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Vendetta Stone
A VOW OF VENGEANCE How far would you go to find the man who murdered your wife? For Jackson Stone, a Nashville advertising executive, avid outdoorsman and former Marine, his journey begins with an extraordinary press conference to announce his deadly intentions. The sensational comments quickly go viral, and reaction is swift-from the police to Jackson's family members to his church family, from bloggers to victim's right advocates to anti-violence groups. Everyone takes sides and his comments divide Music City like never before. Soon, the hunter becomes the hunted, and Jackson's fate will be decided in a suspenseful showdown at one of Nashville's iconic landmarks There to chronicle it all is journalist Gerry Hilliard, who recounts his own role in tracking down the killer in his first "true-crime" book, 'Vendetta Stone'.
312 pages, Paperback
First published August 5, 2013
32 people are currently reading
73 people want to read
About the author
Tom Wood
78 books25 followersTom Wood graduated from Middle Tennessee State University on a Saturday then started full-time the following Monday at The Tennessean, where he spent the next 36 years as a sports writer and copy editor.
Tom covered area colleges, boxing, the Iroquois Steeplechase, the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and other events. He still freelances mainly for the Ledger newspapers in Nashville and Knoxville and Chattanooga (Hamilton County Herald) but has also written for the Saltillo (MS) Daily Journal, Knoxville News Sentinel, Country Family News, the Naples News, and Ft. Myers News-Press, and other publications.
The short story "A Night on the Town" (2020) co-written with Michael J. Tucker is available as an ebook, and also has been turned into a full-length screenplay. Two of Tom's stories have been semifinalists in the Nashville Film Festival, Vendetta Stone (2015) and Death Takes a Holliday (2016). Tom's other short stories have appeared in the anthologies Writers Crushing Covid-19 (2020), Words on Water (2019), Tennesseans West Vol. 1 (2015), Weird Western Yarns Vol. 1, Western Tales! Vol. 3 and Filtered Through Time (2014).
Tom has worked as an extra on the ABC series "Nashville" (2012-2018) as well as "The Identical" movie (2014), a music video, and other multi-media projects.
Tom covered area colleges, boxing, the Iroquois Steeplechase, the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and other events. He still freelances mainly for the Ledger newspapers in Nashville and Knoxville and Chattanooga (Hamilton County Herald) but has also written for the Saltillo (MS) Daily Journal, Knoxville News Sentinel, Country Family News, the Naples News, and Ft. Myers News-Press, and other publications.
The short story "A Night on the Town" (2020) co-written with Michael J. Tucker is available as an ebook, and also has been turned into a full-length screenplay. Two of Tom's stories have been semifinalists in the Nashville Film Festival, Vendetta Stone (2015) and Death Takes a Holliday (2016). Tom's other short stories have appeared in the anthologies Writers Crushing Covid-19 (2020), Words on Water (2019), Tennesseans West Vol. 1 (2015), Weird Western Yarns Vol. 1, Western Tales! Vol. 3 and Filtered Through Time (2014).
Tom has worked as an extra on the ABC series "Nashville" (2012-2018) as well as "The Identical" movie (2014), a music video, and other multi-media projects.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
August 12, 2014
I met this engaging author recently at the Southern Festival of Books, where he graciously pitched his novel. The concept sounded very intriguing, unlike anything I'd read before, and I love reading books set in Nashville, so I bought a signed copy with my remaining cash. Had "life" cooperated, I could have easily completed the book in one sitting--what a thriller! Mr. Wood crafted an excellent "true crime" story in great detail told from the unique perspective of a local reporter. An exceptional job on this debut novel. I will definitely read more from Tom Wood.
September 2, 2013
Vendetta Stone
by Tom Wood
Official disclaimer: For the past 12 months the author and I have participated in a critique group where I had the opportunity to read portions of this novel while it was a work in progress. This is my first reading of his edited finished product.
The novel is uniquely written as a fictional true crime novel. Think of Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, but with the major difference being Mr. Capote’s work is based on an actual crime and interviews with real people. Vendetta Stone has the same style and tone but is fiction.
The novel takes place over a 6-day period from August 13, 2010 to August 19, 2010, in the city of Nashville, TN, and is told through the eyes of fictional newspaper reporter, Gerry Hilliard. Readers familiar with Nashville will delight at the references to various city spots, from Rotier’s restaurant to seedy Dickerson Pike, from Percy Priest Lake to Percy Warner Park, gated Brentwood communities to East Nashville, the Tennessee Titans to the Parthenon.
This is a well-written novel with a minimum of very mild profanity, and one where several murders are committed without gory descriptions. While I referred to this as a fictional true crime novel it is more appropriately in the thriller genre.
The Principle Characters
Gerry Hilliard – newspaper reporter and story narrator
Angela Stone – the victim
Jackson Stone – Angela’s husband
Patrick Stone – Jackson brother
Sheila Stone – Patrick’s wife
Sarah Fletcher – Angela’s guilt ridden best friend
Herb Fletcher – Sarah’s husband
Delmore Remus Wolfe – psychopathic serial killer
Chief Wilson King – Nashville’s Chief of Police
Sargent Mike Whitfield – lead investigator
Dan Clarkston – television news reporter
Pastor Robert Armstrong – Jackson Stone’s minister
Dr. Erica Karnoff – psychologist
The Story
The fictional Author’s Note provides background information on the beautiful and talented Angela Stone. From there the reader jumps into a news conference that takes place after her battered body is discovered. A distraught, zombie-like, Jackson Stone takes the podium and public announces his intentions to personally find his wife’s killer, no matter the consequences. The city, and soon the nation, is quickly divided between those who want to see vigilante justice and those seeking the order of law.
Mr. Wood weaves us through a tapestry of mania where careers can be made or broken on the outcome of Jackson’s personal tragedy. It seems everyone connected to the investigation has an opportunity for personal gain. The reader also sees the dynamic behind the scenes interplay of today’s media (print, talk-radio, television, and social media) as it chases a headline-making story.
Jackson Stone’s only method of finding Angela’s killer rests with making himself bait for a trap. The novel’s climax ultimately comes to the only intersection possible, a showdown between Jackson Stone and Angela’s psychopathic killer, Delmore Remus Wolfe.
If you enjoy thrillers, you will enjoy this novel.
by Tom Wood
Official disclaimer: For the past 12 months the author and I have participated in a critique group where I had the opportunity to read portions of this novel while it was a work in progress. This is my first reading of his edited finished product.
The novel is uniquely written as a fictional true crime novel. Think of Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, but with the major difference being Mr. Capote’s work is based on an actual crime and interviews with real people. Vendetta Stone has the same style and tone but is fiction.
The novel takes place over a 6-day period from August 13, 2010 to August 19, 2010, in the city of Nashville, TN, and is told through the eyes of fictional newspaper reporter, Gerry Hilliard. Readers familiar with Nashville will delight at the references to various city spots, from Rotier’s restaurant to seedy Dickerson Pike, from Percy Priest Lake to Percy Warner Park, gated Brentwood communities to East Nashville, the Tennessee Titans to the Parthenon.
This is a well-written novel with a minimum of very mild profanity, and one where several murders are committed without gory descriptions. While I referred to this as a fictional true crime novel it is more appropriately in the thriller genre.
The Principle Characters
Gerry Hilliard – newspaper reporter and story narrator
Angela Stone – the victim
Jackson Stone – Angela’s husband
Patrick Stone – Jackson brother
Sheila Stone – Patrick’s wife
Sarah Fletcher – Angela’s guilt ridden best friend
Herb Fletcher – Sarah’s husband
Delmore Remus Wolfe – psychopathic serial killer
Chief Wilson King – Nashville’s Chief of Police
Sargent Mike Whitfield – lead investigator
Dan Clarkston – television news reporter
Pastor Robert Armstrong – Jackson Stone’s minister
Dr. Erica Karnoff – psychologist
The Story
The fictional Author’s Note provides background information on the beautiful and talented Angela Stone. From there the reader jumps into a news conference that takes place after her battered body is discovered. A distraught, zombie-like, Jackson Stone takes the podium and public announces his intentions to personally find his wife’s killer, no matter the consequences. The city, and soon the nation, is quickly divided between those who want to see vigilante justice and those seeking the order of law.
Mr. Wood weaves us through a tapestry of mania where careers can be made or broken on the outcome of Jackson’s personal tragedy. It seems everyone connected to the investigation has an opportunity for personal gain. The reader also sees the dynamic behind the scenes interplay of today’s media (print, talk-radio, television, and social media) as it chases a headline-making story.
Jackson Stone’s only method of finding Angela’s killer rests with making himself bait for a trap. The novel’s climax ultimately comes to the only intersection possible, a showdown between Jackson Stone and Angela’s psychopathic killer, Delmore Remus Wolfe.
If you enjoy thrillers, you will enjoy this novel.
May 30, 2018
Not anywhere close to his other books.I suggest sticking to the victor the assassin novels by the same author.
August 17, 2019
Interesting
The true crime.nature of this.novel was what lured.me.in. but much of the way the story played out left me a sceptical reader. Still I stuck it through until the end, so there's that.
The true crime.nature of this.novel was what lured.me.in. but much of the way the story played out left me a sceptical reader. Still I stuck it through until the end, so there's that.
December 9, 2022
Interesting story from the POV of a journalist.
July 3, 2025
This is the worst book I have ever read. It took me literally 3+ years to finish it. Why I even felt inclined to finished? Only to confirm that yea this is truly the f’ing worst book.
December 12, 2015
Reporter Tom Wood’s fictional true crime thriller twists
Author Tom Wood has gracefully overcome obstacles to one of the most difficult genre forms, and this true crime thriller twists. The narrator, a reporter following the case plans to write a totally true crime book based on his investigative journalism for the case. In his debut novel, Vendetta Stone, Tom Wood, a 36-year veteran sports and news reporter of the Nashville Tennessean, leads us on a tortuous cat-and-mouse chase through the city’s seamiest neighborhoods in pursuit of the killer of a popular recording and country singing star. In the plot’s twists and turns Jackson Stone, the victim’s husband, the protagonist, races to discover and catch the perpetrator, while his narrator and writer of a true crime novel, reporter Gerry Hilliard, also must stay one step ahead of his news competitors: Hilliard races with internet feeds, the blogosphere and television news to be first with the story. His challenge is to believe in the innocence of Stone, the still-suspicious husband of the murdered songstress. Stone vows not only to find the killer, but to avenge his beloved wife’s brutal murder.
As the drama unfolds, Jackson Stone follows his gut instinct and inside knowledge of the people involved, while Hilliard applies his skills as a crime reporter: he sifts through clues, contacts leads and interviews suspects. Both try to anticipate the killer’s next move. When Stone’s next-door neighbors, a kind and caring couple, are found dead in an apparent murder-suicide, Hilliard smells a rat and suspects it is the work of a deviant serial killer. But first he must convince his skeptical editors and publisher to stay with him and his story. He tries to outwit law enforcement, rival news sources, the victim’s husband and the perpetrator to land the both the killer and the biggest story of the decade.
Stone races to stay ahead of the murderer all the way to a thrilling climax atop a famous Nashville landmark. Hilliard follows close on his heels. This thriller offers a revealing look at the cutthroat world of today’s news business, in addition to matching wits with a serial killer The double suspense is well worth the modest price of admission.
Author Tom Wood has gracefully overcome obstacles to one of the most difficult genre forms, and this true crime thriller twists. The narrator, a reporter following the case plans to write a totally true crime book based on his investigative journalism for the case. In his debut novel, Vendetta Stone, Tom Wood, a 36-year veteran sports and news reporter of the Nashville Tennessean, leads us on a tortuous cat-and-mouse chase through the city’s seamiest neighborhoods in pursuit of the killer of a popular recording and country singing star. In the plot’s twists and turns Jackson Stone, the victim’s husband, the protagonist, races to discover and catch the perpetrator, while his narrator and writer of a true crime novel, reporter Gerry Hilliard, also must stay one step ahead of his news competitors: Hilliard races with internet feeds, the blogosphere and television news to be first with the story. His challenge is to believe in the innocence of Stone, the still-suspicious husband of the murdered songstress. Stone vows not only to find the killer, but to avenge his beloved wife’s brutal murder.
As the drama unfolds, Jackson Stone follows his gut instinct and inside knowledge of the people involved, while Hilliard applies his skills as a crime reporter: he sifts through clues, contacts leads and interviews suspects. Both try to anticipate the killer’s next move. When Stone’s next-door neighbors, a kind and caring couple, are found dead in an apparent murder-suicide, Hilliard smells a rat and suspects it is the work of a deviant serial killer. But first he must convince his skeptical editors and publisher to stay with him and his story. He tries to outwit law enforcement, rival news sources, the victim’s husband and the perpetrator to land the both the killer and the biggest story of the decade.
Stone races to stay ahead of the murderer all the way to a thrilling climax atop a famous Nashville landmark. Hilliard follows close on his heels. This thriller offers a revealing look at the cutthroat world of today’s news business, in addition to matching wits with a serial killer The double suspense is well worth the modest price of admission.
September 9, 2016
I really enjoyed reading this book written by a former journalist for the Tennessean. It is fast paced and engaging with a glimpse into the world of newspaper and television production that few ever experience. It will surely be a good, solid read for anyone who enjoys crime fiction and doubly so for anyone who has spent time in Nashville.
November 18, 2016
Really great crime drama. Couldn't put it down.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews