@Susan Quinland 2021
BOOK SIX: Whispering GIFTS NOW AVAILABLE!
A Bad, Bad Day
Lou was having a really bad day. She had been fired, rent was due, and her best friend stole her boyfriend.
So, when Lou inherited Grandma’s bakery in a little town called Whispering Mountain, she decided that being jobless, virtually friendless, and boyfriendless meant it was a perfect time to take a break from her life.
Malcolm had been nothing but a shadow, cursed in his ethereal Wraith form for more than two hundred years. Restless and bored, he started following some of the residents of Whispering Mountain just for something to do. Then he saw her. He now had a purpose: follow her, find out why she was so different, why he could — almost– feel something when she was around.
Lou had been coming to Whispering Mountain since she was a kid, but she didn’t quite expect to find a town full of super nice but crazy people who claimed they could control the rain, grow absolutely anything, and deliberately cause avalanches, tornadoes and lightning strikes…
But when her cat started talking to her, whispering in her head like it was the most normal thing in the world, it was time to take a closer look at those claims.
And figure out why that ghost was following her.
Running away was her only, best option.
Sometimes the only thing to do is run away. Good thing Shayla had someplace to run; her friend’s new place way up north in the beautiful Pacific Northwest. Shayla grabbed her camera, laptop, her huge and surprisingly fierce cat, and for some weird reason, a plant, and never looked back. Well, she did watch to make sure that horrid, rotten ex-boyfriend Peter wasn’t following her.
Peter had hit her for breaking up with him. For hitting her. Jerk.
Whispering Mountain was everything she’d hoped for. She got a job, an apartment, made friends, and her cat–who wasn’t a cat after all–started talking to her.
But that wasn’t the weird part. Her friend had married a ghost. And he had a brother, just as ghost-y and just as gorgeous.
Too bad she was on a moratorium from men.
Of course in this case, she might be persuaded to make an exception.
Some Vows you just have to keep…
Isn’t that always the way it goes? Just when things are getting hot, the guy skips out and gives you the cold shoulder. Well, flame that, Katlyn was not having it.
She had loved that hunk of gorgeousness for too long to give up now.
Until she heard about someone new in his life, someone he was keeping secret.
Gabriel knew it was going to happen sooner or later. He had made a promise, no, a vow, and it was time to make good on that vow. Even if it hurt him. Even if it hurt Katlyn.
Some things were just too important.
Now Katlyn wasn’t speaking to him – mostly because he refused to take her calls, but it was better that way, at least for now. He had to deal with this, to deal with things he had done. Attempted murder for one. Well, technically it was an accident, but try telling that to the guy whose daughter he has just kidnapped.
He just wished he could have Katlyn, too.
Jake was cursed, desperate, and alone.
After more than two hundred years, Jake’s brothers had successfully broken their curses and reverted to their human forms, leaving Jake alone to haunt the wilds of Whispering Mountain. Without his brothers as a distraction and unable to touch or communicate in his ghostly form, Jake was desperate enough to keep the memories and guilt from his past from overwhelming him that he started hanging around town.
Then he saw her.
To protect her family from the shame of a devastating secret, Annabelle was on the run. No one would never suspect she fled to the one town every Wraith knew was too dangerous, and therefore forbidden for their kind.
She arrived in the surprisingly welcoming and idyllic small town of Whispering Mountain, found a job and a place to stay. The very last thing she needed was a locally infamous cursed ghost bothering her.
But thousands of miles wasn’t far enough for those who hunted her. They knew exactly where Annabelle was, and they were coming for her
Movie Stars are just so annoying…
Dani didn’t usually get worked up over actors, but something about this hunky action movie star just got her blood boiling. He was rude, arrogant, much too good-looking, and absolutely didn’t belong on her lake. She just wished she could stop dreaming about him.
Mega movie star Logan Gray had known plenty of beautiful women, but this one was different. He apologized for almost upsetting her kayak on the lake, so why did her obvious dislike intrigue him?
Two years later, Logan’s career is in shambles and he came back to Whispering Mountain to heal. He kept running into the pretty brunette from the lake all over town, almost like someone was trying to push them together. She was smart, funny, and, unfortunately, a little crazy, claiming her magic cat could talk. Even so, he couldn’t get the petite beauty out of his head.
Someone else was watching Logan, someone who was taking matters in her own hands to make her perfect plan a reality. Even the voices in her head agreed: no matter what it took, Logan Gray would be hers. Forever.
And no one–not that ridiculous dressmaker or Logan Gray himself–had better get in her way.
She was DONE with Artists… so she thought.
Amelia Barnes refused to admit her heart had been broken. It was just another breakup. No big deal. She would concentrate on managing the Gallery and begin painting again. She was ashamed to admit how much that… creep had undermined her confidence. More than her heart had been damaged, he had broken her spirit.
Amelia was done with men. Especially artists.
Clayton Frye was back home. He had left Whispering Mountain abruptly fifteen years ago when he Shifted unexpectedly outside of his family’s usual Mark. In time, he accepted his gifts and honed his talents until he was good enough to display at The Clear Skies Gallery and stop the wagging tongues.
Delighted that his old High School crush Amelia Barnes was now the manager at the Gallery, Clay noted that she was still critical, still intense, still made his heart pound. She was even better now, as a woman, than in his fantasies.
Time to reclaim his town, but he was not alone. Where had that grey cat with big, intense orange eyes come from, and why was it sitting on the front seat of his truck?
G’Day, mate. Where’re we headin’?
Great. A Fale. Just what he needed..
I love romance. I love the concept of the supernatural. BUT, I was a little tired of the same old tropes, with Vampires and Lycanthropes, especially. Either they super clean or they were super erotic… and not much in between.
Not very realistic.
Brainstorming with a writer friend, we came up with this new world of the Insuri, sketched out a set of scenarios, stories and a series arc. My friend went back to writing her particular brand of SF Romance and I ran with Whispering Mountain.
So here you have it: a new breed of Elemental supernaturals living in a perfect little self-contained town surrounded by mountains, forests, lakes and rivers, where the people control the weather and can grow anything, a world full of surprises and quirky people, curses, talking cats (who are not cats), gossips, romance, a Welcome sign that counts residents but ignores tourists, and an ancient Stone of Creation that is just starting to wake up.
See? Much more realistic.
— Susan Quinland, aka Carrie Jo Thomas
