WHAT LIES BELOW
by
Barbara Taylor Sissel
Genre: Contemporary Mystery / Literary Suspense
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Date of Publication: May 15, 2018
Number of Pages: 334
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Gilly O’Connell’s nightmares aren’t just bad dreams; they’re glimpses of terrifying realities to come. Gilly has spent her entire life trying to suppress the foreboding visions. So when a dismissed premonition leads to her husband’s murder, she buries the guilt and pain of the unsolved crime in the only way she knows how—she runs from it.
Three years later, after overcoming a battle with addiction and starting over in a small Texas town, Gilly dares to believe the worst is over. That is, until another crime rips her heart open: the abduction of a three-year-old girl. Gilly knows more about it than anyone…
She’s dreaming again.
Gilly is convinced that if she tells the police she dreamed of the kidnapping before it happened, there’s no way they’ll believe her. But when she finally gets the courage to come forward with what she saw, people don’t see her as crazy—they see her as a suspect.
Now, in order to help a desperate single father save his child, Gilly must first clear her own name. But as the nightmares of the past catch up to her, Gilly’s only chance for salvation might be the dreams she’s spent so long trying to ignore.
PRAISE FOR WHAT LIES BELOW:
“Infused with heart-stopping suspense, emotional resonance, and startling imagery, What Lies Below swept me along a river of urgency and dread. Barbara Taylor Sissel effortlessly weaves together prescience, regret, grief, love, and revenge—all wrapped in the mystery of a young girl’s abduction. Beneath the breathless immediacy of the story lie deeper questions: How do we forgive ourselves—and others—for remembered transgressions, and can we ever break free of the past?” —A. J. Banner, #1 Amazon and USA Today bestselling author of The Good Neighbor and The Twilight Wife
“Barbara Taylor Sissel’s What Lies Below is suspense at its finest—heartrending, compelling, and beautifully written. If you’re looking for your next up-all-night read, look no further.” —Jessica Strawser, author of Almost Missed You and Not That I Could Tell
“I cannot emphasize this enough: you must read What Lies Below. Barbara Taylor Sissel manages to combine an unreliable narrator, twisting plot, and well imagined characters to create a world where nothing is as it seems and secrets abound. I had intended to savor the novel’s lovely prose but wound up devouring the book in a day. Simply fantastic.” —Karen McQuestion, bestselling author of Hello Love
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ON WRITING, PART ONE
GUEST POST BY BARBARA SISSEL
(originally posted 9/21/17 on Women Writers, Women’s Books)
My children were born in a hospital in Lexington, Kentucky, but their first home was a state-issued, singlewide trailer on prison grounds some 70 miles east of Lexington in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. I was expecting my first son when I moved there with my then husband who had been promoted from prison guard at a facility in Lexington to Deputy Warden at a first offender correctional facility in a remote part of the state.
While moving around a lot as a kid taught me to be adaptable, Appalachia was a culture like none I had ever encountered, never mind living within a few hundred feet of a prison population. Little did I know at the time the impact the experience would have when I sat down some five years later at my writing desk in Texas having decided to finally act on a lifelong dream to become an author. I intended to write a historical novel, a romance, set in the WW II era.
But that isn’t the book that happened. No matter how I tried to force it, a central focus of the plot kept circling one character: a guy accused of murder, who is sent to prison, his experience there, and how his incarceration impacts and jeopardizes the lives of his wife and young child.
As I wrote that story, the vision of the message I wanted to convey began taking shape. It was something to do with hope and survival even when life’s circumstances are at their most dire. As I wrote further into that first book, I realized I was subconsciously drawing from the wealth of my experience living on the grounds of the first-offender facility.
The prison itself was unique in its remote location and its purpose, which was to keep guys new to crime separate from those inmates in medium and maximum-security facilities, who had more or less embraced crime as a lifestyle. On a regular basis, the institution staff would host open house days when the inmate’s families could visit. We were all invited to mingle: the inmates, their parents, siblings, significant others, their children.
It was difficult, in fact, I’d go so far as to say it was almost impossible to separate the inmate families from the staff families. Anyone looking on from a distance would have assumed we were participants at a neighborhood picnic—unless they looked closely. A more careful scrutiny would have shown tears on some faces, emotional embraces, people engaged in somber, or sometimes heated, conversation. Emotions ran the gamut from anger and frustration to shame, sorrow and guilt. There were outbursts of laughter, too, and shared jokes.
But what struck me most as I circulated among the inmates’ family members, was how often one of them, a mom, or dad, or sibling, would pull me into conversation, hungry to connect, to gain insight, support, a hug, reassurance. How did this happen? We raised him better. He gets out and does it again, I’m done, I told him that. Where did I go wrong? How is my boy doing/behaving? What do you think of him?
Continued on the 5/23/18 blog stop with Lone Star Book Blog Tours
Barbara Taylor Sissel writes issue oriented, upmarket women’s fiction that is threaded with elements of suspense and defined by its particular emphasis on how crime affects the family. Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, she was raised in various locations across the US and once lived with her family on the grounds of a first offender prison facility. The experience, interacting with the inmates and staff, provided a unique insight into the inmate’s lives, the circumstances behind the crimes they committed, and the impact on the families that were affected. The bestselling author of nine novels, her stories focus on the family at the heart of the crime. An avid gardener and the mother of two grown sons, Barbara lives in the Texas Hill Country. She’s represented by Barbara Poelle at the Irene Goodman Literary Agency.
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GIVEAWAY! GIVEAWAY! GIVEAWAY!
1st PRIZE:
SIGNED COPY OF BOOK + BOOKMARK + $15 AMAZON GIFT CARD
2nd PRIZE:
SIGNED COPY OF BOOK + BOOKMARK
MAY 15-24, 2018
(US ONLY)
VISIT THE OTHER GREAT BLOGS ON THE TOUR:
| 5/15/18 | Excerpt | Texas Book Lover |
| 5/16/18 | Review | Dressed to Read |
| 5/17/18 | Author Interview | That’s What She’s Reading |
| 5/18/18 | Review | The Clueless Gent |
| 5/19/18 | Notable Quotable/Bonus Review | The Love of a Bibliophile |
| 5/20/18 | Notable Quotable | Story Schmoozing Book Reviews |
| 5/21/18 | Review | A Page Before Bedtime |
| 5/22/18 | Guest Post Part 1 | Reading by Moonlight |
| 5/23/18 | Guest Post Part 2 | Books in the Garden |
| 5/24/18 | Review | Book Fidelity |
