Update: the winners of our June giveaway have been randomly chosen using www.random.org. They are as follows: Mary C has won the gift basket and novel. Evelyn and Mary Beth (not to be confused with our own Marybeth Whalen) have won copies of The River Witch. And Shelly Cantrell has won the Kindle. All the winners have been notified by email. Thanks to all who entered and please come and visit us again soon!!

Summer has arrived and with it comes our newest book club selection. Apart from having the prettiest cover (let’s be honest, we all judge books by their covers) it also happens to have the most charming characters and compelling story we’ve read in a long time. Those spending time near the water this month will find Kimberly Brock’s THE RIVER WITCH to be a very fitting read. We’ll be hanging out with Kimberly and discussing her novel all month long so grab a cup of tea, find a comfy chair, and join us! It will be time well spent.

As always we’ve got a number of amazing giveaways for you. The main giveaway winner will receive a southern gift basket packed full of items similar to those found throughout the novel: a crochet shawl, a pumpkin bread mix, jam, a southern cookbook, ocean scented bath salts, music from Anna Kline and the Grits and Soul Band, a lovely piece of pottery, and a copy of The River Witch. It is a basket of “sacred things,” just as the characters in the novel search for and gather and offer to one another. Two additional winners will each receive a copy of the novel. To enter, simply leave a comment on this post.

We will also be giving away a Kindle to one participant of our online book club discussion this month. It’s free to join and every comment left on the forum equals an entry. Kimberly will be on hand all month to answer questions and participate in the discussion. All of these prizes were provided courtesy of Kimberly’s publisher, Bell Bridge Books.

And now a bit about this amazing debut novel:

Can the river heal her?

Roslyn Byrne is twenty-four years old, broken in body, heart and soul. Her career as a professional ballet dancer ended with a car wreck and a miscarriage, leaving her lost and grieving. She needs a new path, but she doesn’t have the least idea how or where to start. With some shoving from her very Southern mama, she immures herself for the summer on Manny’s Island, Georgia, one of the Sea Isles, to recover. There Roslyn finds a ten-year-old girl, Damascus, who brings alligators, pumpkins and hoodoo into her sorry life.

Roslyn rents a house from Damascus’s family, the Trezevants, a strange bunch. One of the cousins, Nonnie, who works in the family’s market, sees things Roslyn is pretty sure she shouldn’t, and knows things regular people don’t. Between the Trezevant secrets and Damascus’s blatant snooping and meddling, Roslyn finds herself caught in a mysterious stew of the past and present, the music of the river, the dead and the dying who haunt the riverbank, and finding the courage to live her new life.

You can read the first two chapters here.

Kimberly Brock

Kimberly Brock is a former actor, special needs educator, and native to the north Georgia foothills. Her debut novel, The River Witch, is a southern mystical work set against the backdrop of Appalachia and the Sea Islands. Her work has appeared in the anthologies “Summer in Mossy Creek” and the forthcoming, “Sweeter Than Tea”. She spends her non-writing time enjoying her husband and three children, and encouraging storytelling in all its many forms. Kimberly lives north of Atlanta, where she’s made her home for the last eight years. 

Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in this post are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the book, She Reads will receive a very small commission. These commissions help us pay for the site and the services we offer. Regardless, we only recommend books that we have read and loved. 

About Ariel Lawhon

Ariel Lawhon is the co-founder of She Reads, novelist, blogger, storyteller, and life-long reader. She lives in Texas with her husband and four young sons (aka The Wild Rumpus). Ariel believes that Story is the shortest distance to the human heart.

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