🖤✨ This new paranormal romantic comedy by Sherry Soule is bursting with:
💛 Friends-to-Lovers
🐓 Forced Proximity
🐔 A Hex Gone Hilariously Wrong
👽Weird Shifters
🌶️ Medium Spice
A feel-good rom-com with curses, chickens, and chemistry.
The only crop Moxie can't grow? A love life. After a string of dating disasters, she's sworn off men entirely. Her heart is closed for the season—right along with the pumpkin patch after dark.
Then a gorgeous, half-naked man turns up in her barn.
When Jax Crawford filed one noise complaint too many, the librarian hexed him into a rooster from sunrise to sunset. Now the mayor's son needs a discreet place to molt in peace, and Moxie's henhouse is the only option. And while dating Moxie is tempting, he doesn't do romance with friends. Ever.
But their nightly conversations turn into a slow-burning ache neither of them ordered. And after several swoony kisses, Moxie’s retirement from romance is becoming highly negotiable, and Jax’s resolve is starting to wobble.
Falling for her barn guest was never the plan, and Moxie definitely wasn't supposed to like the guy her favorite hen spotted first. Now Moxie has to decide what’s scarier: losing Jax, or admitting that her catastrophically bad taste in men has finally—improbably—led her straight to the right one.
A paranormal romantic comedy about finding love, accepting your inner weirdo, and learning that sometimes the best relationships start with terrible first impressions and aggressive chickens.
Perfect for fans of weird shifters, small-town romance, and a happily-ever-after that comes with plumage.
HENPECKED AND HEXED EXCERPT (unedited):
As a half Kleptoraxian running an animal refuge in Harvest Hollow—a town where werewolves argued about gluten free kibble and vampires had emotional support bats—I thought I’d seen everything.
Until the rooster showed up.
I should’ve known my day was about to get weird.
And the way Henrietta, my Rhode Island Red and undisputed queen of the coop, side-eyed the new rooster made me pause. He was posturing around the henhouse as if he’d just bought the place and was considering renovations. Which didn’t give him the right to upset the delicate social hierarchy of my hens.
The rooster paced back and forth, chest thrust forward, wings slightly extended. He strutted toward a chicken near the feeder, but she continued eating without even glancing up. Shouldered past another by the water dish, but she just walked around him like he was farm decor.
Smiling, I had to hand it to my girls; they treated his bluster with the same enthusiasm I reserved for unsolicited advice, telemarketers, and anchovy pizza.
I squinted through the chicken wire. Where had he come from? No leg bands. No identifying marks.
The abnormally large rooster was handsome—glossy brown feathers, magnificent red comb. Bigger than any rooster I’d ever seen, actually. A total poultry supermodel…with weirdly green eyes.
That wasn’t biologically standard. Henrietta’s eyes were orange and the other hens had gold or brown.
He must’ve been some rare breed.
At five-foot-six, I had to stand on my tiptoes to peer over the coop’s upper rail, my brown cowboy boots sinking into the soft earth. The cheerful red coop had white trim peeling in spots that I kept meaning to repaint.
“Listen up, feather-butt. I’m Moxie Meridian, your human overlord,” I called through the wire. “And this is a hen-ocracy run by Henrietta, so stop bullying my girls.”
A breeze kicked up, rattling the wooden roosting bars inside and sending a shower of autumn leaves skittering across the yard. My long blonde waves whipped across my face. I pressed my palm against the wire mesh, the metal grid biting into my skin. My fair skin buzzed with a pleasant caffeinated jolt that came from soaking up direct sunlight—my body photosynthesizing sunshine like a houseplant.
Most people got a tan; I got a recharge. A perk of my Kleptoraxian DNA, even if it meant I couldn't eat broccoli without turning into a radioactive nightlight.
October in California meant I was basically solar-powered and vivacious until the winter solstice knocked me flat on my face.
The rooster swaggered closer to the wire and kicked dirt at me through the mesh. My mouth hung open like a broken mailbox, as the grit peppered my shins.
“Excuse me? I run a sanctuary, not a poultry firing range!”
This guy wasn’t just territorial; he acted as if I was the one trespassing on his property.
Crouching, I wiped the dirt from my calf. “You’ve got a lot of nerve for someone who pairs well with mashed potatoes.” I opened the henhouse door and stepped inside. “Did someone dump you here? Because if they did, they could’ve at least left a note. Maybe a fruit basket. I like fruit baskets.”
The rooster tried one more power move—a strut-and-head-bob combo near Henrietta’s favorite dust bath spot—and stepped directly into the water dish. Henrietta unleashed a string of chicken profanity that probably violated several interspecies treaties. He flailed backward and slammed into my legs.
I staggered, my boots sliding on grain and straw, and then scooped him up. “Clearly you need a timeout.”
I held the rooster close, the size of a small Thanksgiving turkey. What had this bird been eating? Protein shakes? He was heavier than a sack of feed corn and radiated heat like a freshly baked pie.
I stroked his head. A faint aroma of soap drifted from his feathers. I frowned, running my thumb over his wing. No matted feathers. No signs of outdoor living. His feet were clean, his talons neatly trimmed.
Okay, this was getting weirder. He smelled of fabric softener.
“You need to learn some serious henhouse etiquette.” I set him down in a safe corner of the run and dusted off my hands.
Henrietta did a leisurely lap of the coop, reclaiming her territory without even looking at him. Queen energy.
He was a curiosity, for sure. The green eyes, clean feet, and soapy scent. Someone’s pampered pet?
Exiting the henhouse, I latched the door. I should call animal control and let them deal with the mystery bird, but I dismissed it. Meridian Farm was known as a safe haven for creatures nobody else wanted.
I crossed the lawn toward the barn behind the coop and two-story farmhouse that had a wraparound porch and butter-yellow siding. Autumn in Harvest Hollow smelled of hay, the sweetness of the pumpkins ripening in the patch, and apples drifting over from Theron’s orchard next door.
The donkeys were friskily braying, and I felt like a competent professional in charge of a thriving agricultural enterprise.
One of my rescue goats sprinted past wearing my pink bra as a battle helmet, the cups flopping over its ears.
“Bleaters! Not again!”
This was the third bra this month he’d pilfered off the clothesline.
The black goat paused mid-stride, turned to face me with my 34C perched jauntily between his horns, and let out a triumphant bleat.
“That’s not a crown. That’s load-bearing structural support!”
I glanced at the clothesline beside the house. My bedsheet dangled from one corner. My jeans were in the tomato plants. And my favorite sweater—the one I’d thrifted last week, the gorgeous cable-knit—was missing entirely. Probably halfway to Narnia by now.
Bleaters ambled back to the petting zoo from which he’d escaped. I briefly considered tackling him, but chasing a goat while yelling about lingerie was how you got a reputation in a small town, and I was trying to keep mine comfortably at ‘quirky,’ and not ‘needs an intervention’ by the neighbors.
Sighing, I pinched the bridge of my nose. I was running an all-you-can-wear buffet for a goat with a lingerie addiction.
The sun dipped toward the horizon, painting the sky in shades of orange and pink. A truck rumbled past on the county road, its engine fading into the distance as a chorus of sparrows erupted from the old oak near the barn. The temperature hovered in that limbo between too-hot-for-a-jacket and not-quite-comfortable, and I tugged at the collar of my scarlet sundress.
I checked my watch: five-forty. Feed the horse, Butterscotch, check the water troughs, and then I could finally work on the Halloween costume that was going to win me that contest trophy. Five years of second place had to end somewhere.
Striding to the barn, the day’s energy faded from my skin as the amber sky deepened toward purple—my photosynthesis high winding down like a phone at two percent battery.
“Yoo-hoo! Moxie!”
I suppressed the urge to dive behind a hay bale.
My neighbor’s head appeared above the fence that divided our properties. Theron Clutterbuck waved, holding up a pair of binoculars. The fifty-seven-year old man wore a red-and-purple plaid shirt and his dark-brown hair stuck up in wispy tufts that defied both gravity and grooming products.
“Hey, Theron. Whatcha doing?”
He aimed the binoculars at a spot above my head. “Just observing the migratory patterns of the Western Tanage.”
I crossed my arms. “Pretty sure that doesn’t involve spying on my farm when you’re bored.”
He lowered the binoculars. “The birds go where the birds go, Moxie. I don’t make the rules of ornithology.”
Theron’s interest in nature was exclusively limited to things that were none of his business, that might be his business later, and gossip to share at the post office.
The roadside stand at the front of his property had closed for the day, but the sweet-tart smell of his famous cider still hung in the cooling air.
“But while I was not watching your property, I spotted a black Mustang drive up just before dawn and park in the petting zoo lot. Could’ve been a lost traveler.” He polished the binocular lenses with his shirt hem. “Though the car is still there.”
Ah yes, the three most common reasons for mysterious sunrise visits: lost tourists, criminal activity, or rooster abandonment.
But if the car was here, then where was the owner?
A purple VW Bug crept down the county road, turned into the parking lot adjacent to the petting zoo, and braked beside the black Mustang. The driver—Tala Grant, librarian and professional disapprover—glared at the car like it had overdue book fines. Smirking, she glanced at my farm, then drove away.
Theron and I stood in the kind of silence usually reserved for funerals or discovering your ex just got engaged.
He tilted his head at an angle that would’ve made an owl jealous. “Now where was I? Ah yes, I see you have a new rooster.” He tucked the binoculars into his vest pocket with the care of a man holstering a weapon. “Magnificent specimen and extraordinarily large. I’ve been reading about magical breeds. There’s a rare variety, the Gallus Fortuna Californicus, said to bring prosperity and luck to anyone who touches its feathers.”
“The what now?”
He leaned so far over the fence I worried he might topple into my yard. “I don’t suppose I could touch—”
“No.”
“Please? Just one feather—”
“No.”
“I’d settle for proximity—”
“Theron, I swear on every apple in your orchard, if you enter my henhouse, you’ll be banned from the farm for a week. The rooster needs time to settle. I don't know where he came from, and until I do, nobody's touching him.” I pointed at my neighbor with the authority of someone who’d dealt with this exact brand of nonsense for years.
“Okay, well, didn’t hurt to ask. Gotta an apple strudel in the oven anyway.” He disappeared behind the fence. “I’ll save you a slice!”
Shaking my head, I traipsed toward the barn. A red-tailed hawk circled against the darkening sky. The temperature had dropped enough that goosebumps prickled along my skin, and I caught myself wishing I’d grabbed a cardigan.
Inside the barn, golden shafts of light streamed through the high windows, illuminating dust motes that pirouetted in the air. The building had been built in 1924 by my grandfather, back when Harvest Hollow was still mostly human and the anomalous population kept to the outskirts. Now the town was a delightful blend of species, and the only thing anyone cared about was whether you showed up to the monthly potlucks with decent food.
After grasping the feed bag, I was halfway to Butterscotch’s stall when a strangled squawk-groan echoed from the back corner.
“Hello?” I gripped the sack tighter.
This was the part in horror movies where the blonde investigates the scary noise alone.
I was blonde. There was a scary noise. Yet, my self-awareness was appreciated, but completely ignored.
On a farm, weird sounds came with the territory—usually raccoons, occasionally possums, and once a lost tourist looking for a bathroom. He had left a very polite review on Yelp about my rustic facilities (the bushes), but this didn’t seem likely to result in a five-star rating.
Another groan. Definitely more human than raccoon.
Flipping on the overhead light, I inched forward. The shadows in the corner stall shifted as it stepped into the light—
I staggered back into the wall. Was it a person? Creature? Someone wearing a Halloween mask?
The feed bag slipped from my fingers and landed with a thunk directly on my left boot. Pain shot through my toes as I hopped on one foot, whimpering like a puppy.
The guy—he was definitely male from the neck down, wearing only dark jeans and boots—stood near the back wall. He was tall and muscular, with the kind of body that belonged on a romance novel cover—the good ones I read in bed while eating donuts. And his six-pack abs suggested a personal relationship with protein powder and a deep hatred of carbs.
And where his face should have been? Glossy brown feathers. An impressive red comb. And two green eyes fixed on me with cranky indignation.
The same rooster who’d kicked dirt at me an hour ago.
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