Celebrate Ireland with The Suicide Gene by CJ Zahner @TweetyZ #psychologicalthriller #giveaway
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    • Mar 17, 2020
    • 5 min read

Celebrate Ireland with The Suicide Gene by CJ Zahner @TweetyZ #psychologicalthriller #giveaway



Title: The Suicide Gene

Author: CJ Zahner

Genre: Psychological Thriller


Book Blurb:


She thought they were her siblings. By the time she realized they weren’t, one of them was dead.


Doctor Emma Kerr had no right counseling them. Adopted and her birth records lost, she believed she was born a McKinney. Her face, intelligence, and depression resembled theirs. For years people mistook her for their sister. So she devised a plan. What begins as a scheme to counsel the McKinney family and determine if they are blood relatives, quickly causes Emma to wonder if she had truly done the manipulating. Is someone following her?


Now Emma clamors to escape the McKinney world of domination and deception.

Is she Mathew McKinney’s sister? She can’t be. Is he in love with her? He can’t be. Then how do he and his sisters know more about her than she knows herself? This is a game to them. Is the game Suicide? Or Murder?


Excerpt:


Chapter 1


Wednesday, May 13, 2015


The Funeral Parlor.


The face in the casket was her own. It nearly freaked her out.


She stood between her brother and sister, knees wobbling. Her high-necked dress clung to her skin, choking her throat, squeezing her long, slender body tighter and tighter until she felt her lungs might explode. Damn panic attacks.


Her siblings moved closer, tightening their grip on her when they heard her struggling to breathe. Together their tall frames—movie-star handsome—melded into a dark mass at the foot of the casket. It took all the energy the three of them could muster to keep her upright.


“Are you okay?” Melanie asked her.


She nodded.


“Try not to embarrass yourself,” Matt whispered.


Again, a nod.


She wasn’t sure she could get through the day without fainting. There were no breaks at a funeral, and she just wanted to get away from the grim whispery-whirrs of the bereaved and the sickeningly-sweet waft of the flowers. But she couldn’t leave. Matt would kill her and, besides, she had no cigarettes. Her sister was her supplier. Now she’s dead.


The parade of mourners stretched out of the room and down the hall and it was only 2:05. Some faces in line she didn’t recognize, which infuriated her. Her sister had no real friends. Nosy bastards. They just want to know what happened.


She tried to ignore surrounding conversations and remain composed. But like Medusa’s venomous mane, muffled words of hand-covered comments serpentined toward her from all directions. She couldn’t block them. They echoed in her head like garbled phrases over a worn intercom. “Why did she do it?” “Like her mother.” “Was it suicide?”


That last question nearly sent her to her knees. Her body sagged. Melanie caught her and Matt pulled her close, so she could lean on him until it passed.


“Don’t look if looking makes you queasy,” Melanie told her, but her glance drifted back to her sister’s pasty face. That’s what I would look like if I were dead.


She, herself, had considered suicide for so long it was hard to believe she still feared death. She hated funerals, could barely walk through the front door of a funeral home without hyperventilating. Yet, she had to go to this one. Her own identical twin sister lie in that ugly copper box, her head sunk low in billowing white silk.


“I’m sorry for the three of you.” Her aunt Carol’s hoarse voice coaxed her attention from the coffin. Notably thinner—grief now topping her midmorning chemotherapy cocktail—her aunt dabbed a tissue at tear-stained cheeks. She was in the third round with breast cancer and getting her butt kicked. “I can’t believe this is happening to our family again. Did you know she was that bad?”


“Well.” Melanie paused. “She’s always had those tendencies, but we thought—with the counseling—she was doing better.”


“Counseling?” Aunt Carol’s cheeks pinked.


“Yes,” Matt said. “Six months ago we started seeing a psychiatrist—all four of us.”


“We thought a counselor might help,” sweet Melanie continued. “We decided maybe we did have some baggage about Mom’s—” She took a deep breath. Her gaze moved to her sister.


Don’t say it, Mel, don’t say suicide.


“Death.” Melanie looked away.


“How horrible.” Aunt Carol straightened. She appeared appalled. “You should sue him—that counselor.”


“Her.” Matt shook his head, eyes glaring. “She’s a psychiatrist.”


“We will sue her.” The twin’s voice rose, but she stopped, glanced at Matt, and tightened her jaw. “She didn’t give a damn about us. Now my sister is dead. She’ll pay.”


It happened then—at 2:10 p.m. She felt Matt’s piercing gaze and watched as he released his grip on her arm. Her aunt Carol became so emotional that Matt had to help her to the back of the room. Family members congregated there amidst her wild sobs while Matt held her, and a rush of people came toward her and Melanie at the casket. One after another. Melanie let go of her, too, and she had to stand on her own.


For the first time in her life, she was alone. Her eyes rested on the lifeless body of her twin. Her comrade. Her best friend. There was never a time in her life she didn’t have her sister to talk to, fight with, or cry on. They knew each other’s inner being, finished each other’s sentences, felt each other’s pain. What would she do without her?


Her eyes zigzagged over the casket. Oh no, I’m not feeling well.She couldn’t see her sister’s dimples, her smile, the rose tattoo on her ankle that perfectly matched her own. What shoes did she have on? Was she wearing any? She’d never be jealous of those expensive, black stilettos on her feet again, or the designer purses cascading over her shoulder when they shopped. They’d never pack a picnic lunch and take Mel’s kids to the park, ride bikes at the peninsula, or complain to each other about their ex-husbands. Here comes the blackness. I’m falling now.


She went down hard on the floor but didn’t feel a thing. Her last thoughts were her beautiful sister really was gone, and oh, sweet Jesus, what had she done? I’ll kill that bitch. Emma Kerr will pay.


Buy Links (including Goodreads and BookBub):



Barnes and Noble http://bit.ly/BandNSGene








Why is your featured book a must-read?


Something they inherit haunts them. Unfathomable intelligence? Genetic depression? Are they playing some dangerous game of deception? Only the clever will figure this one out. Who dies? Who’s in control? Pay attention to the numbers and see into the delusional yet ingenious McKinney world.


Giveaway:


Enter to win an e-book bundle of all 17 books featured in the Booklovers' Pot 'O Gold Event:



Open Internationally.


Runs March 13 – 17, 2020.


Winner will be drawn on March 23, 2020.


Author Biography:


CJ Zahner is a digital-book hoarder and a lover-of-can’t-put-down books (always starved for a good thriller). In 2015, after her only sibling was diagnosed with early-onset dementia, Zahner walked away from full-time grant and part-time freelance writing jobs to become a novelist. Now shereads, writes, and runs in Erie, Pennsylvania and Raleigh, North Carolina. She is the proud mother of three children and even prouder grandmother of one. She has been married to her soul mate, Jeff, for over 30 years.


Social Media Links:


Book Circle Online interview: http://bit.ly/CJZinterview

Beyond Reality Radio 9/11 Interview: http://bit.ly/BRRCJZinterview


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