Heartquake by Terry Newman is a Backlist Bonanza pick #paranormalromance #pnr #romance #giveaway
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  • N. N. Light
    • Aug 29, 2023
    • 5 min read

Heartquake by Terry Newman is a Backlist Bonanza pick #paranormalromance #pnr #romance #giveaway



Title: Heartquake


Author: Terry Newman


Genre: Paranormal Romance


Book Blurb:


Coffee shop owner, Charlee Lightheart, views corporations with contempt. She believes her father died at the hands of the pharmaceutical industry. When she's approached to run for city council on an anti-fracking platform, she's reluctant. She's not sure this movement is her cause.


Billionaire Riley Brockton has given up on love. Then he walks into Charlee's shop. All he wanted was coffee and muffins. From that first electrifying touch, he knows he needs more. He withholds one piece of vital information: he's a lionshifter.


A rogue reporter sets out to reveal the one secret that can destroy the anti-fracking movement and the couple's relationship. Can their love survive the truth and public exposure?


Excerpt:


She left them at their booth and went to get two cups and the pot of coffee. She returned, poured their coffee, and turned to prepare their muffins.


“Before you go running off again, Charlee girl,” Ed said, “sit with us a quick spell. We have a question or two to ask you.”


“We’ve heard a few rumors. And want to know if they’re true.”


“Depends on what you’ve heard,” she said easily. She could just imagine what they were about to ask. If it were anyone else, anger would be welling up in her. She would be prepared to say, “None of your business.” But these two elderly gentlemen had good intentions and always looked out for her welfare. Something like uncles. And when you didn’t have any family around, she thought, their concern was sweet.


She put the pot down on the table behind her and sat with them.


“Now, what’s the rumor you’ve heard?”


Apparently, there were some topics even these two frank—that should be blunt—gentlemen found difficult to broach, as they looked at each other trying to get the other to speak.


“Okay, I’ll ask,” Fred said before he shot his pal a dirty look. “The word on the street is that you’re dating that Brockton boy, what’s his face. The one who had been staying in New York City.”


She winced. She wondered how old a person had to be in order to be considered and called an adult in some people’s eyes. They always called her “Charlee girl” and now Riley was “that Brockton boy.” She bit her tongue and let the reference pass.


“It’s good to know the word on the street is spot on,” she said. “As a matter of fact, I am, and his name is Riley.”


There, she said it. It was the first time she had said it to any of her customers, even though she knew many of them had figured it out by now. It was, after all, a small town. She wondered how quickly the “word on the street” would spread once the pair left the coffee shop.


“You best be careful,” Ed said, sitting up a bit straighter, evidently so he would appear to have a bit more authority than what he did—which was zilch. “You know all the rumors about that family, don’t you?”


Charlee took a deep breath. This is one of the reasons she had told so few people about it. For each person she would tell, she knew they would warn her against it and cite some rumor.


Fred cleared his throat. “The following interrogation is brought to you by Ed. His questions and concerns do not reflect my own personal views. I say more power to you, girl. As long as you’re happy.”


The pair had her baffled and nervous. “Just tell me what the rumor is.”


“That they’re nothing but a bunch of lion shifters,” Ed said, his voice quivering a bit as if he had just heard Pearl Harbor had been bombed.


Fred threw up his hands. “Remember, I have nothing to do with this.” He took a sip of his coffee.


She laughed. “I have heard those rumors. But I can’t help you with clearing up that scuttlebutt. I really don’t know.”


“What do you mean you don’t know?” he said, almost in a panic. “That’s something you really need to find out for yourself if it’s true.”


She glanced at Fred who looked as if he were trying his best not to smile.


“Ed,” she said as she patted his hand, “if I ever leave Riley alone in the living room and return to find a lion sitting on my couch, you’ll be the first to know.”


“Are you taking this question seriously, Charlee?” he asked. “I hear those Brocktons are lion shifters, and every time one of them throws a party they go out and roam the city as a pair of lions.”


“This is what I have to put up with, Charlee girl,” Fred laughed.


“There’s nothing funny about this, Fred. We’re talking about her future.”


Fred took a deep breath.


“Everyone knows that the accusation of that family being lion shifters has been hanging over them for years. No, for generations,” he said. “And everyone knows that the chances of that are about the same as the royal family over in England being those alien, reptilian shifters. Give it up already.”


“But that’s not what—”


“Don’t be ridiculous, Ed,” Fred said. “You know as well as I do that there ain’t no shapeshifting lions in these parts of the state. They all cleared out ages ago. And it’s a damned shame, too. They were a good lot of people. Some of my dad’s best friends were lion shifters, he used to tell me.


“Now, what we do have are Bigfoot—families and families of Bigfoot. That’s what you should be worrying about. You never know where they’ll pop up next.”


“I can’t argue with that one,” Ed conceded.


“I’ll get your muffins now, gentlemen,” she said as she stood. She reached for the coffee pot and refilled Fred’s cup. Ed hadn’t touched his. “If you think of any more rumors you’d like me to try to verify, just let me know.”


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What makes your featured book a must-read?


Heartquake, a 2023 RONE Award finalist, is an entertaining tale of paranormal small-town secrets and an environmental crisis that threatens the health of the community. I loved writing about Charlee and Riley and I’m sure you’ll fall in love with them. Readers have called Riley “a book boyfriend unlike any other,” and Ind’Tale Magazine described the book as “…a captivating, page-turner of a novel.”


Giveaway –


Enter to win a $20 Amazon gift card:



Open Internationally.


Runs August 23 – August 31, 2023.


Winner will be drawn on September 1, 2023.



Author Biography:



I’ve spent most of my adult life writing in some fashion, from small-town reporter, to editor-in-chief and ghostwriter for a national natural health publishing firm. The last decade and a half I’ve worked as a freelance writer, penning ebooks that range from how to start a doula services business to Native American herbs.


I’ve finally took the plunge to fiction after having many doubts. I pushed the doubts aside. My first novel with The Wild Rose Press, Heartquake, won a 4.5 crowned heart review with Ind’tale Magazine.


All my books are set in fictional towns in northeast Ohio, where I grew up, and I write about things I love—like coffee. I’ve taught workshops on writing and character development.


I have a daughter, a son-in-law, and a grandpuppy and live in North Lima, a real town in northeast Ohio with all my characters. Yes, it does get crowded.


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