Check Out this Child’s Play #Giveaway

Child's Play by Merry Jones

Child’s Play

Merry Jones

February 1-28, 2017 Tour

Synopsis:

Child's Play by Merry JonesSince her husband’s murder two years earlier, life hasn’t been easy for Elle Harrison. Now, at the start of a new school year, the second grade teacher is determined to move on. She’s selling her house and delving into new experiences―like learning trapeze.

Just before the first day of school, Elle learns that a former student, Ty Evans, has been released from juvenile detention where he served time for killing his abusive father. Within days of his release, Elle’s school principal, who’d tormented Ty as a child, is brutally murdered. So is a teacher at the school. And Ty’s former girlfriend. All the victims have links to Ty.

Ty’s younger brother, Seth, is in Elle’s class. When Seth shows up at school beaten and bruised, Elle reports the abuse, and authorities remove Seth and his older sister, Katie, from their home. Is Ty the abuser?

Ty seeks Elle out, confiding that she’s the only adult he’s ever trusted. She tries to be open-minded, even wonders if he’s been wrongly condemned. But when she’s assaulted in the night, she suspects that Ty is her attacker. Is he a serial killer? Is she his next intended victim?

Before Elle discovers the truth, she’s caught in a deadly trap that challenges her deepest convictions about guilt and innocence, childhood and family. Pushed to her limits, she’s forced to face her fears and apply new skills in a deadly fight to survive.

Book Details:

Genre: Thriller, Suspsense
Published by: Oceanview Publishing
Publication Date: January 3rd 2017
Number of Pages: 320
ISBN: 1608091910 (ISBN13: 9781608091911)
Series: Elle Harrison Thriller #3 (Each can be read as a Stand Alone Novel)
Purchase Links: Amazon 🔗 | Barnes & Noble 🔗 | Goodreads 🔗

Read an excerpt:

I was the first one there.

The parking lot was empty, except for Stan’s pickup truck. Stan was the custodian, tall, hair thinning, face pock-marked from long ago acne. He moved silently, popped out of closets and appeared in corners, prowled the halls armed with a mop or a broom. In fourteen years, I couldn’t remember a single time when he’d looked me in the eye.

Wait—fourteen years? I’d been there that long? Faces of kids I’d taught swirled through my head. The oldest of them would now be, what? Twenty-one? Oh man. Soon I’d be one of those old school marms teaching the kids of my former students, a permanent fixture of the school like the faded picture of George Washington mounted outside the principal’s office. Hell, in a few months, I’d be forty. A middle-aged childless widow who taught second grade over and over again, year after year, repeating the cycle like a hamster on its wheel. Which reminded me: I had to pick up new hamsters. Tragically, last year’s hadn’t made it through the summer.

I told myself to stop dawdling. I had a classroom to organize, cubbies to decorate. On Monday, just three days from now, twenty-three glowing faces would show up for the first day of school, and I had to be ready. I climbed out of the car, pulled a box of supplies from the trunk, started for the building. And stopped.

My heart did triple time, as if responding to danger. But there was no danger. What alarmed me, what sent my heart racing was the school itself. But why? Did it look different? Had the windows been replaced, or the doors? Nothing looked new, but something seemed altered. Off balance. The place didn’t look like an elementary school. It looked like a giant factory. A prison.

God, no. It didn’t look like any of those things. The school was the same as it had always been, just a big brick building. It seemed cold and stark simply because it was unadorned by throngs of children. Except for wifi, Logan Elementary hadn’t changed in fifty years, unless you counted several new layers of soot on the bricks.

I stood in the parking lot, observing the school, seeing it fresh. I’d never paid much attention to it before. When it was filled with students, the building itself became all but invisible, just a structure, a backdrop. But now, empty, it was unable to hide behind the children, the smells of sunshine and peanut butter sandwiches, the sounds of chatter and small shoes pounding Stanley’s waxed tiles. The building stood exposed. I watched it, felt it watching me back. Threatening.

Seriously, what was wrong with me? The school was neither watching nor threatening me. It was a benign pile of bricks and steel. I was wasting time, needed to go in and get to work. But I didn’t take a single step. Go on, I told myself. What was I afraid of? Empty halls, vacant rooms? Blank walls? For a long moment, I stood motionless, eyes fixed on the façade. The carved letters: Logan School. The heavy double doors. The dark windows. Maybe I’d wait a while before going inside. Becky would arrive soon, after she picked up her classroom aquarium.

Other teachers would show up, too. I could go in with them, blend safely into their commotion. I hefted the box, turned back to the car. But no, what was I doing? I didn’t want to wait. I’d come early so I could get work done without interruption or distraction before the others arrived. The school wasn’t daring me, nor was I sensing some impending tragedy. I was just jittery about starting a new year.

I turned around again, faced its faded brown bricks. I steeled my shoulders, took a breath and started across the parking lot. With a reverberating metallic clank, the main doors flew open. Reflexively, I stepped back, half expecting a burst of flames or gunfire. Instead, Stan emerged. For the first time in fourteen years, I was glad to see him. Stan surveyed the parking lot, hitched up his pants. Looked in my direction. He didn’t wave or nod a greeting, didn’t follow social conventions. Even so, his presence grounded me, felt familiar.

I took a breath, reminded myself that the school was just a school. That I was prone to mental wandering and embellishing. And that children would stream into my classroom in just three days, whether I was ready or not.

Merry JonesAuthor Bio:

Merry Jones is the author of some twenty critically acclaimed books, both fiction and nonfiction. Her work has been translated into seven languages. Her previous Elle Harrison novels have been THE TROUBLE WITH CHARLIE and ELECTIVE PROCEDURES. Jones lives with her husband in Philadelphia.

Catch Up with Merry online:
Website 🔗, Twitter 🔗, & Facebook 🔗

 

Tour Participants:

Don’t miss your chance to stop by these awesome sites for reviews, guest posts, interviews, & more great giveaways!


Oh, & Enter the Giveaway!

This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours for  Merry Jones. There will be 1 winner of one $15 Amazon.com Gift Cards AND 3 winners of one (1) eBook copy of Child’s Play by Merry Jones. The giveaway begins on January 26th and runs through March 3rd, 2017.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Get More Great Reads at Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours

 

Related Posts:

Excerpt | COLOR ME DEAD by Teresa Trent

Excerpt | COLOR ME DEAD by Teresa Trent

Gina @ HottBooksNov 5, 20248 min read

COLOR ME DEAD by Teresa Trent October 14 – November 8, 2024 Virtual Book Tour Synopsis: Artist Gabby Wolfe has the ability to see not only the beauty of the living but the despair of the dead. When she returns…

The Dead Detective Casefiles by Tj O’Connor

The Dead Detective Casefiles by Tj O’Connor

Gina @ HottBooksOct 31, 20249 min read

THE DEAD DETECTIVE CASEFILES by Tj O’Connor October 28 – December 13, 2024 Virtual Book Tour   Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads DYING TO KNOW   Detective Oliver Tucker’s dead—murdered—and back as an earth-bound spirit to help his…

Excerpt | AUTUMN EMBERS by Tina deBellegarde

Excerpt | AUTUMN EMBERS by Tina deBellegarde

Gina @ HottBooksOct 29, 20248 min read

AUTUMN EMBERS by Tina deBellegarde October 14 – November 8, 2024 Virtual Book Tour Synopsis: A Batavia-on-Hudson Mystery   Bianca St. Denis travels to Kyoto to return a priceless artifact recovered in Batavia-on-Hudson during last summer’s flood. It’s late October…

Unnatural Intent by Brooke L French

Excerpt | UNNATURAL INTENT by Brooke L French

Gina @ HottBooksOct 24, 202415 min read

UNNATURAL INTENT by Brooke L French October 24, 2024 Book Blast Synopsis: A Letty Duquesne Thriller   The last one they sent didn’t come back. Disease ecologist Letty Duquesne is barely settled in to her new job when a colleague…

Excerpt | Frozen Lives by Jennifer Graeser Dornbush

Excerpt | Frozen Lives by Jennifer Graeser Dornbush

Gina @ HottBooksOct 22, 20245 min read

FROZEN LIVES by Jennifer Graeser Dornbush October 7 – November 1, 2024 Virtual Book Tour Synopsis: A Coroner’s Daughter Mystery   Dr. Emily Hartford is back in Frozen Lives, the next thrilling mystery from Jennifer Graeser Dornbush. Chicago surgeon Emily…

Share:

3 Comments Text
  • November 2024
    S M T W T F S
     12
    3456789
    10111213141516
    17181920212223
    24252627282930
    Search
    https://www.tiktok.com/@partnersincrimevbt