Tangled Roots Is Here

I’ve rewritten the first line of this post about ten times now.

I keep trying to find the right words. Something polished. Something that sounds like a proper announcement. But the truth is, nothing I type feels big enough for this moment and nothing feels small enough to match how terrified I am right now.

Tangled Roots is out today.

It’s actually out. In the world. Available for anyone to read. And I am equal parts thrilled and nauseous, which I think is exactly how you’re supposed to feel when you release something that scared you to write.

What This Book Cost Me

Not money. Not time. Those things I expected. What I didn’t expect was how much of myself this story would demand.

If you’ve been following me for a while, you know me as a romance author. The Made Series. A Sunday Affair. Stories about love, desire, complicated women making impossible choices. That’s the world I built my name in and I love that world. It’s warm there, even when things get messy. There’s always a thread of hope running through the chaos.

Tangled Roots has no thread of hope. Not at first. This story lives in the dark and writing it meant I had to live there too.

I wrote characters who lie to the people they love. I wrote about people who bury the worst thing they’ve ever witnessed and build entire lives on top of that silence. I wrote scenes that made me uncomfortable, chapters that made me sit back in my chair and wonder what I was doing. There were days I closed my laptop and felt unsettled in a way I never felt writing romance. Like the story had followed me out of the pages and into my living room.

And I loved every second of it.

Characters I Created But Don’t Like

I need to be honest with you about something. There are characters in this book that I am not a fan of. At all.

I created them. I gave them voices, backstories, motivations. I spent months inside their heads. And there are still some I would never want to sit across from at dinner. They’re selfish. They’re manipulative. They make choices that made me angry while I was writing them.

But the story needed them. Every lie, every betrayal, every uncomfortable truth in this book exists because these characters demanded it. My job wasn’t to like them. My job was to make them real. And real people are not always likable. Real people hide things. Real people protect themselves at the expense of others. Real people make choices you want to scream at them for.

That’s what makes a thriller work. You’re not supposed to trust everyone. You’re supposed to wonder who you can believe and then find out you were wrong.

The Part I Haven’t Said Out Loud

Here’s what keeps me up at night: I don’t know if my readers will follow me here.

You found me through romance. You fell in love with The Made Series. You rooted for Delilah’s quiet rebellion. You trusted me to give you love stories with heat, drama and heart. And now I’m handing you a psychological thriller set at a lake in the Blue Ridge Mountains where nothing is what it seems and everyone has blood on their hands.

That’s a big ask. I know it is.

But here’s what I need you to know: this is still me. The same writer who cares about characters more than plot twists. The same voice that finds the humanity in even the most flawed, broken, complicated people. The genre changed. The heart behind the writing didn’t.

Thank You

To everyone who read the teaser post back in March and said “I’m in” before you even knew what this book was about. You have no idea what that meant to me.

To everyone who pre-ordered based on nothing but trust. You believed in me before you had a reason to and I will never take that lightly.

To my ARC readers and street team who took a chance on me and this book before anyone else. You read it, you shared it, you showed up for me when it mattered most. I don’t take that for granted.

To the readers who’ve been with me since The Made Series and are still here, still reading, still showing up. You are the reason I get to do this. Not the algorithms. Not the marketing. You.

And to myself, because I almost didn’t do this. I almost stayed in my lane, stayed comfortable, stayed in the world I already knew. Writing this book was the scariest creative decision I’ve ever made. Releasing it is even scarier. But I’d rather be terrified and proud than safe and wondering “what if.”

About the Book

Twelve years ago, Clark Delaine drowned at his lakehouse. The police called it an accident. They were wrong.

Now, an anonymous letter threatens to expose the truth and the five strangers who've been keeping it buried. As their lives collide, dark secrets surface about the man everyone thought they knew. But in a story where no one is telling the whole truth, the biggest shock is yet to come.

TANGLED ROOTS is a multi-POV psychological thriller. Five perspectives. One murder. Twelve years of lies.

Some secrets don't stay buried. They grow roots.

This is Book One of The Root Series.

Where to Get Your Copy

Amazon: e-book/ KU/ Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GTG1N4ND

Want a signed copy?

Autographed copies are available! Order your copy at cnbookseries.com/shop

One Last Thing

If you read Tangled Roots and it won’t leave your head, if it makes you text a friend “you HAVE to read this,” please leave a review. On Amazon, on Goodreads, wherever you bought it. Reviews are everything for an independent author. They help other readers find the book and they let me know that the story landed the way I hoped it would.

And if you want to talk about it, come find me on Instagram, TikTok and/or Facebook @cnbookseries. You can also reach me by email at cnbookseries@gmail.com. I want to hear your theories, your reactions, your favorite characters and especially which ones you couldn’t stand. Trust me, I’ll understand.

The roots run deep. And now, finally, they’re yours to uncover.

Until next time,

Love, lies and everything in between

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