Tag Archive for: #badbloodsisters

Distractions

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Distractions

by Saralyn Richard

 

I’ve never been diagnosed with ADD or hyperactivity. In fact, my whole life I’ve been able to focus and concentrate whenever needed. I can read for long periods without becoming antsy, and I’m equally good at listening.

All of these stand me well in writing novels, because long sessions at the computer would be dreadful otherwise. But lately, I find myself ready to jump up in mid-chapter, mid-paragraph, or mid-sentence.

I’m distracted by the internet. Let me just search for a certain outfit for my character to wear to a luncheon. How close is the hurricane to people I worry about? What quasi-newsy item is trending?

Maybe I should check on my brother, who is recovering from major surgery. Oops—I forgot to take out something to cook for dinner tonight. And heaven help me if I have a phone call, even if it’s from a robot.

What are the latest polls saying? And what is going on in the Middle East, or with the British royalty? The dishes need washing, the dogs need walking, the plants need watering, and on and on.

Back to the chapter—I crawl back into Quinn’s point of view and detail what happens to her. I share her fears and angst, and I feel good about moving her story forward, but no matter how involved I am, I can’t stay there as long as I want or need to.

I have too many distractions.

The same thing happens to me with reading. Or watching a movie. Or even watching the news, as riveting as it can be these days.

I’m hoping this is a passing phase. Maybe after the election and after hurricane season, things will settle down into a more peaceful routine. In the meantime, I’ll plod along, hoping that, despite distractions, I’m writing a captivating and touching mystery.

Are you similarly distracted? How do you manage?

 

Saralyn Richard is the author of the Detective Parrott mystery series, Naughty Nana, A Murder of Principal, and Bad Blood Sisters. Her work in progress is the sequel to Bad Blood Sisters.

Quinn’s family always joked about death, but this summer death stopped being funny.

Fences
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by Saralyn Richard

 

Do good fences make good neighbors? In the past few months, I’ve gained new neighbors on either side of my house. There’s a brand-spanking-new fence between my yard and that of the neighbor to the north. There’s no fence between my yard and that of the neighbor to the south. I love both sets of neighbors. We’ve shared lots of visits in our front yards, several barbecues and parties, baked goods, pets, children, home improvement advice, and more. They may be pine, and I, apple orchard, but I enjoy spending time with them and being part of their community.

Robert Frost’s MENDING WALL is one of my favorite poems. His last line is the source for my opening question. I find a lot of wisdom in this poem:

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,

That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,

And spills the upper boulders in the sun;

And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.

The work of hunters is another thing:

I have come after them and made repair

Where they have left not one stone on a stone,

But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,

To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,

No one has seen them made or heard them made,

But at spring mending-time we find them there.

I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;

And on a day we meet to walk the line

And set the wall between us once again.

We keep the wall between us as we go.

To each the boulders that have fallen to each.

And some are loaves and some so nearly balls

We have to use a spell to make them balance:

‘Stay where you are until our backs are turned!’

We wear our fingers rough with handling them.

Oh, just another kind of out-door game,

One on a side. It comes to little more:

There where it is we do not need the wall:

He is all pine and I am apple orchard.

My apple trees will never get across

And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.

He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’

The same analogy applies to my relationships with fellow authors in The Stiletto Gang. I may be police procedural and they cozy writers, but we have much in common, and we can help each other every time we meet to walk the line and re-build the wall (which might just be the website). I’m grateful for my neighbors, my Stiletto Gang colleagues, and everyone who reads this post. May all your walls be mended, and may all your neighbors be good.

Galveston Author Saralyn Richard

Award-winning author and educator, Saralyn Richard writes about people in settings as diverse as elite country manor houses and disadvantaged urban high schools. She loves beaches, reading, sheepdogs, the arts, libraries, parties, nature, cooking, and connecting with readers.

Visit Saralyn and subscribe to her monthly newsletter here, or on her Amazon page here.

 

Sharing the Spotlight

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Sharing the Spotlight

by Saralyn Richard

 

When BAD BLOOD SISTERS came out last March, a book club chose it as its first selection, and invited me to speak. This was no ordinary book club. It was the Elks Lodge #126, and they were fund-raising for the Texas Elks Children’s Services, Inc. So enthusiastic were they about BAD BLOOD SISTERS! They split the book club discussion into two events:  1)a tour of the local funeral home with a discussion  about the book in the wake room (because the main character works in death services); and 2)a dinner, book talk, and raffle.

I was touched by the amount of attention they were giving to my latest novel. Sympathetic to their drive to raise money for this worthy organization, I offered to auction the privilege of being a named character in my next book. Asta Timm, Elks Sweetheart, loved the idea and we decided to start the bidding at a reasonable price.

The night of the book club dinner, there was a buzz in the air. The Elks organizers, including Karen Crummett Sawyer and Asta, had a number of fun surprises. We ate, we drank, we talked about the book, we played a trivia game (with prizes). Then it was time for the raffle. The bidding opened and took off with a bang. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to be a character in a book. My head swiveled from one side of the room to the other as friends outbid one another over and over again. Finally, the auction ended, with the closing bid at ten times what the opening bid had been.

The winner of the auction, Tammie Caballero, became one of the key characters in CRYSTAL BLUE MURDER, which was published in September. Tammie was thrilled, because she wanted her family name in the spotlight. She knew her grandfather would be proud. When I replaced Tammie’s name in the manuscript, MS Word made 365 changes.

Tammie has come with me to several book launch events, and I always introduce her and ask her to say a few words about her part in the book’s journey. Her involvement in the book adds a special dimension that we both enjoy talking about. I have a new friend for life, and the Texas Elks Children’s Services has a generous benefactor. I can’t say enough about the Elks, Asta, Karen, and Tammie. I love sharing the spotlight with them!

 

Award-winning author and educator, Saralyn Richard writes about people in settings as diverse as elite country manor houses and disadvantaged urban high schools. She loves beaches, reading, sheepdogs, the arts, libraries, parties, nature, cooking, and connecting with readers.

Visit Saralyn at http://saralynrichard.com, on her Amazon page here, or on Facebook here.

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What I’ve Learned about
Death Services

by Saralyn Richard

When I was a senior in high school, I had an English teacher who moonlighted as a mortician. I don’t remember much about the course curriculum, but I have vivid memories of his stories about dead bodies, sitting up while he worked on them. Mr. M., as I’ll call him, thrived on telling grotesque tales and watching our reactions.

            Aside from those stories, I can’t remember the topic of funerals coming up much. No one likes to talk about caskets or embalming fluid over lunch or on a date. In the few instances where I’ve been responsible for arranging funerals, I’ve worked with experienced people whose calm, tact, and caring attitude helped block out the grief, and I’ve never asked too many questions.

            Fast forward to the past several years, when I’ve been writing mysteries. Mysteries often have dead bodies. Dead bodies require death services. To get the details right, I began interviewing morticians, and I learned a lot.


                                                                           One of my sources, Jay Carnes of Carnes Funeral Home, Texas City, Texas

Here
are a few salient facts:

1.          People who work in death services are
people just like you and me. They have the same hopes and fears and dreads, the
same olfactory sensibilities, the same tastes and distastes. They generally
don’t engage in discussions about them, though. If you complain about a bad day
at the office, they might sympathize, but they won’t tell you about theirs.
 
     When death is your business, and you’re
around dead bodies every day, you become immune to the drama and/or horror that
others may associate with corpses. You might even share inside jokes with
colleagues, like, “Want to have a couple of cool ones from the fridge?” This
kind of levity is never expressed in front of outsiders, though.
 
    There’s a tiny bit of guilt when business
is good, like when we have a pandemic. Some of the joy of a robust end-of-year
bottom line is mitigated by the fact that the income was derived from people’s
hardships, sorrows, or tragedies.

 

                                        James J. Terry Funeral Home in Downington, PA, where Lee Walasavage has graciously answered my questions.

My
upcoming release, BAD BLOOD SISTERS, centers around a woman who’s grown up in
this business.

Quinn McFarland has grown up around dead bodies…

Quinn’s
always joked about death, but this summer, death stops being funny. For one
thing, her brother finally undergoes transplant surgery. For another, Quinn’s
estranged BFF, her “blood” sister, is brought into the family mortuary,
bludgeoned to death.

            Quinn’s haunted by the past, her friendship gone awry,
and the blood oath she’s sworn to keep secret. The police consider her a person
of interest, and someone threatens her not to talk. Quinn is the only one who
knows enough to bring the killer to justice, but what she’s buried puts her in
extreme danger.



Bad Blood Sisters will be released March 9, 2022. My other mysteries, Murder in the One Percent, A Palette for Love and Murder, and A Murder of Principal can be found here. Sign up for my monthly newsletter with special offers, news, surveys, and more at http://saralynrichard.com.