Paranormal Keepers by Jen Naumann
Publication date: March 11th 2014
Genres: Paranormal Romance, Young Adult
Synopsis:
Everyone thinks Harper Young killed
her boyfriend. No one will say it to her face, but the signs are everywhere.
It’s almost been a year since Gavin
was torn from Harper’s arms and brutally murdered. The police wrote it off as a
freak accident, deciding Harper’s strange testimony was given under duress. But
she knows something unnatural was involved and refuses to stop looking until
she finds his killer, even if it means her reputation as a senior is ruined.
Even if it means there really are monsters living among us.
With the discovery of the mothmen,
witches, vampires and all the creatures she always suspected were out there,
Harper finds herself amidst a complex bundle of unseen heroes who call
themselves “Keepers”, sworn to keep the secret of the paranormal creatures that
walk this earth. As she tries to understand what’s so special about her that
she’s able to break an old Keeper law, Harper has a baffling vision of kissing
a mysterious guy before a blade is brought down on him.
Before she can get a
handle on her future, she becomes central to a battle between the questionable
“heroes” and the evil she’s been training to fight, leaving her to wonder if
there’s any way to change the fate that has been foretold before it’s too late.
AN HOUR PASSES BY BEFORE SOMETHING STIRS in the shadows off to my
left. While this isn’t the first time I’ve sat in the cemetery alone since
Gavin’s death, it’s the first time there’s been a full moon, and I’ve read
about a medieval European belief that werewolves like to devour the bodies of
the recently buried. The little fuzzy hairs on the back of my neck prickle,
bringing a warm rush to my ears.
I strain to hear anything that would suggest I’m not alone—a rustle
of grass, a
labored breath, the growl of something angry and possibly starving
for human blood—but nothing gives my visitor away. The shadows move again,
closer this time.
I grip the crowbar tighter.
All at once, a bright light blasts my face. “Harper! It’s me!” The
light flickers down to the ground, revealing my tall, gangly friend.
I choke on a stuttered breath, my shaking hand seizing my chest.
“Holy shit, Corbin!”
I blurt in a not-quite whisper. “Girl in a cemetery, here.
By herself.”
He laughs in his unusually high-pitched voice as I feel him stroll
to my side. “Sorry. I would’ve sent a text, but I figured if your phone buzzed
in your pocket, it would freak you out.” He turns the light off as soon as
we’re standing side by side.
Corbin doesn’t mean to be a pain, he just sometimes is. The
two of us bonded in art class when he first moved to town a few months after
Gavin died. A particularly annoying senior who had begun calling me “the black
widow” asked him if he was going through hormone replacement therapy after
hearing him speak. I grabbed an extra chair so Corbin could join my table.
Turns out we have more in common than our statuses as outcasts, like
our tastes in movies and music, so we kept hanging out, spending the rest of
junior year and the summer together. He claims to believe in ghosts, although
he’s never had any eerie experiences like I’ve had.
“Any luck?” Corbin tries to whisper, but the pitch of his voice
doesn’t allow him to do any such thing. He plunks down at my side, the odor of
fried food wafting along with him. I hear the rustle of paper followed by his
lips smacking whatever greasy goo he’s jammed into his mouth.
Sighing, I realize at this point there’s no way I’m going to catch
anything unnatural creeping through the graveyard, especially if they have a
good sense of smell. We may as well be blasting Katy Perry and flashing a
“humans present” neon sign over our heads. “What are you doing here?” I ask. “I
thought your little brother had a thing tonight.”
“His karate instructor came down with something. It’s being
rescheduled.” A flint of moonlight passes through the clouds, exposing my
spindly friend with curly dark locks sitting at my side, hands resting on his
thighs, carryout bag between his crossed legs. “When you’re done here, you
wanna go see the new Paranormal Activity?” he asks. “I hear it’s not as
scary as it is funny.”
“Those movies don’t even make sense. They’re more pointless than
that old Blair Witch flick. I think I’ll pass.”
He stuffs a handful of fries into his mouth. “Yeah, my mom probably
won’t let me go to a late show with school starting tomorrow anyway. We can see
if there’s anything good being released next weekend.”
Shoulders sagging, I stretch my neck to the dark skies. I should be
grateful that Corbin entertains my wild notions, and doesn’t treat me like an
outcast or murderer like the others. But if he witnessed some of the crazy
things I’ve seen in the middle of the night, the reason I hold a shaft of iron
in my hand among a sea full of corpses, he wouldn’t be taking on such a
lackadaisical approach to the whole situation.
I smile. “Sounds like a plan. Got any extra heart attack-inducing
goodies for me?”
Corbin’s grin stretches wide as he hands me a bag of greasy french
fries. He may not appreciate my disappointment in not finding proof of anything
mystical, but once home, I know there’s someone who will.
AUTHOR BIO:
Jen Naumann grew up in southern Minnesota as an addict of such
flicks as Indiana Jones and The Goonies until she discovered John Hughes,
and spent her high school days locked away writing love stories with
a sci-fi twist. Married to a farmer in southern Minnesota, she tries
to follow the madness of her four active children while balancing
an imagination that never shuts down. As the author of CHEATING
DEATH, SHYMERS, AND PARANORMAL KEEPERS, she writes stories with
strong female leads who have a good sense of humor and tend to fall in
love despite their better judgment. For more on Jen visit her
website www.JenNaumann.net.
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