Next Stop: The Islands

Ahhhh…. The Islands

Sounds so dreamy and vacation-y, doesn’t it? I’m working on book four of my San Juan Islands Mystery series.  A book that I have been swearing that I will get to for about three years. And I’m finally doing it! And good lordy do I hate the islands. It’s not vacation. It’s a slog.  All of which is completely unfair to the islands. It’s not their fault that I’ve been procrastinating.  Or that I named three different people Cooper.  Or that I chucked out at least three different plots before I got to this one.

So Whose Fault is it?

Oh.  Yeah. It’s mine.  But taking responsibility really throws off a good rant. Part of the problem is that past self did not set me up for success. At three books in, you would think that I would do what I usually do with a series – start a spreadsheet.  Keeping a spreadsheet of characters names, a general description, and what books they appear in really cuts back on how many people are named Cooper.  (We’re now down to one.  The other two got magical name changes.) But when I started the series I didn’t intend for it to be a series. It was supposed to be a fun standalone mystery about an ex-actress and her ex-CIA agent grandfather solving mysteries in the islands of Washington State. The problem is that Tish and Tobias Yearly are funny and fun to hang out with.  Also, they just keep finding bodies, so… they keep needing more books.  It is not my fault.  It’s theirs. Blame the Yearlys.

And What Are You Going to do About it?

Keep better notes? I really am trying this time.  I revived the spreadsheet.  Added all those extra people I forgot about.  And I’m swear I’m this close >< to being done with book 4 – An Unfinished Storm.  Tish and Tobias are battling life, love, and Hollywood and trying to keep a police detective from jumping to some very wrong conclusions.

If you’re interested in Tish and Tobias Yearlys journey through the San Juan Islands, you can find out more from all the usual book selling suspects.

***

Bethany Maines is the award-winning author of action-adventure and fantasy tales that focus on women who know when to apply lipstick and when to apply a foot to someone’s hind end. She participates in many activities including swearing, karate, art, and yelling at the news. She can usually be found chasing after her daughter, or glued to the computer working on her next novel (or screenplay). You can also catch up with her on TwitterFacebookInstagram, and BookBub.

Cruising into Danger book cover

Special Guest: Kari Lee Townsend

by Sparkle Abbey

Today we’d like to welcome our friend Kari Lee Townsend to the blog. She’s going to tell you a bit about herself and share some info about the book she’s working on as well as what she has coming up. Welcome Kari!

Hi there. My name is Kari Lee Townsend, and I’m an author of several genres, but one of my favorites to write is the cozy mystery, especially paranormal ones.

Cruising into Danger book coverHave you ever been on a cruise ship? Today’s cruise ships are humongous compared to original cruise ships like The Love Boat. I love MSC cruise ships, but I took a Princess cruise ship
recently. The Love Boat was a Princess ship. How funny is that? During this particular cruise, I happen to be working on a cruise ship mystery. A lot of people know me for my Fortune Teller Mysteries, now known as The Sunny Meadows Mysteries. My newer Mind Reader Mysteries are called The Kalli Ballas Mysteries. Sunny is a fun, quirky psychic who uses fortune telling tools to predict someone’s future or see something from their past. The hero of her series is Detective Mitch Stone who is a serious, cynical sort, with a cast of eccentric characters in town. Meanwhile, Kalli is a fashion designer who falls and hits her head, giving her the power to read people’s minds, but only when she’s touching them. The kicker is, she’s an introverted germaphobe who doesn’t like to be touched. The hero of her series is Detective Nik Stevens who is a devilish extravert who loves to push her buttons. Kalli was adopted into a Big Fat Greek Family, while Nik is half Greek, which is Greek enough for the mamas to meddle in matchmaking. The cruise ship mystery I’m working on is called Cruising into Danger. It’s a crossover book between the two series. The two couples are on a cruise out of NYC to the Bermuda Triangle, where they meet and hit it off. Everything starts off great until mysterious things start to happen and then a passenger winds up dead on the return trip. The ship is on lockdown in the middle of the ocean with a killer loose on board. The detectives decide to use their skills to help wrap up the case faster, but they’re not the only ones who interfere. Sunny and Kalli use their abilities to investigate on their own, winding up in all sorts of sticky situations, causing both their families to meddle from afar.

Author photo: Kari Lee Townsend

I’m having so much fun writing this book. The exciting part is, a new spin off series of The Sunny Meadows Mysteries called Stone Investigations will be coming out next year. In that series, Mitch and Sunny have a grown daughter and son. Their daughter, Martina aka Tina, is just like her father. A serious private investigator. While their son, River, is a psychic like Sunny, who’s been backpacking across America with his blood hound Harley to find himself. Sunny convinces Tina to let River work with her, and they open Stone Investigations right in Divinity, where all the old favorite characters come into play.

Thank you for having me. I’ll give one signed copy of a paperback (winner’s choice) to a commenter.  Good luck!

 

Thanks so much for stopping by Kari. We can’t wait to read the new book!  And the new spin off series sounds like great fun! 

To find out more about Kari’s books visit her website at: www.karileetownsend.com

And don’t forget to comment in order to be in on the giveaway drawing! 

 

 

 

Clicking Our Heels – When We Know Our Writing is Good

Lynn McPherson – If it makes me laugh, I like to think it could make someone else laugh, too.

Gay Yellen – If it makes me laugh, or feel sad, or touches me in the way I want it to touch readers, I’m guessing it will work.

Lois Winston Having previously spent more than a decade working for a literary agency, I will be the first to admit that not only does it take a lot to impress me, but that I’m my own harshest critic. It’s obvious to me when I’m coasting in my writing, whether it’s a sentence, a scene, or an entire chapter, and I’ll work on it until I consider it fixed. That which can’t be fixed gets ditched.

Kathryn Lane – I write, edit, re-edit. Then I leave it for a month or so and read it again. That’s when I know whether it’s good or not, but the ultimate proof is when readers like my work.

Dru Ann Love – If something I read is good, I shout it out on social media.

Donnell Ann Bell – If it moves me and propels me further in the story. If I keep tweaking it, the words probably aren’t the best fit.

Anita Carter – If I still find it interesting after setting it aside for a few weeks and rereading it with fresh eyes.

T.K. Thorne – I don’t like the word “good.” I focus on whether it “works.” That is happening if it moves me in some way, makes me laugh, cry, reveals character, moves the plot ahead, etc.,  and if the writing itself enhances these things or at least doesn’t get in the way

Shari Randall/Meri Allen – I ask myself, does it elicit emotion? Laughter? Surprise?  If it does, even after several readings, then I’m satisfied.

Mary Lee Ashford   don’t think I’m a very good judge of whether something I write is good. It’s so difficult to have perspective on your own work. If it’s making sense to me and I think it’s moving along, I’ll keep going. Then if it still makes sense or the scene/chapter seems to work when reread a day or two later, I decide that it’s good enough for my critique group and beta readers to read. After that it’s ready for the editor and off on its journey on to readers. Then when I hear from readers: that they enjoyed the book, that it made them laugh (or cry), or that something in the story resonated with them. I guess, it’s then that I decide maybe that the writing was okay.

Debra H. Goldstein – If the text writes smoothly from the zone rather than me struggling for a concept, I know the piece should be good, but I won’t know for sure until I get reader feedback.

Linda Rodriguez – Every once in a while, I’ll be immersed in writing something, and when I emerge, I’ll read it over and feel this little zing inside that tells me I’ve struck pay dirt. Doesn’t mean I won’t wind up doing a good bit of editing and polishing, but I know the heart of it is good. Usually, however, I don’t know until I’ve set it aside for a little while and come back to it with that cold editor’s eye.

Bethany Maines I think there are two different kinds of good.  Is the writing itself—sentence structure, word choice, etc—of a high quality? For that, I can usually tell by how many junk words I have or haven’t used (very, really, just) and whether or not it makes me have an emotional reaction every time I read it. The second kind of good is whether or not the story itself is good. I have had ideas that are wonderful, but I don’t always have the skill to execute them to their fullest. Sometimes I have to wait until I feel confident to tackle those. I usually feel like those ideas are the ones that make me excited. But at the end of the day, I always feel like my writing probably could have been better, so maybe this isn’t my best question.

Barbara Eikmeier – My husband is often my first reader. He’s a tough critic so if he tells me he thinks it’s good I feel like it must be good.

Saralyn Richard – I need to have a vague sense that I have accomplished what I set out to do in each chapter that I write, but I don’t really know that it’s good until a reader tells me so.

Robin Hillyer-Miles – I think something is good if, after having it rest a bit and reading it, I feel emotional.

Guilty About Reading Genre?

Have you ever felt guilty for reading a cozy, a mystery, or a romantic novel instead of delving into one of the great books, like Homer’s Iliad or Proust’s Swan Way or a classic like Virginia Wolf’s A Room of One’s Own?

I grew up in northern Mexico and I attended a fantastic high school that was accredited in both Mexico and the US, giving students the opportunity to attend the university in either country.

The school offered a two-semester English literature class. The teacher was a dynamic, talented woman who instilled in her students the love for the classics and the great books. She also encouraged us to shun genre and to avoid soap operas, quite popular at the time.

I moved to the US in my mid-twenties and soon discovered romance novels. After devouring a romantic story with a happy ending, I’d run to the library to borrow books by Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky to balance my reading guilt. Compare the fun of reading genre to the lessons of the great books. It’s very different reading! The great books represent the foundations of Western Culture’s ethics, social norms, values, and ideas that stem from the Greco-Roman tradition. Genre, on the other hand, is pure entertainment.

Fast forward a few years when I was working in international finance and traveling the world for my corporate job.

On a flight between New York and Buenos Aires, Argentina, I missed my connection in Miami. I window-shopped airport stores in search of something to do until the next flight. A bookstore, displaying mountains of books set on tables that stretched down the hall, caught my eye.

The year was 2001 – the year I discovered the mystery novel. I purchased Tell No One by Harlan Coben and I was immediately hooked on mysteries. My new-found love in reading would disappoint my wonderful literature teacher back in Mexico, yet for the rest of my international finance career, I carried a mystery or two to read on long flights.

Mysteries became an important part of my life. So important, in fact, that I left the corporate world to write the Nikki Garcia mystery series, setting my stories in a few of those international locations where I traveled. Do I still feel guilty? Not at all!

At a book signing four years ago, I met Harlan Coben. I told him his novels influenced me to write mysteries.

And my former teacher says she loves my novels and she’s thrilled that one of her pupils became a writer. Instead of feeling like a wayward former student, I’ve converted her to reading genre.

***

About Kathryn

Kathryn Lane writes mystery and suspense novels usually set in foreign countries. In her award-winning Nikki Garcia Mystery Series, her protagonist is a private investigator based in Miami. Her latest publication is a coming-of-age novel, Stolen Diary, about a socially awkward math genius.

Kathryn’s early work life started out as a painter in oils. To earn a living, she became a certified public accountant and embarked on a career in international finance with Johnson & Johnson.

Two decades later, she left the corporate world to create mystery and suspense thrillers, drawing inspiration from her travels in over ninety countries as well as her life in Mexico, Australia, Argentina, and the United States.

She also dabbles in poetry, an activity she pursues during snippets of creative renewal. In the summer, Kathryn and her husband, Bob Hurt, escape the Texas heat for the mountains of northern New Mexico.

Stolen Diary

Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BSHFRD11

Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/Stolen-Diary-Kathryn-Lane/dp/1735463833/

Photo credits:

Girl Reading by Camille Corot, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Harlan Coben and Kathryn Lane by Bob Hurt

The Right Way to Worry –by T.K. Thorne

There’s a lot to worry about.

The world is on fire. Literally and figuratively. It’s not the first time, of course, even though it feels like a unique crossroads of time.

I grew up under the threat of nuclear winter and the extinction of life on Earth. My family discussed what to do should the sirens go off (the sirens that now warn of tornados rather than a nuclear bomb headed our way). “Stay at school,” my mother said. Of course, there was no guarantee it would happen while I was at school. I spent a good bit of time wondering where we could hunker down and if we could get a lead shield big enough for the garage door to keep radiation out and what food we needed to have stored away. I still have the little booklet on how to survive nuclear fallout.

So, I know how to worry!

There also are more mundane issues to concern us. We worry about inflation and that gas prices are too high, or about deflation and that they will go too low. We are worried our investment dollars (however small) may not poof back into existence when they poof out. If we are working, we worry about the stability of our jobs or whether we picked the right career or the right mate.

Writers worry that our stuff will not be good enough, or read enough, or whether we will have “writer’s block” and not write enough, or we will write too much and have to cut … and (yikes!) what if we cut the wrong stuff? We worry that agents or editors or readers won’t love us or, if we are fortunate enough to have a success, we panic that the next project won’t be as good.

Then there are the really scary worries. We worry about politics and what will happen to our children, whether they will be able to live their dreams or end up in prison, in a fascist state, or under the thumb of a world-dominating Artificial Intelligence.

Pick a subject; we can worry about it. Everyone, except possibly the enlightened Dalai Lama, worries about something, more likely a lot of things. Worrying must have had some evolutionary value. If we never worried about having stuff in lean times, we wouldn’t have invented grocery stores…or shopping.

We plan in response to worry. If junior is smart, how are we going to pay for college? Better start saving early. If junior isn’t smart, we may have to feed him well into his adult life. Better start saving early. Some worrying (that leads to planning or working to make change happen) is therefore good. Excess worrying, however, causes stress, and stress is linked to everything from headaches to premature death.

Early man worried about placating emotionally unstable gods and spirits that rocked the world with floods, drought, earthquakes, and fire from heaven. They must have worried incessantly about what they could do about it until they invented shamans to tell them exactly when, where, and how much stuff to offer up. Of course, we are way beyond that now. I think it’s been days since I knocked on wood to keep from irritating the gods about something I said.

My 4’ 10” grandmother was a Professional Worrier. She was pretty much undiscriminating about the subject matter, but as I entered my teens, she worried in particular that my hair was not stylish, my cheeks were too pale, and my skirts were too long to catch a boy’s eye. She worried I would not marry a doctor and that some illness or accident was bound to befall me, probably at the worst time, (i.e., before I got married). Most of all, she believed I was oblivious about the importance of these things and so, she carried the burden of worrying about them on her own tiny shoulders.

On one family outing, we watched from a bank while my grandfather puttering around the lake in a small one-seater motorboat. Grandma’s palms stayed plastered to her cheeks for the entire thirty minutes he had fun.

She heaved a sigh. “I’m so worried about him.”

Grandma’s concern was always an expression of her love, not something to question, but that day I turned to her and asked, “Why, Grandma? Why are you worried? What good does that do?”

With a look of disbelieve at my ignorance, she said, “Because you never know!”

You never know. True. Something could happen. Anything could happen.

With a flash of understanding, I got it.

Worrying is magic. If you’ve worried about something, you’ve tipped the scales of fate, you’ve appeased the gods; you’ve knocked on wood. That’s why when you say, such and such could happen, you add a “God forbid” to the end of it. Grandma’s strategy, even if it was an unconscious one, was that you should do preventive worrying to keep something bad from happening. And if you weren’t diligent and hadn’t covered all the bases, something you hadn’t even thought about was sure to sneak up on you … and (God forbid) happen.

The Dahlia Llama sees all this in a very different light. He says that if there is a solution to a problem, there is no need to worry. And if there is no solution … there is no need to worry.

I, being my grandmother’s descendant, have developed my own, somewhat less enlightened, but workable, strategy: Refocus your worries. I like to worry about exactly how I am going to spend the money should I win a lottery. (You have no idea all the problems such a responsibility raises.) And speaking of responsibility, we could worry about starving people in Africa a little more often than when we are admonishing children to eat what’s on their plate. We could worry about the precious democracies that are under threat, not to mention the polar bear’s diminishing habitat and our chances for surviving on a planet whose thermostat has gone whacko.

But even responsible worrying can become stressful. When the You-Never-Knows of everyday life start to tangle my mind, I refocus on the scientific proclamation that our Universe is possibly a random bubble among many, and it could pop at any moment and annihilate the whole thing.

Now, there is something to worry about!

T.K. Thorne writes about what moves her, following a flight path of curiosity, reflection, and imagination.

July 2023 Summertime in Southern Colorado By Juliana Cha Cha de Cochiti Pueblo, New Mexico de la cruz Aragón Fatula

Dear Reader,

This is the story that I want to write and read. Something no one else can write. Only I can tell this story. It is my story about two talented Chicanas from Pueblo, Colorado who solve crimes and mysteries and run Emma’s Recovery House for women and children. L.A. and Eva Mondragón Private Investigators and social activists in Denver, Colorado honoring their mother by helping the unfortunate. There but for the grace of God, go I.

Summertime and living is easy. The tide has finally rolled out and we are beginning to enjoy the peace, quiet, and solitude of retirement and our golden years.

I’ve been working since I was twelve years old. My first job, babysitting, taught me how to take care of a baby, my nephew.

My second job, I was fifteen and pregnant, taught me how to clean and scrub toilets at the beauty shop owned by the only Latina beautician in town, Dee. She gave me my first office cleaning job.

Eventually, I gained employment scrubbing the toilets of the local doctors, lawyers, judges, and politicians. Their houses never seemed dirty to me, but I dusted, swept, vacuumed, mopped, and cleaned windows and bathrooms.

My mother cleaned houses, but she also ironed and washed the clothes of her employers and they gave my mom their children’s hand-me-downs and toys. Even though we were poor, we dressed nice and had great toys, bikes, sleds, skateboards, Suzy Easy Bake Oven…

The rich loved my mom’s cooking. She made the best tamales in the county. They gave her their children’s possessions as they outgrew them. We in turn gave our clothes and toys to the white family down the block because they were even poorer than we were in our family.

Mom and Dad taught us never to make fun of those poor white kids who wore our hand-me-downs. Our parents taught us respect, morals, ethics, honesty, kindness, and generosity, and gave us unconditional love. (Don’t know how I turned out semi-normal).

I worked through the summer of 1972 and by the fall, my friends had returned to high school sophomore year. I left my small hometown in Southern Colorado and moved to San Francisco, California.

The culture shock was minimal but the homesickness was maximum. I missed my family and my friends but not my hometown. I was thrilled to be living in the Bay area and enjoyed my fifteenth birthday, my boyfriend, and my baby boy. I had no clue what I was doing.

My California romance ended, and I returned to Colorado and my parents. I returned to my hometown high school and found my next job at the communication monopoly known then as Mountain Bell.

At sixteen I was the first person of color in my hometown to work at a major corporation like Mt. Bell as a telephone operator. Thanks to the Equal Employment Opportunity Act and Family Planning I was able to rent an apartment, buy a car, and support myself and my son and get healthcare for us. Mt. Bell also hired the first male telephone operator in the county. He happened to be gay but was closeted in our small, town of 99.99% Caucasian in 1973.

I celebrated my eighteenth birthday in the ICU in the hospital in my hometown after nearly bleeding to death in the ER restroom. I had an ectopic pregnancy that burst when I was packing to move to Denver. I lost my left ovary and fallopian tube and lived to tell the story.

I transferred to Denver and left my hometown. I was a customer service representative for Mt. Bell in their downtown Denver high-rise. I met people from all walks of life and became part of a diverse community. I loved living in Denver. I transferred several times to better-paying jobs and climbed the corporate ladder. I learned job skills and networked with coworkers from around the country.

I never gave up on my dream of graduating from college. I made my goal of a degree in English and Creative Writing a priority in my life. Eventually, I earned several degrees and my teaching certificate.

When my Dad died, I returned to my hometown to be near my mother in her golden years. I was hired by the school district and taught in the same building I had attended in my freshman year of high school.

I had come full circle, but I wasn’t satisfied. I wanted to push myself. I challenged myself to write and get published. The year I graduated, Conundrum Press published  my first book of poetry, Crazy Chicana in Catholic City, a year later my second book of poetry, Red Canyon Falling on Churches, was published.

I graduated with honors from CSU Pueblo in 2008 at 50 years old, published two poetry books and a chapbook, The Road I Ride Bleeds, and decided to challenge myself to write my first novel.

I’ve always loved the mystery genre. I naturally chose to write a love story mystery. I don’t want to write a good novel. I want to write a great novel. I joined several national writing groups and networked with writers, editors, journalists, and publishers. I read books on writing by the masters: Stephen King, Ernest Hemmingway, Linda Rodriquez, etc.

I set my self-imposed deadline of July 15, 2023, to finish revising my m.s. I’ve been writing this novel off and on for five years. Stopping when life gets too crazy and starting again when I figure out how to survive the global pandemic, my son’s drug addiction, his heart attack, his stroke, his brain damage, and his death at fifty.

In December of 2022, my husband and I both had covid and weeks of illness. Then came the death threat to my husband by my nephew and the subpoena to testify against him in court.

One day I shook off all of the pain and grief and went back to work on my novel and worked harder than I ever had before. I realized with my son’s death at only fifty years of age that I could die at any minute from anything and needed to complete my book, publish my book, and then I could die, but not until then. I added to my bucket list: publish a great mystery love story and spread my message of diversity, inclusivity, peace, love, and understanding and do it with a sense of humor and dun dun dun, mystery.

Today I’m chilling. I’m waiting for feedback from my editor and her critique for revisions and submitting my novel. I truly have hopes of submitting to all the Latinx/Chicanx publishers. There are few but they do exist, and I want to start with them first. It also is important to me to submit with an LGBTQ publisher because many of my characters are lesbian, gay, transgender, bisexual, and queer and have important messages to teach about being marginalized.

Many of the women characters in my novel living at Emma’s Recovery House are recovering drug addicts, alcoholics, inmates, human trafficking victims, runaways, abused, confused, and used women looking for a new life, a new start, a fresh chance to survive in a world gone crazy. They have been judged, mistreated, abandoned, beaten, and ignored as worthy human beings with something to contribute to society. I want to tell their stories of wicked warrior women with survivor attitudes and joyful spirits.

Summertime…and the TBR pile is calling!

By Lois Winston

A Crafty Collage of Crime, the 12th book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, released six weeks ago. After a multi-week blog tour to promote the book, I’ve now officially entered the period I call “me” time, a mini-vacation I permit myself after each new book leaves the security of the laptop womb and before I begin seriously thinking about the next book. Much of that “me” time is spent binge-reading (especially since it’s too hot to leave the house!) I’m trying to make a sizable dent in my virtual TBR pile before I add another book to my Kindle library. Here are the books I’ve read so far (in the order I read them) and what I thought.

 

Murder at the Pontchartrain by Kathleen Kaska

Kathleen Kaska always delivers, and once again she doesn’t disappoint in Murder at the Pontchartrain, the sixth book in her delightful 1950s era Sidney Lockhart Mystery Series. This time Sidney and Dixon are in New Orleans, having decided to elope, but it doesn’t take long for a dead body to show up in their hotel room, delaying the nuptials and plunging them into yet another murder investigation as the bodies begin to pile up and Dixon finds himself locked up. Kaska had me guessing whodunit until the very end, and those are the best murder mysteries.

 

The Tiffany Girls by Shelley Noble

A brilliant blending of fact and fiction. When a Parisian woman artist is forced to immigrate to New York, she secures a position at the Tiffany Glass Works, working beside the real women responsible for many of the designs and much of the work attributed to Louis Comfort Tiffany. Noble has woven a well-researched historical novel that will draw you in and keep you turning pages.

 

The Princess Spy by Larry Loftis

A fascinating look at an American woman who worked as an OSS operative in Spain during WWII. I just wish the author had delved more into her life in this biography and spent less time celebrity name-dropping. I also wanted more narrative action and less dry summarization of events.

 

Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

For such a prolific playwright, so little is known of William Shakespeare’s life and family, including the circumstances of his young son’s death. In Hamnet, the author weaves an engaging tale of what might have occurred and how it may have become the catalyst for one of Shakespeare’s greatest works.

 

Dead Men Need No Reservations by Terry Ambrose

The latest edition to Terry Ambrose’s Seaside Cove Bed & Breakfast Mysteries doesn’t disappoint. I always love spending a few hours with these characters, especially Alex, the precocious thirteen-year-old wannabe sleuth. If you’re in the mood for a light mystery and a few chuckles along the way, this book will give you both.

 

Going Rogue by Janet Evanovich

No matter the lemons in your life, spend a few hours with Stephanie Plum, and you’ll be sipping lemonade. Going Rogue is just as entertaining as all the other books in the series and will certainly make you forget your cares–at least for a little while–as you slip into Stephanie’s world.

 

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie

I had never gotten around to reading this acclaimed Christie mystery, but I did figure out whodunit before the denouement, so for me that was a bit of a disappointment. However, what’s not to love about Monsieur Poirot?

 

Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz

Unfortunately, I didn’t feel this book lived up to the first in the series. I really enjoyed Magpie Murders, but this sequel seemed forced, contrived, and often plodding. I’m someone who enjoys the “book-within-a-book” format when it’s done well, but that wasn’t the case here. The style works best when the two stories alternate, not when the entirety of the second book is dropped into the middle of the other. However, he did keep my guessing whodunit until the end.

 

In addition, I’ve read several mysteries for a contest I was judging and one where I was asked to write a blurb, but since the contest winners have yet to be announced, and the blurb book is not yet published, I can’t mention anything about them.

Now I’m off to tackle the next book on my list…but before I go, If you’re planning a road trip and looking for an audiobook to pass the drive time, I still have a few promo codes available for a free download of A Stitch to Die For, the fifth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series. Post a comment about your summer reading for a chance to win one.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

Macavity, Shamus, and Silver Falchion Short Story (and Other) Award Nominations

by Paula Gail Benson

The nominations for Macavity Awards, Shamus Awards, and Silver Falchion Awards have been announced for best short story or best short story collection or anthology.

The Macavity Award is named for the “mystery cat” of T.S. Eliot (Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats). Each year the members of Mystery Readers International nominate and vote for their favorite mysteries in five categories: Best Mystery Novel, Best First Mystery, Best Mystery Short Story, Best Non-Fiction/Critical, and the Sue Feder Memorial Award for Best Historical Mystery. Here are the nominees for best short story:

Best Mystery Short Story:

  • Brendan DuBois: “The Landscaper’s Wife” (Mystery Tribune, Aug/Sep 2022)
  • Barb Goffman: “Beauty and the Beyotch” (Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, Jan 2022)
  • Donna Moore: “First You Dream, Then You Die” (Black is the Night, Titan Books)
  • Anna Scotti: “Schrödinger, Cat” (Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Mar/Apr 2022)
  • Catherine Steadman: “Stockholm” (Amazon Original Stories)
  • Jess Walter: “The Angel of Rome” (in The Angel of Rome and Other Stories, Harper)
  • Melissa Yi: “My Two-Legs” (Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Sep/Oct 2022)

Previously, Brendan DuBois’ short stories have won three Shamus awards.

Barb Goffman’s “Beauty and the Beyotch” has been nominated for the Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity. It won the Agatha.

Donna Moore’s “First You Dream, Then You Die” was nominated for an Edgar.

Anna Scotti is a former journalist whose stories regularly appear in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. “Schrödinger, Cat” received a third place Ellery Queen Readers’ Choice Award.

Catherine Steadman’s “Stockholm” won the Thriller for best short story.

Jess Walter’s “The Angel of Rome” comes from his collection of stories by that title.

Melissa Yi is an emergency room doctor who writes a medical crime series as well as romance and YA.

The Private Eye Writers of America, an association of fans, writers, and publishing professionals, is devoted to elevating the private eye story from a sub-genre of mystery to a genre of its own. It categorizes private eyes as private citizens paid to investigate crimes. Private eyes may include investigators, company employees, and reporters. Each year the Private Eye Writers of America presents Shamus awards in four categories: Best PI Hardcover, Best Original PI Paperback, Best First PI Novel, and Best PI Short Story. Here are the nominees for best short story:

Best PI Short Story:

  • Lori Armstrong: “No Place for a Dame” (Edgar & Shamus Go Golden, Down and Out Books)
  • Libby Cudmore: “Charlie’s Medicine” (Lawyers, Guns, and Money: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Music of Warren Zevon, Down and Out Books)
  • O’Neil DeNoux: “A Jelly of Intrigue” (Edgar & Shamus Go Golden, Down and Out Books)
  • Carolina Garcia-Aguilera: “The Pearl of the Antilles” (Edgar & Shamus Go Golden, Down and Out Books)
  • Elliot Sweeney: “Bad Actor” (Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Nov/Dec 2022)

Lori Armstrong has won two Shamus awards for her novels.

Libby Cudmore writes the Martin Wade PI series for Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine.

O’Neil DeNoux won the 2020 Shamus award for his short story “Sac-a-lait Man” in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine’s Sep/Oct 2019 issue.

Born in Cuba and based in Miami, Carolina Garcia-Aguilera has been a private investigator for twenty-five years. She is known for her Lupe Solano mystery series.

Elliot Sweeney, born in London, had his debut novel The Next to Die published in February 2023.

The Silver Falchion Awards are presented annually at Killer Nashville, which takes place August 17 through 20. (Note: there is still time to register to attend the conference. Also, online voting for the Readers Choice Awards continues until midnight Tuesday, July 25.)

Here are the nominees for best short story collection or anthology:

Best Short Story Collection or Anthology:

  • Chris Chan: Of Course He Pushed Him & Other Sherlock Holmes Stories: the Complete Collection (MX Publishing; 1st edition; September 2, 2022)
  • Marianne Donley, ed.: An Element of Mystery: Sweet, Funny, and Strange Tales of Intrigue (Bethlehem Writers Group; September 27, 2022)
  • Marissa Doyle: Countess of Shadows: The Ladies of Almack’s Omnibus No. 1 (978-1-63632-094-6; November 1, 2022)
  • Catherine Jordan, ed.: That Darkened Doorstep (Hellbender Books; September 21, 2022)
  • Lindy Ryan: Into the Forest: Tales of the Baba Yaga (Black Spot Books; November 8, 2022)
  • J.B. Stevens: A Therapeutic Death: Violent Short Stories (Shotgun Honey Books; February 16, 2022)
  • J.D. Webb: Incredible Witness (Wings ePress, Inc.; June 27, 2022)

I’m very proud to be a member of the Bethlehem Writers Group and to have a story in An Element of Mystery. Debra H. Goldstein has a story in it also. Two of our other members, Dianna Sinovic and Diane Sismour, have stories in An Element of Mystery as well as in That Darkened Doorstep.

While I’m mentioning Silver Falchion nominees, let me brag on several of my Stiletto Gang blogging partners whose books placed in other categories: Debra H. Goldstein’s Five Belles Too Many was nominated for Best Cozy and Saralyn Richard’s Crystal Blue Murder and Joyce Woollcott’s A Nice Place to Die were nominated for Best Investigator.

Many great stories, collections, anthologies, and novels for your reading pleasure. Please enjoy!

Where do ideas come from?

WHERE DO IDEAS COME FROM?

by Joyce Woollcott

I wonder, I really do, where ideas come from. Not just ideas for books and short stories and magazine articles, but ideas in all creative fields. Artists, painters, sculptors, potters, movie makers, song writers––anyone at all who creates original content. Of course I do wonder more about my fellow writers. Getting the idea is only the first part, what do you do with it when you get it and how do you put it together as a terrific book?

I struggle to flesh out my novels. For me at least, the initial concept, that what if? moment is the easiest. What if a detective sergeant arrives at a crime scene only to discover he knew the victim? What if a well-respected retired detective chief inspector is brutally murdered in his bed and his past comes into question? I bet this is the stage most writers enjoy most, the idea. How wonderful it is to get that first storyline, that initial spark, the potential it holds, the possibilities.

Then the work begins.

I think after that first initial thought, the book unfolds in a series of ideas. It does depend on how you write, are you a plotter or a panster? I’m a little of both. I generally know what the beginning, middle and end will be, in a vague way, it’s filling in the bits between that present a challenge, and probably not just for me. I think about my story in progress most of the time. Certainly when I have a free moment, just before I sleep and when I wake up. Sometimes I’m watching television or chatting to friends something will come up out of nowhere and I’ll think, oh–that might work.

My husband came up with a great analogy the other day as we were discussing how ideas come together to form a book. He said it sounds like you have many pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and you’re slowly putting them together in your head. Each puzzle piece is an idea. Most writing advice I’m hearing these days is to get that first set of ideas down. Get that plot on paper and make it to the finish line. Then you can take a breather and reread it. Start to see which ideas work and which ones don’t.

So, maybe all the pieces don’t quite fit first time, you can’t see where that blue bit goes, or that funny squiggly piece fits, but eventually, after you try putting it here and there, the final piece drops into place and you have the whole picture.

Writing a book isn’t that easy, it’s an exercise in pulling all these ideas together, tidying them up, and arranging them into some sort of order that makes sense.

Now if I could just figure out how to do that, each time I sit down to write a book…

Funny thing is that there’s a… ‘The World of Ian Rankin’ Jigsaw puzzle out now, a day in the life of Rebus in Edinburgh, what a great idea. If only I could buy a complete jigsaw puzzle of my next novel before I wrote it, I would put it together, and voila!

Which incidentally brings me to my next book which is due out in August. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get the jigsaw puzzle of it, but at least it did come together, the final piece clicked into place. Hopefully, if you get a chance, you can see if it all fits together nicely. Blood Relations – available next month on most platforms, audio book to follow.

Perfect Sense: A Short Collection of Flashbacks

 

By Barbara J Eikmeier

It was the first really hot day of summer. My car didn’t have a chance to cool down between errands. I was hot. My car was hot. Then I stepped into the CVS pharmacy. The blast of cool air from the air conditioned store hit me at the door. In that instant I had a flashback to Clark’s Drugstore, Willows, California, in the early 1970s. Situated on the corner of Sycamore and Butte Streets, I don’t even know why I went there in my teen summers. I certainly didn’t have money to buy anything, and my friends didn’t either. I think we went for the air conditioning! The feeling of the cool air in CVS brought me immediately back to Clark’s Drugstore. It was a fleeting moment, but I liked it.

I walked along Angel Falls Trail. The wide sidewalk was in complete shade, streaks of mud ran across the low spots – a reminder of the heavy rains from the previous night. I rounded the last bend before the bridge and heard the rumble of the water rolling over the falls, which always runs wild after a rainstorm. In a nanosecond it took me back to the Van Duzen River near Fortuna, California. It was 1983. I was a college student. My boyfriend kayaked that river. I often accompanied him. With my feet dangling in the cool, clear water, I studied my nursing lessons while he ran the river. I could hear the rumble of the last waterfall he would clear, just there, where the river curved, out of sight but for the sound of spilling water. Angel Falls Trail brought me back to that place.

I saw him as I left the gym. He was wearing a black cowboy hat and stood studying the blooming bushes. He looked up at me, breathed deeply and said, “They smell amazing!”

I said, “Oak Leaf Hydrangeas. They just started blooming.”

He said, “Oak Leaf?” I walked near the plants and showed him how the shape of the leaf was similar to an oak leaf. He said, “Thank you. I want to get one for my yard. I came around the corner and the smell reminded me so much of my grandma’s house.”

The feeling of air conditioning on a hot day. The sound of a waterfall after a rainstorm. The smell of a blooming shrub. They are things that take us back in time, unbidden, in a flash, sometimes jolting us with the clarity of a memory.

Barbara J. Eikmeier is a quilter, writer, student of quilt history, and lover of small-town America. Raised on a dairy farm in California, she enjoys placing her characters in rural communities.