Burning Blue: Chapters 30–42

by Paul Griffin
A beautiful girl in a wealthy New Jersey town is burned in a shocking attack. When hacker Jay Nazarro decides to investigate, he uncovers a long list of possible suspects.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Chapters 1–15, Chapters 16–29, Chapters 30–42, Chapters 43–55

Here are links to our lists for Adrift by Paul Griffin.
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. substantive
    having a firm basis in reality and therefore important
    I’d been about to ask him what went down between Mr. Castro and him all those years ago, but no way I was going to get anything substantive out of him when he was smashed.
  2. elegy
    a mournful poem; a lament for the dead
    Would you be in a rush to get yourself some pastoral elegy of John Donne?
  3. wince
    draw back, as with fear or pain
    She hit his chest with the heel of her hand. It did nothing to push him back, and she hurt her wrist. She winced as she rubbed it, but she stood her ground between Kerns and me.
  4. murmur
    speak softly or indistinctly
    Then somebody in the murmuring crowd said, “Did you see her?
  5. assault
    a threatened or attempted physical attack
    You don’t want to file an assault complaint?
  6. glint
    a momentary flash of light
    He was furious, flexed in his wrestling singlet, that dark glint in his eyes.
  7. disown
    prevent deliberately (as by making a will) from inheriting
    It has to be Harvard. My father’ll disown me otherwise.
  8. mausoleum
    a large burial chamber, usually above ground
    We sat back against the side of a crumbling mausoleum and ate our slices.
  9. maim
    injure or wound seriously and leave permanent disfiguration
    While I was talking to Mrs. Cletus about getting out of the lab, you know, like requesting a substitute lab, where I wouldn’t have to maim anything, my lab partner cut off the arm.
  10. lunatic
    an insane person
    My mother’s was the Pink Panther. Imagine her wearing that to every one of my summer league games. She looked like a lunatic.
  11. despise
    look down on with disdain or disgust
    The idea that somebody out there despises me enough to do this?
  12. ultimatum
    a final peremptory demand
    “I said the words, after he gave me an ultimatum.”
  13. brandish
    exhibit aggressively
    She came out brandishing the Club, but when she saw I was kind of out of it, she lowered her weapon.
  14. accommodate
    have room for; hold without crowding
    “Pizza’s great,” I said, even though my stomach was twisting to accommodate the ever-expanding, four-pound-ball of cheese there after my pizza slam with Nicole.
  15. loiter
    linger, remain, or wait around for no apparent reason
    She can’t be driving around in her real plates in case a street camera picks her up doing the loitering thing.
  16. environs
    the area in which something exists or lives
    “Ask him to give the cops the plate number and tell them that the driver of this vehicle, a black Civic, was acting suspiciously in the environs of Valedale Boulevard.”
  17. silhouette
    an outline of a solid object as cast by its shadow
    She was in silhouette with the sun behind her, but she had nice hair.
  18. devotion
    commitment to some purpose
    But they still get ruined, no matter your watchfulness, your worry, your singular devotion.
  19. vulnerable
    susceptible to attack
    We know that when women are vulnerable, some men will try to take advantage.
  20. confront
    deal with head on
    We all want to think that way. But the sooner you confront reality, the sooner you’ll be able to move on.
  21. confirm
    establish or strengthen as with new evidence or facts
    Angela was able to confirm that Chrissie was at her dentist’s when Nicole was hit.
  22. unwitting
    not aware or knowing
    After my ride with Mr. Castro, I had to face the possibility that my father was somehow involved in this thing—inadvertently, not as the acid thrower, of course, but maybe as an unwitting causal agent.
  23. invoke
    cite as an authority
    In my experience, when adults give you their word about something, half the time they’ll break it, invoking the old standby clause: I know what I said, but I had to do what was best for you.
  24. obsessed
    having excessive or compulsive concern with something
    Says he can’t even get his wife out of the studio long enough to take her to dinner. She’s obsessed, he says.
  25. sarcastic
    expressing or expressive of ridicule that wounds
    I’m getting my coat, and here’s Castro again, giving me this sarcastic thank you, like this was all my fault.
  26. bona fide
    not counterfeit or copied
    Guy’s a bona fide prick. He killed her.
  27. pity
    a feeling of sympathy and sorrow for misfortunes of others
    I don’t mean it like that, and I don’t want your pity.
  28. larceny
    the act of taking something from someone unlawfully
    “I believe that’s grand larceny,” I said.
  29. imminent
    close in time; about to occur
    Twenty minutes later, the picture I got of the black Civic swerving out of the parking lot in front of my building the previous night was up on the tabloid sites with the headline BREAK IN BURNED BEAUTY CASE IMMINENT, RECLUSE ON THE RUN.
  30. credibility
    the quality of being believable or trustworthy
    Only the likes of Shane Puglisi and his Scorpion Image-works had the credibility to get such a shot picked up.
  31. amateur
    someone who pursues a study or sport as a pastime
    The post was untitled, but the poster was cryforhelp669, an amateur’s attempt at anonymity: 669 spelled out NOW on a phone keypad.
  32. confide
    reveal in private
    Angela had backtracked the ID to Marisol Wood, the sophomore who confided to Nicole at the tennis club that her parents were splitting up.
  33. conspire
    act in agreement and in secret towards a deceitful purpose
    They had conspired to do no more than get that chem teacher’s guide to Nicole.
  34. peer
    a person who is of equal standing with another in a group
    Sabbatini believed a lot of questions went unasked because students were afraid of looking dumb in front of their peers.
  35. distort
    twist and press out of shape
    The heat rising from the oil burner chimneys across the highway distorted and magnified it.
  36. outskirts
    area relatively far from the center, as of a city or town
    I created a map that covered Brandywine and the Hollows outskirts, and I checked the addresses of the Civic owners with Google Earth Street View, one by one.
  37. promote
    make publicity for; try to sell
    She was using Facebook primarily to promote her home business, handcrafted scarves, sweaters, blankets made to order.
  38. flaunt
    display proudly
    They owned the northeast with nine of every ten towers flaunting their brand.
  39. import
    transfer data into a database or document
    Why was Bobbie Lyles importing ridiculous amounts of data into her home, into her back bedroom, specifically; way more data than that crappy desktop dinosaur PC with its half a gigabyte of RAM could handle?
  40. syndrome
    a pattern of symptoms indicative of some disease
    “This is what you do all the time. Bird with the broken wing syndrome. Of all the girls out there, you have to fall in love with this one?”
Created on Thu Jan 22 20:43:30 EST 2015 (updated Mon Sep 10 15:55:21 EDT 2018)

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