Sneak peek of Hoodoo Woman

Right now I'm busy preparing the third book in my Roxie Mathis paranormal series for release. Hoodoo Woman is going to bring some big changes to the life of witch and paranormal investigator Roxie. Her love life's a mess, her vampire ancestor is drunk all the time, and her new spirit familiar keeps giving her attitude. The very last thing she wants to do is return to the hometown she fled, but that's exactly what she's asked to do - by her old boyfriend. But he's got a good reason. Here's a brief teaser:

“Why are you really here, Ray?”

He took a drink of coffee then looked away and rubbed his jaw. I remembered that move. Something was up and he was making a decision. After a moment he met my eyes. “There’s something going on back home.”

“What is it?”

Now he was all cop. “Britney Parker, twenty-four, found face down in the water down by the landing.” He meant Blythe Landing, the marina and state park on Kentucky Lake about a fifteen-minute drive from downtown Blythe. “Her blood alcohol level was twice the legal limit and there was marijuana in her system. Empty beer bottles in her car, half a joint and a dime bag. The coroner ruled it accidental before I could do much in the way of investigating. He’s friends with her family.”

“Her family? She one of the Parkers?”

He nodded once, rubbing his jaw again. Something about this made him nervous and that wasn’t like him.

I said, “I always thought those people were like something out of those Faulkner books I read the Cliff’s Notes to in high school.” A rich, powerful, small-town clan, I’d done my best to avoid them as much as my mother had done her best to curry favor with them.

Ray took a long swallow of coffee in a manner that suggested he wished it were laced with something stronger. “I think she was murdered.”

“Why?”

“Because her ghost wrote the word murdered on my refrigerator with a can of whipped cream.”

Taken aback, I raised my eyebrows. “Well, don’t that beat all?”

Storm magic - wild, unpredictable, and guaranteed to turn the world upside down. Roxie Mathis is stronger than ever now that she's learned to call thunder and lightning and she's rebuilding her life. But her lover Blake doesn't trust her new supernatural assistant or the untamed magic she now practices. Roxie will have to decide between making him happy or being true to herself.

To complicate things further, her old love Ray Travis asks her to come home. A dead girl is haunting the entire town and the only way to bring the spirit to peace is to solve her murder. With her vampire ancestor along for the ride, Roxie bites the bullet and decides to face her past. Caught in a web of secrets and magic, going home could kill Roxie - or set her free.

If you'd like to know when Hoodoo Woman is released, keep an eye on the Here Be News posts on this blog, or sign up for my new release newsletter: http://eepurl.com/bT3NL. I don't have an exact date (this is a self-pub project) but the book will be live no later than the first of June.