Book Excerpt & Giveaway: The Grotesques by Tia Reed

Tia will be awarding a $20 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Description

Discredited journalist Ella Jerome isn’t thrilled about working at Adelaide’s fanciful tabloid The Informer. So when zoologist Adam Lowell seeks her help in finding his missing cousin, she’s cynical of his claim a monster lurks near the Church of the Resurrection. The trouble is, solving the gruesome case could be her best shot at restoring her shredded reputation.

With her old instincts resurfacing, Ella combs the Port for clues. Experience tells her the only monsters are the human variety, and the bloodied stonemason certainly raises her suspicions. But when her investigation turns up everything from petrified remains to the headless carving of a dragon, the truth threatens to steal both her sanity and the man she’s falling for.

After all, gargoyles can’t be anything other than harmless stone. Or can they?

Excerpt

Ella slapped the snooze button on her alarm clock and buried her face in the pillow. A moment later the shrill ring of the telephone elicited a groan.

Her hand searched the cluttered bedside cabinet until it connected with her mobile. Turning over, she mumbled her name while wiping sleep-encrusted eyes, then immediately held the receiver away from her ear as the voice of Phil Waterman, senior editor at The Informer, barked down the line.

“Get out of bed. I need you to attend a press conference in half an hour. The police have just hauled another body from the Port River.”

“What?” Suddenly alert, Ella sat bolt upright.

“You heard me.”

Wincing in anticipation of Phil’s ear-splitting orders, she nestled the phone between her shoulder and ear and reached for the pen and pad that sat permanently between a lopsided lamp and an unfinished crime novel.

“You got details?” She flicked to a blank page.

“Of course I haven’t got any details, woman. You’re the journalist. Just get down there and report.” She could imagine him reclining in his chair, extended legs crossed in front of him, half-eaten cinnamon doughnut balanced on his beer belly.

“Who else is covering this?”

“I’m sending you.” She heard the slurp of a sucked finger.

“I’m not about to give you a vampire bat story.”

“Vampire bat? You got some lead I don’t know about?” His voice, though quieter, rasped suspiciously. “Last I heard the take was a killer shark.”

“Whatever, Phil. Look, you know I don’t do your sort of cover stories.”

“Yeah, but this is big, Jerome.” He adopted a confidential tone. “My reporters are sassy creative writers but they couldn’t look into a parking fine if the warden was waving it under their noses. You’re the best investigative reporter this state has, and I sure as hell want a scoop for The Informer.”

Ella sighed. “Phil, I might work for you, but I don’t want my name tagged to fantastical nonsense.” Even to her own ears she sounded tired, defeated. One day soon she was going to cave in and be done with clinging to whatever shreds of dignity she had left.

“Just get me the story. For Pete’s sake, woman, six girls missing, one with a severed torso and the latest…” He broke off. “Things could hardly get-”

“The latest what?” she interrupted.

“-more sensational than that.”

There was a pause as she waited vainly for an answer.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Tia Reed loves nothing better than burying her nose in a story of her own imagining, cuddling her bossy cat and rescuing chewed pillows from her hyperactive dog. She takes every opportunity to do all three when she is not teaching English as a second language. Her other hobbies usually take a back seat but include trying to tame her beast of a garden, hiking and travelling. The latter has thrown her many interesting, sometimes hair-raising experiences, which she loves twisting into stories. She was born in Malta, but lives in Adelaide, Australia.

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8099993.Tia_Reed
http://tychebooks.com/product_author/tia-reed/
https://www.facebook.com/Tia-Reed-1718346235054078/

https://www.amazon.com/Grotesques-Tia-Reed/dp/1928025390
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-grotesques-tia-reed/1122744363

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/588948

Tia will be awarding a $20 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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