TUESDAY EXCERPTS: “DEAD OF WINTER”

Welcome to another Tuesday celebrating bookish events, First Chapter/Intros, hosted by Bibliophile by the Sea; and Teaser Tuesdays hosted by The Purple Booker.

Today’s feature is a recent download:  Dead of Winter, by Wendy Corsi Staub, a Lily Dale Mystery.

 

 

Intro:  Belle Jordan squints and takes aim.  Just as she presses the trigger, a voice bellows, “Mom!”

Jolted, she misses the target.

A fat white blob lands in the middle of a newly installed tile instead of in the seam along the countertop.  With a sigh, she sets aside the caulk gun and grabs a rag.

“Mom!”

“What is it, Max?”

Her six-year-old son offers an unintelligible response from the small TV room off the front parlor.

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Teaser:  Calla turns away with her phone.  It doesn’t allow her any more privacy, because every word on her end is still audible, but they can’t see her expression.  Still, Misty can hear the trepidation in her voice (50%).

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Synopsis:  Just as a murderer dumps his corpse into the lake across Valley View in Lily Dale, Bella Jordan happens to be at her window, not quite realizing what she’s seeing. Unbeknownst to her, the killer spots her silhouette and prowls straight to her door. That is, until he’s interrupted by a black cat. A superstitious gambler, he takes off, but Bella’s seen too much, and he vows to return.

Jiffy Arden, a neighborhood kid looking for the black cat and stumbling across the killer, begins to have premonitions of being kidnapped during the season’s first snowstorm. Sure enough, when it strikes, he vanishes, never arriving home from the bus stop. While her son, Max, believes Jiffy has been kidnapped, Bella is convinced he’s just wandered off as he typically does… until a body shows up in the lake.

Now everyone is pulling out all the stops to find the missing child, identify the victim, and collar the killer. And fast, because he’s coming for Bella next in Dead of Winter.

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What do you think?  Do you want to know more?  Would you keep reading?

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