As I mentioned last Friday, author Joylene Nowell Butler is on tour this month with MC Book Tours featuring her new mystery novel, Mâtowak: Woman Who Cries. It will be released November 1st by Dancing Lemur Press L.L.C.
- Copies are currently available for pre-order in eBook at the following sites:
Amazon.ca
Amazon.com
Dancing Lemur Press, L.L.C - Print copies are available for pre-order at:
Amazon.ca
Amazon.com
My blog is today’s location on the tour, and I’m offering a tantalizing sneak peek from Chapter 12. I think you’ll enjoy it.
You can follow the rest of Joylene’s daily tour schedule by clicking here to find other excerpts, Q&As, chances to win copies of her book and more. If you click on the bright red Rafflecopter link at the end of this page (below the excerpt), there’s an opportunity to enter to win one of three print copies of Mâtowak: Woman Who Cries (available to people in the USA only) and one eBook copy (available internationally). The giveaway ends November 22nd.
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Synopsis:
A murder enveloped in pain and mystery…
When Canada’s retired Minister of National Defense, Leland Warner, is murdered in his home, the case is handed to Corporal Danny Killian, an aboriginal man tortured by his wife’s unsolved murder.
The suspect, 60-year-old Sally Warner, still grieves for the loss of her two sons, dead in a suicide/murder eighteen months earlier. Confused and damaged, she sees in Corporal Killian a friend sympathetic to her grief and suffering and wants more than anything to trust him.
Danny finds himself with a difficult choice—indict his prime suspect, the dead minister’s horribly abused wife or find a way to protect her and risk demotion. Or worse, transfer away from the scene of his wife’s murder and the guilt that haunts him…
Now here’s the promised excerpt…
Chapter 12
A chill targets my spine, and my eyelids feel as if they’re stuck open. I wrap my sweater tightly and fold my arms across my chest.
Blink, Sally.
Through the French doors and across the way to my husband’s study, an officer rummages through Leland’s desk, then his filing cabinet. How many are upstairs going through, well, who knows what really? How many are in the kitchen and the garage?
Bad images cloud my judgment. Why is Corporal Killian disrupting my life? I trusted him. I thought he liked me.
Blink, Sally.
Does he sense my fear?
I focus on comforting visions. Images of blackberry bushes rise in front of me. My gloved hands sweep the stems aside. I concentrate on relaxing by slowing my breathing. Out of my peripheral vision, on the fringe of the room, I see someone hunting through the wet bar and the cupboards beneath. He knocks about on the shelves with only his shoulders and head visible. The small refrigerator door swooshes open, he looks in. Another officer says something to him and he shuts the door.
What are they after? What have they been doing since I left this morning? I should never have left. I should have stayed and—and—and…
I pull a tissue from my pocket and face the fireplace. Next to it are the French doors leading out back. I dab at the moisture on my upper lip. A gust of wind swirls the white flakes outside, throwing them to and fro. I feel like the snow, my thoughts blowing in many directions.
I twist to the left away from Pinscher’s and Killian’s scrutiny and, through the other French doors, see a man pass from the breakfast room to the kitchen. He disappears. The upright freezer door opens. The door and adjacent wall block my view, but I imagine him unwrapping each package, then rewrapping sloppily and tossing them aside. He does this until he’s opened every package. He returns them to the freezer. I see all this in my mind. After they leave, I’ll have to rewrap everything. A voice inside of me says you’re being absurd. Of course they wouldn’t go through my—freezer. The door closes. Now I sense him going through the pantry…
Fifteen minutes have passed according to the grandfather clock near the entrance wall. I’m grateful I sit in my gathering room and not in my bedroom. The idea that a stranger would go through my lingerie drawer is almost too much to bear. I feel violated. My skin crawls. Killian speaks to someone. I turn in time to see Lacroix. I recognize him immediately, though I haven’t seen him since our sons died. He’s coming this way. I look to Killian for support. He’s too busy eyeing his boss. Lacroix sits down across from me but something distracts him near the room’s entrance. I drop my hands to my lap and, remembering my Law and Order shows, try hard not to appear frightened.
** The Rafflecopter giveaway **
(Click the link!)
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Joylene lives with her husband and their two cats Marbles and Shasta on beautiful Cluculz Lake in central British Columbia. They spend their winters in Bucerias, Nayarit, Mexico. For more on Joylene and her writing, visit her website and blog then connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, and her Amazon Author Page.
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