Open
Door
By Christine Locke
ENTRANCING OPPORTUNITIES BECKON A
YOUNG GIRL...
It's 1987, and 16-year-old Carin White desperately needs her first job.
An elegant woman she's never met appears at her door offering employment.
"Aunt" Helen asks Carin to work for her on the family's rambling,
enigmatic estate in the tiny resort town of Eureka Springs.
IN A WORLD WHERE NOTHING IS AS IT SEEMS...
Carin takes little notice of Rafe Allen, Helen's other hired help. But a
brutal assault forces Carin to confront her own capacity for violence.
Carin learns her mother concealed her identity from her, and the mansion hides
horrific secrets of its own.
AND ONLY LOVE CAN SAVE HER.
Carin exposes the truth about her presence on the estate. Will she be
strong enough to recognize love and redeem her family legacy? Or will the
temptations of power and control lure her to the same dark places where others
lost themselves?
Notes to Readers:
This novel is NOT about werewolves, vampires, or fallen angels. It is a
story about magic. The gothic Mallace Mansion lives and breathes as a
character, and only one woman controls its Legacy. Is Carin the one? Read
OPEN DOOR to find out.
This novel does NOT have a cliffhanger ending. The author does not
believe in them. The story is complete in itself, and the ending points
the way to a new storyline for IN TIME, the second novel in the Legacy Trilogy
due out this Halloween.
OPEN DOOR is a full length novel at over 46,000 words.
Guest Post
Casting Call for Open
Door, the Movie, by Christine Locke
It’s great to be invited here to share my novel, Open Door. Open Door is a
paranormal YA novel with enough ghosts and gore for a Halloween chill and a sweet
love story for a romantic thrill. I
am, most assuredly, not the only novelist who enjoys picturing her novel as a
movie. What’s fun about a guest
blog like this one is the chance to indulge my author’s fantasy to the
fullest. I’d like to share a few
character profiles with you. Who
would you cast in these rolls?
Carin White:
Petite and pretty, Carin has dark brown hair with subtle red
highlights and deep brown, almond shaped eyes. At sixteen, she’s far more attractive than she realizes; her
nomadic lifestyle has given her little chance to see herself through the eyes
of her peers. She fears the reason
for her mother’s constant desire to keep moving might be a carefully-concealed
mental illness. But Carin speaks
of this to no one. Instead, she accepts
a job on Mallace Estate, a vast property owned by Helen Mallace who claims to
be family but will not explain the relation. Carin arrives at Mallace Mansion determined to work hard,
earn money, and return to her life protecting her mother and guarding their
secrets.
Helen Mallace:
With narrow
hips and tiny feet, blond and formerly-pretty Helen Mallace makes herself more
imposing with big hair, heels and expensive clothing. At middle age, it’s not clear whether Helen ever
invested herself in a career as she now wastes her time doing nothing in
particular in her newly-inherited home.
Helen does not seem comfortable in Mallace Estate, for she’s always
ordering new furnishings and taking on projects to alter the view. For help with this endeavor, she brings
in another distraction: a young man named Rafe Allen, a local from town hired
to help with the heavy lifting.
But Helen’s shallow personality might just be a ruse, as she, too, keeps
many secrets—and none of them very well.
Rafe Allen:
Tall and muscular in a sinewy, lean fashion, Rafe is not
unattractive. In fact, with a
haircut and shower with lots of shampoo, he could be downright hot. But Rafe seems to enjoy his
off-putting, sexy-yet-repulsive persona.
He takes pride in it, almost, in a manner that a sheltered girl like
Carin might find hard to understand.
Rafe has secrets, too, although they are the kind no one would ever care
to discover. Rafe is a miserable
sort of person, and his angry rejection of others keeps happiness ever beyond
his grasp. Carin might have been
an understanding friend, but he will never get the chance to know her in that
way. Rafe sees women as objects
and victims, simultaneously unattainable and unworthy of his trouble. He might put a woman on a pedestal only
to delight in watching her topple off.
With someone like him around, Helen might be amused, but Carin will be
in danger.
Any casting suggestions for me? I’d love to hear from you! Thanks for reading, and thanks for visiting For the Love of
Film & Novels.
About The Author
Christine Locke was
born in California and grew up in various locations around the United States as
a Navy brat. She was the oldest of six children and today is mother and
step-mother to seven. She attended Texas A&M University, receiving her
Master of Arts degree in Comparative Literature in 1995.
Christine has worked as a writing instructor, a salesperson, and an award-winning
retail manager and management trainer, among other things. Today, she
co-ordinates makeovers for a local magazine. She and her husband, Mike, live
with their children, two dogs, and two cats in Arkansas.
For years, Christine has been writing novels around her work and family life.
Open Door is her first published novel. Several other manuscripts are almost
ready to follow Open Door onto Amazon KDP, including the Open Door sequel, In
Time.
Twitter: @wrtrdoll and @CarinsGriffin
christinelockebooks.blogspot.com
carinatmallacemansion.blogspot.com
http://www.goodreads.com/wrtrdoll
Great interview. The book sounds so interesting.
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