Born and bred in the sunny seaside town of Brighton, one of the first literary conundrums Shani had to deal with was her own name – Shani can be pronounced in a variety of ways but in this instance it’s Shay-nee not Shar-ney or Shan-ni – although she does indeed know a Shanni – just to confuse matters further!
Hobbies include reading and writing – so no surprises there. After graduating from Sussex University with a degree in English and American Literature, Shani became a freelance copywriter. Twenty years later, the day job includes crafting novels too. Writing both contemporary fiction and paranormal mystery, she is the author of The Runaway Year and The Runaway Ex, both published by Omnific Publishing. Her paranormal work is published by Crooked Cat Publishing and includes Jessamine and the bestselling Psychic Surveys Book One: The Haunting of Highdown Hall and Psychic Surveys Book Two: Rise to Me. All are available on Amazon.
The Return – published June 2015 – is the third in the Runaway series but can also be read as a standalone.
Psychic Surveys Book One: The Haunting of Highdown Hall – Synopsis…
‘Good morning, Psychic Surveys. How can I help?’
The latest in a long line of psychically-gifted females, Ruby Davis can see through the veil that separates this world and the next, helping grounded souls to move towards the light – or ‘home’ as Ruby calls it. Not just a job for Ruby, it’s a crusade and one she wants to bring to the High Street. Psychic Surveys is born.
Based in Lewes, East Sussex, Ruby and her team of freelance psychics have been kept busy of late. Specialising in domestic cases, their solid reputation is spreading – it’s not just the dead that can rest in peace but the living too. All is threatened when Ruby receives a call from the irate new owner of Highdown Hall. Film star Cynthia Hart is still in residence, despite having died in 1958.
Winter deepens and so does the mystery surrounding Cynthia. She insists the devil is blocking her path to the light long after Psychic Surveys have ‘disproved’ it. Investigating her apparently unblemished background, Ruby is pulled further and further into Cynthia’s world and the darkness that now inhabits it.
For the first time in her career, Ruby’s deepest beliefs are challenged.
Does evil truly exist? And if so, is it the most relentless force of all?
Psychic Surveys Book One: The Haunting of Highdown Hall – when Ruby meets Cash…
“Do you come here often?” said Cash, attempting to fill the gap. “Sorry, that’s such a cliché! I just meant I haven’t seen you in here before.” He looked mortified.
“That’s okay,” Ruby rushed to reassure him, “it’s as good a question as any, and yes, I do come here quite often. It’s my local; I work just up the road.”
“Oh right, I’m usually at the other end of town actually, at The Snowdrop, thought I’d pop in here for a change tonight though. I work locally as well. What do you do?”
And here it was, so soon, the question she always dreaded. How should she reply? The answer: ‘I see dead people’ rarely enamoured her to strangers even if they had seen and enjoyed the film Sixth Sense. Rather, it tended to make them look at her with barely concealed horror before making some excuse, any excuse, no matter how trivial, and hightailing it from her, condemning her mid-flight as some sort of fruit loop. Until they encountered a problem of the spiritual kind that is. Then they flew right back.
Refusing to be embarrassed, however, and reminding herself that her profession was just as valid as any other, she replied confidently, “I’m a surveyor, a psychic surveyor.”
“A what?” he asked, clearly baffled.
Holding her head high, she continued, “I run a company called Psychic Surveys, just a short walk from here up the High Street, opposite the castle. I survey houses for paranormal presence and, if such a presence exists, I work either alone or with a team of psychics to send that presence into the light, where it belongs.”
“You’re a ghost hunter?” gasped Cash, his eyes wide, not with horror she was quick to note, but fascination.
“We don’t call them ghosts, we call them spirits,” she pointed out. “And we certainly do not go hunting for them.”
“Wow! I never thought I’d be sitting in a pub on a Monday night talking to a ghost hunter!”
“As I’ve just explained,” Ruby replied, a little peevishly this time, “I am not a ghost hunter, I’m a psychic surveyor. There’s a difference.”
Nodding towards their empty glasses Cash said, “Well, whatever that difference is, I’d love to hear about it. Another drink?”
Psychic Surveys Book Three: 44 Gilmore Street is in progress.
All events in Shani’s books are inspired by true life…
Brighton-based author of paranormal fiction, including UK Amazon Bestseller, Psychic Surveys Book One: The Haunting of Highdown Hall. Psychic Surveys Book Two: Rise to Me, is also available and due out in November 2015 is Eve: A Christmas Ghost Story – the prequel to the Psychic Surveys series. Shani is also the author of Jessamine, an atmospheric psychological romance set in the Highlands of Scotland and described as a ‘Wuthering Heights for the 21st century.’
Catch up with Shani via her website www.shanistruthers.com
The Haunting of Highdown Hall UK http://tinyurl.com/lak4ub2
Canada http://tinyurl.com/owg9b5w
Why not visit Shani on her Facebook Author Page: http://tinyurl.com/p9yggq9
Twitter: https://twitter.com/shani_struthers
Goodreads http://tinyurl.com/mq25mav
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