I always knew when a ghost was hanging around the bookshop. I couldn’t see the buggers. Or hear them. Occasionally all the hair rose on the back of my neck, or a random shiver stole over my skin. But that could be attributed to the drafty failed seals in Glimmer Ridge and the gusty mountain winter.
No, it was the way Emma’s gaze strayed from her work and followed a particular patron through the rows of shelves or fixed on an empty stool by the coffee bar. She could never ignore the ghosts. No matter how many times I advised her to do exactly that.
Clearing my throat loudly got her attention. Her head whipped to me, and her ever-changing gaze fixed on my face. Her pale skin flushed with embarrassment. She knew she’d been busted.
“Something you need help with, Hatty?” Emma reached for a rag to wipe down the spotless counter. It was one of her standard habits. Look busy to avoid suspicion.
“Your picks for the newsletter.” I nodded at my open laptop screen where the template for our monthly email sat waiting.
Her odd irises looked blue today to match her long-sleeved scoop-neck shirt. If the top had been green, the color of her eyes would have changed to match. Rue and I liked to dress her in blue, to make it look as though she did have the Bramblewick eyes that our real cousins possessed.
Emma forced a smile. “Oh, I made a list. I think it’s in my room. Do you need it now?”
I didn’t but sending her out of the shop when an apparition drifted through the store was always a good idea. “Go and get it now. I’ll hold down the fort.”
She tucked a stray lock of brown hair behind her ear. Her hair had never been truly curly, but not exactly straight either. In the five years she’d been with us in Mist Glen, it had started to sparkle with even more silver strands than the night she’d arrived at our doorstep, bleeding with no memory of who she was or what had happened to her. A pang went through me when I spotted those wisdom-highlights. Was she wasting away in our little corner of North Carolina?
At least she’s safe, I told myself as Emma slipped from behind the counter. She passed Rue who emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray of orange cranberry muffins.
My sister’s round face beaded with sweat. “Everything okay, Hatty?”
I made a noncommittal noise and refocused on the laptop. “Do you have your recipe for this month’s newsletter?”
My sister, the sixty-five-year-old girl scout, extracted the recipe card from her apron pocket. “Here you go. Where’s Em?”
Rue fretted about Emma as much as I did. However, her worries were different. She wanted Emma to be normal, not hang around with a couple of crones who couldn’t decide if they should have a bookshop or a café, so opened both in the same space in a village barely large enough to support either. We made it by—mostly.
“Upstairs. There’s a tagalong in the shop.” I used our code word for a ghost.
Rue sighed. “I’ll get the spray.”
The spray, aka ghost-be-gone, was something concocted by a necromancer we knew. Emma didn’t know about it. In five minutes, that ghost would be history. And our odd little foundling would be safe from the risk of exposure for another day.
My Midlife Magic Daze: A Pages & Potions Mystery, Book 1
Genre: Cozy Paranormal Mystery
Release: February 2025
Format: Digital
Purchase Link
How does a woman know who to trust when she can’t remember who she is?
My name is Emma. That was the name I was given on the first day I remember. The forty years before that remain secret. My only clue to life before the Pages & Potions bookshop is the scar from a botched C-section. It is probably better that my past remains a mystery.
Still, I crave answers. Who hurt me? Are people searching for me? What happened to the baby I was carrying? And why can I see the ghost of the customer who died last week?
My Midlife Magic Daze is the first book in the Pages & Potions paranormal women’s fiction series. If you enjoy spellbinding tales of love, mystery, and books featuring characters over forty, you don’t want to miss USA Today bestselling author Jennifer L. Hart’s unforgettable tale.
About the author
USA Today bestselling author Jennifer L. Hart writes steamy midlife mysteries and paranormal romances featuring main characters over forty. When not talking to her imaginary friends, Jenn spends time exploring the North Carolina mountains with her husband and two badly behaved rescue dogs. Pages & Potions is her tenth series.