The Water Tower by Amy Young October 9 - November 3, 2023 Virtual Book Tour!

Josie Ashbury was a successful Hollywood actress with a booming career—until an on-set breakdown sends her back to her small Ohio hometown to recover. Taking a job teaching at her old high school, Josie is beginning to put the pieces of her life back together when one of her students dies under suspicious circumstances. The police close the case quickly, without any real answers. Josie is determined to find the truth behind the girl's death.

At the same time, Josie is battling demons of her own. As she faces debilitating insomnia that leaves her with gaps in her memory, she dives into the tangled secrets surrounding the investigation. When she finally unravels the web, she discovers that the truth lies much closer to home than she could have ever imagined.

Praise for The Water Tower:

"Start with a suspicious death of a beloved student, add a devoted former starlet turned drama teacher, and a dash of the police closing the case far too quickly, and you have the makings of a twisting and propulsive mystery. Amy Young’s The Water Tower will keep you flipping the pages to find out who killed the politician’s young daughter, and then have you checking if your teenager is where they should be tonight."
~ Mary Keliikoa, multi-award nominated author of HIDDEN PIECES and the PI Kelly Pruett mystery series

"The Water Tower is an electrifying work of suspense that depicts a wonderful hometown setting. This slow-burn mystery with sparkling prose has a well-crafted plot that is at once engrossing and fully realized from beginning to end. I highly recommend this engaging mystery."
~ David Putnam, Bestselling author of the Bruno Johnson series and Dave Beckett series

Book Details:

Genre: Mystery
Published by: Level Best Books
Publication Date: June 20, 2023
Number of Pages: 290
ISBN: 9781685122775
Series: The Lakeview Mysteries, Book 1
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop.org | Goodreads

Read an excerpt:

Chapter 1

She stood on the water tower, looking at the skyline she had only observed from the ground. You really could see the whole town from up here. Funny how your whole life can fit into one 360-degree glance. Peering down at the ground, she was no longer able to see individual blades of grass, all of them blurring into a sea of perfect emerald green. To her right was the roof of Lakeview High School, looking small from this vantage point. She felt as though if she leaned over far enough, she could almost touch it. But that was ridiculous; the school had to be several hundred feet away. Her vision came in and out of focus as she swayed, thinking about her life, her past, her future.

In her three years at the school, she had never been up on the tower. No one she knew had been up here, either. Most students wouldn't dare to scale it. Too scared of getting caught, too scared of breaking the rules, too scared of living. When she looked down at the ground, she thought she could see movement, like little grass men dancing and hopping around through a crowd of their peers. Kind of like high school. More like, exactly like high school. Everyone looks the same; maybe some are a bit taller, a bit shorter, a bit wider, but everyone dressed in essentially the same uniform, hopping over one another, trying to make their mark.

How many feet above the ground was she—50, 60 feet? Was that high enough to kill you, or maybe just break a few bones? It would probably depend on how you hit the ground. Here she was, high above the town, pondering the angle at which you might hit the ground and live through the fall, the velocity at which an object might fall from here.

Her body felt warm all over, despite the crisp air of late fall, and she took off her jacket and threw it aside. She leaned against the rail and spread her arms, allowing the breeze to blow through her, inhabiting every cell for just a moment, before moving off in another direction to go dance with someone else. Her 17 years had all been spent here, in this one place, in this small, boring town where, it seemed, nothing was all that was destined to happen.

The clock tower chimed; it was 11:00. She felt she had eternity in front of her, the rest of this night, the rest of her life, stuck here in this town. Would she ever get out? Did it even matter if she did? She thought about the college catalogs arriving at home, the hundreds of pages of sales pitches clamoring for her family's money. The sprawling campuses, the smiling students, the serious, but friendly, professors—what was the point? She would just end up back here, raising the same family as her friends, living the same life that her kids would eventually live.

Reaching out her slender arm, she twirled her wrist. She could hardly wait for graduation when, everyone said, “real life” would begin. “I can't wait to get out of here,” her friends exclaimed, dreaming of big cities and even bigger lives in far off places: Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, anywhere but here. But she knew they would return, just like their parents, raising 2.5 kids with a Labradoodle and a balding husband in one of the best-little-suburbs in the country. Was it really so bad? She watched all these super-educated women who had given up their careers to stay home and clean up after the kids and drive to soccer practice, instead of changing the world as they'd so hopefully planned when plotting their escape years earlier. Was that her fate? Was that what awaited her now? Dozens of similar thoughts swirled and crashed like waves in front of her, mixing in a fantastic spray of colors, lights, and sounds.

She was dead before she hit the ground.

***

Excerpt from The Water Tower by Amy Young. Copyright 2023 by Amy Young. Reproduced with permission from Amy Young. All rights reserved.

Amy Young is an author, comedian, and actor based in Cleveland. After spending a decade in Los Angeles working in the entertainment industry and writing her debut novel, The Water Tower, she returned to Ohio to be closer to family. Amy is working on her second book, a thriller, and in her free time she enjoys going to the theatre, bingeing reality TV, and spending time with her husband and many, many cats. She has a B.A. in English from Kenyon College.

Catch Up With Amy Young:
AuthorAmyYoung.com
Goodreads
BookBub - @authoramyyoung1
Instagram - @amypcomedy
Twitter - @authoramyyoung
Facebook - @authoramyyoung
TikTok - @amypyoung1

My Thoughts

Josie Ashbury had been a successful actress until she had a breakup and felt that her time in Hollywood was over. She became a teacher at a local high school in Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland,  the place she decided to settle.

She has insomnia so she thought that she saw someone at the top of the local historic water tower. She chalked that up to her insomnia and didn't investigate further.

One day as she was jogging, as she usually does, she finds a young student Amber Oldman whose father is a Congressman and a prominent figure. The consensus is that Amber jumped although Josie does not believe this.

There was speculation that she was on Fentanyl and jumped, Josie finds that she can't let this go after the case was closed, probably because Amber's father was who he was.

Josie decides to investigate this case, she feels that Amber needs the truth to come out. Her friends are worried about her because of her insomnia. Josie is close to a previous significant other who is with the police. Josie also has a relationship with a fellow teacher. She thinks that he is the one.

This novel is a fast read, a book that you will want to finish quick. Some twists and turns in the story are well-written. I really enjoyed this first novel by Amy Young. I look forward for more by this author.

I give it 5 stars!

I received a copy of the book from Partners in Crime and was not monetarily compensated for said review

Tour Participants

Visit these other great hosts on this tour for more great reviews, interviews, guest posts, and opportunities to WIN in the giveaway!

ENTER FOR A CHANCE TO WIN:

There will be ONE (1) winner, US ONLY, for this tour. The winner will receive a $10 Amazon.com Gift Card. 

This is a giveaway hosted by Partners in Crime Tours for Amy Young. See the widget for entry terms and conditions. Void where prohibited.

Get More Great Reads at Partners In Crime Tours