Mystery – Barbara Edwards Comments

Please meet Casi McLean, author of Beneath The Lake – A Time-Slip, Romantic Suspense – Rated PG13

Worldwide Amazon Link: http://smarturl.it/BeneathTheLake

What is your inspiration for For Beneath The Lake, Casi?:

I love to talk about my story, Beneath The Lake, and the eerie lake lore that inspired my muse. A town that time forgot––the history and creepy stories attached to a rural area that sleeps beneath Atlanta’s famous man-made lake, Sidney Lanier, fascinated me. Homes, churches and businesses still linger beneath the surface. The moonshiners of the 1940’s added built-in suspense, and the birth of NASCAR. Looper Speedway, a half-mile dirt track where bootleggers competed with their souped-up cars, exposed its cement stands in a recent draught.

There’s a Lady of the Lake who haunts the ghost town too––the spine-chilling lore is the basis for book three in my Beneath The Lake series, Between The Shadows. Some say she lures victims to her watery grave. The truth is, swimmers get trapped among the deadfall of sheered-off trees and town remains. Even expert divers get tangled beneath the murky surface, hence the lake’s unnerving label: Lanier never gives up its dead. The inspiration swirled in my mind, begging for a story to be told. What a perfect setting for my romantic time-slip suspense series.

Why time-slip? Ever since my childhood imagination discovered Madeleine L’Engles, A Wrinkle In Time, the idea of time travel intrigued me. And Lake Lanier, a man-made lake with mesmerizing history, presented a plausible theory. What if the excavation explosions triggered a seismic shift? Given enough energy, could the blasts rip a portal into a different dimension or a crack in time? The possibilities were endless.

The birth of Lacey Montgomery evolved through my young adult love for Jude Deveraux’s A Knight In Shining Armor. The time-slip novel introduced her endearing Montgomery family. I hope my books honor her inspiration. My high school friend, Hilary Johnson, inspired the persona of my heroine, Lacey Montgomery. A lawyer, discouraged with defending criminals, yearned to help honest people in trouble. Some of Hillary’s finer qualities became part of Lacey––the dysfunctional relationships came from my own personal experiences. LOL. Once these elements entwined, Beneath The Lake blossomed with an energy and life of its own.

The sequel, Beyond The Mist, picks up where the first story ends incorporating two minor characters as the new hero and heroine. Beyond The Mist is complete, in editing, and will be published in a few months.

For a Free Gift, and a chance to win my entire short story collection, Destiny: Five Novelettes With a Twist, click here:https://spark.adobe.com/page/pxekfzj8Rx4el/

I hope you enjoy my trailer, blurb, and the opening excerpt below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwOqm8DUUfA

Blurb –

A ghost town submerged beneath Atlanta’s famous man-made Lake Lanier reportedly lures victims to a watery grave. But when Lacey Montgomery’s car spins out of control and hurtles into the depths of the icy water, she awakens in the arms of a stranger, in a town she’s never heard of–34 years before she was born.

When the 2012 lawyer tangles with a 1949 hunk, fire and ice swirl into a stream of sweltering desire. Bobby Reynolds is smitten the moment the storm-ravaged woman opens her eyes and, despite adamant protest, Lacey falls in love with a town destined for extinction, and the man who vows to save his legacy.

Threatened by a nefarious stalker, the wrath of bootleggers, and twists of fate, Lacey must find the key to a mysterious portal before time rips the lovers apart, leaving their star-crossed spirits to wander forever through a ghost town buried beneath the lake.

Excerpt:

Lake Lanier, Georgia—June 2011

A final thud hurled him backward, flailing through brush and thickets like a rag doll. Grasping at anything to break momentum, Rob’s hand clung to a branch wedged into the face of the precipice. Spiny splinters sliced his skin. Blood oozed and trickled into his palms, and one by one, his fingers slowly slipped.

A sharp crack echoed through the silence of the ravine as the bough succumbed to his weight. He plummeted into free-fall. Clenching his eyes, he drew in a deep breath, terrified of the pain, the mauling that waited on the jagged rocks below.

When icy water broke his fall, the chill kept him from losing consciousness. He spun, straining to see, but darkness enveloped him. Soggy clothing pulled him deeper—deeper into the murky, fathomless depths. He wrestled to squirm free from the waterlogged jacket dragging him down to a watery grave, watched the coat disappear into black obscurity. Panic gripped his stomach, or was it death that snaked around his chest, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing the air, the life from his body? Lack of oxygen burned his lungs, beckoning surrender, and a shard of rage pierced his gut as reality set in. He lunged upward with one last thrust and burst from the water’s deadly grip, gasping for air. A gurgling howl spewed from the depths of his soul and echoed into silence.

Sunlight shimmered across a smooth, indigo lake, but aside from the slight ripples of his own paddling, nothing but stillness surrounded him. He floated toward the shore, sucking deep breaths into his lungs until the pummeling in his chest subsided. When he reached the water’s edge, he hoisted his body onto the soft red clay and collapsed while the sun’s warmth drained the tension from his body.

No one knew he had survived. The rules had shifted. Now he could reinvent himself, become a stealth predator. His target: Lacey Madison Montgomery.

Amazon Best-Selling Author Casi McLean Bio:

Award winning author, Casi McLean, pens novels to stir the soul with romance, suspense, and a sprinkle of magic. Her writing crosses genres from ethereal, captivating shorts with eerie twist endings to believable time slips, mystical plots, and sensual romantic suspense. Beneath The Lake won the 2016 Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence for BEST Romantic Suspense.

Her stories entwine strong, believable heroines with delicious hot heroes to tempt the deepest desires then fans the flames, sweeping readers into their innermost romantic fantasies. Ms. McLean weaves exceptional romantic mystery with suspenseful settings and lovable characters you’ll devour. You’ll see, hear, and feel the magical eeriness of one fateful night. You’ll swear her time travel could happen, be mystified by her other worldly images, and feel heat of romantic suspense, but most of all you’ll want more.

Contact Links:

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Winner Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence

Winner 2016 Best Heroine Still Moments Magazine

2016 Aspen Gold Finalist for Best Romantic Suspense

2015 Top Pick by Night Owl Reviews

2015 Chicago Fire and Ice Finalist

2014 Winner 2014 AWC Short Story Award

Romantic Suspense, Time Slips, And Mystery with a Sprinkle of Magic….

Welcome to my guest, Kathy L Wheeler

Please tell us why you wrote Blood Stained Memories.

I originally started this book to write under Mel Odom’s Winter Frost gothic line. But as so often happens, I got sidetracked and it was put on the back shelf. In the meantime, my friend Amanda McCabe and I flew to Atlanta for the RWA National Conference, but decided to drive home. We stopped in Pensacola for three nights and stumbled upon Fort Pickens which turned out to be the perfect setting for my Gothic Romance.

We went by there twice. The first time, we made it to the museum store and all hell broke loose. The sky was black, the wind pelting. You truly could tell the ocean from the sky. There was no seeing the ruins that day! We drove back the next day. We’d almost decided not to go, but it was just too irresistible. It was almost 6p as we pulled into the parking lot and one last car was leaving. The sun was out, but the sky on one side was dark. You’ve seen those days, right? Half sun, half it-can’t-tell-what-it-wants-to-do? By this time the museum was closed but the ruins were open. There were tri-fold sheets with a numbering system that detailed the different parts. So Amanda read, while I explored. You see, she is a bit…um…claustrophobic. We walked by one part with two tunnels that looked as if they might meet at the very back. I told her I was going to go in. She said, “I’ll wait here.” I took her picture from way back there and she looked like a ghost. (That’s not even the interesting part.)

We made our way through the 9 sections, stepping over corpses (I think it was a mouse.) We returned to our Victorian B&B and were each on our computers and she starts telling me all this stuff about the ruins. (This was the interesting part.) How they were haunted and the ghosts…I was sooooo glad we hadn’t read that before we visited. I don’t freak out that easily, but man, it was creepy…and the perfect backdrop for Blood Stained Memories.

Blood Stained Memories

A World of Gothic: United States

Kathy L Wheeler

Excerpt:

bloodmemories_cvr_sml I glanced over to my handsome chauffeur. Water from his hair dribbled down a strong neck that disappeared into the collar of his rain-soaked shirt. He and Adam must be somewhere in their mid-to-late thirties by now. I knew his dry hair would resemble burnished gold. The light from the dashboard didn’t reflect the tone of his skin.

I leaned back in the seat and let his accent wash over me. Its familiarity settled nerves drawn so tight I felt I would shatter with a sudden move. I cleared my throat. “Where do you call home, Mr. Creighton?” There wasn’t much of him that reminded me of that long ago young man, just the clipped British words, making it easier to remember to refer to him as Mr. Creighton.

He grinned. Most likely relieved I’d finally joined the conversation. “Call me, Ian. Manchester, mostly. I’ve been here since spring assisting Adam with his research. I spent summers here on the island as a younger man until—” He tossed a quick glance in my direction. “Well, I’d planned on returning home by now.” His gaze dropped to my ringless fingers before he shifted his attention back to the road. “Though I may find my stay here pleasantly extended.”

Until what? I wanted to scream. Instead, heat flamed my cheeks at his not-so-subtle regard. I curled my fingers beneath my tote and out of sight, at a loss for words. My goal on this quiet Gulf Coast island was not to find romance. My sole agenda dealt with the bland contents of the letter stowed in my bag. A letter stained with my own bloody prints.

Amz preorder buy link (won’t have the rest until the 8^th): https://amzn.com/B01K82OKJG

Blurb: There on the Gulf Coast in the Florida Panhandle lies the ruins of a haunted, old armory…

Blurb: Helena Abigail Evans-Ross remembers nothing from her past except the sting of her Aunt Lydia’s hand almost knocking her head from her shoulders. “Don’t look!” she screamed, just as Abby’s gaze meets her father’s blank stare, and the realization that she is holding the bloody knife that ended his life. She’s home to learn the truth—but can she live with a truth is she is the one who murdered her own father?

A World of Gothic Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AWorldofGothicSeries

Bio: Kathy L Wheeler (aka Kae Elle Wheeler) is the author of fourteen contemporary and historical novels and novellas that range from sweet to spicy. She has a BA in Management Information Systems from the University of Central Oklahoma that includes a vocal minor. She loves the NFL, the NBA, musical theater, travel, reading, writing and just to scratch the singing itch…. karaoke. She is a member Romance Writers of American and The Beau Monde chapter. She currently serves as editor of both, the Regency Reader and Novel Notes Authors newsletters. Kathy lives in Edmond, OK with her attorney and musically talented husband, Al. She has one grown daughter with an adorable baby boy and another on the way, and one bossy cat, who acts as if she were the rescuer rather than the rescue-e!!

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