The Widow of Pale Harbor by Hester Fox

From the author of the buzzed-about THE WITCH OF WILLOW HALL comes an atmospheric follow-up novel set in historic New England, about a minister who takes a position in a small Maine town plagued by strange occurences that resemble the stories of Edgar Allan Poe, and the woman--rumored to be a witch and a murderer--presumed to be behind them. October 2019 marks the 170th death date of Poe and this is a novel that both compliments the season and the times.

A town gripped by fear. A woman accused of witchcraft. Who can save Pale Harbor from itself?

Maine, 1846. Gabriel Stone is desperate to escape the ghosts that haunt him in Massachusetts after his wife’s death, so he moves to Maine, taking a position as a minister in the remote village of Pale Harbor.

But not all is as it seems in the sleepy town. Strange, unsettling things have been happening, and the townspeople claim that only one person can be responsible: Sophronia Carver, a reclusive widow who lives with a spinster maid in the eerie Castle Carver. Sophronia must be a witch, and she almost certainly killed her husband.
As the incidents escalate, one thing becomes clear: they are the work of a twisted person inspired by the wildly popular stories of Mr. Edgar Allan Poe. And Gabriel must find answers, or Pale Harbor will suffer a fate worthy of Poe’s darkest tales.


I enjoyed The Witch Of Willow Hall by this author so I was excited to get an advance copy of her latest work. This was a historical fiction/mystery with a bit of romance thrown in for good measure.
Sophronia Carver was never made to feel particularly welcome by the people of Pale Harbor Maine after settling there with her cold and cruel husband. Upon his death, the locals began to speculate and gossip that she may have murdered him, either by her own hand or some sort of witchery. Some even claim she has a tail. When strange occurrences begin, and dead animals are found the town gossips blame Sophronia even though she rarely leaves her home and spends her lonely days reading story submissions to her late husband's magazine which she now owns. Its a very solitary existence except for her one true friend and servant Helen.
When Gabriel Stone arrives to take over the church the villagers can't wait to give him on earful of rumors about the Widow, but what they don't know is that he has come to Pale Harbor under false pretenses and has his own secrets as tragic as the one Sophronia keeps.

4 out of 5 stars
I received an advance copy for review.

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About the author
Hester comes to writing from a background in museum work and historical archaeology. She loves the Gothic, the lurid, the dark...so long as the ending is a happy one. She has never seen a ghost, though she remains hopeful.

Hester lives outside of Boston with her husband. THE WITCH OF WILLOW HALL is her first novel.

Website

http://www.hesterfox.com/

Little Whispers by Glen Krisch

It's a time to say goodbye.

Krista Forrester and her family return to her childhood lake house to say goodbye to her dying grandfather. His last wish is to spend his final days surrounded by family. It's a time to reminisce, a time for togetherness and love. But the family's return awakens both forgotten memories and the unsettled spirits tied to the land.

Sometimes memories are better left buried.

Krista never wanted to return to the lake house. She hasn't been back since Breann, her childhood friend, disappeared from the sandy beach right outside her back door. Her disappearance left behind both lingering sorrow and many unanswered questions. Was Breann a victim of a now-convicted serial killer? Will Krista and her family succumb to the evil bound to the lake house? Is Breann still somewhere close, waiting to be discovered? What are those melancholic little whispers Krista hears in the middle of the night?

Only by confronting the tragedies of the past can Krista guarantee her family's future.


A family reunion stirs up more than memories when Krista, her siblings, and their children arrive at the lake house to be with their grandfather in his final days. Years ago, Krista's best friend went missing from this area after they had an argument, never to be found. A convicted murderer may know her whereabouts, but Krista's grandfather may know more than he's admitted to all these years. Part family drama, part mysterious ghost story, this novel hit all the right notes for a captivating read.

I received an advance copy for review.
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Without a Trace by Carissa Ann Lynch

Lily’s gone.
Someone took her.
Unless she was she never there…
A little girl has gone missing.
Lily was last seen being tucked into bed by her adoring mother, Nova. But the next morning, the bed is empty except for a creepy toy rabbit.
Has Nova’s abusive ex stolen his “little bunny” back for good?
At first, Officer Ellie James assumes this is a clear custody battle. Until she discovers that there are no pictures of the girl and her drawers are full of unused toys and brand new clothes that have never been worn…
Is Ellie searching for a missing child who doesn’t actually exist?





After suffering years of mental and physical abuse at the hands of her husband, Nova takes her young daughter and runs like hell. Having no friends or family to turn to since having been isolated from everyone by her smooth and smarmy husband Martin she flees to an isolated, furnished cabin that she has rented with the help of someone she met through an app on her phone. In the morning, her daughter Lily is gone and this story takes a twisty turn from domestic violence to  psychological terror.
4 out of 5 stars.
I received an advance copy for review.


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About the author
Besides my family, my greatest love in life is books. Reading them, writing them, holding them, smelling them…well, you get the idea. I’ve always loved to read, and some of my earliest childhood memories are me, tucked away in my room, lost in a good book. I received a five dollar allowance each week, and I always — always — spent it on books. My love affair with writing started early, but it mostly involved journaling and writing silly poems. Several years ago, I didn’t have a book to read so I decided on a whim to write my own story, something I’d like to read. It turned out to be harder than I thought, but from that point on I was hooked. My first and second books were released by Sarah Book Publishing: This Is Not About Love and Grayson’s Ridge. I’m a total genre-hopper. Basically, I like to write what I like to read: a little bit of everything! I reside in Floyds Knobs, Indiana with my husband, three children, and massive collection of books. I have a degree in psychology and worked as a counselor.

Twelve Nights at Rotter House by J.W. Ocker

Felix Allsey is a travel writer with a keen eye for the paranormal, and he's carved out a unique, if only slightly lucrative, niche for himself in nonfiction; he writes travelogues of the country's most haunted places, after haunting them himself.

When he convinces the owner of the infamous Rotterdam Mansion to let him stay on the premises for 13 nights, he believes he's finally found the location that will bring him a bestseller. As with his other gigs, he sets rules for himself: no leaving the house for any reason, refrain from outside contact, and sleep during the day.

When Thomas Ruth, Felix's oldest friend and fellow horror film obsessive, joins him on the project, the two dance around a recent and unspeakably painful rough-patch in their friendship, but eventually fall into their old rhythms of dark humor and movie trivia. That's when things start going wrong: screams from upstairs, figures in the thresholds, and more than what should be in any basement. Felix realizes the book he's writing, and his very state of mind, is tilting from nonfiction into all out horror, and the shocking climax answers a question that's been staring these men in the face all along: In Rotter House, who's haunting who?

"The first floor had plenty of furniture, surely bought and left by countless past residents who dared call this behemoth home. When you flee in terror, you rarely stop for the ottomans."

This was not at all what I was expecting from what sounded like a "typical haunted house" novel.
Yes Felix moves into an abandoned house in order to write a book about his experiences, but from the start the alleged haunted history of this home is a bit vague which only serves to emphasize that it may not be the main theme in this story. Enter Thomas, the estranged best friend. We don't really know why these former best buds have stopped speaking to each other, only that Felix has reached out to him for help with his book and although it is the first time they've bothered with each other in a year, Thomas has agreed. The pace is a bit slow here and we are given only the briefest of hints as to what could have caused their falling out. At this point I thought I had it all figured out and that the ghosts were not meant to be literal but  whether or not this ghost of a friendship could be resurrected from it's death. I can't share much more of my thought process or tell you if I was right or wrong in my assumptions without ruining the reveal at the end but I will say that although it was a leisurely arrival the pay off was with the wait.

I received an advance copy for review.

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