Beached & Bewitched

Emery Belle

Nov 2019 · A Magic Island Paranormal Cozy Mystery Book 1 · Emery Belle

About this ebook

Book your ticket to Magic Island, where the potions are brewed fresh daily, the beaches are perfect for creature-watching, and the fangs and fur are on full display.

Wren Winters is utterly, painfully ordinary. The most boring job on the planet? Check. A boyfriend of eight years who still hasn’t put a ring on it? Double check. A squirrel that can’t stop gorging itself on her tomato plants? Make that a triple. But on the eve of her thirtieth birthday, Wren can’t shake the feeling that things are about to change.

And they are. Just not in the way she planned.

After a series of unexplainable events makes her question her sanity, a strange little man arrives to deliver an even stranger message: Wren isn’t so ordinary after all. She’s a witch, and in order to claim her powers, she must leave everything behind and journey to a place she never even knew existed.

Suddenly, Wren is thrust into a fantasy world come to life, where taxis sprout wings and take to the skies, merwomen teach sold-out water aerobics classes, and scent-challenged ogres panhandle on street corners for unusual delicacies. Add in a new job, a hunky coworker, and a full schedule of magical lessons, and Wren’s formerly boring life is nothing but a distant memory.

But before she’s able to even test out her training wand, Wren is confronted with a murder she feels compelled to solve, a list of suspects with plenty to hide, and a mysterious man in black who seems to be tracking her every move.

Turns out even fantasy worlds have their dark sides.

Author's Note: Each book includes a self-contained mystery, but there are longer, ongoing subplots that continue throughout the series.

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Ratings and reviews

It's a nice book with a fun story. I struggled to picture the main character as a 30 year old woman, however. Her thoughts, actions, feelings and insecurities kept me picturing someone fresh out of high school. I found a couple typos, nothing like some books I get on Google Play. I think what annoys me the most about the story is the cliffhanger. I understand a long term back story the continues on from book to book, but I see cliffhangers as cheap ways to coerce the reader to buy the next book. Generally, I refuse to buy the next book in protest, even when I really liked the story and writing. A good writer shouldn't have to resort to cheap tactics to sell books. [[[stepping off my soapbox]]] That said, I enjoyed the book enough to try book 2 in the series.

Very good book. Loved the characters though it's a hard to relate to our heroine coming to her powers at that age. I was left wanting more especially about the MAN IN BLACK!!!!!

it had a few odd confusing parts but was otherwise pretty good. A good proofread would have helped a lot.

About the author

Emery Belle is the author of paranormal cozies featuring plenty of magic, mystery, and a dash of mayhem. When she isn’t dreaming up new worlds or wandering around the house with her nose in a book, you can find her digging her toes in the golden sand beaches of Southern California (sadly, she hasn’t found the ferry docks for Magic Island yet), fitting in a serious game of bowling, or chasing around an overly excitable, and overly large, rescue pup.

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Emery welcomes comments and emails from her readers! Feel free to send her a message at [e-mail].