for his retirement, concerned co-workers would ask, “What are you going to do when you’re not working?” He found this question rather curious. It should have been posed, “What are you going to do first?” Mark knew that if travel was involved, he had had enough of commercial flights after 28 years of teaching for the medical device industry. Mark yearned for road trips – to visit those places he only saw from 38,000 feet. Little did he know that wish journeyed down an unexpected fork in the road. He would become an author.
While conducting genealogy research, Mark discovered archived de-classified military documents that revealed the name of a U.S. Navy destroyer his father served aboard during WWII. The reason this was a poignant discovery was because, while growing up in Grand Rapids, Michigan, his father made no mention of this. Apart from being a U.S. Naval Reserve flight instructor, he knew his father served aboard the carrier USS ESSEX. But in what capacity? That, too, was not revealed. More discoveries materialized the further he dug. In fact, there was a lot more his father didn’t mention. This wasn’t unusual. Many WWII veterans didn’t talk about what happened back then.
Because of the pandemic, the National Archives in St. Louis was closed and rendered Lt. Bearss’ military records unavailable. Thus began a project that challenged Mark’s research endeavors for over two years and about 5,000 miles on the road. The biographical sketch was sorted from creative Internet search strings, history books, navy publications, and networking with journalists, librarians, archivists, bloggers, aviation enthusiasts, museum and historical society curators, navy veterans, relatives, and more. One online resource that was instrumental in tracking his father’s journey was the weekly newspaper published in the county where his parents grew up: The Oceana Herald. It included a Local News section where family members and organizations could submit a short blurb about a relative’s visit, a social gathering, or – where a son or husband was currently stationed.
This project culminated in 2022 with Mark’s first publication titled, Undisclosed Stories Discovered: Honoring the World War II Military Journey of Lt. Joseph Ward Bearss, USNR. When asked what was one of the highlights surrounding this story, he described the road trips to seek out and discover places where his father lived, trained and was stationed during the war. What prompted him to write this as a biography took place during a meeting with the curator of the World War II Home Front Museum on St. Simons Island, Georgia. St. Simons Naval Air Station was the site for the U.S. Naval Radar Training Station, where Lt. Bearss was trained in shipboard radar operations, enemy interception, and Fighter Direction. While the museum had ample archived materials about the facility, it had very little documented about the servicemembers who trained there.
Only 250 copies were printed. Mark went back on the road in his Class-B motorhome and personally donated those copies to family members, friends and relatives, the librarians, archivists, researchers, museums, curators, historical societies, newspapers, The American Heritage Center, VFW Posts, airport FBOs, and other assorted WWII enthusiasts in 12 states who helped in his endeavors. It was a two-fold reward. Not only did his father’s story finally become told, Mark experienced the pleasure of meeting all these wonderful people who were his resources, advisors, collaborators, and consultants. Up until that point, they were only names in an email contact list.
You’re probably asking, “How is all this relevant to Mark’s new novel, Cain’s Chameleon?” It was the research from The Oceana Herald that planted the seed for this story. While perusing its issues, Mark stumbled on two articles that piqued his curiosity. The first reported an attempted murder in a home close to his family’s summer cottage on Lake Michigan. The second reported a drowning victim that washed up on the beach right where Mark and his friends used to play. Just two more stories never divulged while growing up. He wondered, Were these two events related? Then Mark decided — he would make them related.
https://mybook.to/CainsChameleon
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