My Monday Moments are featuring Shani Struthers, one of my Crooked Cat author friends, who has a new story officially launching tomorrow - 24th November. I've read Shani's excellent Psychic Surveys Series already and loved it - it's an entertaining blend of amateur sleuth and paranormal and I'm sure I'll enjoy this new one, too.
Shani's extremely generously sent along some information for me to share today, including an excerpt- a privileged early peek so make sure to read on for that...
Welcome to my Monday Moments slot Shani!
Thank you
for hosting me on your blog today! My new book, Eve: A Christmas Ghost Story
launches on the 24th November on Amazon and is the prequel to the
popular Psychic Surveys series. Featuring two of the Psychic Surveys team –
Theo Lawson and Vanessa Patterson – it’s set between 1899 and 1999 and is
loosely inspired by a true event.
In my fictional
re-telling, Theo and Ness are asked to
investigate a town weighed down by the sorrow of what happened 100 years before…
What do you do when a whole town is haunted?
In 1899, in the North Yorkshire market town of Thorpe Morton
In 1999, psychic investigators Theo Lawson and Ness Patterson are called
in to help, sensing immediately on arrival how weighed down the town is.
Quickly they discover there’s no safe haven. The past taints everything.
Hurtling towards the anniversary as well as a new millennium, their aim
is to move the spirits on, to cleanse the atmosphere so everyone – the living
and the dead – can start again. But the spirits prove resistant and soon Theo and
Ness are caught up in battle, fighting against
something that knows their deepest fears and can twist them in the most
dangerous of ways.
They’ll need all their courage to succeed and the help of a little girl
too – a spirit who didn’t die at the hall, who shouldn’t even be there…
Excerpt
As Theo turned round to face the double doors, she had a feeling that
someone - something - was rushing at her, as fleetingly as whatever had
been in Adelaide
Theo's eyes widened. "Oh darling, darling," she whispered. She
took a step forwards, tried to remember the names of the children on the list
from earlier: Alice, Helen, Bessie, Adelaide
She inched closer still. "Darling, your name, tell me what it
is."
The little girl's arms moved upwards, she stretched them out, her manner
beseeching although she remained mute. Theo tried again, told the child her own
name.
"It's short for Theodora. I bet you're called something
pretty."
The girl had a dress on; long, brownish, a course material - linen
perhaps? Nothing special but if it was her party dress then maybe it was
special to her. Her boots were brown too - lace ups, sturdy looking. She was
around eight or nine but it was hard to tell. She could have been older just
small for her age. Her hair was brown and tangled; she had a mane of it.
Everything about her seemed to be brown or sepia, maybe sepia was the right word,
as though she'd stepped out of an old photograph.
"I'm here now, sweetheart, I've come to help. You've been here for
such a long time. Too long. You need to go to the light, go home, rest
awhile."
Up closer, Theo could read her eyes. The longing in them stirred her
pity.
"Let me help you," Theo persisted, her voice catching in her
throat. As glorious as the other side might be, she still felt it unfair to be
felled at such a young age. Often this was a good existence too and it deserved
to be experienced fully.
She was close now, so close and still her arms were outstretched.
Harriet - the name presented itself whole in her mind.
"Your name's Harriet. Is that correct? It's lovely, it suits
you."
Was that a smile on the child's lips, the beginnings of trust? Soon
she'd be able to reach out and touch her. What would she feel like? Cold?
Ethereal?
"Darling, I'm here," she repeated, no more than a foot between
them. "I'm here."
Joy surged - one spirit had come forward - it was an encouraging start.
Just before their hands touched everything changed. Hope and joy were
replaced with confusion as something sour - fetid almost - rose up, making her
feel nauseous.
"Don't be afraid," Theo implored. Yet there was nothing but
fear in her eyes now. No, not fear, that was too tame a word - terror.
"I'm not here to harm you," she continued. "I'm here to
help."
As the words left her mouth, other hands appeared behind the child, a
whole sea of them - disembodied hands that clawed at her, forcing her backwards.
"No!" Theo shouted. "Stop it. Leave her alone!"
But it was no use. Her words faded as the girl did. She'd been torn
away, recaptured; the one who'd dared to step forward. Theo could feel sweat
break out on her forehead, her hands were clammy. She clutched at her chest,
her breathing difficult suddenly, laboured. Her heart had been problematic of
late, a result of the pounds she'd piled on. She must go to the doctor to get
some medication. Struggling to gain control, it took a few moments, perhaps a full
minute, before her heart stopped hammering. And when it did, she remembered
something else. The girl's eyes - her sweet, brown, trusting eyes - when the
expression changed in them they hadn't been looking at her, they'd been looking
beyond her. Was it at the thing that sideswiped her? Theo couldn't be
certain. She wasn't certain either if that 'thing' was a spirit or much less
than that - something with no soul, but with an appetite, an extreme appetite:
a craving. Something, she feared, was insatiable.
That's definitely an appetite whetter, Shani!
You can get your copy of EVE here:
About Shani...
Brighton-based
author of paranormal fiction, including UK Amazon Bestseller, Psychic Surveys
Book One: The Haunting of Highdown Hall. Psychic Surveys Book Two: Rise to Me,
is also available and due out in November 2015 is Eve: A Christmas Ghost Story
- the prequel to the Psychic Surveys series. She is also the author of
Jessamine, an atmospheric psychological romance set in the Highlands of
Scotland and described as a 'Wuthering
Heights
Psychic
Surveys Book Three: 44 Gilmore
Street
All
events in her books are inspired by true life and events.
Catch up
with Shani via her website www.shanistruthers.com or on Facebook, Twitter and
Goodreads.
Facebook
Author Page: http://tinyurl.com/p9yggq9
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/shani_struthers
Goodreads
http://tinyurl.com/mq25mav
Thank you for sharing with us today, Shani, and best wishes for a fantastic official launch tomorrow. I'll be popping in when I can - grand childminding duties meaning the timing of that will be a little unpredictable.
Slainthe!
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