I
am thrilled to be hosting a spot on the BEHIND THE VEIL by E.J. Dawson Blog
Tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours. Check out my post and make sure to enter the
giveaway!
About
The Book:
Author: E.J. Dawson
Pub. Date: October
1, 2021
Publisher: Literary
Wanderlust
Formats: Paperback,
eBook, Audiobook
Pages: 292
Find it: Goodreads, Amazon, Kindle, Audible, B&N, TBD, Bookshop.org
Read for FREE with a Kindle Unlimited
membership!
Can she keep the secrets of her past to rescue a girl tormented by a ghost?
In 1920s Los Angeles, Letitia Hawking reads the veil between life and death. A
scrying bowl allows her to experience the final moments of the deceased. She
brings closure to grief-stricken war widows and mourning families.
For Letitia, it is a penance. She knows no such peace.
For Alasdair Driscoll, it may be the only way to save his niece, Finola, from
her growing night terrors. But when Letitia sees a shadowy figure attached to
the household, it rouses old fears of her unspeakable past in England.
When a man comes to her about his missing daughter, the third girl to go
missing in as many months, Letitia can’t help him when she can’t see who’s
taken them.
As a darkness haunts Letitia’s vision, she may not be given a choice in helping
the determined Mr Driscoll, or stop herself falling in love with him. But to do
so risks a part of herself she locked away, and to release it may cost Letitia
her sanity and her heart.
Reviews:
“The author is adept at selling not only the novel’s supernatural elements, but the historical era as well. She takes her time building the characters and the world around them, which pays dividends once the really spooky stuff starts to happen. Like all good ghost stories, the true horrors aren’t entirely spectral: The characters are haunted by personal traumas and secrets as frightening as any spirit. An old-fashioned ghost story told with inventiveness and style.”-Kirkus Reviews
"A powerful reflection on mortality and the lengths some will go to find closure or their own separate peace. A suspenseful but patient ride from start to finish, Dawson has created an empathic and endlessly engaging protagonist in Letitia. The plot is well supported by a poignantly penned cast of characters that readers can envision and invest in. Emulating a 1920s literary voice, without ever letting the style slip, this paranormal thriller is sinister, macabre, and hugely entertaining." -Self-Publishing Review, ★★★★1/2
EXCERPT
A four-poster bed draped in gauze shrouded the figure within. A pale pink duvet covered the slight frame, illuminated by a rose glass lampshade held aloft by a fairy cast in bronze.
Pretty as it was, Letitia focused on the girl in the bed.
Finola’s breathing was labored, her eyes twitching beneath her lids and forehead clammy, with threads of auburn hair sticking to her skin.
Letitia studied her for several moments.
There was no darkness attached to the girl, though the room’s low light gave too many shadows for Letitia’s liking. Ever wary of self-protection, she took hesitant footsteps closer.
When she stood at the foot of the bed, and was sure there were no dark specters here, she took Finola’s measure.
Finola was drugged, but from the girl’s eyes flickering in uneasy sleep it wasn’t working. Even with the morphine, Letitia could tell what the others could not—Finola would still have the nightmares.
A nurse sat beside the bed, and Letitia looked to her, letting a sliver of the nurse’s personality in.
A warm autumn breeze regarded her, refreshing though it was weak. The nurse stared at Letitia but made no comment at Letitia’s scrutiny.
“What’s your name?” Letitia asked, coming around the bed to offer her hand.
“Nurse Hopkins.” Hopkins had curling brown hair and hard dark eyes. A firm hand gripped Letitia’s gloved one, and she maintained eye contact. There was a hardness within the nurse, and Letitia guessed she’d served in the war. Not on the front lines, but she was toughened by her experience.
“What can you tell me about Finola’s condition?” Letitia asked. Mr. Driscoll came up beside her, and Letitia held up a hand to silence him. He glared but nodded permission for Hopkins to speak when the nurse hesitated.
“She has terrible night episodes,” the nurse said, “like those of the soldiers coming back. When she’s awake she cries a lot, she…bathes often but won’t eat much.” The nurse’s glance dipped between Finola and Mrs. Quinn as though she would say more, but she pressed her lips together.
“What else?” Letitia’s gentle tone, and the retreat of Mr. Driscoll’s looming form, let loose the nurse’s tongue.
“I walk with her in the gardens,” she said. “She…doesn’t like people to touch her. Appears distracted and nervous, takes to fright, doesn’t like strange men—the gardeners and delivery men and such.”
It was succinct but what Letitia needed to hear. “Thank you, could you give me a moment?”
The nurse needed another nod from Mr. Driscoll before she took her leave.
“Well?” Mrs. Quinn asked, standing on the far side of the bed, touching her daughter’s forehead. The girl flinched, and Mrs. Quinn drew back her hand with a disappointed frown.
“Please don’t,” Letitia asked, and Mrs. Quinn’s glower turned to acute displeasure.
“She’s my daughter and she’s sick.” Mrs. Quinn’s voice held a razor’s edge that hadn’t been there before.
“She also can’t distinguish who is touching her when she’s dreaming,” Letitia said, and Mrs. Quinn covered her widening mouth, gaze darting between Letitia and Finola. She must come do this often, and what should have been the comforting gesture of a mother made the nightmares worse.
About E.J. Dawson:
E.J.
Dawson both credits and blames her mother-by reading The Lord of the Rings
aloud to E.J. twice-for her complete absorption with the world of fiction.
Growing up in a haunted mansion sandwiched between an abandoned mine and an
endless pine plantation should have been all the fuel E.J.'s imagination needed,
but her parents filled her life with stories: about themselves, their lives,
and the ones they had found through the pages of books.
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Giveaway
Details:
1
winner will win a finished copy of BEHIND THE VEIL & Swag, International.
Tour Schedule:
Week One:
|
11/8/2021 |
Guest Post |
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11/8/2021 |
Excerpt |
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11/9/2021 |
Review |
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11/9/2021 |
Guest Post |
|
|
11/10/2021 |
Review |
|
|
11/10/2021 |
Review |
|
|
11/11/2021 |
Excerpt |
|
|
11/11/2021 |
Review |
|
|
11/12/2021 |
Review |
|
|
11/12/2021 |
Review |
Week Two:
|
11/15/2021 |
Review |
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11/15/2021 |
Review |
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11/16/2021 |
Review |
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11/16/2021 |
Review |
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11/17/2021 |
Review |
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11/17/2021 |
Review |
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11/18/2021 |
Review |
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11/18/2021 |
Review |
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11/19/2021 |
Review |
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11/19/2021 |
Review |
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