The Ghosts of Jefferson Texas Part 2

Arriving in Jefferson on the Thursday before Halloween, my husband and I decided to go on the Jefferson Ghost Walk. This tour was already on our “must do” list and we thought it would help us get acquainted with the town and some of its fascinating history.

Just in case some of you have plans on attending this tour, I won’t go into detail about specific stories or the town’s history. What I will say is, if you get the chance to go on this tour—do it. If you’d like more information, go here.

The tour started with all of us following the owner/tour guide Jodi Brekenridge around the town. We heard interesting stories about Jefferson, its historic buildings, and of course about the ghosts that allegedly haunt the town.

 As part of the tour, we were allowed to go into an old antique shop that was officially closed for the night. Upon entering this huge building, we gathered in the first section of the building (as I said, this place is HUGE.) We stopped to hear the tour guide tell us about the building and about some of the “ghostly occurrences” that had been reported.

While standing there, I felt someone place their hand on the center of my back. Thinking it was one of the other tour goers I tried to ignore it as I listened to Jodi talk about the store. After a few minutes went by with the hand still on my back, I inched forward in the crowded room trying to give whoever it was a little more space. The hand remained.  

After a few more minutes of this, I started to feel a little agitated. Deciding to turn around and ask the person if they would like to trade me places I was shocked to see that the person standing closest to me was a couple of feet back, with his arms hanging down by his side.

Still feeling the hand on my back, my mind whirred as I faced forward again. After a short time, I reached behind my back to see if I could figure out where the sensation was coming from. There wasn’t anything or anyone there, yet I could still feel it.

As the group stood and listened to Jodi, I continued to brush at my back and sneak glances behind me. Finally when the man standing at the rear of the line gave me a strange look as if to say, “Why do you keep starring at me?” I faced forward again (with the “hand” still on me) and I tried to concentrate on the stories being told.

When Jodi told the group that we could continue on our own through the store, the “hand” began pushing me forward. This wasn’t a shove, just a slight push in the center of my back. As the group made its way to the main section of the building, most people made a left turn. Feeling the push to move forward, I did. 

Now after many opportunities to turn right or left, I continued walking in a straight line towards the back. Soon I found myself alone with the hand prodding me forward. I kept walking toward the back of the building.

 The building was dark and I could hear that most of my group was getting further and further away. With my common sense finally kicking in, I turned around to search for my husband…or at this point…anyone who had flesh.

 As soon as I turned around and headed in the opposite direction the pressure on my back was gone. I rejoined the group and didn’t have any additional experiences—that night. This was after all my first night in Jefferson Texas. Stay tuned for part 3.

 

 

 

 

Postponed

Due to a death in the family the Ghost of Jefferson Part 2 has been postponed.

The Ghosts of Jefferson Texas Part 1

To say that I had been excited about my upcoming trip to Jefferson Texas would have been an understatement. Oftentimes, when we build something up so big in our minds, we are setting ourselves up for disappointment—luckily, that wasn’t the case here. I’m thrilled to report that this picturesque little town was even more than I imagined it would be.

The B&B that we stayed in was AMAZING. I could ramble on for hours about the house itself and about the owners who went way above and beyond to make all of their guest feel like family, but I suspect you visited my blog to hear about the ghosts, so let’s get to it. 

Is Jefferson haunted? You may ask.  

In my opinion, the answer is yes, Yes, and YES.

Many of the locals enjoy talking about the towns ghosts. As much as I love hearing these stories I always want to “experience” it myself and experience it I did. My first encounter happened the very first night at the B&B we were staying at. 

We arrived on Thursday and as luck would have it, we were the only guest that were staying there that night. The owners sleep in quarters out behind the main house so my husband and I were told that we had free reign of the house. *Insert happy dance here* 

As much as I wanted to do a formal investigation of the house, the trip had worn me out. After walking around a bit and taking a few pictures, we went to bed in our upstairs room sometime around midnight. After being asleep for a short time, I woke to the sound of someone walking up and down the hallway just outside my room. After listening to it for a few minutes my curiosity got the best of me. I got up and walked to my bedroom door. Opening it as quietly as I could, I peered out into the hall. The noise abruptly stopped. I went out into the hall to look around and I noticed that my feet made the same creaking noise on the hardwood floors that I’d heard earlier. Not seeing or now hearing anything out of the ordinary, I returned to my room and went back to bed.

Shortly after, I once again heard the pacing. Instead of getting up this time, I stayed in bed and listened. After about fifteen minutes, the house fell silent. I went back to sleep only to be awakened a short time later to the sound of tapping on the wall, this too stopped after about ten or fifteen minutes. With the room now quiet I went back to sleep.

A few hours later, I woke to the sound of what sounded like someone rolling a marble back and forth across the hardwood floor. It seemed as though the noise was coming from our private bathroom. With the sunlight now coming in through the window, I got up and made my way to the bathroom. The minute I opened the door the sound of the rolling marble stopped. Even though I was certain the sound had been coming from the bathroom, I opened the door leading into the hallway. Once again,  no one was there.

After getting dressed, I went downstairs and told the homeowner about the noises I’d heard in the night. She assured me that my husband and I had been the only people in the house.  I had no reason to disbelieve her. I’m sure we were the only “people” in the house, but I’m also convinced we weren’t alone. 

Stay tuned for Ghosts of Jefferson Part 2

The Grove - Jefferson, Texas

From my understanding, a trip to Jefferson isn't complete until you visit The Grove. This is private residence and is said to be one of the most haunted locations in the state of Texas. Lucky for me, it is also a tour home, which I definitely plan to visit on my upcoming trip.

Watch the video and tell me what you think. Would you take the tour?

Share a Shake - Episode 5 - Jefferson Ghost Walk Guide Jodi Breckenridge

Still looking forward to my trip to Jefferson, I stumbled upon this video and thought I would share it. Jodi does the historic ghost walk tours in Jefferson and will be hosting the History Haunts & Legends event that I will be attending in a couple of weeks.

HaPpY... October

Most of you know by now that I love Halloween so much that one day simply isn’t enough time to celebrate it. I need the whole month. Typically, I use this time on here to share real ghost stories from my own experiences and I’ve even shared some of yours as well. (Thanks again for those.) 

This year I will be doing something different—as in this is something, I’ve wanted to do for a long, l o n g, time. *drum roll please* I will be spending three glorious days in Jefferson Texas including Halloween. 

What’s in Jefferson Texas? You might ask.  

Well, for starters, according to the Discover, Travel and Scifi channels, Jefferson is considered the most haunted small town in Texas.

But wait…

     there’s more.  

I will not only be spending the Halloween season in the most haunted town in Texas, I will be setting up a vendors table at the Fall History, Haunts, and Legends Event!!!!!

 

In between listening to these amazing speakers, I will be selling signed copies of my ghostly books, handcrafted bookends, and ghost pictures that I have taken over the years. In case you couldn't tell, I am beyond excited about this. Before you turn green with envy, let me say that YOU can come too.

 

For more information and pricing go here 

 

Jefferson has it all. Haunted hotels, B&B's, restaurants, etc. I will be exploring some of my "hope for stops" along with their ghostly tales right here, virtually, you know before I actually go. So stay tuned for more details on my upcoming trip.

Ghost-like figure shows up on police station video

This is pretty interesting. I'd love to know what you think about it.

Ghost-like figure shows up on police station video: Surveillance video recently taken at the Espanola Police Station is a bit freaky.

Pioneer Library System

I want to give a quick shout out to the Pioneer Library System. Tonight they hosted the Local Writer's Dessert Showcase for the Friends of the Library. It. Was. Awesome. I met many wonderful people and had a great time. I want to give a big THANK YOU to all who were involved in setting this up.

If we met tonight I apologize for not getting your contact information so please use my contact me button. I'd love to keep the connection.

Writer's Funk

Most of you have probably heard of writer’s block and maybe even of writer’s slump. Unfortunately, I’ve taken writing (or lack of) to a whole new level. I call it writer’s funk. I haven’t been able to put a coherent thought down for quite sometime now. I have even found it difficult to write a blog post or a facebook update let alone accomplish anything on my WIP.

Frustrating doesn’t even begin to describe what I have been going through. A couple of months ago I grew tired of seeing my blinking cursor mock me from the blank page so I decided to try something different. I scoured the internet for writing contest and found a few that inspired me enough to actually put my thoughts down on paper.

I ended up entering thee different contest! This was quite an accomplishment for me considering I hadn’t written anything in a while.

One of these contest was a Christmas story and I was informed that my piece was chosen to be put up on the website for public voting. YAY!!!! However, this won’t happen until next Christmas season, but it gives me something to look forward to anyway.

Last week, I received the news that my story, “Two Weeks,” was chosen for a cash prize for another contest I had entered, so YAY again. J

I’m writing this post, not to brag, (well, maybe a little) but to encourage others who might be going through the same thing to step out of your comfort zone and try something different.

For those who may be interested in reading my 450-word nonfiction story “Two Weeks,” it will soon be available here and no it isn’t about ghosts. See I told you it was different…

Attention Authors

One of the greatest things about being an author is meeting people that I wouldn't have otherwise met. Some of these encounters have been in person while others have only been online, but they have ALL been special.

When I first started in this crazy and fascinating world of writing, Silvia and Franny guided me through my first interviews and blog tours. Both  of these women were instrumental in helping me get started. Later, Silvia even designed this beautiful blog for me.

Together they have started an online business offering an array of services for authors, so if you find that you need help give them a call.

Dark World Books offers customized boutique services for independent and published authors of Urban/Dark Fantasy, Dystopian, Steampunk, YA/NA Paranormal, Paranormal Romance, Historical Romance, Dark Erotica, Contemporary Erotica & Erotic Romance.

Having problems with your author business? Our job is to guide you through this sometimes overwhelming process and take care of manuscript edits, covers & marketing material creation, trailers and book tours. Also, you can now hire us to be your virtual personal assistants! Is your life taking too much time away from your author duties? Are you so busy writing that you don't have time to promote your novel/s? We’re the right team for you! Management of your social media accounts, marketing consultation, review/ARCs distribution are only some of the tasks we take care of by being your PAs.

Don’t wait any longer, get in touch! We hope to have the pleasure of working with you very soon!

Franny & Silvia

Dark World Books

Facebook - Twitter - Google+ - LinkedIn - Pinterest - Youtube

Looking for Daniel

Since appearing on Darkness Radio, I’ve received a lot of email. *happy dance* Even though I've already sent out my replies, I again want to thank each of you. Your encouragement means so much to me. That is why I do what I do.

I love hearing from others who are also interested in the paranormal, so when someone contacts me, I ALWAYS respond. Unfortunately, many times I get the email returned saying that it could not be delivered. L

After my interview, I received one such email from a man named Daniel. His paranormal experience was very intriguing and heart warming. Before finishing his letter, I had tears in my eyes—it truly touched and amazed me.

I wrote him back thanking him for sharing his incredible story, but my reply wasn't delivered so Daniel, if you see this, Thank you. 

 

Darkness Radio

Just like a lot of authors, I tend to be a little shy. Last night I stepped out of my comfort zone (as in waaaaaaaay out) and did my very first radio interview. The interview was with Dave Schrader on darkness radio and you can listen to it here.
If you have any problems with the link please let me know.

A Halloween Story

Most of you who have followed this blog for a while know that I Love, Love, Love Halloween. You also know that I usually do all sorts of fun ghostly things here on my blog during the month of October. Yet, here it is October 21 and I have yet to do one spine tingling post.

 

But why, you may ask with tear filled eyes. Well, let me explain... recently we found out that my husband has Type 2 Diabetes. Apparently, he has had it for quite awhile and his numbers were through the roof. Instead of taking the time to schedule Halloween post we have spent the better part of October learning all we can about diabetes and making major life style changes.

To make up for my Halloween slackiness I do have a story to share with you. Several months ago, my husband and I went on a small vacation and we experienced the strangest encounter of our lives.(For us, that is saying quite a lot) I simply could not get this incident out of my head so I do what writers do and I wrote the experience down. Llewellyn Worldwide, the publishing company who published my nonfiction, On Haunted Ground, chose also to publish this article in their journal. If you’d like to read this bizarre encounter go here.  If you read the article I’d love to know what you think about it and if you have any wonderful diabetic recipes you’d like to pass along I’d appreciate that as well.

 

 

Happy, Happy, HAPPY

Writing a book is hard. Getting one published can be down right excruciating. Usually by the time a book hits the shelf, countless hours have been poured into it—not only by the author, but by the publisher, editors, and cover designers.

I will never forget the sheer joy I felt the first time I held a REAL copy of my first book. It was surreal. Suddenly, all of the work, all of the ups and downs was finally worth it. I didn’t think that I’d ever experience anything like it again… I was wrong.
 

 

A few weeks ago when my daughter handed me a copy of HER book, all of those wonderful feelings came back. Knowing what it takes to get a book published and knowing that she had went the distance made me so extremely happy and proud that I find the experience hard to put into words. Not only is my daughter a wonderful Christian, but she's an awesome daughter, sister, wife, mother, and an EXCELLENT author. Today is her first novels official release and I simply couldn't be any prouder of her. Please join me in congratulating her in this monumental event. You can find Keshia here or here.
Blood Bound is available online at Barnes & Noble, Amazon, WalMart, etc order your copy today!!!

Only A Little Late...

Wow I can't believe two weeks has already past since the paracon and my very first ever book signing at Barnes & Noble. Earlier, as in a month ago, I promised to post pictures of these events and then...life happened. Grrrrr

This is me at Paracon!!!

 

I had never attended an event quite like this and simply cannot wait to go to another one. Even though the attendance was lower than expected I met some amazing people and had a great time. If you've never attended an event like this one, I urge you to do so. If you know of an event like this in or around the OKC area please let me know.

 

This is Mary Barrett and I at Barnes & Noble :)

 

 



Upcoming Events

Things are getting busy around here and I couldn’t be happier about it. I will be signing copies of my books in Mustang Oklahoma this Saturday, and then I will be here....

 

 

and then here...

 

 

Hope to see you there.

 

New Feature

It’s here! It’s here! It’s here! The ever-awesome Silvia from Darkest Sins has added a new feature to my blog. If you’ll look up, you should see the Purchase My Books tab. Once you click on it, you'll find several different options of places where you can buy my books, which now also includes the option of buying them directly from me. I can autograph and/or personalize them for you.

As Jeff Foxworthy would say… True stuff is the funniest

Last night my husband and I decided to go out to dinner at our all time favorite restaurant. Having a lull in our conversation, I decided to bounce a few ideas off him for my current WIP. Not coming up with anything new, I brought up his suggestion from a few days earlier of killing off my main character at the end of the book.

Revisiting this topic, I told him it would never work. I explained that in classic story telling, there NEEDED to be a more agreeable ending.

To this he replied, “Make the ending in the next book more agreeable.”

Even though I’ve never considered there being a “next book,” I thought about it for a minute, shook my head no and said, “What next book? I already killed everyone.”

It was then that the waitress who was serving a man seated directly behind my husband, stumbled and almost fell. As I tried to convince myself that it was all a coincidence, I couldn’t help but notice that the man at the table was now sitting very rigid.

Seeing my expression, my husband asked me what was wrong. Letting the waitress finish up and walk away, I told him what had happened. Just when I got to the part of repeating what I’d said about how I’d already killed everyone, a waiter, who was now behind me, jerked his head up and looked our direction.

Even though we had gotten very good service, up to that point, the staff seemed to avoid our table for the rest of our meal.

Long story short, if you are a fiction writer, be VERY careful when and where you decide to talk about your books, especially if they involve murder. BTW, if you happen to be from the OKC area, could you recommend a good Tex-Mex restaurant? Even though I’ve eaten at this one for 30 years, I’m not sure I will be able to go back. J  

 

 

New News

For those of you who do not follow Angelina's Secret on facebook I'm reposting this here for you. But if you're not following you should...you really really should. follow here

Bad News + Awesome News = Emotional Rollercoaster… which translates into the wonderful (it truly is) life of an author.

As some of you know, I had hoped to turn the characters from Angelina’s Secret into a character series. I had planned to publish another book with Angelina, Kobi, Josie, and all the favorites through the awesome Spencer Hill Press. Unfortunately, *sniff* that didn’t turn out. After crying, sulking, and kicking the door a few times I decided to go another route.

I’m happy to say that I’ve signed Angelina’s Promise with agent Albert Longden. I’ve worked with Al in the past. In fact, he is my agent for On Haunted Ground. So wish us luck and hopefully, I can soon report that Angelina’s Promise has found a home. Angelina’s Secret is still with SHP so if you haven’t gotten your copy it is still available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble website.

Oklahoma

For those of you who follow me on facebook, you know that I was super excited about attending a ghost hunt at the Stone Lion on May 19, 2013. I'm happy to report that I was able to go and I had a couple of experiences that I wanted to share with you all, but then... Monday rolled around and it just didn't seem that important anymore.

I'm sure that by now most of you have heard about the horrible tornado that hit several towns in Oklahoma that day. I'm sharing this video to let you see a little of what Oklahoma is dealing with right now. The pictures in this video are from Moore Oklahoma.

I live about 20 miles from there and I have a lot of family that lives in Moore. One of my nieces lost her home, but ALL of my family is okay and for that, I'm feeling very very blessed.

There are many reasons why I LOVE living in Oklahoma, but the main reasons are the awesome people who make up this great state. From the time of the tornados (some actually hit on Sunday night while I was driving to the Stone Lion), people have come out in droves to offer money, supplies, equipment, and labor—lots and lots of labor to help these victims.

Eventually I will get back to the routine of things and I will tell you all about my time at the Stone Lion until then Please keep Oklahoma in your prayers.