When several small-town locals die under mysterious circumstances, an aspiring journalist is determined to prove the connection between them, only to discover the dangerous secrets they left behind.
Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from Paula Gleeson’s Boney Creek, which is out June 3rd 2025.
Boney Creek is a dying town where not a lot happens. The perfect solution for married couple Addie and Toby who are escaping their own personal tragedy. But a quiet and simple life is not exactly possible with so many recent, strange deaths.
Seven locals, all gone too soon. That’s the nature of tragic accidents. And in a town this small, there’s no room for too many questions.
But Addie isn’t so sure. Although she never followed through on her dreams of becoming a journalist, she still has a reporter’s instincts. And her gut—not to mention all the small-town gossip—is telling her that whatever’s happening in Boney Creek is not as random as it seems.
There’s no such thing as coincidence, especially when it comes to seven bodies. And while burying her own secrets, Addie digs up far greater ones that will have her asking if she will be the town’s next so-called accident.
It’s dead.
Has been for some time. Its branches twisted, bare. Some broken, unmoving on the ground.
A man sits on one of them. His chain saw at his feet. A cup of hot tea from the thermos in his hand, the steam rising like the heat haze coming from the arid land around him. He swats a fly. Another lands in its spot. He curses the midday sun and all the bullshit it brings every summer.
If he’s caught out here cutting wood in fire season, he’ll be fined, but he couldn’t give a rat’s ass. No one around here would dare tell him what to do. Especially now he’s back to stay.
He throws his tea away, too bloody hot. The land guzzling the liquid as soon as it hits the ground.
He’s already polished off his ham-and-pickle sandwich, and all that’s left is the brownie Mary made down at the general store. She’d kept it for him. No charge, she said, teeth brown and lips thin.
Most days her words are like venom. Piercing to start, then slowly sinking in, impossible to shake loose. Other days she’s as sweet as her baked goods.
Like today. Clearly wanting something by not taking his money. He’d figure out what soon enough by way of her telling him. Mary might be delicate in her withering frame but not in her delivery.
If she knows already, I’m screwed, he thinks.
He bites into the dense chocolate texture, needing that tea after all. Mary always heavy handed with the cocoa. No matter, the sugar will get him through the rest of this tree, cutting it early to sell for firewood.
Dead trees are not hard to come by around here, just depends on whose property they’re found on. Firewood is easy money if you own the land—which he doesn’t.
He knows he’s pushing his luck being out here so late in the day. But this tree has been a bastard, and the sun hasn’t helped. Plus he’s miles from anyone; they’ll be lucky to hear his chain saw this far out.
His truck stands close by. The flatbed already packed with his other cuttings. Just this last one and he’s out of here.
He shoves the rest of the brownie into his mouth and coughs a little at the loose cocoa powder going down his throat. Mary’ll kill this town with her cooking, he thinks. Knowing full well he’ll pick up whatever she’s baked tomorrow and all the days afterward.
Unless she knows.
He dismisses the thought, wipes the sweat from his brow and his hands on his jeans, pushing the wide-brimmed hat onto his head. Just get this last tree down and he can be home in plenty of time to have a shower and a beer before the kid comes over.
Get himself right—in the mirror and in his head.
It’s a relationship he’s been wanting since forever, and he’s not going to screw this up. Not again. Three little words and he’ll be free. Finally.
I’m your father.
He smiles a little. Not common but it suits him. It’s lost out here with no one to notice.
His grip on the chain saw is firm, and he only needs one pull to get it started. It’s something he prides himself on. A few crows land on one of the branches overhead as he moves to the tree trunk. One of them lets off a wet shit, but it misses its mark. No good luck for him today.
He steps closer to the trunk, sizes up his first cut so the tree will fall just right. Felling them is a dangerous business.
A loud crack pierces the quiet of the bush.
Followed soon after by another.
One of the crows squawks, stumbling as the branch that’s been hit begins to fall. The birds screech as they all take flight, knowing their temporary resting place is no longer.
He looks up, distracted by the movement.
Not from the birds but the branch now falling from the sky.
There’s a thud as it cracks his skull just so.
He’s dead before he hits the ground.
The chain saw rattles away for a while longer, until it, too, dies.
Chapter One
DAY ONE
The sign hints at all the deaths.
BONEY CREEK
POPULATION 217
Except the 217 has been spray-painted out in red and left with two question marks.
Addie flicks her eyes to her husband. Nope, no reaction to the ominous sign. Acting like seven tragic deaths here in the last three months is no big deal. She fidgets in her seat. They’ve finally made it into town after a four-hour drive. Their new home. New life. No reason to be scared anymore.
“Here it is. Not much, but it’s exactly what we need.” He hasn’t spoken for an hour now, and it sounds weird in the quiet of the vehicle.
The car rattles as they drive over wooden palings on the small bridge leading into town; below is a completely dried-up creek bed.
“Is this the creek the town is named after?” Addie scans the baked, cracked land below. “It’s dry as a bone.”
Toby nods. “Yeah, that’s Boney Creek. Not much to look at now, though, with the constant drought and no flowing water.”
She glances at her husband, who has been distant the whole trip. No matter what she’s tried to do to lighten the mood, he’s shot her down. It’s not like him. Or maybe it is. After what happened, she can’t predict her husband’s state of mind like she used to. Maybe he’s nervous, too, even if it was his suggestion to move here. Made it happen so fast she hasn’t had time to process it all.
Maybe he’s having second thoughts like I am. That’s all it is, she decides as she catches him chewing the inside of his mouth. His eyes laser focused on the town they will call home, his short black hair sticking up at the back where he’s leaned against the seat for so long.
Addie hopes he’ll finally validate her own concerns about moving here. Confirm they’ve made a mistake now that they’re driving through the town on its crumbling asphalt road.
“You sure this is it? There’s nothing here,” she says.
“I told you, most folks live on properties all around. Not in the town itself.”
“What town? There is no town,” Addie mumbles to herself.
She’s seen one house so far since they’ve passed the sign welcoming them to Boney Creek. One house. And it was surrounded by long grass and bad fencing, so it could’ve been abandoned.
Addie shivers. These bad feelings were supposed to go once we left the city.
“You cold? I can turn the air-conditioning down.” Toby’s hand hovers over the dial that’s turned to three. It’s a scorcher outside, but in here is like a cool room—and not just because of the blasting frigid air.
“It’s okay, thanks. Just someone walking over my grave.”
“Speaking of.”
Addie follows his head tilt to a dirt road up ahead, lined with parked cars.
She leans forward. “What is it?”
“A funeral, I’m guessing.” His voice is matter of fact, almost bored.
They pass the road and the small sign saying it is, in fact, CEMETERY LANE. “How did you know the cemetery was up there?”
“If we’re going to run the only operating store in this town, then we should get to know it as well as we can.” He shrugs like she should have researched the town as much as he has.
Normally she prides herself on her research, but work hasn’t exactly been her thing as of late and moving to this remote town isn’t one of her newspaper articles. She hasn’t studied anything lately, except the growing worry lines on her forehead. His multiple uses of “we” are also not lost on her, like he’s trying to include her in a decision she didn’t make.
Addie sits back as more houses appear along the sides of the road. None of them close together. All with acres of dried land between them.
This is a mistake.
There it is again. The voice telling her to turn back. That life in the city was hard, sure, but will this life be any easier? Who’s she going to talk to besides sheep?
“Is that a café? I thought we were the only ones selling coffee?” Addie points to a small cottage with picnic tables out front. There’s a large area of red dirt for parking cars, which is completely empty. “Maybe we can try a coffee before we grab the keys? Before they know we’re competition.”
“If you like.” Her husband’s face is unreadable. It’s unnerving. She usually knows what he’s thinking after having been together for five years, three of them married. Not anymore, though. Not after that night.
The blinker is on, even though theirs is the only car on the road, and they turn in to the cottage-now-café before Addie’s suggestion becomes another reason for him to clam up further. She knows how much running late drives her husband to despair, and they’re cutting it fine.
They park, and Addie is out of the car first. The heat blasting her immediately. She squints at the glare of the sun coming from the ground and takes a deep breath. Country air. It’s like inhaling the heat from an oven with a whiff of cow shit. Might take some getting used to.
Addie looks around, but they are very much alone. No other cars in sight. She walks up a step onto the wooden veranda and pulls the door. It’s locked.
There’s a sign taped to the glass inside the door.
CLOSED FOR FUNERAL.
Ah, so he was right. That was a funeral back there. Which means there’s been yet another death.
Her husband is still stretching his arms near the car, taking in the nothingness. He probably loves the smell of baked cow shit, she thinks.
Stop it. Be nice.
“The café is closed. You were right, a funeral.”
He nods. “We should get going anyway. I told Gary we’d be there by one.”
She pulls out her phone. They’ve got a few minutes. The general store can’t be far from here.
“It’s just there.” He points, reading her mind like he always does—even if she’s as changed as he is after what they went through. “Spitting distance, as they say.”
Addie follows his finger and sees the slightly elevated sign displaying the word FUEL through the heat haze.
Under it is the recently purchased store. New business. New home. New life.
Only made possible because Mary, the lady who owned it for God knows how many years, died choking on her cereal just last week. One of seven deaths so far in Boney Creek in the last three months.
CLOSED FOR FUNERAL.
Make that eight.
