Saturday, July 12, 2025

Second Chance at Sunshine Inn by Amy Clipston


Everleigh was devastated when she found out her beloved godmother, Alana, passed away.


She had spent summers there and loved the Bed and Breakfast Alana ran and that she helped with.


When she was called to the attorney's office to hear the reading of the will, she was totally surprised that she was left half of the Bed and Breakfast and more surprised her godmother had left the other half to her handyman, Cade.


Why did Alana do that?


I think Everleigh finds out why as she and Cade grow closer even though she is all sunshine and he is a bunch of worry.


SECOND CHANCE AT SUNSHINE INN is a heartwarming read with great characters you will love and a setting you won't want to leave.


Thank you to the publisher for a copy of this book.  All opinions are my own.



Friday, July 11, 2025

Showcase of Echoes On The Wind by Helaine Mario and a $25 Amazon.com Gift Card

Echoes on the Wind by Helaine Mario Banner

ECHOES ON THE WIND

by Helaine Mario

June 23 - August 1, 2025 

Virtual Book Tour

Synopsis:

Echoes on the Wind by Helaine Mario

THE MAGGIE O'SHEA SUSPENSE SERIES

TWO STRONG WOMEN, GENERATIONS APART, CONNECTED BY MUSIC...

In 1943 war-torn France, a young woman on the Night Train to Paris has a chance meeting with two very different men who will change her life, setting in motion a Dual Timeline story that will resonate like ripples on water for generations to come.

Many years later, classical pianist Maggie O’Shea is drawn to Brittany by a long-lost letter from her French grandmother and the stirring music of Chopin, whispering like echoes across the years. But as Maggie discovers the secrets of her past, her life spirals out of control, threatening her upcoming wedding and those she loves.

Set against the backdrop of World War II France, Maggie learns her grandmother’s story, chord by chord, through Chopin’s emotional Preludes. And, in one shocking moment, Maggie’s love story will take a heart-breaking turn that will change her life and echo into her future.

Past and present converge in this haunting tale of loss and sacrifice, friendship and family, courage and survival – and the transcendent power of hope, music and love.

Praise for Echoes on the Wind:

"History, mystery and music. I love this series."
~ Ellen Kirschman, Author of the award-winning Dot Meyerhoff mysteries

"I am loving it. Your lovely words are my path back to reading. Thank you."
~ Book Reviewer, The Reading Frenzy

"Echoes on the Wind stands alone as a beautiful story… Beyond this is layered a second story of enduring love, of commitment. This story is set in another time and place. A story of family. The two stories are linked by family through time… healing, forgiveness and resolution are finally able to happen. Through all of this, the thread that held it together is the music, the art, and the poetry of the heart that poured forth."
~ Karen Laird, Reviewer, Shade Tree Book Reviews

"Echoes on the Wind presents two love stories – one in the present day and one during World War II. It’s easy to root for Maggie and Michael as the main couple (and Clair and Charles in the past). This book is exemplary in its choice of topic or theme of the story. It is unique but still has strong appeal for most readers in its intended genre."
~ Writers’ Digest Reviewer

"In this book, readers embark on a poignant journey through the past and the present. Maggie’s story is a careful examination of how one’s ancestral past can influence their present. Most of all, it is a story of female fortitude. Both Maggie and Clair find a strength within themselves that neither of them knew they possessed. Additionally, the incorporation of classical music in the novel is refreshing. This focus is a reminder of the unifying and healing power of the arts, music, and literature. The poetic writing makes this book even more gripping, as readers are completely swept up in Maggie and Clair’s experiences."
~ RECOMMENDED by the US Review

"Once again, Maggie O’Shea, is the central character, but this entry in the series features a dual timeline that will captivate the reader. Both the contemporary, present-day storyline and the historical thread set in World War II France are so authentically depicted that readers will struggle to determine which setting they enjoy more. Watching how these two plots weave and intermingle continues to surprise, with echoes being the perfect symbolic image. Light the fireplace, put Chopin’s Preludes on the stereo, and settle in for a gripping read you won’t soon forget."
~ Kristopher Zgorski, BOLOBooks.COM

Book Details:

Genre: Romantic Suspense
Published by: Suncoast Publishing
Publication Date: June 18, 2024
Number of Pages: 364
ISBN: 9781735184975 (ISBN10: 1735184977)
Series: A Maggie O'Shea Romantic Suspense, Book 4
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop.org | Goodreads

The Maggie O'Shea Romantic Suspense Series:

The Lost Concerto by Helaine Mario
THE LOST CONCERTO
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads


Dark Rhapsody by Helaine Mario
DARK RHAPSODY

SHADOW MUSIC
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads

Read an excerpt:

OVERTURE

“Like so many things that matter, it began with an accident.”
David Ignatius, 12/28/98

NOVEMBER, 1943. THE NIGHT TRAIN TO PARIS

Light and dark.

The bleak November landscape rushed past the train’s window. Black tree branches against the dark night sky, then a sudden flash of light. Then blackness again.

The blackout had claimed the streetlamps and cottage windows. Clair Rousseau stared out the rain-streaked glass, waiting for the next glimpse of light. A lone lantern. Car headlights tilted down, a sliver of gold beyond a cracked curtain. Sheet lightning over distant hills, a glimmer of light on water. But all she saw was the blurred, pale oval of her reflection staring back at her. Dark hair scraped back, framing huge eyes beneath winged brows, sharp cheekbones, the too-wide mouth.

No hint of the emotions flowing through her, except for the deep purple shadows beneath her eyes.

The dim, four-person compartment was cold, and she pulled her coat more tightly around her body. The seat beside her was still empty, thank God. Across from her, two German officers. One asleep, snoring loudly, his hands slack between thick gray-green uniformed knees. The other awake, a Gauloises cigarette clamped between thin lips, a jagged line of white scars marring his left cheek. The narrow fox-like face stared at her through thick round glasses and wreathes of curling blue smoke. His jacket was heavy with insignia, oak leaves, medals. Military Intelligence, she thought with a sudden chill. A high rank, SD or Abwehr. What was he thinking?

The watchful, unblinking eyes made her afraid. Like a snake’s eyes, waiting to strike. She looked away, forcing herself not to reach for her satchel, touch her identity papers for reassurance.

The carriage’s glassed door slid back and forth with an unnerving rattle as the train rocked around a bend. From the hallway came the sharp scent of burning coal, wafting back from the old steam engine several cars ahead. A cloud of steam billowed past the window like sudden fog.

She could feel the vibration beneath her, hear the rumble of the train’s wheels speeding along the tracks. The lonely call of a train whistle, echoing in the night. A quick flare of light, illuminating the rain like silver threads streaming down the window.

Light and dark. Light and dark.

Movement at the edge of her vision. A tall figure appeared in the hallway, beyond the door. Her chest tightened. Would she ever feel safe again?

A sharp crack of thunder, a sudden bright flash lighting her face.

“Mademoiselle Clair?”

Startled, her head came up. The stranger had stopped, was staring into the compartment. Across from her, the watchful German stiffened and slid pale eyes toward the voice.

Be careful.

There was something familiar about the gaunt face, the faint, questioning smile just visible above a thick woolen scarf. She stood quickly, stepping between the German and the carriage door to block the officer’s view.

Oui,” she said softly, peering into the dim hallway. The man nodded and moved closer. Something about those gentle eyes, the arch of silver brows. Memory surged. Father Jean-Luc.

She flashed him a warning glance for silence and stepped into the train’s narrow corridor, closing the door firmly behind her. “Mon Père, is it really you?”

Oui, ma petite, c’est moi.” The priest pulled the scarf down to offer a glimpse of his white Roman collar, then lost his smile as he gazed over her shoulder and saw the Germans. “But we cannot talk here. Come with me.”

He slipped a hand beneath her elbow and guided her to the end of the dark passageway, where an open exit door led across shifting metal plates to the train’s next car. She felt the sudden bite of night wind on her face, cold and wet with mist. Here the clatter of the train wheels was loud enough to hide their conversation.

They sheltered just inside the doorway, in the shadows, away from the rain. Outside, the countryside of France rushed by, then disappeared in a billow of black smoke. In the dim corridor, the planes of the priest’s face were lit by a tiny, flickering overhead bulb.

Light and dark. Light and dark.

The priest looked down at her, shook his head. “Little Clair Rousseau,” he murmured. “Now such a beautiful young woman. It’s been – what? – four years since we met? You were just thirteen, I think. Playing the piano in your parents’ apartment. Bach, yes? It was so beautiful, so stirring. I hope you are still playing?”

She shook her head. “You need hope to create music, Père.” She looked back toward her carriage compartment. The hallway was empty. “But I remember that day. The war was coming. You asked us to help you remove the stained-glass windows from Sainte-Chapelle. To save them from the bombing.”

“You were fearless, Clair. I remember watching you, swaying at the top of that impossibly high ladder. The morning light was coming through the stained glass, spilling over you like shimmering jewels. I’ll never forget it. I told myself, Clair means light, she is perfectly named.”

He leaned down. “And I can still see your sister, Elle – too young to help us, bien sûr – dancing around the altar.”

Her expression softened. “Elle loved to dance. It was the last happy day I can remember.” She lifted her eyes to his, took a breath. “Paris was another lifetime, Père.”

“You cannot lose hope,” he told her. “The glass pieces are in a safe place. Beauty and goodness cannot be destroyed. You will see the stained-glass windows back in Sainte-Chapelle when the war is over. I know it.”

She shook her head. “I wish I had your faith.”

“God has his plans. There is a reason we’ve met by chance on the night train to Paris.” Concern flashed in his eyes. “But you’ve been in Brittany? Dangerous times for a young woman to be traveling alone, Clair.”

She looked out at the black trees rushing past the doorway, and felt the blackness deep in her heart. “I am alone now, Père.”

Mon Dieu. What happened?”

“My father knew that war was inevitable. Not long after we saved the glass my parents moved us from Paris to the coast near Saint-Malo to be safe. Such irony. They had no idea how dangerous Brittany would become. And then…”

She could not stop the sudden rush of tears that filled her eyes. “The Gestapo shot my father last year, in a retaliation roundup for an act of sabotage by the Resistance. He was with the Liberty Network, they had bombed a train track. He stepped forward, admitted it, hoping to save the others. But still they took thirty innocent people from our village, murdered them in the square.”

“Oh no, Clair.” The priest made a quick sign of the cross. “I am so sorry. And your mother, your sister?”

“I don’t know, Père. I was studying in Paris, I begged them to come stay with me. But Maman refused. When I returned last month to see them, the house was empty. They were just… gone. The neighbors said the Germans took them, in the night. The mayor was told they were being relocated to Poland.”

The priest paled. “Désolé. I will pray for their souls.”

Anger erupted, spilled out. “Prayers did not help my family! I have no time for prayer now. Or sorrow. Even avenging my father will have to wait. I need all my energy now to find my mother and my sister.”

He bent toward her. “I am afraid you are still too fearless for your own good. Tell me what you’re doing, little one.”

She turned once more to scan the dark hallway, then leaned closer. “I excelled in languages in my lycée studies these last years,” she whispered. “I am fluent in several languages, including German and English. I hope to find a new job, in the Hotel Majestic in Paris, where the German High Command is quartered. Then I will join the Resistance, find a way to get news of Maman and Elle. I must find them!”

He gazed down at her for a long moment, then put a hand on her shoulder.

“Perhaps I know of another way,” he murmured.

The sound of a door opening. Wavering shadows spilled into the train’s corridor. Then the red glow of a cigarette, a spiral of smoke. She froze as the German officer turned toward them.

“Find me at Èglise Saint-Gervais, in the Marais,” the priest whispered quickly. “I am with the Resistance there. You could work with me, we need someone like you to –”

A sudden terrifying screech of metal wheels. Clair felt herself thrown to the floor as the train braked, slammed to a shuddering stop. Stunned, Clair reached out, felt the still body of the priest beside her. “Mon Père…

Shouts in German in the darkness, the clatter of heavy boots. When she raised her head she saw flashing blue lights against the night sky.

Light and dark. Light and dark.

PART 1

“An echo of the past…”
Victor Hugo

CHAPTER 1

THE PRESENT
PERFORMING ARTS CENTER, MARTHA’S VINEYARD

Light and dark.

The stage was shadowed, lit only by a handful of overhead lights. One of the lights began to flicker, a bright flash illuminating Maggie O’Shea’s face for a brief moment, then casting her into darkness.

Maggie sat at the Bechstein grand piano, marveling at the power, the responsive touch, the unique tone of the beautiful instrument. Prokofiev deserves no less, she thought.

The score propped above the keyboard was marked by penciled notations, heavy lines, arrows and slashes. Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 2 was the ultimate challenge for a pianist, but Maggie had chosen it because it was so emotional, so personal. So incredibly beautiful.

It has the most to say, she thought.

And, oh, she had so much she wanted to say. Always, since she’d been a young child whose bare feet did not yet reach the pedals, she had spoken through her music. Told the piano her secrets long before she told anyone else.

Her earliest memory was of being curled beneath the grand piano, listening to her mother play, surrounded – cradled – by music. Then later, sitting on the piano bench by her mother’s side. The smoothness of the keys beneath tiny fingers, the sound that seemed to magically flow from her shoulders to her fingertips. Seeing the colors, making the piano sing. Making the rest of the world disappear.

But this piece – face it, every piece lately – was giving her trouble. Something, some emotion, was just out of reach. Her mentor, the legendary pianist Gigi Donati, would say she was taking the easy way out by mastering technique but not the emotion. She could hear Gigi’s smoky, exasperated voice in the shadows. No, no, no! You are not growing, Maggie, your music is lifeless. Imagine you are kissing your lover goodbye for the last time. What do you feel? Now, again!

Maggie sighed. She had been playing the first movement for an hour, with nary a lover in sight. Without Espressivo, as Gigi would demand. She would say, You don’t know the music yet. Take the time. Grow with the music. Illuminate its secrets. Make it yours.

The light high above the stage flickered again, slipping her out of the light into darkness.

Light and dark, thought Maggie. The story of my music. The story of my life.

She closed her eyes, took a deep, shaky breath, and began to play the next phrase of music.

Look into the heart of the music, whispered Gigi from behind her. Find its light. Find its soul.

A few more chords, and suddenly Maggie’s fingers stiffened, locked, slipped off the keys. Shaking her head, she gathered the sheet music and dropped it to the bench.

I just can’t, Gigi. I know what’s wrong, why I can’t play. I just don’t know how to fix it.

But deep down, she did know. What she needed was to feel. But once again, part of her was frozen.

You will not give up, she told herself. You have so much joy waiting for you. Raising her left hand to stretch tensed tendons, the engagement ring on her finger flashed emerald in the theater lights.

The flash of emerald green in a shadowed cabin. The memory washed over her and once again she was back in the moment. She saw Michael’s face, as craggy and strong as the mountains he loved, his granite eyes locked on hers.

What are you doing, Michael?

It’s called offering you a ring, Maggie. The color of your eyes, the color of the mountains. It’s been hidden in my sock drawer for months.

I know it’s a ring. I mean… What are you doing?

Jumping off a cliff, it seems. Don’t make me get down on one knee, darlin’. I’ll never get back up.

Silver eyes blazing like a torch. Marry me, Maggie.

I… You… Oh, Love.

I’ll take that as a yes, ma’am.

She smiled. Colonel Michael Jefferson Beckett. A man who had fallen in love with her when he didn’t want to, a man she hadn’t wanted to love back.

And yet.

It just was. Like music. And right this minute he was back in those beloved mountains of his, at his cabin in Virginia’s Blue Ridge. Working on a secret project, he’d told her, with Dov, the Russian teenager in his care.

She pictured the battered, rugged face she knew so well. The quirk of his mouth, the spiky silver brows, eyes like river stones locked on her. His stillness, as if he was carved from the mountains he loved. The way he listened…

Michael, standing behind her, wrapping her naked body in a woven blanket.

Michael, beneath her in the shadowed bedroom, whispering her name against her lips while her hair fell like dark rain around his face.

She breathed out in a long sigh. It had been an emotional several months but now, finally, she was letting go of the past. Moving on. Ready to marry again. To spend the rest of her life with the Colonel, Dov and their rescue Golden, Shiloh. She had never expected this gift, this second chance at love.

She shook her head, barely recognizing the woman she’d become. For so long she’d thought of herself as a city-girl. But the small cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains was becoming her center. Her home. She heard music differently in the quiet of the mountains. Listened better.

Suddenly wanting to hear Michael’s voice, she dialed his cell. Message.

“Hey you, it’s me,” she whispered. “Call me tonight, I’ll wait up. I have so much to tell you.”

If only…

If only she didn’t have to tell Michael the secret she’d been keeping from him these past few weeks. That once again, a vicious murderer was threatening all she held dear. Dane, with his scarred, wolf-like face and mirrored sunglasses hiding his eyes. The one nightmare she could not put behind her.

Because now Dane was back in her life.

+ + +

Over 4,500 miles to the East, the man who called himself Dane could not sleep. Still hours before dawn, shadows lay sharp across the tiles of the villa’s bedroom, angling from the terrace doors. Dane sat in a cushioned chair, crutches propped beside him, staring out the glass at the black Aegean far below – waiting for the sun’s light to spill over the horizon and fill the dark water with gold.

A sudden shift of the moon, and he caught his breath at his reflection in the window. All the mirrors in the villa had been shattered years ago, by his own hand. As shattered as his life. Now, caught off guard, he stared at the disfigured face of the stranger wavering in the glass.

Without warning his mind flung him back several years. He had been standing in the Kennedy Center’s Grand Foyer, his French knife secure under his tuxedo jacket, when he had caught a glimpse of himself in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors. Tall and god-like, he’d had muscles that rippled beneath the silk, a strong carved face, flowing hair the color of wheat, streaked by the Provençal sun. A diamond in his left ear, mirrored aviator glasses that hid tiger-colored eyes. His stride had been long, fast and as powerful as the Jaguar he drove.

And then he had crossed paths with Magdalena O’Shea.

First, the badly burned hand, thanks to an encounter with Magdalena’s Colonel at a Provençal abbey. He held up his right hand, now encased in a tight black glove. Then the botched plastic surgery in Italy after being forced into hiding. The scarred, distorted face, the loss of an eye. And then, months later… He looked down at his withered legs. The fall. The sickening feeling of spinning into the void. The excruciating pain that followed. The months of unbearable physical therapy.

All because of one woman. Magdalena O’Shea.

He glanced at his Rolex. Early evening in the states. Firas should have arrived in Martha’s Vineyard by now. He smiled. Until the time came, Firas would be his legs.

The image in the glass wavered, dissolved, and Dane turned away. “For death remembered should be like a mirror,” he whispered. “Who tells us life's but breath, to trust it error.”

***

Excerpt from Echoes on the Wind by Helaine Mario. Copyright 2020 by Helaine Mario. Reproduced with permission from Helaine Mario. All rights reserved.

 

Author Bio:

Helaine Mario

Best-selling author Helaine Mario grew up in NYC and is a graduate of Boston University. Now living in Arlington, VA, this mother of two, grandmother of five, and passionate advocate for women's and children's issues came to writing later in life. Her first novel, The Lost Concerto, won the Benjamin Franklin Award Silver Medal. Echoes on the Wind is her fifth novel and the fourth in her Maggie O'Shea Classical Music Suspense Series. Royalties from her books go to children's music and reading programs. Helaine recently lost her husband, Ron, after 57 years together. Her new book echoes with loss, grief, and, ultimately, the healing power of love.

Catch Up With Helaine Mario:

HelaineMario.com
Amazon Author Profile
Goodreads
BookBub - @helainemario
Instagram - @helainemario.author
Facebook - @helaine.mario

 

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Book Blogger Hop - 7/11/2025

Question of the Week:

How many weekly bookish posts do you put on your blog and/or social media? (submitted by Elizabeth @ Silver's Reviews)

My Answer:

I post a bookish post EVERY day on my blog and social media.  :)

I hope you stop by my blog and social media posts.  :)



Thursday, July 10, 2025

Showcase of The Conductor by Eva Shaw and a Giveaway of THREE $10 Amazon Gift Cards

The Conductor by Eva Shaw Banner

THE CONDUCTOR

by Eva Shaw

June 16 - July 11, 2025 

Virtual Book Tour

Synopsis:

Strikes, blackmail, and murder plague Beatrix amid growing unrest following the supremacist ideologies of World War II.

Beatrix Patterson has faced monsters before, but in a world teetering on the edge of social change, she comes up against her most complicated case yet. In one chaotic morning, her friend has been arrested following a fight during a strike at the railroad, the railroad owner was found murdered, and another close friend admits to being blackmailed.

The Conductor by Eva Shaw

Amid growing tensions between the Union Pacific Railroad and workers' strikes, Beatrix must go undercover before more people are killed or injured. But as she dives into this investigation, she finds one consistent group at the center.

In order to bring down the racial supremacist group digging its claws into Santa Barbara, California, she must put her intense loathing aside to stop the threat before it can reach Thomas, their baby girl Birdy, and the life they're building. With deadly secrets everywhere she turns, Beatrix has to keep her cards close to her chest if she hopes to escape this case unscathed.

Praise for THE CONDUCTOR:

"Historical mystery readers seeking stories rooted in social change and racial strife will find The Conductor a gripping story"
~ Diane Donovan, Midwest Book Review

Book Details:

Genre: Mystery
Published by: TorchFlame Books
Publication Date: April 8, 2025
Number of Pages: 280
ISBN: 978-1611536133
Series: Beatrix Patterson Mystery Series, Book 4 | Find the series on: Amazon & Goodreads
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop.org | Goodreads | BookBub | TorchFlame Books

Read an excerpt:

Chapter 1

Santa Barbara, California. March 1948

“Fancy a snog?”

Thomas didn’t wait for a reply as he kissed his wife once and then again before holding up their infant, Birdy, to place a soft peck on Beatrix’s cheek. The little one waved with both chubby arms, and her almond-shaped eyes always made Beatrix blink in astonishment, feeling wonder and joy, fear and gratitude, all balled together. It was nothing she’d ever experienced.

“Can’t you just say ‘kiss’ rather than snog, darling? It sounds scandalous,” Beatrix protested.

“My point exactly.” He kissed Beatrix again, then turned to the nearly year-old baby. “Amazing wave there, Birdy, and now, come on. You can do it. You can say ‘Daddy.’” Thomas had been coaching her to wave and say Daddy, consumed with it for weeks.

“You know, Thomas, that Birdy might not actually speak until after her first birthday. And ‘Ma’ is the easiest sound for her. The wave, however, is quite genius,” Beatrix said.

“Isn’t she just? Don’t wait up for us.” He laughed again.

They’d just finished breakfast, so this made Beatrix chuckle, her brown hair with the auburn highlights stuck back in a loose ponytail. She was dressed for the garden in green denim overalls and a blue, lightweight pullover. She was eager to get digging in the dirt. In another month, the flower beds would be exploding with a riot of reds, yellows, and orange nasturtiums, happy-faced Marguerite daisies, and yellow coreopsis with white cosmos accenting the design. Sweet alyssum in puffy clouds would round out the color scheme. She planned to jam the beds and pots with everything the local nursery offered.

As anxious as she was to plant the starters she’d bought at the nursery center the previous day, Beatrix never rushed their goodbyes. Not in the most secret places of her heart or her wildest dreams, in the darkest times of her life as an unwanted orphan, lost in a series of boarding schools as a teenager, and floundering to make a living during the horrors of the war, did she ever think her life would be filled with the love of a devoted husband and the cutest baby on the planet.

Standing on the sidewalk in front of their ever-so-slowly-being-renovated Victorian mansion in the sleepy, little California beach town of Santa Barbara, Beatrix moved closer to Thomas, slipped her arm around his trim middle, and moved in for a hug. In the cheerless days of World War II, all the gratitude she felt in that moment had been impossible even to dream about. She trailed her fingers down her cheek, where soft baby lips had just been, and sighed.

“Think we’ll saunter over to Woolworths Five and Dime for an escapade, and certainly we’ll be back before elevenses, which I prefer to call it over your Americanized ‘snack time.’ That chocolate chip scone in the pantry is to share with our tea, my dearest Bea. Not my best baking, but it had better be there when I return.” He produced a frown, knowing she had a penchant for chocolate—the reason he’d baked them.

“Wave goodbye to Mummy, Birdy pet. We’re off for a jaunt,” he said, and Birdy did exactly as her daddy asked. Then the twosome was off for their quick spin in the neighborhood or even farther to Sterns Wharf or north to the mission. Down the sidewalk they went, and Beatrix waved to their backs. She loved his smile and knew how broad it would be, even as she watched them moving toward the shops.

Thomas had procured, somehow, an honest-to-goodness British pram in the traditional navy blue fabric. She often thought he got more British by the day, although they’d lived in this community since the end of the war. He insisted that sweaters were jumpers and knackered meant that he or the baby was tired.

Just like Thomas, Birdy seemed to mostly have an “on” switch where she was happily and thoroughly engaged with toys, cooing, and making sounds that would eventually become words, and the rare “off” one, where she, as Thomas did, slept like a bag of rocks. While they had fostered and then adopted Birdy as an infant, it was remarkable to friends, family, and strangers how much the baby looked like Thomas and Beatrix. She had striking, intelligent eyes that constantly watched where her parents were, wild hair just like Thomas’s, and smooth, creamy skin like Beatrix’s. Most likely, they’d discussed, they’d never find her birth parents—who had left her, hours after her birth, at Cottage Hospital—or know her heritage.

Thomas had researched the possibility of using blood samples or even the cutting-edge science of gene testing to determine her ethnicity, but without any way to find Birdy’s biological parents, it hardly mattered. They had just the previous evening talked about adopting more children and knew as soon as was appropriate that they’d explain to all the Patterson-Ling kids that they had been chosen, just like Mummy and Daddy had chosen each other.

They’d decided to name the little girl after all of their mothers and call her Jay. She would be Jennie, for Beatrix’s adoptive mother; Adelina, for her biological mother; and Ya, for Thomas’s mother, which in Chinese meant refined, elegant, and graceful. About a month after the baby came into their lives, there was a flock of squawking and comical California scrub jays frolicking the bird bath in the garden, and the little girl’s nickname morphed into Birdy.

Thomas moved with grace and a quiet confidence, which Beatrix knew came from his years of martial arts training. Thomas was lithe and just an inch taller than his wife at five foot eight. He never thought there was anything unmanly about strolling around the city with the little girl and was totally in love with the child, as he’d told Beatrix that morning and every morning since the little one had joined their lives.

Thomas felt burdened with guilt as he headed into downtown Santa Barbara. He knew it was not cricket to conceal the letter he’d placed in his jacket’s pocket when he picked up the morning mail. Yet, as with everything in his well-organized life, he dreamed it would be better to wait until evening to discuss what had been written. Was this an opportunity or madness? He liked to think he made wise decisions, calculated and smart. Yet the contents of the letter could change everything about their future and their family life in the tranquil beach city.

Was it a lie not to tell Beatrix at once? He thought not, except one could say it was a lie of omission. He mentally calculated what the effect caused by the letter would be on his family and sighed deeply. Beatrix had just established her practice as a psychologist focusing on returning veterans who suffered from mental damage as well as physical issues during and after the war. The effects of trauma on soldiers during the Great War was a field she’d studied at length, and now she was compiling data on the current mass of returning veterans, wounded inside and out from the Second World War.

Then there was the house. It still needed a multitude of improvements. Thomas thought, What houses built in the late 1800s didn’t? However, it was livable, warm in the winter, and cool in summertime, thanks to the oversized windows letting in the playful ocean breezes.

Then there were the friends, closer than family, they’d made in the city. Sam and Jo Conrad lived just blocks away. The couples and their kids dined together once and sometimes twice a week. They were already planning summer picnics on Arroyo Burro Beach, also known as Hendry’s Beach by locals, with its wide sandy shore and cliffs perfect for boys like the Conrads’ eldest, Sammy, to scurry up. Thomas imagined Birdy following the Conrad twins and Sammy, running through the waves, unaware of how idyllic their childhoods would be away from the recent nightmares of war, with loving parents and a safe community in which to grow, learn, and follow their dreams.

After the war, when he could safely cross the Atlantic and travel from England to Santa Barbara to see his lover, he vowed never to forget how fortunate he was. This letter? The knowledge of it felt like a fire in his pocket, as its contents would change every aspect of their lives.

Can I do that? Am I dedicated enough? Why am I even considering it? It’s utter madness, he thought.

Earlier that morning, he shook his head in dismay at the sheer contentment on his wife’s face as she stroked Birdy’s pitch-black hair. They’d been through so much together, individually and now as a family, after adopting Birdy. They were on a journey that made them both feel at peace. Once Beatrix read the letter and acknowledged its content, the future would flip, a dangerous somersault to their tranquil life. There would be no going back.

Whatever the result, we’ll never be the same. That frightened Thomas, and he thought, For now, I best wait. A few more hours of bliss before . . . He couldn’t even think the words—didn’t want to face what would be the outcome when he did.

Beatrix continued to watch the pair and imagined Thomas chatting with the baby in Cantonese as they ambled down serene Anapamu Street in the heart of the city and onward to State Street, the main shopping street. Truth be told, she’d had doubts about becoming a mother to the fostered little one and then again when they applied to adopt the infant. At thirty, she didn’t know if she’d have the patience of younger moms, but the moment Birdy arrived in their arms, Beatrix never looked back. Thomas, on the other hand, never doubted the decision. He jumped in, taking over the hourly feedings when Birdy was tiny, changing the nappies, walking the floor, sterilizing glass baby bottles, and suddenly becoming an expert on burping the baby. Because of Beatrix’s incredible memory, she’d cataloged and compiled every event in their lives since the child had come to them. Often, when she was alone or taking a quiet walk on the beach, she’d think of how they’d come together and what their future could possibly hold.

At least once a day, Thomas would remark, “I was born to be a father.” Thomas told this to anyone and everyone who would listen. He’d even taken a year’s leave of absence from the University of California researching clean energy and teaching so he could be there for Beatrix and Birdy. “I do not want to forgo a second of our daughter’s first year.” The year was closing in, which made him blink back tears more often than not when he talked about returning to the university.

Beatrix thought of how, since the day Birdy was placed in his arms, Thomas sang the same Chinese lullabies his grandmother crooned to him. After all this time, Beatrix could finally join him, still fuzzy on the translated words. Thomas assured her one song was Birdy’s favorite and performed it regularly at bedtime. “It’s all about how the moon protects little ones,” he’d told her. Then he winked and looked like a mischievous boy—a look she loved.

Beatrix remembered pointing out that the song sounded like a rude sea shanty that his grandmother also sang. She had learned that possibility from one of Thomas’ sisters when the entire Ling clan had visited for December and January to get away from the chill of London. More so, to admire and love Birdy Patterson-Ling. And they did.

Beatrix knew that Thomas regularly held deep scientific conversations, talking to the infant as if she were a colleague. Other times, Beatrix had seen him get teary-eyed watching their exquisite little girl just sleeping. He’d whisper to Beatrix, “She’s dreaming. Look at her fingers move. Look at that heart-shaped mouth. Bea, whatever do babies dream about?”

Truth be told, Beatrix did the same, humming French songs and reciting poems that her Parisian biological mother had taught her, also wondering what babies dreamed of.

Beatrix often found Thomas sitting near Birdy’s bassinet, holding her plump little foot or stroking it while the baby napped. He balanced a book of advanced physics or some scientific theory Beatrix barely grasped and stayed close to the tot, sheer bliss etched on his face.

Birdy’s arrival was unexpected and awe-inspiring. Thomas and Beatrix were the only couple on the county’s foster parent list who asked for a child of mixed race, so the county of Santa Barbara quickly granted them the opportunity to adopt Birdy. Hence, the plans to visit London and Thomas’s family were postponed, mandating immediately that the entire Ling clan came to Santa Barbara. Thomas and Beatrix put off visiting Paris to reunite with Beatrix’s biological father, General Charles de Gaulle. After discovering Beatrix was de Gaulle’s daughter, his family refused to speak with her, respond to her letters, or any attempts at reconciliation. Growing up, Beatrix had always thought that de Gaulle was an unofficial uncle, a kindly and generous man. Now, they were all, including her father, estranged from Beatrix.

Beatrix felt content, more than she’d ever experienced. That surprised and pleased her. She was just climbing the last of the front steps when the buzzing of the big, black Bakelite telephone in the front room of the Victorian home demanded her full attention. She swung open the screen door and dashed for the phone.

“Hello, Dr. Beatrix Patterson speaking,” she said.

Beatrix felt fear shoot through her, and her forehead wrinkled when she heard the caller sob. “What is it? Who is this?”

It certainly could not be the person she’d expected to call. She glanced at her watch. No, it was too early.

That cry was completely out of character for her first counseling client of the day, as the woman always called to confirm before an appointment. Gloria Rayne had been in the South Pacific as a surgeon throughout the war, bobbing around on a naval hospital ship, often being harassed and bombed by the enemy as she performed surgeries with limited resources. Beatrix met her by chance during a previous investigation of a local religious leader who died under suspicious circumstances and the murder of a federal agent connected with the local Indigenous people, the Chumash Indians. Gloria had enough courage to do her job with the utmost confidence and then the wherewithal to seek counseling when she returned to the home front.

To the city’s population, Santa Barbara’s esteemed coroner, Dr. Rayne, seemed like the poster model for a competent, modern woman. “I can hide my pain well,” she’d told Beatrix at their first counseling session, although the scars from Japanese bullets hitting her neck were visible still. Explaining the injury, she shook her head. “I was stupid, Beatrix. Went on deck. It had been a horrible night, filled with death, and unless I saw the sun that fateful morning, I knew I wouldn’t be fit for the next surgery. I was sun-deprived and naïve. I walked to the edge of the ship and turned to see—truly, I could see the pilot’s eyes on me—I saw the plane swoop down. He aimed at me, a woman.” Her palm covered the scream that was in her throat. “I was the only one injured that day as our boys shot that killer out of the sky. I found myself in surgery, but not as the doctor.”

While her external wartime wounds had left a mark, the psychological ones were deeper. Loud noises, barking dogs, and screaming children all sent her into a well-concealed panic. She’d come to Beatrix knowing that therapy could help with “combat fatigue.” Over the past five months, they had been working to desensitize her crippling fears. Fortunately, Gloria could now enter a shop or restaurant where there was chaos and deafening noises without breaking out in a drenching sweat.

The caller was not the coroner. The sob Beatrix heard sent a chill to the hair on the back of her neck.

“Beatrix, it’s Jo.” Jo’s voice quivered, and that never happened. “I’m sick with fear.”

***

Excerpt from The Conductor by Eva Shaw. Copyright 2025 by Eva Shaw. Reproduced with permission from Eva Shaw. All rights reserved.

Author Bio:

Eva Shaw

Eva Shaw always loved a good mystery and when she took a break from her successful ghostwriting career, it was a mysterious idea than turned into The Seer, book 1 in the Beatrix Patterson series. She reads, breaths, watches and thrives on mysteries and is often shocked when the characters do a better job plotting the book than she could. When not writing, she's kept on her toes thanks to her silly and rambunctious Welsh terrier companion, Coco Rose. Eva is an avid volunteer with her church, programs to support women and children, and as a clerk at the American Cancer Society's resale shop. She loves gardening, reading, spending time with friends and family, traveling, shopping, painting and playing the banjolele. She and Coco live near the beach in Carlsbad, California.

Eva is a full-time, working writer with more than award-winning 100 books to her credit. In addition to the four Beatrix Patterson mysteries, she’s written: Ghostwriting for Fun & Profit, Writeriffic: Creativity Training for Writers, Write Your Book in 20 Minutes, Shovel It: Nature’s Health Plan, What to Do When a Loved One Dies, The Successful Writer’s Guide to Publishing Magazine Articles, Writing the Nonfiction Book, Insider’s Guide to San Diego, The Sun Never Sets, and more. Eva's work has been featured, reviewed and honored in USA Today, Los Angeles Times, Costco Connection, Publisher’s Weekly, Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and over 1000 published columns, articles and short stories. Motivational, entertaining and witty, Eva keynotes at writing conferences and appears on television, radio and in the media. “Shaw knows her onions and peels them well,” Columbia School of Journalism. Washington Post said her work is “illuminating.” From Publisher’s Weekly, “Shaw produces books that are practical and worthy of the self-help genre.”

Catch Up With Eva Shaw:

www.EvaShaw.com
Amazon Author Profile
Goodreads
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Instagram - @evashawwriter
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Wednesday, July 9, 2025

Showcase of The Everest Enigma by Jeannette de Beauvoir and a Giveaway of TWO $20 Amazon Gift Cards

The Everest Enigma by Jeannette de Beauvoir Banner

THE EVEREST ENIGMA

by Jeannette de Beauvoir

June 16 - July 11, 2025 

Virtual Book Tour

Synopsis:

AN ABBIE BRADFORD MYSTERY


Abbie Bradford is at a crossroads.

Fresh off earning her doctorate in history, she’s unsure of her next move—until bestselling novelist Emma Caulfield, an acquaintance of Abbie's brother, presents an irresistible challenge: join her on a grueling trek from Kathmandu to Everest Base Camp in Nepal.

The Everest Enigma by Jeannette de Beauvoir
When the adventure takes a deadly turn, Abbie starts to question Emma’s true motives as she finds they may hold the key to unraveling a century-old mountaineering mystery—if they can survive long enough to solve it.

Book Details:

Genre: Women Sleuths, Mystery, Thriller
Published by: Beckett Books
Publication Date: May 15, 2025
Number of Pages: 280
ISBN: 9798992594201 (Pbk)
Series: An Abbie Bradford Mystery, Book 1
Book Links: Amazon | Goodreads

Read an excerpt:

Chapter 1

I saw my first dead body when I was nine years old.

That sounds scary, but oddly enough, it didn’t feel that way at the time—something about the resilience of childhood, I expect.

We’d gone to Algeria for my father to take celestial measurements in the Sahara, and one day the local expat group asked him to accompany a doctor going to see a woman in a village outside of town—she was an American, they said, and would be reassured by the presence of other Americans.

We went along with him because my mother wanted to, and that was back in the good days, the days before she started having serious conversations with the bust of Shakespeare in the front hall of our mansion in Boston’s Back Bay.

My family members each embrace obsession in their own way. My younger brother Martin went so mad for God he had to become a priest—albeit an Episcopal one, so he can still enjoy some of the finer things in life. My father, following a patriarchal tradition of obsessive eccentricities, devotes his life to stargazing—and traveling to stargaze—while my older brother Phillip turned those same stars into scientific objects and spends his days teaching astrophysics. And my mother… well, the less said about my mother, some days, the better.

I expect we each have something terribly wrong with us.

So my parents and I went along the bumpy track in the Land Rover, with the doctor explaining that she’d been screaming, the American woman, something about great birds blotting out the sun. Ergot poisoning, he added. It happens.

By the time we arrived, the woman had died, and there was fear still etched in her face, fear of those dark wings she’d seen in the sky. Memorable. And so I saw my first body when I was nine.

I wonder, now, if that meant anything, pointed me in a direction I didn’t even know I was taking, that would be revealed only once I went to Nepal.

***

The visitor came soon after I was contemplating the dispiriting contents of my refrigerator.

I periodically go on diets, and the first step in any diet is clearing out anything remotely delicious from your kitchen. And then, of course, that first night finds you staring at a hard-boiled egg, a can of tomato juice, some healthy-looking grain, and an apple that’s seen better days.

I pulled up the online delivery menu from The Q, my favorite local Chinese restaurant. I could go back to the diet tomorrow.

So when the buzzer rang downstairs, I flung the door open with enthusiasm achieved only by a person who’s been dieting for a full eight hours. Instead of the delivery guy with a bag full of goodies, however, I was looking at a slightly older-than-middle-aged woman in an anorak with the hood up.

“Yes?”

She sniffed, wiping an errant snowflake from her cheek. “Are you Abigail Bradford?”

“Yes,” I said automatically. “Can I help you?”

The gray eyes looked me over, shrewd, intelligent, and extremely thorough. I wondered what she made of what she saw, because I can be a little startling at first: a tall youngish woman, chin-length hair currently an experimental vivid blue, brown eyes behind glasses. “You answered my post,” she said calmly.

I stared at her. “Excuse me?”

“My post,” she repeated, exasperation creeping into her voice. “I put a post up on the intranet. At Harvard.”

At that moment the dinner delivery arrived, the driver impatiently shouldering past her. “Here you go.”

I had the tip ready. “Thanks,” I said, grabbing the food and hoping this woman would take the hint and leave.

“Well,” she said, eyeing the bag, “you’ll want to get to your dinner.”

“Yes,” I agreed.

She stepped forward. “So let’s get inside. There’s supposed to be heavy snow after midnight.” She caught my eye. “Well, of course I won’t be staying past midnight,” she said. “But with the timing of things—well, I wanted to do the interview as soon as possible. Of course.”

Interview?

The wind was screaming down Acorn Street—the most-photographed street in Boston is also one of the narrowest, a perfect wind tunnel—and my dinner was getting cold. I gave up and let her in.

Five minutes later we were sitting rather cozily in my living room, her coat and hat hung up in the hall, fire blazing merrily along, boxes of fragrant Chinese food between us. “You’re sure you don’t want anything?” I asked for about the third time. I am nothing if not polite, even to people who are clearly off their rockers.

“No, no, you go ahead, dear,” she said, fluffing the pillow beside her, settling in. Seen in the light, she had no-nonsense, short salt-and-pepper hair, with lots of laugh wrinkles around her gray eyes.

Nothing distracted, however, from the sharpness in those eyes.

“Since your memory is clearly failing you,” she said, “I’ll remind you. I’m Emma Caulfield. I put up an ad for a research assistant to go with me to Nepal.”

I’d just opened the chopsticks packet. “Nepal?”

“Well, yes, of course, Nepal,” she said, frowning. “Really, dear, do you usually repeat what people say to you? Do you want the job, or not?”

I put everything down. There was a glimmer of an idea at the back of my mind. Harvard perforce means Phillip, and this was exactly something Phillip would think was funny. “I have a feeling my brother answered your post on my behalf,” I said carefully.

She was unfazed. “Then he must have known you’d want the job.”

“Going to Nepal.”

She nodded. “Going to Nepal.”

I thought about it. It wasn’t actually totally insane. My brothers and I are that most hated of species, trust-fund babies, and Phillip and I have spent a substantial part of our inheritances collecting academic letters after our names, probably to prove something to someone… well, I’ve never quite worked that part out. I was into the second year of holding my doctorate in history, and hadn’t yet found any work in academia. Boston and Cambridge might together be the hub of higher education, but even lectureships are harder and harder to come by, and guarded jealously.

And—here’s the thing—truth be told, I was slowly coming to the conclusion that I didn’t actually want a career in higher education. I liked the research part: I liked being a detective, figuring out what really happened, the story behind the story preserved for posterity. Learning about people who weren’t just stick-figures, real people who lived and loved and breathed and should be remembered. Bringing them back to life, somehow, if only on paper.

Teaching… yeah, maybe not so much. Faculty interactions, definitely not. And while it’s true I’d never need to work for a living, that didn’t mean I didn’t actually want to. To contribute to the world in some way. I just wasn’t yet seeing how.

All that meant, of course, was there wasn’t anything tying me to Boston at the moment.

“What,” I asked, “are you going to Nepal for?”

“Well, research, of course, dear.” She looked puzzled. “I thought that would be obvious.” I didn’t say anything, and she sighed gustily. “I’m Emma Caulfield,” she said again.

“Yes, I got that part.”

“I’m a writer.”

I continued to stare blankly at her, and she started looking annoyed. “I write historical romances,” she said. “I’m on the New York Times bestseller list.”

And there it was. I hadn’t heard of her for good reason: I subscribe to the academic historian’s dim view of historical fiction in general, and historical romances in particular. It’s an automatic judgment we make: slipshod research, damsels in distress, Regency dresses. I met her eyes. “Bodice-rippers,” I suggested, nodding.

To my surprise, she laughed. “Well, good for you, Abigail Bradford,” she said. “I was starting to think you didn’t have any gumption at all.”

There it was again, that sharp mind behind those eyes. “You fraud,” I said slowly. “You knew I’d react like that.”

Emma nodded. She looked thoroughly satisfied. “I am researching my next novel,” she said crisply. “I am going to Kathmandu, and then on to some trekking. I’m planning on getting up to Everest Base Camp, and I certainly don’t want to do that alone.” Her expression dared me to say anything. “I’m good at asking questions, and taking in the scenery, and all that. But I’m not always able to organize what I’m doing, and this time around I need some specialist help. I want you to help research what it was like for people on the mountain, people in the country, people in the world, in the early nineteen-twenties.”

She paused, and a trace of something vulnerable slipped into her voice. “I also need someone to—well, to go with me. I used to like traveling on my own, have done it for years, but not so much anymore. There’s too much to keep track of, and I need to be thinking and writing. So I need someone to go with me.”

“As a researcher,” I said.

She didn’t meet my eyes. “I’ve never done this before,” she confessed. “I’ve always done everything on my own. But this time feels different—and I’m not about to get a reputation for slipshod work, so I need some help. Some research, some organizing, some travel… and someone to tell me when I’m going off in the wrong direction. That’s why I need a historian—you.”

Not just any historian: me. I’d remember that, later. “You’re looking for facts?” I asked sweetly. “That must be a first for a romance novelist.”

“Historical romance novelist,” she corrected. Her eyes were steely. “So are you in, or what?”

I had a feeling I was going to regret this. “I’m in,” I said. “And now, can we eat?”

***

I Googled her, of course. The moment she was out the door.

Emma Caulfield, it transpired, was indeed a Big Name in the genre. She’d been writing novels for the past thirty-odd years. She’d been part of the big Regency romance movement, had switched things around for a while with an American Colonial period, even set a small series in prehistoric Britain.

And she was right: her novels were consistently on the bestseller list. She must be making a fortune.

“The romance bestseller list,” I reminded my friend Justine when I told her about the late-night visit. We were still deep in February, and we’d come off the ice-skating at Boston Common to the warmth of my fireplace, a pot of tea, and a bag of popcorn.

“You know,” Justine said, stretching out a leg toward the heat, “you could manage to be just a little more judgmental if you tried.”

“Do you think?” I smiled and refilled her tea. I was only half-serious.

“What I think,” she said carefully, “is that you might be surprised. Romance novels have come a long way since the oh, John, oh, Mary days.”

“And you would know this, how?”

She laughed. “Come on, Abbie. Sex and the City changed everything. There are feminist romances now. And your Emma Caulfield—she has a good reputation. I think she might surprise you, I really do. God, I think my toes are finally thawing.” She slanted a look at me. “So you’re going with her? To Kathmandu?”

I nodded. “I think so.”

“You know, you don’t have to, just because Phillip had one of his harebrained ideas.”

“Trouble is,” I said slowly, “he’s usually right, and it actually sounds like it could be fun. And… interesting. The work, the travel, the research—there’s a goal, you know? Something that might mean something.”

She nodded, her eyes on the flames. Justine knows about my past. Phillip and Martin and I are the thirteenth generation of an old, old Massachusetts family: check it out, the first governor of what would eventually become the Commonwealth was named Bradford, he was on the Mayflower that first miserable winter in Provincetown and Plymouth. Later, during the Gilded Age, the Bradfords became rich beyond understanding, though they had one saving grace—philanthropy. Hospitals, learning institutions, the arts … my ancestors helped build the knowledge-based economy that still characterizes Boston.

I have an ambivalent relationship with my family wealth—well, to be fair, with much of my family itself, too—and am always looking for ways to put it to good use; I’m not interested in a trust fund that does nothing but increase itself. I give away a lot of money, in a whole lot of ways, and that’s good, that’s important… but I’d like to be doing something important, too. I just hadn’t yet figured out what.

“So what’s the plan?” Justine asked. “What exactly is she researching?”

I shut my eyes; I can nearly always visualize conversations when I do. “She’s doing something about an Everest expedition back in the 1920s,” I said. “There was an Englishman called George Mallory who went up and didn’t come down, and there’s controversy about whether he reached the summit or not, which is an important question among mountaineers.” I paused. “And apparently he was incredible eye-candy, as was his wife, so maybe it’s a love story between them.” I found I was smiling. Okay, so maybe there was something more to romance novels than I’d assumed. “She wants me to go to Kathmandu ahead of her, and she’ll join me after she’s done some sort of conference in New York.”

“Well, it sounds exotic anyway,” said Justine. “Why not? It might be just what you need while you decide what you’re going to do with your life.”

That was, of course, the question. “I’m intrigued,” I admitted. “Phillip was right. It sounds exotic, it sounds interesting, and it’s the other side of the world.”

“Top of the world,” said Justine. “Everest’s the highest mountain on Earth.”

“I’m not actually climbing Everest,” I reminded her.

“No,” she conceded. “You’d need to be a little more of an Outdoors Girl for that. Still, it might lead to other things.”

“Like what?” I asked suspiciously.

Justine grinned. “Romance?” she suggested.

I threw the popcorn at her.

***

Excerpt from The Everest Enigma by Jeannette de Beauvoir. Copyright 2025 by Jeannette de Beauvoir. Reproduced with permission from Jeannette de Beauvoir. All rights reserved.

 

Author Bio:

Jeannette de Beauvoir

Jeannette de Beauvoir is an award-winning author of historical and mystery/thriller fiction and a poet whose work has appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies. She has written three mystery series along with a number of standalone novels; her work “demonstrates a total mastery of the mystery/suspense genre” (Midwest Book Review) She’s a member of the Authors Guild, the Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, and the Historical Novels Society. She lives and works in a seaside cottage on Cape Cod where she’s also a local theatre critic and hosts an arts-related program on WOMR, a Pacifica Radio affiliate.

Catch Up With Jeannette de Beauvoir:

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Tuesday, July 8, 2025

COVER REVEAL of Winter's Season by R.J. Koreto and a $20 Amazon Gift Card Giveaway

Winter's Season by R.J. Koreto Banner

WINTER'S SEASON

by R.J. Koreto

July 8, 2025 

Cover Reveal

Synopsis:

Winter's Season by R.J. Koreto

In 1817 London, Before the Police, There Was Captain Winter.

London, 1817. A city teeming with life, yet lacking a professional police force. When a wealthy young woman is brutally murdered in an alley frequented by prostitutes, a shadowy government bureau in Whitehall dispatches its "special emissary"―Captain Winter. A veteran of the Napoleonic Wars and a gentleman forged by chance and conflict, Winter is uniquely equipped to navigate the treacherous currents of London society, from aristocratic drawing rooms to the city's grimmest taverns.

Without an army of officers or the aid of forensic science, Winter must rely on his wits and a network of unconventional allies. His childhood friend, a nobleman, opens doors in high society, while a wise Jewish physician uncovers secrets the dead cannot hide.

But Winter's most intriguing, and potentially dangerous, asset is Barbara Lightwood. Shrewd, beautiful, and operating as a discreet intermediary among the elite, Barbara shares a past with Winter from the war years. Their rekindled affair is fraught with wariness; she offers intimate information crucial to his investigation, but guards her own secrets fiercely. Like Winter, she is both cunning and capable of danger.

From grand houses to dimly lit streets, death stalks Captain Winter. He must tread carefully to unmask a killer, navigate a web of secrets and lies, and perhaps, in the process, save his own soul.

Book Details:

Genre: Historical Mystery
Published by: Histria Books
Planned Publication Date: January 20, 2026
Number of Pages: 300
ISBN: 978-1592116898
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop.org | Goodreads

Author Bio:

R.J. Koreto

R.J. Koreto is the author of the Historic Home mystery series, set in modern New York City; the Lady Frances Ffolkes mystery series, set in Edwardian England; and the Alice Roosevelt mystery series, set in turn-of-the-century New York. His short stories have been published in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine and Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, as well as various anthologies.

Most recently, he is the author of "Winter's Season," which takes place on the dark streets and glittering ballrooms of Regency-era London.

In his day job, he works as a business and financial journalist. Over the years, he’s been a magazine writer and editor, website manager, PR consultant, book author, and seaman in the U.S. Merchant Marine. Like his heroine, Lady Frances Ffolkes, he’s a graduate of Vassar College.

He and his wife have two grown daughters, and divide their time between Paris and Martha’s Vineyard.

Catch Up With R.J. Koreto:

www.RJKoreto.com
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Monday, July 7, 2025

Spotlight of All That Remains by Jane Darby


PHOTO SOURCE:
TYPORAMA

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ALL THAT REMAINS
JANE DARBY
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All information in this post is courtesy of Kristen Ludwigsen of MindBuck Media Book Publicity.

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All That Remains is a compelling exploration of grief, marriage, and identity from debut author Jane Darby.
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May 27, 2025
Apprentice House
Literary Fiction
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PRAISE FOR ALL THAT REMAINS:

"Darby takes on loss and grief with a subtle wisdom. Hers is a narrative for our times." - Afaa M. Weaver, author of A Fire in the Hills


"Jane Darby's taut novel speaks to the depths of life-altering loss and the power of the human spirit to transform it. All That Remains will keep you on the edge of your seat and break your heart." - Tom Lagasse, author and poet 


"All That Remains explodes off the page with domestic tension. Darby delivers a richly slanted view of contemporary American life." - Bill Ratner, author of Fear of Fish


"Darby weaves her story in clear and lyrically honed prose reminiscent of Updike." - Davyne Verstandig, poet and teacher


"Jane Darby is a master storyteller. I knew I was in good hands from page one." - Andy Christie, The Moth Radio Hour
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EXCERPT OF ALL THAT REMAINS:

All That Remains - Jane Darby 1 “I wouldn't wait until the weekend. Why not go up this afternoon? By yourself.” Richard stirred cream into his coffee and wiped the spoon clean with a paper napkin. "What do you think?" “Yes,” Anna said, trying to plumb this peace offering. “I could do that.” “You said you wanted to have some time alone. It will be good for you. Fresh air. Take a walk in the woods. That’s why we bought the place. A little peace and quiet, no?” He smiled. “You can get started on the garden." Anna sipped her coffee, wincing at the heat. She couldn’t blame him for wanting to get rid of her. Last night’s blow-out had ended in retreat: he, to the bedroom and she, to Ben's old room, now a den. Curled up on the divan, she listened to the sounds of Richard getting ready for bed: click of a light switch, rush of water in the sink, sounds of an intimate, shared life, so maddeningly calm and deliberate that each was another stone in the wall rising between them. But here at breakfast with sunlight streaming through the window and coffee cooling in their mugs, civility had returned and along with it, a fragile truce. "Yes," she repeated. "I could do that." "Good. I'm working late tonight anyway. I'll catch a train Friday evening. You'll pick me up at the station?" He smiled at her, eyebrows raised as if there were any question. "Of course." It wasn’t until she was driving up the Palisades that she realized Richard was right. The city had barely dropped away, and already she felt a lift in spirits. Trees flashed by, still winter-naked though some were shot with early sprays of green. Yellow forsythia bloomed along the side of the road. Up the rise and around the bend, she passed a small lake tucked into the landscape like a secret. Farther up, the road cut past cliffs glistening with the spring thaw. The ascent peaked and suddenly below her: a Walmart. A Chuck E. Cheese. More stores under All That Remains - Jane Darby construction, wrapped in a white membrane with the big, blue words Tyvek, Tyvek, Tyvek. All of this surrounded by a vast parking lot with rows and rows of cars where crops once grew. She needed a shovel. If she was going to cut sod and build a fence for the garden, she would need a shovel. And some chicken wire. Stakes for fence posts. Work gloves. She tried to think it through, to cast her mind ahead to what might be needed. Without warning, bile rose to her mouth and she gasped. What might be needed. She pressed her lips together and swallowed the thought whole. Pay attention. Needle-nosed pliers with a built-in wire cutter. She took the exit to the Walmart. The vastness of the store was a shock after the cramped aisles of Manhattan markets. Anna pushed a cart that could house a family of four past a bin of Easter candy marked half-off. Over the loudspeaker a voice squawked that chicken tenders were buy-one-get-one-free in the frozen food section. Everyone was in a state of fatigued awe. Anna watched a worn-out couple in their late twenties worry each other over whether they should put a wide-screen TV on layaway. A toddler with a snot-crusted nose and raw upper lip rocked and keened in the child’s seat of the cart while a five-year-old boy or girl – Anna wasn’t sure with that haircut – pulled on the woman’s arm, chanting indecipherable demands. Suddenly, the man swung his head around to the child. “Tyler, if you don’t shut up, I’ll give you something to shut up about.” Anna looked away. The selection in Gardening Supplies was slim; it was so early in the season. There were some shovels and hand tools. An entire row was devoted to poisons for pests. If she had wanted to, she could’ve bought a reflective blue sphere perched on a Grecian pedestal made out of durable plastic. She couldn't believe they didn't sell chicken wire. At least they had deer netting. She All That Remains - Jane Darby angled a couple of rolls into her cart. On her way out of the store, she paused by the vending machines. When Ben was little, it had been impossible to pass them without stopping. They would be walking down Broadway, in a hurry, as usual, to get him to school and her to work, and there the vending machines would be, banked against the storefront of a deli or a news shop. Without warning, Ben would dart over and start fiddling with the mechanisms. Mom, can I have a quarter? No, Ben. Come on. C’mon, Mom. Please. Just one. What is it you want? That. That plastic thing. Ben, it’s nothing. It’s junk. It's landfill. It’s a thing, Mom! He was always a sucker for The Claw, a glassed-in chamber filled with stuffed animals, bouncy balls, and cheap digital watches that worked for about five minutes. For a dollar a pop, you could guide a three-fingered mechanical hand to lower, grasp, and retrieve whatever your heart desired. Ben always pestered her for that one. She tried to tell him. She even let him do it once to show him it was nothing but a cheat. But out of sheer, dumb luck he managed to pull up a stuffed something, a green alien with huge almond-shaped eyes that glowed in the dark. From that day on, he was hooked. Anna pushed her cart over to The Claw. Of course, there was nothing in it she wanted, but she fished some quarters from her coat pocket and dropped them into the slot. The chamber lit All That Remains - Jane Darby up as a plinkity rendition of Under the Sea buzzed through the speakers. She studied the jumble of plush fur and plastic, steered the claw over to a purple Teddy bear, fine-tuned the positioning, and pushed the button. The claw descended over the bear’s head and pulled up. The mechanism had no more strength in it than an old woman’s arthritic hand. The fingers slipped over the bear and returned home empty-handed. What had she expected? It was night by the time Anna pulled up to the house. The footpath to the porch was so dark and unfamiliar that she had to toe her way along the flagstone and up the broad wooden steps leading to the door. She felt with her fingers for the lock and guided her key into it. Entry by Braille, she thought as she pushed against the heavy door and pawed the wall to switch on the lights. It was an old house, an Adirondack-style hunter’s lodge built in the 1930s with a stone fireplace, vaulted ceilings, exposed beams and rafters, and plenty of taxidermy left by the previous owner. A moose’s head, mangy with age, hung high over the hearth. From the moment he saw it, Richard had fallen in love with the house with its long, gravel driveway and the wooded hills that surrounded it. “A real find,” he whispered to Anna when the realtor turned her back. “The real thing.” Once it was theirs, he took to calling it “The Lodge,” or, when he was feeling particularly grand, “The Manor.” Anna referred to it as The House of Heads, to which Richard always admonished, "Don’t be ugly." It was grand and it was the real thing, but it was also terribly gloomy. The timbered walls absorbed light. From the shadows, deer looked down with glass eyes empty of life. A scent of musty, old fur and wood filled the air. Anna set her bags by the sofa and flicked on as many lamps as she could find, but still the room felt dark and heavy. A tomb. She decided to light a fire. There was plenty of firewood; the caretaker had seen to that. But Anna, a city-dweller for All That Remains - Jane Darby most of her life, hadn’t paid attention when Richard lit their first fire several weeks ago. She had been sitting right in that armchair, drifting off as usual, sinking herself with her thoughts. She could not shake her astonishment that life continued. Even after all this time – more than a year - something in her refused to understand it. How was it possible that she could sit in an armchair and watch her husband fumble about with matches? How was it possible that when he struck the match, it actually lit? Shouldn’t the world stop? Shouldn’t the laws of nature be suspended? How could a man who had lost his only child still manage to light a fire? Anna had been married to Richard for twenty-five years, yet she did not understand him. He possessed the gift of taking life in stride, while she took each new blow as if it might be her last. Even through the initial shock of the phone call, the subdued voice of a stranger on the other end, the interminable drive to Philadelphia, the awful sight of Ben in the morgue – still and waxy, not really Ben at all, more the absence of Ben – through all of that, Richard had held it together. And in the days that followed, he made the calls, the arrangements; he spoke at the memorial service, while Anna simply shut down. A couple of weeks after the service when there was nothing left to do, Anna found Richard lying in bed, pulled into a tight fetal curl. She lay down next to him, cupped his back with her body, and snaked her arm around his belly and up his chest. But he was stone: silent and cold.

ABOUT ALL THAT REMAINS:

A couple is determined to get on with their lives, but as they try to cope with the loss of their only child, the different ways in which they grieve threatens to tear them apart. 


Anna and Richard, a long-married Manhattan couple, lost their adult son and only child to a violent mugging a year ago. 


Time heals nothing. 


As they struggle to navigate the very different ways in which they grieve their loss, they meet two young people who are fighting their own demons.


Over the course of a shattering weekend, Anna and Richard face devastating secrets that have simmered beneath the surface of their marriage and threaten to tear their lives apart.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:


Jane Darby's short stories, essays, and articles have appeared in Lynx Eye, Washington Square Review, Storyglossia, Feminine Collective, New York Runner Magazine, and This One Has No Name.

Recently she worked as a creative consultant and researcher for the documentary film, The Art of Eating: The Life of M.F.K. Fisher. 

All That Remains is her first novel(la). 

She lives in rural Connecticut.

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