As the Tangled Souls 99 cents sale continues (see previous post), here’s a bit more about my very unique characters. Leave it to me to pair a Wiccan and an Irish Catholic in a romance.

The heart of any novel is the lead characters. Not only do they have to be believable, they have to possess a complexity that warrants the reader’s interest. In short, the characters better have a strong “back story” (their personal history) and compelling “issues” that must be resolved over the course of the novel.

Authors spend a great deal of time working out those elements to ensure the story is strong. To that end, I purposely chose to make Tangled Souls’ two lead characters from opposite ends of the religious spectrum.
Douglas O’Fallon is a red-haired Irishman who has lived in the US for a number of years. He has a strong sense of right and wrong, which is reflected in his career as homicide detective in Los Angeles.

He’s Roman Catholic and rather devout, despite two divorces. He and his priest (O’Fallon’s former partner and ex-homicide detective Avery Elliott) are best friends. Now a private investigator, O’Fallon has a deep distrust of most things supernatural, which is awkward since he’s psychokinetic (has the ability to “pull” images off everyday objects). That “gift” makes him very uncomfortable, if not physically ill, especially when he was working crime scenes. In fact, he took early retirement just because of that problem.

My hero is cynical and stubborn, but a romantic; a man who has lost at love more than once and yet still believes he’ll find the right lady. His “history” and his disdain for psychic charlatans immediately puts him at odds with my heroine, Gavenia Kingsgrave.

Gavenia is from a different faith tradition: she’s Wiccan, as is her aunt. Her “gift” came to her late in life, just a few months before, and now she’s a Shepherd, tasked with helping the souls of the dead to make the journey toward The Light (Heaven). It’s a difficult and heartbreaking job with a high burnout rate. Her Ethereal Guardian (Bartholomew Quickens) is trying to teach her the ropes, but even Bart isn’t allowed to tell her everything.
In addition to the “job” stress, Gavenia has some serious emotional issues stemming from a horrific event when she was a teenager, making it hard for her trust men.
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So we have one pigheaded Irishman going head-to-head with an equally stubborn woman, both with romantic baggage. Put them on the mean streets of L.A., with a murder mystery to solve and dangerous ghosts on the loose, add in a dash of romance and that’s Tangled Souls. Personally, it’s one of my favourite tales if nothing more than for Gavenia and O’Fallon’s love story. ‪#‎TangledSouls ‪#‎99cents ‪#‎Ireland ‪#‎MurderMystery

Tangled Souls, my adult paranormal romantic suspense, is currently on sale for 99 cents (99 pence etc.) for the e-book edition. It’s available worldwide on Kindle, Nook, Kobo, ibooks and GooglePlay and will remain on sale until Friday, July 17 at midnight PDT. A print edition is also available.

Finalist for four Romance awards!

Wiccan Gavenia Kingsgrave’s psychic gift, the ability to talk to the dead, comes with strings attached. As a Shepherd, she escorts them into the hereafter, but not all the souls want to cross over, and some can be downright vicious. When her latest case involves a heart-breaking hit-and-run victim, Gavenia is stressed to the max. The last thing she needs is a no-nonsense private detective on her tail, even if he is a handsome Irishman.

Former homicide detective Douglas O’Fallon possesses his own psychic gift, one he’s denied for years. Hired by a wealthy client to prove Gavenia’s a con artist, he’s skeptical of the witch’s claims she can speak to the dead. If he finds her gift to be genuine, then he will be forced to accept his own. When their two cases intersect, opposites attract. But will they able to set aside their differences long enough to outwit their foes — both the living and the dead?
 
Why I wrote Tangled Souls (from a 2013 author interview):
This story had a long gestation, some ten years in the making. During that time I have returned to the manuscript when my schedule permitted, though the story is still pretty much as it was back at the beginning. Gavenia and O’Fallon have always waited patiently for their tale to be told and now it’s their moment in the sun.
The original idea for the story came from an article about a lightworker who helps the dead across the Veil. Back in 1983, she and other like-minded folks were in the middle of a ritual when the spirits of dead soldiers walked through the walls of their room, drawn by their “light”. Shaken by the experience, the woman pointed the soldiers toward the Veil and they crossed over. It was only later she realized that the exact moment the soldiers had appeared is when the Marine barracks was bombed in Beirut, leaving countless dead.
That story has remained with me for years, and I decided to write a book about a Shepherd and a PI who learn to accept the gifts they’ve been given and, along the way, find love. Hope you enjoy Tangled Souls.