Haunted Halloween 2012: Guest Post, Blind Spot author, Laura Ellen + A GIVEAWAY!!!

HAPPY BOOK BIRTHDAY TO LAURA &

BLIND SPOT!!

The creepiest thing that ever happened to me occurred when I was in college.  I went to visit my sister Michele and my newborn niece in Eugene, OR for Thanksgiving.

The morning after I got there, my sister needed to go to the store, but my two-month-old niece was still asleep and since I hadn’t showered yet, I offered to stay. She headed out the front door; I headed into the bathroom to take my shower.

I’d only been in the shower a few seconds when I heard someone yell something outside the door. I thought it was Michele; maybe she’d forgotten something and was now yelling to me.

I yelled back, “What?”

No answer.

“Michele?”

Again no answer.

I figured she’d left again, so I continued showering. As I was getting out a few minutes later, however, I heard a thump against the wall. My niece must be awake, I thought, and I hurried to get dressed.
When I opened the bathroom door, I realized two things:

My niece’s bedroom was down the hall, not adjoined to the bathroom wall, so the thump I heard couldn’t have been her.

 And. . . .

The microwave was going in the kitchen.

“Michele?” I called out.

No answer. Just the sudden DING as the microwave stopped.

A cold chill ran through me. My heart began thumping. My breath stopped.  I tip-toed to my niece’s room and peeked inside. She was still asleep in her crib.

I carefully shut her door and began making my way down the hallway toward the kitchen.

I jerked my head left to right, scanning the small kitchen and living room.

No one was there.

I walked over and opened the microwave. Empty.

“What the heck?” I muttered. As I turned away from the microwave I heard a shuffle and a thump from the living room closet. The shut door was directly across from where I stood and was located between the front door and the sliding glass doors.

My mouth went dry. If someone was in there, there was really nowhere to go to get away.

But then I thought, Michele.

She and her husband had to be messing with me.

“Ha, ha, Michele,” I said. “Very Funny.” I waited for her to come out of the closet. When she didn’t, I sat down on the couch, where I could see the closet, and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

I looked outside and searched for her car. It wasn’t parked in front of the apartment like it had been earlier. But she could’ve drove away and parked somewhere else to make me think she’d left.

So I waited some more.

Now this was back in the day before cell phones. I couldn’t call my sister and have her take a picture of her surroundings to see if she was in that closet playing a prank or if she was really at the store and someone or something was actually in the closet. The longer I waited, however, the more I became convinced.

Michele was not in that closet. As many tricks as we’d played on each other over the years, she’d never kept one going this long.

I sat there, not moving, barely breathing, my eyes glued to the closet until I heard the keys jingle in the lock half an hour later.

My brother-in-law checked the closet, but of course there was nothing there.

As the week went on with no more occurrences I told myself the noise in the closet must’ve been the neighbors (the closet did share a common wall with the apartment next-door), that the microwave could’ve been left on accidentally, and that the yell I heard must’ve just been the water pipes….because the alternative explanation was too scary to believe.

Title: Blind Spot
Author: Laura Ellen
Publisher: Harcourt Children's Books, 336 Pages (October 23rd, 2012)
Add to: Goodreads

Synopsis: There’s none so blind as they that won’t see.

Seventeen-year-old Tricia Farni’s body floated to the surface of Alaska’s Birch River six months after the night she disappeared. The night Roz Hart had a fight with her. The night Roz can’t remember. Roz, who struggles with macular degeneration, is used to assembling fragments to make sense of the world around her. But this time it’s her memory that needs piecing together—to clear her name . . . to find a murderer.

This unflinchingly emotional novel is written in the powerful first-person voice of a legally blind teen who just wants to be like everyone else.

Find Laura Online:

Website | Blog | Twitter | Facebook

Order Blind Spot Online:

Amazon | Barnes and Noble | The Book Depository




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Laura, thanks for writing up this post and for letting me share it with everyone on Blind Spots Release date! I'm so excited that I had the chance to celebrate this wonderful day with you! Also, hella creepy post! WOW! I don't know how I would have reacted, but I'd have been freaking out THAT'S for sure! Also, thanks for donating a copy of Blind Spot for giveaway!

Don't forget to stop by and check out who Jessica is featuring today for Haunted Halloween!

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