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Thursday, October 26, 2017

NEW RELEASE AND GIVEAWAY! THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON BY CHERYL PIERSON

A woman with no home…

Beautiful Southern belle Julia Jackson has just been informed she and her niece must find a new home immediately—or else. With no family to turn to in Georgia, Julia takes a mighty gamble and answers an advertisement for a nursemaid in wild Indian Territory—for the child of a man she knows nothing about. Together, she and five-year-old Lauralee waste no time as they flee to the safety of the new position Julia has accepted. She can only hope this move will be the start of a bright future for them away from Lauralee’s dangerous much older half-brother.

A rancher with no heart…

The death of Devlin Campbell’s young daughter has ripped the light from his life. Though the birth of his son, little Jamie, should have been a source of happiness, the subsequent loss of his wife forces Dev to ignore his emotions and trudge through life’s joyless responsibilities. But all that changes with the arrival of Miss Julia Jackson from Atlanta! Not at all what Dev is expecting in response to his ad, his resentment boils over at her failure to mention her tag-along niece—a painful reminder of the loss of his own little girl just two years earlier. Yet, how can he deny the sunshine Julie brings into his drab existence with her very presence?

Can love find a way?

In the depths of Dev’s boundless sorrow and his accompanying anger, is there room in his life for anyone else as Christmas approaches? Can Julie convince him that love is the cure for a broken heart, and hope is the only recipe for a new beginning between THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON…

EXCERPT:

The door banged open behind the three, a gust of icy wind howling in before the tall man who’d entered could get it shut.
Lauralee hugged herself and shivered, then ran to the blazing hearth to the warmth. She eyed the man warily as she crouched before the fireplace.

Julia turned the baby away from the cold, until she heard the door shut behind her.

“What the devil—” the man bit out savagely.

When Julia’s gaze shot to his, her heart sank. This must be Mr. Campbell, her employer. And he was bending the fiercest glare she’d ever seen on Lauralee, who cowered by the fireplace.

Julia quickly gathered herself. Over the past few years, she’d had more than her fair share of life-changing surprises. Her parents had been killed in a runaway carriage accident when she was ten. Her older brother, Jerome, and sister, Helena, had tried to hold onto the family’s holdings, but Jerome’s penchant for gambling had ended up landing them all on the street.

It hadn’t been too much longer before Jerome had been found in an alley with his throat cut—and Helena had had to marry quickly to give herself and Julia a home. Now that Helena was gone, Julia knew she could never be parted from her niece. Helena had provided for Julia when there’d been no one else—now, Julia would keep Lauralee safe from the world—including the likes of the very unpleasant Mr. Devlin Campbell!

“I assume you are Mr. Campbell?” Julia asked uncertainly, as she stepped toward him, extending one hand. She shifted Jamie to her hip. “I’m Miss Julia Jackson,” she continued primly, “up from Savannah way—your new nursemaid for young Jamie, here. And this—” she stepped to the side as Dev took her hand— “is Miss Lauralee Redmond.”

Lauralee, it seemed, had recovered, as well. She had risen to her feet, and stood glaring at the man, her hands on her hips.

He glared right back at her, barely sparing Julia a glance.

We’re not the Debbil! You are!” Lauralee said, pointing at him with an accusatory finger.

Oh, Dear Heavenly Father… Julia’s throat constricted as she stepped forward. They were going to be tossed out into this blizzard for sure! “Lauralee—” Julia began, her heart pounding.

But silence filled the room as her employer took a step forward, causing Julia to lose her voice completely and forget that she needed to chastise Lauralee for her insolence to an adult.

Mr. Campbell hunkered down on the floor in front of Lauralee, studying her. Jamie kicked and smiled, holding out his arms to his father, but the man ignored his son, watching Lauralee intently.

“Well…I supposed you might be right about that, Miss Lauralee,” he finally allowed.



Have you ever had an appallingly embarrassing moment like the one Lauralee created for "Miss Julia Jackson" above? I've had my share, for sure! Please leave a comment to be entered in my drawing for a free digital copy of THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON!

THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON is available now for KINDLE, and is available in both digital and paperback as of October 26 (today!). It’s full of action, suspense, and of course, Christmas magic!

Here's the link to order THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON for your very own!


      

25 comments:

  1. Hit my ereader and can't wait. So glad to see this one. Doris

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    1. Hey Doris! I hope you enjoy. This was one of those that started out as a short story, but...those people just had more to tell than what I could fit into a short story! So they got their own book. LOL

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  2. The title alone is intriguing. Yes, I'll get a copy of this, for sure. I love the response he gives Lauralee--about being the "debbil." Another Cheryl Pierson masterpiece?
    For sure.

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    1. Celia, you are too kind! I appreciate the support, dear friend. I hope you love the story of Dev, Julia, and the rest of the family. I had a lot of fun with this one.

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  3. Congratulations on your book birthday, Cheryl!!! I'm looking forward to reading it.

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    1. Aw, thanks so much Tracy! I hope you enjoy it. It's my first "new" thing in quite a while now. I was on a roll this summer--got a story coming next week in our SWEET TEXAS CHRISTMAS anthology--sure missed having one of yours in there this year!

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  4. I have a feeling this book is going to tug on the heartstrings, Cheryl. Dev Campbell seems to have something of Mr Darcy about him and Julia is a resourceful heroine with an uninhibited 5 year old niece to support. Lots of interesting psychodynamics and emotion and Christmas magic to work through. It sounds like a winner. I wish you the very best of luck with it.

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    1. Thanks, Keith. This, like so many of my stories, started out as a short story, but it just kept getting longer and longer...and then...it became a book. LOL Dev has sure had his share of heartbreak in losing his young daughter and then his wife, and having to raise his baby son alone (with the help of the ranch hands). He needed a ray of sunshine in his life. Thanks for your kind words!

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  5. Adding to my wish list! Congratulations on your new release!

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    1. Hi Krysta! Thanks so much for stopping by! I'll pick a winner tomorrow, so be sure and check back--it might be YOU!

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  6. Congratulations on the release, Cheryl. Looks like a winner.
    You have so many irons in the fire I don't know where you find the time to write.
    Some of my novels started out as short stories as well. Hurray for creativity.
    The best.

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    1. Hi, Jerry! Thanks so much for stopping by. My secret for this one was this summer my son was working on his masters' degree thesis in engineering physics and we decided to keep us both on track with our projects we would meet as many days each week as we could. It's pretty amazing what you can get done when you get away from the house to another environment (a cool tea shop we discovered with outlets all around the walls for the tables to use, and of course, WIFI) and when you know you have to just get up and do it because the other person is counting on you. LOL I tell you, though, it really got me moving and creativity began to flow. It had no choice! LOL

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  7. Big Congrats on the release. I cannot wait to read it. Your romances are always such great reads!

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    1. Thanks, Deborah! That is so nice of you to say--I'm glad you love them. Hopefully, I'll be able to get finished with the one I'm working on now sometime this year... SIGH. I'm not a fast writer. LOL

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  8. If he can answer her in such a way, he can't be all bad. The loss of a child or spouse can make one bitter and resentful of another's good fortune.
    Getting pregnant was way to easy for us. I got pregnant 5 weeks after getting married, but miscarried after a serious fall 3 1/2 months later. It was during the Vietnam War and my husband was deployed. I got pregnant a couple of months after he got back. (You could tell the people that were crewed together on the B-52. Their children were born about the same time.) When our first daughter was just 6 months old, I got pregnant again for our second daughter. We had a neighbor who had lost a little boy who was stillborn. I can not imagine how terrible it would be to have that happen. They were trying hard to have another child, but were not having much success. One day after I was pregnant for our second daughter, I was at a neighborhood coffee when she made a comment in a nasty way, directed at me, about some people being like rabbits. Things got uncomfortably quiet for a few minutes. I can understand how much she hurt and was jealous that we had no trouble having children when they wanted one so badly and couldn't. She was never friendly to me. I am glad to say they did eventually have a healthy little girl.
    I can understand how bitterness can overtake someone and cause them to shut down. I t takes a special person to help them open their eyes to the happiness still in the world and lead them back to it.
    Congratulations on the release of THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON. It sounds like it will be a nice holiday read. One I need to add to my holiday keeper shelf. I hope the release goes very well for you.

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    1. Thanks, Patricia. I hope it will, too. It's been a while since I've had something completely new out there--especially a longer project. I have another one I've been working on forever...I am hoping to finish it in 2018. That's my goal. I write pretty slowly--everything by hand first, and then enter it into the computer. But it helps in the long run with the editing.

      That was really tacky of that woman. Of course, bad things happen sometimes, but it's wrong to blame the world around you for that, or to take it out on people who had nothing to do with it. I agree--it does take a special person, or sometimes it can be one thing that opens a person's eyes to see that there is still life worth living and a purpose for them that is still to be fulfilled, no matter what has happened.

      Dev is a tough nut to crack though. And he assumed some things about his wife that passed away that weren't true. That made a difference to his outlook when he discovered the truth of the matter.

      Thanks for stopping by and commenting, my friend!

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  9. Cheryl, So sorry I'm late. Had no internet for half the day yesterday--nasty winds and storm--even trouble with cells. So didn't catch this till this a.m.. I so look forward to reading this story as I'd preordered the minute I knew it was up to order. Just checked, and yep, I've got it now. It sounds like it's going to be full tons of emotions, upheavel and more than heartwarming. Love it when there are little ones involved to add to tugs and pulls. Livia again did an awesome job on the cover. Wishing you much success with this one. As soon as I'm down with Josie Malone's new one, I'll start yours. Looking forward to it. In between trying to finish my gunman one. Oh well. A girl has to keep up her reading with all these great books.

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    1. Bev, the great thing about the internet is that you're really not ever late on these blog comments. LOL I am leaving this up for an extra day before I draw for a winner of the free copy in case there are some other latecomers! LOL

      I hope you enjoy reading--yes there are plenty of tugs on the heartstrings, for sure. LOL Oh, and you're reading Josie's--I loved her story! That was so different! Thank you for the compliment on the cover, too--Livia really outdid herself on that. I love it so much. Truly, I thought about having it blown up and framed, it is so perfect! LOL

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  10. Do I detect a bit of Jane Eyre in Julia Jackson, and Mr. Rochester in Devlin Campbell? An English Gothic tale transposed (if only in part) to the Wild West? Whatever, it sounds very intriguing...

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    1. Hi Andrew! Could be a bit of Jane Eyre...maybe subconsciously as I was writing. LOL Oh, if only there had been moors in Indian Territory! Devlin Campbell would definitely have been out there, tearing his hair in anguish! LOL Thanks so much for stopping by, Andrew!

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  11. I really want to read this. I enjoy your stories so much.

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    1. Hey Barbara! Thanks so much for coming over! And for your VERY kind words--so much appreciated. You made my day!

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  12. I just found this new release announcement in my spam box! Good thing I thought to see what was in there. This story sounds loaded with emotion and some great moments. I can't wait to read it. I love your stories. Each one is just super rich with feelings and plot lines that would seem to lead to disaster--but they always come out better than expected. Now is a great time to start reading Christmas stories, too.

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    1. Hey Sarah! Well, my hat size just grew about 10 inches! LOL Thanks so much for your VERY kind words, my friend! I appreciate you taking time to come by and comment. I hope you enjoy The Devil and Miss Julia Jackson! I really had fun with this one.

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  13. A big thanks to everyone who came by and commented and have shown me such wonderful support! I've picked two winners for the digital copies of THE DEVIL AND MISS JULIA JACKSON!

    They are....

    KRYSTA and BARBARA!!!! If you ladies will e-mail me at fabkat_edit@yahoo.com I will send your prize to you as soon as possible!

    Thanks again, everyone!

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