From
New York Times bestselling author
Christina Dodd comes a brand new, standalone suspense about a reclusive artist
who retrieves a seemingly dead woman from the Pacific Ocean...only to have her
come back to life with no memory of what happened to her. With a strong female
protagonist, a chilling villain, and twisty secrets that will keep you turning
the pages. Perfect
for fans of Lisa Jewell, Karin Slaughter and Sandra Brown, POINT LAST SEEN,
will have readers keeping the lights on all night.
LIFE LAST SEEN
When you’ve already died, there should be nothing left to fear…
When Adam Ramsdell pulls Elle’s half-frozen body from the surf on a lonely
California beach, she has no memory of what her full name is and how she got
those bruises ringing her throat.
GIRL LAST SEEN
Elle finds refuge in Adam’s home on the edge of Gothic, a remote
village located between the steep lonely mountains and the raging Pacific
Ocean. As flashes of her memory return, Elle faces a terrible truth—buried in
her mind lurks a secret so dark it could get her killed.
POINT LAST SEEN
Everyone in Gothic seems to hide a dark past. Even Adam knows more
than he will admit. Until Elle can unravel the truth, she doesn’t know who to
trust, when to run and who else might be hurt when the killer who stalks her
nightmares appears to finish what he started…
About the Author
New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd writes
"edge-of-the-seat suspense" (Iris Johansen) with "brilliantly
etched characters, polished writing, and unexpected flashes of sharp humor that
are pure Dodd" (ALA Booklist). Her fifty-eight books have been called
"scary, sexy, and smartly written" by Booklist and, much to her
mother's delight, Dodd was once a clue in the Los Angeles Times crossword
puzzle. Enter Christina's worlds and join her mailing list at
www.christinadodd.com.
Twitter: @ChristinaDodd
Facebook: Christina
Dodd
Instagram: @christinadoddbooks
My Thoughts
Point Last Seen by Christina Dodd
takes us to Gothic, California which is a town for lost souls. We meet Elle who washes up on the beach and is
rescued by Adam. Adam is a troubled man
who has let an incident from the past haunt him. It is evident that Elle was attacked and is
lucky to have escaped. Adam keeps her
safe while Elle works on recovering her memories. I loved the town of Gothic. It is a charming town full of quirky, caring
residents. Rune is the town psychic and
fortune teller. She is a unique
character. She is a tall woman who wears
the traditional fortune teller clothing and has a five o’clock shadow. Rune tells people that they can use the
pronoun they are most comfortable with when referring to her (which is why in
the book some people use she and others use he). There is humor sprinkled throughout that had
me chuckling. There is a mystery or two
along with suspense. The action keeps
the story moving along at a good clip. As
Adam and Elle spend time together during these fraught times, they begin to
fall for each other. They must outwit a
deadly foe if they are to get their happily ever after. There
are a couple of steamy scenes as well as foul language. I was surprised at the
conclusion. I am glad that this is not
our only visit to Gothic. It will be
interesting to see what lost soul turns up next time in the Last Seen in Gothic
series. Point Last Seen is dramatic tale
with a damsel in distress, an artistic knight, a conversant psychic, a mad mugger,
a crafty killer, a kindhearted chef, a dodgy joust, and a hamlet of lost
souls.
Excerpt
A Morning in February
Gothic, California
The storm off the Pacific had been brutal, a relentless
night of cold rain and shrieking wind. Adam Ramsdell had spent the hours
working, welding and polishing a tall, heavy, massive piece of sculpture, not
hearing the wailing voices that lamented their own passing, not shuddering when
he caught sight of his own face in the polished stainless steel. He sweated as
he moved swiftly to capture the image he saw in his mind, a clawed monster
rising from the deep: beautiful, deadly, dangerous.
And as always, when dawn broke, the storm moved on and he
stepped away, he realized he had failed.
Impatient, he shoved the trolley that held the sculpture
toward the wall. One of claws swiped his bare chest and proved to him he’d done
one thing right: razor-sharp, it opened a long, thin gash in his skin. Blood
oozed to the surface. He used his toe to lock the wheels on the trolley,
securing the sculpture in case of the occasional California earth tremor.
Then with the swift efficiency of someone who had dealt with
minor wounds, his own and others’, he found a clean towel and stanched the
flow. Going into the tiny bathroom, he washed the site and used superglue to
close the gash. The cut wasn’t deep; it would hold.
He tied on his running shoes and stepped outside into the
short, bent, wet grass that covered his acreage. The rosemary hedge that grew
at the edge of his front porch released its woody scent. The newly washed
sunlight had burned away the fog, and Adam started running uphill toward town,
determined to get breakfast, then come home to bed. Now that the sculpture was
done and the storm had passed, he needed the bliss of oblivion, the moments of
peace sleep could give him.
Yet every year as the Ides of March and the anniversary of
his failure approached, nightmares tracked through his sleep and followed him
into the light. They were never the same but always a variation on a theme: he
had failed, and in two separate incidents, people had died…
The route was all uphill; nevertheless, each step was swift
and precise. The sodden grasses bent beneath his running shoes. He never
slipped; a man could die from a single slip. He’d always known that, but now,
five years later, he knew it in ways he could never forget.
As he ran, he shed the weariness of a long night of cutting,
grinding, hammering, polishing. He reached the asphalt and he lengthened his
stride, increased his pace.
He ran past the cemetery where a woman knelt to take a chalk
etching of a crumbling headstone, past the Gothic Museum run by local historian
Freya Goodnight.
The Gothic General Store stood on the outside of the lowest
curve of the road. Today the parking lot was empty, the rockers were
unoccupied, and the store’s sixteen-year-old clerk lounged in the open door.
“How you doing, Mr. Ramsdell?” she called.
He lifted his hand. “Hi, Tamalyn.”
She giggled.
Somehow, on the basis of him waving and remembering her
name, she had fallen in love with him. He reminded himself that the dearth of
male teens in the area left him little competition, but he could feel her watching
him as he ran past the tiny hair salon where Daphne was cutting a local
rancher’s hair in the outdoor barber chair.
His body urged him to slow to a walk, but he deliberately
pushed himself.
Every time he took a turn, he looked up at Widow’s Peak, the
rocky ridge that overshadowed the town, and the Tower, the edifice built by the
Swedish silent-film star who in the early 1930s had bought land and created the
town to her specifications.
At last he saw his destination, the Live Oak, a four-star
restaurant in a one-star town. The three-story building stood at the corner of
the highest hairpin turn and housed the eatery and three exclusive suites
available for rent.
When Adam arrived he was gasping, sweating, holding his
side. Since his return from the Amazon basin, he had never completely recovered
his stamina.
Irksome.
At the corner of the building, he turned to look out at the
view.
The vista was magnificent: spring-green slopes,
wave-battered sea stacks, the ocean’s endless surges, and the horizon that stretched
to eternity. During the Gothic jeep tour, Freya always told the tourists that
from this point, if a person tripped and fell, that person could tumble all the
way to the beach. Which was an exaggeration. Mostly.
Adam used the small towel hooked into his waistband to wipe
the sweat off his face. Then disquiet began its slow crawl up his spine.
Someone had him under observation.
He glanced up the grassy hill toward the olive grove and
stared. A glint, like someone stood in the trees’ shadows watching with
binoculars. Watching him.
No. Not him. A peregrine falcon glided through the shredded
clouds, and seagulls cawed and circled. Birders came from all over the word to
view the richness of the Big Sur aviary life. As he watched, the glint
disappeared. Perhaps the birder had spotted a tufted puffin. Adam felt an
uncomfortable amount of relief in that: it showed a level of paranoia to
imagine someone was watching him, but…
But. He had learned never to ignore his instincts. The hard
way, of course.
Are you ready to read Point Last Seen? Point Last Seen is available from Amazon*, BookShop.org, Harlequin, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, and Powell’s. You can find Christina Dodd's other novels here on Amazon. Christina Dodd's next novel is Forget What You Know which publishes on March 7, 2023. I appreciate you stopping by today. Tomorrow I am featuring Murder Spills the Tea by Vicki Delany. It is the third A Tea by the Sea Mystery. I hope that you have a happy day (it is Friday). Take care, stay cool, and Happy Reading!
Kris
The
Avid Reader
*This post contains affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
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