Occupation: photographer of abandoned places…
I started the day trespassing in an ancient cemetery, and ended it creeping around an (officially off-limits) abandoned hotel. The way one does.
My name is Aubrey Spencer. Not Audrey, or Audra, or anything else that starts with “A” (Some folks have a tough time with names.) I’m an architect and an amateur photographer, and I’m not normally a trespassing scofflaw. But when it comes to the chance to take amazing photos of old places, all bets are off.
Things have been a bit fraught for me lately. First there was a miserable divorce, then a disaster at work, and that’s not even counting the fact that I’m still dealing with a tough childhood. All of which explain how I wound up taking “a bit of a respite” in a remote area of the northern California coast, not far from a small fishing village called Gualala. My best friend Nikki asked an old friend who manages a swanky mid-century modern hotel for a “friends and family discount,” and since March is often gray and blustery on this stretch of the coast, there were plenty of rooms available.
Each guest room comes with an old-fashioned record player, and in the lobby are thousands of albums, as well as stacks of classic board games. It’s a little like visiting one’s grandparents’ house — if those grandparents were the cool kind who never threw away the fun stuff and who lived on a cliff above the wild, and incongruously named, Pacific Ocean. I loved it at first sight.
Here’s the problem: only after traipsing around the fabulous old Hotel Seabrink did I learn that trespassers might incur a deadly curse. According to the locals, the curse afflicts those who see the ghostly image of a girl in an attic window. One thing is for sure: the grand old Spanish-Revival building, which dates back to the Golden Age of Hollywood, has been the site of several mysterious deaths over the years.
So when a fellow trespasser is found dead at the bottom of a cliff, the image of a young teen appears in one of my photos, and I begin receiving threatening letters, my friend Nikki decides to join me. Though intrigued by the idea of ghosts roaming the Hotel Seabrink, what actually worries Nikki is the suspicion that her stalkery ex followed me here — and that he might be prone to violence.
A remote fishing village, a sexy hardware man, harbor seal babies, Thai food, running through the attics and secret passages of the grand old Hotel Seabrink…what could possibly go wrong?
Asylum Hotel
Genre: Paranormal Suspense
Release: July 2025
Format: Print, Digital, Audio
Purchase Link
When a mysterious figure shows up in the photograph an architect takes of the derelict Seabrink Hotel, ghostly encounters and murder are unleashed.
Aubrey Spencer loves photographing classic old buildings and abandoned places that hold old secrets. The Hotel Seabrink, perched overlooking the sea, is one such place. Currently abandoned but scheduled for a major renovation, it has a torrid history. Back in the 1920s it hosted A-list celebrity clientele, and now the locals insist it is haunted by the ghosts of two young women who died there. When Aubrey goes to photograph the site before the renovation begins, she bumps into a man named Dimitri Petroff, a minor online celebrity who shares her fascination with old buildings, the Hotel Seabrink in particular.
When he is found dead the next day at the base of a cliff, the police are quick to close the investigation. But Aubrey feels unsettled by locals who claim he was murdered and that it’s not the first time someone interested in the hotel was killed. As she digs deeper into the property’s dark history (and its origins as an asylum) as well as Dimitri’s professional rivalries, she becomes mired in an unsolved murder case from several decades earlier, one with eerie parallels to the contemporary case. But someone is determined to keep her from discovering the truth—at any cost.
About the author
Juliet Blackwell is the New York Times bestselling author of several novels based in France, including The Paris Showroom, The Vineyards of Champagne, and The Paris Key. She also penned The Witchcraft Mystery Series, The Haunted Home Renovation Series, and, with her sister Carolyn, the Agatha-nominated Art Lover’s Mystery series. A former anthropologist, social worker, and professional artist, Juliet divides her time between France, Spain, and northern California.