Wednesday, October 29

@GoddessFish Guest Post: Visiting Lilly by Toni Allen



Visiting Lilly


Toni Allen


Genre: British Detective meets Paranormal Romance
Publisher: Booktrope Publishing
Date of Publication: September 23, 2014
Number of pages: 322
Cover Artist: Greg Simanson



Available at the following retailers:
Amazon     BN


D.I. Jake Talbot is a burnt-out British detective given a second chance to believe in love, friendship, and the transcendent essence of the human experience. When he investigates a seemingly innocent visitor to a residential care home for the elderly he uncovers a dangerous family hiding a forbidden romance that mysteriously crosses the boundaries of time. The deceitful family does all they can to prevent Talbot from discovering their secrets surrounding an unsolved murder, family betrayal; at the core of which is a keenly intelligent, though somewhat mentally challenged young man who is fixated on an elderly woman being held captive by her own son. Talbot sets out to right the many wrongs done to the blameless, and in turn, rediscovers his own humanity.
Excerpt: 
Frankie is warned off
Chapter 9

Laughing, Hayward picked up his mug and sat back in his chair. ‘I’ve been told not to speak with you,’ he said. ‘Warned off.’

‘I beg your pardon.’ Talbot fished out his cigarettes and offered one over.

Rather than leaning forwards, Hayward held out his hand so he could be thrown one. He caught it in mid-air. Impressive.

‘I’m a police officer.’ Talbot lit his own before chucking the lighter over. ‘Who has the authority to instruct you not to speak with me?’

‘You’ll find out … if they give you your permissions.’ Hayward lit his cigarette and leant forwards to flick ash that wasn’t there yet into the ashtray. Neat, obsessively neat. ‘I’m a man of honour,’ he said, looking down as if ashamed. ‘But I’d much rather be free, and able to try and see Lilly, than locked up. I’m sorry.’

‘Hold it, hold it. Locked up. Are you serious?’

‘Never more so.’

Sipping his tea, Talbot stared at Hayward, tried to judge whether he was lying. Being blocked by someone stronger and more important than him made his pulses race and nerves jangle. He wasn’t used to being trodden on from invisible heights.

‘Tell me, Frankie … can I call you Frankie?’

Frankie shook his head. ‘We’re not friends. It would mar the line, wouldn’t it?’

‘Sure.’ Talbot saw his point: it would cross a boundary, and Hayward wasn’t ready for that yet.

‘Well, tell me, if you speak to me, about Lilly and what is important, how would they ever know?’

Hayward shrugged. ‘They’d know.’ He drew heavily on his cigarette and smiled. ‘You’d become involved. You’d ask different questions. You’d tread on their toes.’

‘Will my being here get you into trouble?’

‘Not if we stick to the weather.’ They both burst out laughing, threw silly quips at each other about how wet it was for the time of year, and then suddenly stopped, Talbot feeling the bubble burst, the fun over.

‘Mr Hayward.’ He leant forwards. ‘We have a huge dilemma.’

Trailer: 



Guest Post: 

D.I. Jake Talbot’s Tarot Cards

You read Tarot cards for a living: If your protagonist D.I. Jake Talbot came to you to have his cards read, what would he learn?

This may sound like I’m bragging, but if my protagonist DI Jake Talbot came to me for a tarot reading, the case he’s investigating would be solved pretty quickly. I’d be able to see a complete overview of what was going on and point him in the right direction to make his enquiries.

In the past I’ve worked alongside a Private Investigator, helping him solve investigations. In one case that the PI and I worked on together the main suspect never came up in a reading, which was really weird, and all I could say was, ‘I can’t see the guy.’ It was a major fraud case we were helping one of the victims with, and after a while we concluded that the man several of the other victims were pointing the finger at, didn’t exist. The people involved in the sting had portrayed themselves as victims and invented this bogus man as a smokescreen to lead us down a false line of enquiry. Ultimately we took our findings to the police, and they uncovered a vast network of people working together to pull off a scheme that enabled them to defraud people out of hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Over the years I’ve also seen many suspicious goings on in readings for my clients. Most often it’s the usual, everyday stuff, such as seeing that someone’s husband or wife is having an affair. I always have to be extremely tactful so as not to upset people, but most of the time my client already has a gut feeling that their partner is cheating.

At other times what I see is more sinister. To be honest, if I believe from what I see in a reading that my client is involved in criminal activity, I keep very, very quiet about it. I’m honourable, but I’m not stupid, and my first priority has to be to keep myself safe. After one such reading, in which I suspected my client was up to no good, I went down the local police station and asked the officer on duty what I had to divulge. I needed to know the point of law and whether I’d be accused of withholding evidence.

To my utter amazement the police did not treat me as some looney tarot reader, but treated me with the utmost respect. I was assigned an officer to liaise with, and occasionally we’d meet for coffee and I could talk through any concerns I had about what I’d seen during a reading. To ensure client confidentiality I was never asked to divulge anyone’s name. We spoke in a kind of code, where the officer would say, ‘He’s young with thick dark hair.’ I’d reply, ‘Yes.’ The officer would respond with, ‘We’ve got our eye on him, but he hasn’t crossed the line yet.’

So, if DI Jake Talbot did come to me for a reading, I think he might become a regular client, and we could work on lots of cases together.

Giveaway: 

Toni will be awarding a free e-book of VISITING LILLY and a FREE TAROT CARD reading for one lucky commenter to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.





Book Tour Info: 
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It's Raining Books

Author Bio:


Toni Allen is a professional tarot reader, astrologer, author and photographer.

I’ve been a professional tarot reader for about 30 years, and an astrologer for about 25. Now, thanks to the internet, I have an International client database. My main website is creaking because I haven’t updated it for so long, but it’s still fully functional and full of lots of interesting information. www.toniallen.co.uk . A new build is underway, with lots of modern bits and pieces so that you can connect with me via Facebook and easily keep up to date with events that I’m offering readings at.

To connect with the author online:

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads


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