Exclusive Excerpt from “The Salty Rose”
I host blog tours and every once in a while I get an exclusive excerpt. If it’s from a book I that impresses me, I like to share those excerpts here. Recently I got one from a historical fiction/fantasy novel that appears to involve more than romance. I’m intrigued. It’s called The Salty Rose.
This is how author Beth M. Caruso describes her book.
Author’s description
Marie du Trieux, a tavern keeper with a salty tongue and a heart of gold, struggles as she navigates love and loss, Native wars, and possible banishment by authorities in the unruly trading port of New Amsterdam, an outpost of the Dutch West India Company.
In New England, John Tinker, merchant and assistant to a renowned alchemist and eventual leader of Connecticut Colony, must come to terms with a family tragedy of dark proportions, all the while supporting his mentor’s secret quest to find the Northwest Passage, a desired trading route purported to mystically unite the East with the West.
As the lives of Marie and John become intertwined through friendship and trade, a search for justice of a Dutch woman accused of witchcraft in Hartford puts them on a collision course affecting not only their own destinies but also the fate of colonial America.
An Exclusive Excerpt for Us!
Chapter 7.
“Hello, Marie. Listen to Grandmamma so she can get a better look at you,” Sara said.
The midwife winked. “Yes, come, Marie. My granddaughter knows what’s best,” she said, smiling.
I guided them to a small room in the back of the tavern. In the exterior wall near the corner was the secret slot where the Indians who wanted a drink after hours placed their deer meat or other trade goods in hopes of a discreet exchange for liquor. My guests couldn’t see it since it was well hidden from the inside by a sliding facade.
“Sit, Marie, I need to see those feet. Are you still sick to your stomach?” she questioned.
I took a seat in a tall-backed wooden chair carved as a marriage present from Henri La Chaîne, a furniture maker and friend.
“No, it’s passed already. I’m fine, just a little tired but no more than with any other child,” I responded.
The midwife carefully placed her hand over my belly. “Do you feel her moving about?” she referred to the baby.
A loud crash emanated from the front of the tavern. The babe in my womb stirred abruptly in response.
“What’s this?” she cried.
We ran to the front, the three of us, to see what was the matter. Business in the tavern had been at a lull when I’d retreated to the back only a few minutes earlier.
On my way to the main room, I heard a man with an English accent screaming at Domingo.
“I won’t take a drink from a filthy rogue like you. Where’s your mistress?” He had just upended a table where Domingo had placed his drink and was ready to turn over some benches in his senseless rage. All my work of cleaning the tavern that morning was ruined in seconds.
Want to read more?
The book is available at:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Salty-Rose-Alchemists-Witches-Amsterdam/dp/1733373802
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-salty-rose-beth-m-caruso/1133991342
I chose this book because I enjoy fantasy, and shape-shifting dragons sounded like way too much fun to miss. It turned out to be more of a romance novel in a fantasy setting. However, it is a fun read (and the shape-shifting dragons were as good as I hoped.) 
Yes, it may not be the classic telepathy of fiction, but we are talking about direct brain to brain communication here, aided by modern technology. The article goes on to address possible real life uses including already successful work on adapting a brain-to-machine interface to help paralyzed patients walk by using their brain signals to control prosthetic devices. This is cool, and it is really happening.
You probably can tell that I’m fascinated by the seasons, just as I’m fascinated by pretty much everything else about our amazing planet. If you find such things interesting, check out a wonderful site called 
Every once in awhile you read something so bizarre that you do a sort of mental double take. This happened the other day when I read that the classic hippie peace symbol from the sixties had its origins in satanic worship. What?
We hold animated discussions about how telepathy works and how to write a phrase readers will want to quote and the other day we got started on ideas that are inherently powerful, even magic if you will. The best example we could find was the power of the number three.
The world, our world, is filled with magic when we are willing to use a broad brush to define enchantment. And why not? We touch upon telepathy and magic charms, natural shape shifters and mysterious potions, if you open your eyes wide enough in the aquarium or the pharmacy to see the correlations.
S. R. Cronin 