To the outside world, English professor Carly Bennett is a rising star…. poised, confident and on a fast-track to success. But behind her professional facade lies a childhood shattered by betrayal and her mother’s mysterious death.
Fifteen years earlier, Carly was shipped off to boarding school after being accused of threats she never made and exiled by her beloved mother and wealthy stepfamily. Throughout, Carly clung to her one ally, her stepbrother Julien…. until she discovered he masterminded her downfall.
Julien, now a psychiatrist, reappears in Carly’s life, apologetic and bearing news: before a fatal break-in, Carly’s mother planned to bring Carly home. Vindicated, Carly investigates her mother’s cold case. But doing so unearths memories that cause Carly to question her sanity and finally face the truth.
Was she responsible for her mother’s murder or is something more sinister at play in her former stepfamily’s still perfect world?
"This tense psychological thriller, where nothing is as it seems, will keep you on edge until the final reveal" ~ Kirkus Reviews
"This was a well-written and complex drama that immediately grabbed my attention, quickly becoming a page-turner as I had to know how this was going to end." ~ Dru Ann Love, Agatha, Anthony & Macavity Award-Winning Author, Raven Award Recipient
AUTHOR GUEST POST
Get to Know Jane Haseldine
Thank you so much for letting me stop by!
Beyond my short author bio and the book jacket copy for my latest domestic suspense novel, EVERYONE IS PERFECT HERE, I’d love to share a few other things about myself and my books.
Here are the top eight things to know about me:
1. My mom was also a writer and journalist. She named me after her favorite book, Jane Eyre. I actually thought my middle name was spelled “Air” until I was in third grade.
2. Even though I’m named after a famous literary character, I always thought my first name was too pedestrian. That’s why I chose more interesting names for my kids. My sons’ names are Nash and Beck.
3. I used to be a crime reporter. My personal experiences covering the crime beat provided real-life insight into my Julia Gooden Mystery Series, which follow a fearless crime reporter still haunted by the childhood disappearance of her beloved older brother, a still unsolved case that fuels her to uncover answers for others that she could never find for herself.
4. Moving a lot as a kid was one key reason that I became a writer. As the perennial new kid in town, I broke the ice with my classmates by asking them questions about themselves. I learned early on that everyone had a story, and I loved to hear them. That helped pave the way for me to study journalism at Syracuse University and make a career out of it.
5. I’ve lived in three countries (Canada, the US, and England--my dad was British), eight states, and in pretty much every part of California (Southern, Bay Area, and Central Coast). Moving around a lot was definitely an interesting ride. It instilled in me the love of adventure, new places, and meeting new people and hearing their stories.
6. My first concept for EVERYONE IS PERFECT HERE centered on a drug that could change a person’s darkest memories. That plot didn’t exactly sing. I went back to the drawing board during the COVID lockdown. I reread Patricia Highsmith’s THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY, which is epic. I also started binge reading Liane Moriarty during that time, and I rewatched the classic movie Gaslight. Inspired, the new plot for EVERYONE IS PERFECT HERE took shape. The themes of charming and manipulative psychopaths, gaslighting, female friendships, and deceit cemented, and it became the book it is today.
Jane Haseldine is a journalist, former crime reporter, columnist, and newspaper editor, and has also worked in politics as the deputy director of communications for a governor. Jane is the author of the Julia Gooden mystery series from Kensington Publishing and her upcoming domestic suspense novel, Everyone is Perfect Here, from Severn House.
Synopsis: *Hall Ways Note: remember "haunting" has more than one definition
An eerie suspense novel, in which a grieving woman takes a job at an isolated mansion only to become wrapped up in the curse that seems to have befallen its eccentric owner.
Emily Grace has endured the worst loss imaginable. But can she survive a remote manor haunted by more than just memories . . .?
Drowning in grief, Emily Grace has lost everything: her home, her friends, her career. Only one lifeline remains—a job working for an eccentric millionaire. Along with his wife, he’s been building a mansion on a secluded island surrounded by a harsh and unforgiving sea. But when the millionaire's wife disappears under mysterious circumstances, Emily Grace is hired to finish the project.
Locals believe the house is cursed, but their warnings go unheeded as Emily Grace works to rebuild her life. After what she’s been through, nothing can scare her—except perhaps the attention of a handsome man offering more than friendship. And yet, there’s something strange about this solitary fortress. Accidents. Mishaps. Ghostly whispers through the surrounding forest. Footsteps when she’s completely alone . . .
Is there truly a curse or is the ethereal specter in the window an omen of something more sinister?
I don't spend time on plot summary, so please read the book synopsis above.
HALL WAYS REVIEW
“Haunting:
having qualities (such as sadness or beauty) that linger in the memory: not
easily forgotten” – Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Twelfth Edition
Before
starting The Haunting of Emily Grace, remember, "haunting" has
more than one definition, and this novel is not about the spooky meaning.
Knowing that going in made all the difference for me and made reading The
Haunting of Emily Grace a page-turning pleasure.
What
the story is about is that a woman haunted by her grief gets entangled
in mysterious goings-on in a small, coastal town. Had I been constantly waiting
for an otherworldly encounter, I’d have been sorely disappointed; and honestly,
author Elena Taylor’s tale is eminently more fascinating.
The
Pacific Northwest setting is perfect for The Haunting of Emily Grace because
the landscape is so dramatic and eerily atmospheric. Taylor adds to the
creepy ambiance by referencing the natural phenomenon of breathing forests that
truly seems unnatural. Taylor teases
otherworldly presences throughout the novel, but the mood is conveyed primarily
because of her writing skills.
“I
don’t need to borrow his tragedy when I’m so firmly ensconced in my own.”
Ah,
the writing. Taylor’s prose leans toward literary and lyrical as she creates
evocative scenes and moods. A malaise hovers over the main character, Emily
Grace, and combined with the weight of her despair, the temperament of Mother
Nature, and the mystery enshrouding a place called, “The End of the World,” The
Haunting of Emily Grace is compelling Gothic suspense. In fact, I read it
in one sitting, which is something I haven’t done for many years. It was a joy
to read Elena Taylor’s carefully-crafted sentences.
There
were a couple of things I found questionable, plot-wise, and some confusing
parts that tripped me up here and there, but the caliber of the writing kept me
engaged – until about the last ten percent of the book. At that point, there were reactions
and actions that didn’t ring true, and the resolution was one huge, rushed
info-dump, which was jolting after the stellar storytelling before it. Given
the novel is less than three hundred pages, there was room to give readers more,
keeping aligned with the style and expectation set with the rest of the book.
Despite
my quibbles, the ending is apropos, satisfying, and even provides a glimmer of hope,
promising brighter days for Emily Grace. The Haunting of Emily Grace is
a book I’ll recommend as it truly is an escape into an engrossing world. I'll be seeking out other titles by this author.
I voluntarily reviewed this book and received an e-ARC from the author through Partners in Crime Virtual Book Tours.
------- 🕮 -------
Author Bio:
Elena Taylor spent several years working in theater as a playwright, director, designer, and educator before turning her storytelling skills to novels. Her first series, the Eddie Shoes Mysteries, written under Elena Hartwell, introduced a quirky mother/daughter crime fighting duo.
With the Sheriff Bet Rivers Mysteries, Elena returned to her dramatic roots to bring readers more serious and atmospheric novels. Set in her beloved Washington State, Elena uses her connection to the environment to produce tense and suspenseful investigations for a lone sheriff in an isolated community. The third in the series, Kill to Keep, launches summer 2026.
The Haunting of Emily Grace is Elena’s first standalone suspense novel.
Her favorite place to be is at Paradise, the property where she lives, south of Spokane, Washington, with her equines, dogs, cats, and hubby.
Publisher: BookBaby Release date: June 2025 Content Rating: PG-13
Some language and a non-explicit post-coital scene
Scroll down to enter the giveaway!
Book Description:
Frustrated novelist Danny is resigned to writing material for trade shows, promoting garage doors and non-stick cookware. His ex-wife threatens legal action for non-payment of alimony. Danny never dreamed the answer to his troubles could be larceny.
But then wealthy, charming Packard Hale III reenters his life. He was Danny's college roommate, and like Lupin and Raffles, he now fancies himself a gentleman thief. Packard hires Danny to write about his capers.
Danny follows Packard as they break into a mansion and steal, among other things, a priceless Chinese vase and a curiously valuable souvenir blanket from Branson, Missouri. However, it's not Packard who is pursued by the police, but Danny.
Simultaneously, he struggles to please his client, a lawn-and-garden CEO with an erotic attraction to lawnmowers. Danny also endures abuse from Soren, a boozy has-been Vegas magician. He tolerates the mistreatment because of Crystal, the magician's assistant. He's falling for her.
When he learns Soren screwed Crystal out of rights to magic tricks she's created -- and in spite of the cops on his tail -- Danny plots revenge. He and Packard attempt the daring theft of a state-of-the-art lawnmower—during a live performance in front of 400 people.
Your book is set in Chicago; have you ever been there? I’ve lived in Chicago off and on since I came here to college in the 1970s. Some of the locations mentioned in the book are real – Astor Street, the Drake Hotel. Some locations are fabrications – Clancy’s Steakhouse and the Zekman Theater.
How did you research the book? I gorged on gentleman thieves (A.J. Raffles, Arsène Lupin) and their stories, and I binged on caper films – Topkapi, Ocean’s 11, and The Hot Rock. I’ve also done my share of industrial shows. I even played Carnegie Hall in a show for Wilson Jones Office Products.
In The Gentleman Thief Steals a Blanket, who was the hardest character to write? Crystal, the knockout magician’s assistant. I wanted her to be heroic and sexy. All the time I’m wondering, can a man write this character convincingly? Happily, my wife gave Crystal her seal of approval.
The easiest character? Danny. A bit out of shape. Terrified of adventure but craving it at the same time. I heard his voice loud and clear.
What genre do you typically write in? It’s not a genre, but everything I’ve ever done is funny. This includes sketches, songs, short stories, and feature films. Why? There’s nothing better than making people laugh.
What advice would you give to budding writers? Forget that nonsense about opening a vein and bleeding on the page. Writing is fun. Enjoy the process and share the joy with others.
------- 🕮 -------
About the Author:
MARK NUTTER grew up in a motel near Joliet, Illinois, which is not as glamorous as it sounds. He's the author of the humorous heist novel The Gentleman Thief Steals a Blanket. He wrote three collections of comedic short stories: Giant Banana Over Texas, Dancer on the Ceiling, and Sunset Cruise on the River Styx. He won the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award and the LA Weekly Theater Award for the music & lyrics for Reanimator the Musical. Mark also wrote for television (SNL, 3rd Rock from the Sun) and feature film (Almost Heroes).
Wyatt W. Sallow, MBA poet, business ethics professor, and coach of the 8th ranked collegiate chess team in East Texas—travels to the heart of northern England to trace his family origins in mundane Sallowsfield, only to find his supposed ancestry a mirage. He does have a real past, however: one that stalks him across the green hillsides in echoes of his catastrophic marriage, the lingering shadow of a lost child, and—there, in person, inexplicably emerging from the town’s faux-Victorian train station—“X,” the enigmatic object of his unrequited passion and a figure as perplexing as an algebraic variable.
On his eight-day tour / pilgrimage / mock epic journey, Wyatt pursues the specter of his lost love and crosses paths with the citizens of this down-at-its-heels market town as they struggle to grasp the all-consuming obsessions, ghosts, and X-factors that confound their days.
Thought-provoking yet dryly humorous, Sallowsfield weaves diverse elements into a story both light-hearted and philosophical, exploring along the way universal human touchstones of obsession, ruined love, and the inexplicable mysteries that shape our lives.
Cliff Hudder received an MFA in fiction writing from the University of Houston in 1995 and a PhD in American Literature from Texas A&M in 2017. He has been an archaeological laborer, a film and video editor, photographer, air compressor mechanic, electrical lineman, and educator.
His fiction has appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, The Kenyon Review, The Missouri Review and other journals and his work has received the Barthelme and Michener Awards, the Peden Prize, and the Short Story Award from the Texas Institute of Letters. His novella, Splinterville, won the 2007 Texas Review Fiction Award, and his novel, Pretty Enough for You, was named a Top Ten Texas Favorite by Lone Star Literary Life in 2015. In 2017 Cliff was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters.
In this intimate rendering of a relationship, we learn how deceptive surface impressions can be.
Leon Hale, author of Bonney’s Place, was sixty years old, a “country boy” who wrote about rural Texans with humor and sensitivity in his popular column for The Houston Post and, later the Houston Chronicle. Babette Fraser at thirty-six was a child of privilege, a city girl educated abroad, struggling in her career while raising a young son. No one thought it could work.
Even Hale himself held serious doubts. But it did endure. The interior congruencies they discovered through a long and turbulent courtship knit them tightly together for the rest of his life.
And when he died during the Pandemic isolation period, searing levels of grief and doubt threatened Babette’s understanding of the partnership and marriage that had sustained her for forty years. Had he really been the person she thought he was? Had he kept secrets that would forever change her view of him?
In candid, evocative prose, she explores the distorted perceptions that often follow the death of a cherished spouse, and the loving resolution that allows life to go on.
Babette Fraser Hale is the author of A Wall of Bright Dead Feathers, 2022 winner of the debut fiction award from the Texas Institute of Letters. Her stories have received notice from Best American Short Stories, 2015 and the Meyerson Award from Southwest Review. In addition to writing fiction, Babette has been a magazine feature writer, columnist, contributing editor, book editor, and publisher. She lives in Texas.
In the aftermath of a devastating sickness that shatters their close-knit beach town, six lonely kids are drawn together during the unpredictable autumn equinox. Among them are fourteen-year-old Lorelei, who yearns to be an oceanographer, and her peculiar younger brother, Tad, who possesses an otherworldly curiosity.
When Lorelei has a strange and almost deadly encounter in a sea cave, her loyal boyfriend, Casey, cannot reconcile her fantastical experience with the rational world. Condi, Lorelei's best friend, understands ocean magic but isn't free to share what she knows. Kait, a girl from Ireland, regrets her impulsive move to America-all because of an odd occurrence involving her deceased boyfriend's lost surfboard. When tides turn and the moon shifts, Isaac, the new kid in town who despises the ocean, is forced to face the truth-a profound and powerful magic lives in the deep.
Guided by a wise surf master, mystical old women known as the Beachlings, and an open-hearted grandmother, six kids embark on transformative adventures that challenge their beliefs about possibilities and the intense nature of love.
Amethyst, the Shallows is the brand-new
companion novel to The Aquamarine Surfboard.
PRAISE FOR AMETHYST,THE SHALLOWS
“Amethyst, The Shallows' sensitive and potent prose stirs the reader, leaving a lasting impression. Although this novel is the second installment in a series, it stands strong independently, welcoming newcomers and returning readers alike.” --Literary Titan
Kellye Abernathy's passions are writing and serving trauma survivors as a yoga teacher and practical life skills advocate. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Secondary English Education from the University of Kansas. Her home is in land-locked Plano, Texas—where she’s dreaming of her next trip to the sea!
Jennie May Walker Burleson was envied for having everything a woman of her time could want—the privileged upbringing, the dazzling good looks, the dashing war hero husband. She was admired for demonstrating that a woman could want more, from the front of the 1913 Woman Suffrage Procession to the bottom of a Mesoamerican archaeological dig. But as she stood over the body of her husband’s second wife, gun in hand, society’s envy and admiration quickly hardened into pity and scorn. T. Felder Dorn examines the complicated trajectory of her life as socialite, suffragist and shooter.
CLICK TO BUY ONLINE ┃ Also available locally in Texas wherever books are sold ┃
T. Felder Dorn graduated from Duke University in 1954 with a BS in chemistry and was awarded a PhD in that discipline in 1958 by the University of Washington. He was a member of the chemistry faculty at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, in 1958–69 and then served four years on the program staff of the College Board in New York. From 1973 to 1991, he held administrative positions at Kean University in Union, New Jersey, serving as associate dean, dean and vice-president for academic affairs. His last ten years at Kean were spent as professor of chemistry. He retired in 2001. Felder Dorn and his wife, Sara Ruth, have resided in Millburn, New Jersey, since 1973. They have three children and three grandchildren. Dorn has previously published four books: Challenges on the Emmaus Road: Episcopal Bishops Confront Slavery, Civil War, and Emancipation (University of South Carolina Press, 2013); Death of a Policeman, Birth of a Baby: A Crime and Its Aftermath (Xlibris, 2012); The Guns of Meeting Street: A Southern Tragedy (University of South Carolina Press, 2001); and The Tompkins School, 1925–1953: A Community Institution (Attic Press, 1994).
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
