Edith Maxwell's Blog, page 117

Guest Debra Goldstein, plus #giveaway

Edith/Maddie here, so happy to have Debra Goldstein back on the blog. Her new mystery, Three Treats Too Many, comes out next week, and it’s a treat to read!

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For someone whose greatest culinary skill is ordering takeout, Sarah Blair never expected to be co-owner of a restaurant. But while Sarah and her twin sister, Chef Emily, are tangled up in red tape waiting for the building inspector to get around to them, an attention-stealing new establishment—run by none other than Sarah’s late ex-husband’s mistress, Jane—is having its grand opening across the street.  Jane’s new sous chef, Riley Miller, is the talk of Wheaton with her delicious vegan specialties. When Riley is found dead outside the restaurant with Sarah’s friend, Jacob, kneeling over her, the former line cook—whose infatuation with Riley was no secret—becomes the prime suspect. Now Sarah must turn up the heat on the real culprit, who has no reservations about committing cold-blooded murder . . . Includes quick and easy recipes!

Take it away, Debra!

Includes quick and easy recipes!

Let me begin by stressing the last sentence of the blurb: “Includes quick and easy recipes!” This sentence is there because my publisher and those of many cozy mysteries require recipes. If I could leave them out, I would. As it is, I include fewer than many cozy writers.

Why? Because like my protagonist, Sarah Blair, being in the kitchen petrifies me. It is far easier to heat up an already prepared packaged food or pick up take-out or curbside service than it is for me to cook. But I didn’t have a choice if the Sarah Blair series was going to see daylight. Not only did each book have to have recipes, they had to work.

In the first book in the series, One Taste Too Many, I combined quick and easy, humor, and research, to come up with two of my favorite recipes: Jell-O in a Can and Spinach Pie made with Stouffers Spinach Souffle. 

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Staying within the confines of Sarah’s cooking abilities, I included Sarah’s Sweet Potato Puffs the Convenient Way in Silver Falchion Finalist Two Bites Too Many, but I gave more page space to recipes for a Classic Wine Spritzer and the Howellian Catnip.

Writing Three Treats Too Many, I began feeling guilty about leaving out recipes from some of the other characters. Sarah may find being in the kitchen more frightening than murder, but her twin, Emily, is a Culinary Institute of America trained chef, Sarah’s nemesis, Jane, professes to be a professional cook, and Jane’s sous chef, Riley, specializes in vegan recipes. Consequently, to assuage my guilt that recipes illustrating their talents didn’t come to me naturally, I did my homework and included quick and easy recipes each of them might make. For Jane, the recipe is Jane’s Chilled Zucchini Soup; Emily is represented by Emily’s Lasagna Casserole; and Riley’s recipe is Pumpkin Quinoa Muffins.

Don’t worry, though. There is one recipe tailored to Sarah’s abilities: E’s Crock-Pot Butternut Squash Soup. All a cook of convenience like Sarah or me need to make the soup are a Crock-pot, a bag of cut butternut squash, one box of vegetable stock, a can of coconut soup, and an onion, apple, and red pepper. For a chance to read the entire recipe by winning a copy of Three Treats Too Many, leave a comment.

Readers: Are you are a cook of convenience or a master chef (new easy recipes are also welcome)?

Judge Debra H. Goldstein authors Kensington’s Sarah Blair mystery series, including recently published Three Treats Too Many, 2020 Silver Falchion finalist Two Bites Too Many, and January 2019 Woman’s World Book of the Week One Taste Too Many. Debra also wrote Should Have Played Poker and 2012 IPPY Award winning Maze in Blue. Her short stories have been chosen as Agatha, Anthony, and Derringer finalists. Find out more about Debra at https://www.DebraHGoldstein.com .

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100 Years

Jessie: Feeling grateful and thinking about the women who came before me.

Tomorrow marks a momentous event. 100 years ago tomorrow Tennessee ratified the 19th amendment which enfranchised approximately 26 million American women. The amendment was certified on August 26, 1920 making it possible for many women to vote in the 1920 US presidential election.

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As triumphant as the amendment was, it must be said that African-American women, Native American women, Chinese-American women and Latina women faced incredible barriers to exercising the right to vote. Threats and outright violence routinely obstructed African-American women throughout the United States but particularly below the Mason-Dixon line. Language barriers, poll taxes and literacy tests blocked Latina women, particular in Puerto Rico, from voting. In fact they did not receive the right to do so until 1929. Even more shockingly Native Americans were not granted citizenship United States until 1924 by an act of Congress. Even then, some states continue to bar Native American people from voting until 1957. Historically, discriminatory and complicated immigration policies created a variety of barriers to Chinese-American women.

In the UK, The Representation of the People Act 1918 enfranchised all women over the age of 30 who met certain property requirements. However, it wasn’t until 1928 all people over the age of 21 were permitted to vote regardless of property ownership. I think of these sorts of privileges and restrictions often as I write the Beryl and Edwina novels. As I imagine my sleuths’ stories I try to remain mindful that both of them are women of privilege. Edwina is the proud owner of her family home, the Beeches and in her forties. And Beryl may only have become eligible to vote well into her adulthood but as a white woman, is freely allowed to do so.

Sometimes it’s very difficult put myself in the mindset of someone who was so recently allowed to vote simply because of her gender. Other days it feels all too easy. I write my books in a house that was built 45 years before I would have been allowed to vote. An oil lamp sits behind me as I do so that belonged to my grandmother who was ten years old in 1920. Her own mother died before the 19th Amendment was ratified. As I sit at my desk creating novels using modern technology, it often seems that 100 years is not nearly enough time to shift the story as to who is valued, who receives justice and who has a voice that is heard.

It is my heartfelt hope that each of the readers of the Wickeds blog will find a way to make her or his own voice heard over the next few months by casting votes in any way available to them, supporting whomever they choose. The next hundred years depends on all of us.

Readers, what do you hope life will include 100 years from now?

Welcome Back Mollie Cox Bryan

[image error]Mollie Cox Bryan is such a lovely, generous woman and a talented, prolific writer. I’m so glad she could join us to talk about the second book in her Buttermilk Creek Mystery, Goodnight Moo. Don’t you just love that title?

When I was considering how to approach the second book in my Buttermilk Creek farm series, I knew I wanted it to be a different time of year from the first book, and I knew I wanted Brynn MacAlister to be steadily becoming more and more a part of the rural Shenandoah Springs community. The idea of a country fair came to me and I thought it was a perfect way to achieve both of those goals. Anybody who’s lived in the country knows how important and fun those fairs are. It was the highlight of my summers as a kid and I’ve yet to experience that exact kind of fair as an adult. 

How many of us remember the pie contests, the tractor pulls, and craft competitions of summer country fairs? Row and rows of quilts and crocheted blankets–be still my craft-loving heart! I also loved the games, rides, and the best part was the animals. (If you’ve never had a calf suck your hand, and look sweetly into your eyes, you’re missing out!)
Brynn is a cheese maker and micro dairy farmer. She decides to start the first amateur cheese contest at the fair. She figures it will help her get to know more people and spread her love and knowledge of cheese at the same time. But her first year is marked with not one but two murders, which places a pall on the sweet country fair—along with a few other things. 
Out of all the settings in my books, this one hits closest to home (except the murder). My fictional town is set just outside Staunton, Va., which is a real town, and right next to where I live in Waynesboro. I grew up in a rural part of Pennsylvania surrounded by farms and woods. Shenandoah Springs is a mix of my Western Pennsylvania roots and my Virginia surroundings. I gave the place a calling–this small rural area is getting rejuvenated by farmers, artisans, and crafts people who practice healthy farming practices and lifestyles. Add all that together and you get my kinda place.

Readers: Have you thought about your dream place to live?

About the Book 
Welcome to Shenandoah Springs, Virginia, the bucolic small town where Brynn MacAlister keeps cows, churns cheeses—and is sharper than the ripest cheddar when it comes to solving mysteries . . .   With a foster cow in her corral and a new calf on the way, Brynn MacAlister has a lot on her plate. Especially since her micro-dairy farm is hosting the first annual cheesemakers contest at this year’s summer fair. A relative newcomer, Brynn’s hoping the contest becomes a tradition, bonding her even more strongly to the community. But when a mysterious tractor accident looks suspiciously like murder, Brynn suspects someone is up to no-gouda . . .   Some folks say the lead suspect was just defending his underage daughter from a suitor more mature than a vintage provolone, but Brynn isn’t buying it. Especially when another dead body turns up and Brynn’s top cheesemaker falls under suspicion. It’s enough to make a girl bluer than her best Stilton. But not enough to stop Brynn from getting to the bottom of things. What she discovers is the small town harbors some pretty unsavory characters. And the closer Brynn gets to the killer, the deeper she gets into danger 

Includes Udder-ly Delicious Recipes! 

Praise for Mollie Cox Bryan’s mysteries “A playful charmer!”  —Woman’s World on No Charm Intended   “Scrapbookers and hobby cozy fans will enjoy this delightful holiday escape.” —Library Journal on A Crafty Christmas   “A font of ingenuity . . . superb entertainment.” —Mystery Scene magazine on Scrapbook of   

Social media  links 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/molliecoxbryanauthor
Twitter: https://twitter.com/molliecoxbryan
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/molliecoxbryan/boards/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/molliebryan/
Website: molliecoxbryan.com

About Mollie:
Mollie Cox Bryan  is the author of the Buttermilk Creek Mysteries, the Cora Crafts Mysteries, and the Cumberland Creek Mysteries. Her books have been selected as finalists for an Agatha Award and a Daphne du Maurier Award and as a Top 10 Beach Reads by Woman’s World. She has also been short-listed for the Virginia Library People’s Choice Award. Mollie is distantly related to Jean Harlow.

Daphne & Agatha Award finalist
Cozy Mysteries with Edge. Romances with Slow, Sweet Burn.
molliecoxbryan.com
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Beach Scenes

Happy Thursday! Liz here, and I am pleased to announce I was able to spend a few days at the beach – I was starting to worry I wasn’t going to make it there this summer with everything going on. Social distancing prevailed, of course, but it was still awesome. Sharing some of my favorite scenes for your enjoyment.

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[image error]Swimming



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[image error]Made a friend!



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Readers, any socially-distanced trips to your happy places this summer? Tell us in the comments!

Wicked Wednesday – Moon-themed Books

Happy Wednesday! We are continuing with our theme of the moon this week. The moon is frequently found as a theme in literature. From Robert Louis Stevenson’s poem “The Moon” to the children’s story “Goodnight Moon” by Margaret Wise Brown to my own Full Moon Mysteries, which have been so much fun to bring to life. So Wickeds, today my questions is, do you have a favorite moon-themed story or book? 

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Jessie: I love Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney which I used to read to my children. It is a story in which a little nut-brown hare tells a big nut-brown hare how much he loves him by describing a distance away. The older hare responds with a claim of love at an even greater distance. They go back and forth mentioning more and more love until night descends and Little Hare becomes sleepy and tells Big Hare that he loves him to the moon. He thinks he has made the ultimate declaration of love to his father when Big Hare admits that is very, very far. Just after Little Hare falls asleep, Big Hare whispers that he loves him to the moon, and back.

Barb: Jessie, you have reminded me of Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me by Eric Carle, which my children loved. As for crime fiction, I think we have to mention Wilkie Collin’s The Moonstone, often considered to be the first detective novel. The Moonstone is a diamond, not a stone from the moon, but nonetheless…

Julie: Jessie, I love you to the moon and back is a saying in our family, inspired by that book. Makes me weepy to think about it. I love your new series, Liz/Cate. But my favorite moon story is from a movie. Apollo 13. I also loved the mini-series, From the Earth to the Moon. Capricorn One is another movie I loved, though the moon is faked in that one.

Edith/Maddie: My sons’s father used to say that to them, too, Julie, having gotten it from his mom. The main book that comes to mind is Goodnight Moon. I probably read that a thousand times to my boys. “Moon” was also my son Allan’s first word. He pointed to the midday sky and said “moon.” Sure enough, there it was!

Sherry: I love the book The Moon-Spinners by Mary Stewart and the Disney movie too. It’s set in Crete so if you need a virtual vacation I recommend the book or movie. The movie was filmed in Elounda, Greece. I think all the romantic suspense I read growing up really influenced my writing without me realizing it. If you loved the movie with Haley Mills or want to see it, it’s streaming on Disney+.

Liz: These are all awesome! What about you, readers? Tell us if you have a favorite book that features the moon in the comments below.

A Wicked Welcome to Leslie Wheeler **GIVEAWAY**

by Julie, enjoying summer in Massachusetts

I am delighted to welcome friend of the Wickeds Leslie Wheeler back to the blog. She has a new book coming out this month, and we’re delighted to help her celebrate.

The Flower Thief

by Leslie Wheeler

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There’s a scene in my latest mystery, Shuntoll Road, where a male character describes digging up peony plants by the light of the moon in an old, abandoned garden, and replanting them in his lover’s garden. A beta reader was horrified. “Stealing from private property!” she wrote in the margin.

You wouldn’t be so shocked if you had a mother like mine, I thought. On the outside, Mom looked like any other oh-so-proper Pasadena lady of a certain age. Her silvery hair was beauty salon “done,” her beautiful face with its large hazel eyes carefully made-up. She often sported a lavender velour pants suit with a white collar, and white sneakers on her feet. Yet behind this innocent façade, she possessed a larcenous soul worthy of John Laroche, the orchid thief himself.

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My mother grew orchids, roses, camelias, and other flowers in her Southern California gardens, but that didn’t stop her from raiding the gardens of others, if she spotted a bloom she thought would look nice in one of the Japanese flower arrangements she delighted in making. Sometimes she enlisted my help. I remember sneaking into a neighbor’s yard to collect small branches with colorful liquid amber leaves she wanted for an autumnal display. Fortunately, the trees were located a distance from the house, and I arrived safely home with the loot.

On another occasion, Mom wasn’t so lucky. Armed with clippers, under the cover of darkness, she launched a stealth attack on another neighbor’s azaleas. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” the outraged owner demanded when she caught Mom red-handed. But if my mother was chastened by this, she never let on. She even laughed as she mimicked the woman’s angry voice.

With a such a mother, I was bound to become a flower thief. Why did I have a character swipe peony plants in Shuntoll Road? Because I’d done the very same thing.

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My Berkshire house sits on an old field with lots of grass, few trees, and the only flowers, wild ones. To create a flower garden, I had to either buy or “find” flowering plants. I did both. In my ramblings on the hill where my home is, I noticed an old abandoned garden. I dubbed it “the secret garden” after the novel by Frances Hodgson Barnett I’d enjoyed as a child. At one time, this garden was so stunning that the townspeople made special trips just to admire it. But after the death of the woman who’d tended it, it fell into disrepair. Weeds sprang up to choke the gorgeous peonies, daylilies, phlox, and other flowers that grew there. The property owners lived far away in upstate New York. They were not about to restore the garden. Channeling Mom, I dug up some of the peony plants and other flowers and brought them home to be replanted in the border I planned. I considered this a form of recycling. And recycling is good, right?

Now, many years later, you can’t see the peonies and other flowers that once grew in the secret garden, but my pilfered plants have thrived in their new home. They are a source of great pleasure to me. As are the purloined peonies to Kathryn Stinson, the protagonist of Shuntoll Road.

Readers: Do you have a family member who has influenced you and/or your characters for better . . . or worse? One of the commentators will receive an ARC of Shuntoll Road.

ABOUT SHUNTOLL ROAD:

Boston library curator Kathryn Stinson returns to the Berkshires, hoping to rebuild her romance with Earl Barker, but ends up battling a New York developer, determined to turn the property she’s been renting into an upscale development. The fight pits her against Earl, who has been offered the job of clearing the land. When a fire breaks out in the woods, the burned body of another opponent is discovered. Did he die attempting to escape a fire he set, or was the fire set to cover up his murder? Kathryn’s search for answers leads her to other questions about the developer’s connection to a friend of hers who fled New York years ago for mysterious reasons. The information she uncovers puts her in grave danger.

Buy the book here, or Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple

ABOUT LESLIE WHEELER:



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An award-winning author of non-fiction, Leslie Wheeler writes two mystery series. Titles in the Berkshire Hilltown Mysteries are Rattlesnake Hill and Shuntoll Road. Her Miranda Lewis Mysteries debuted with Murder at Plimoth Plantation and includes two other titles. Wheeler’s mystery shorts have appeared in numerous anthologies including the Best New England Crime Stories series. She divides her time between Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the Berkshires, where she writes in a house overlooking a pond.

A Heath Emergency in the Time of Covid-19

by Barb, writing from a family vacation in Stone Harbor, New Jersey

[image error]Bill and me and our granddaughters

When we owned our house in Boothbay Harbor, our family–my husband, Bill, our two kids, their spouses, and their kids–used to get together there over the Fourth of July long weekend. When we sold the house, we said, “No worries, we can rent.” Renting a house for a week seemed like a much better idea than paying for a house over the course of a year, especially given the maintenance required by a Victorian by the sea. The first year we rented the house right next to our Boothbay house. But this year, with a baby and a toddler coming with us, we had decided a place by a lake would be better. We made reservations at the campground where we had camped when our kids were little.

[image error]The house

By the end of April it was obvious no one was going to be comfortable going to a campground. But we hadn’t all been together since Thanksgiving and longed to see one another. My son and his wife hadn’t met their newest niece, and their seven year-old daughter missed us all. We decided to rent a house in the country that everyone could drive to in one day. We found a place on the Massachusetts/Connecticut border with enough bedrooms and a pool and a pond. The Fourth of July wasn’t available, (a downsized wedding had snapped it up), but the last week in June was. Plans were made. We had all been pretty isolated up to that point. It was our first social venture in months.

The place was great. We were thrilled to be together. My granddaughters were so excited to have another kid to play with that the more than five year difference in their ages wasn’t an obstacle.

[image error]Cooking

I started feeling sick around day three. Nothing serious, but lethargy and no appetite, which was annoying because every night a different person cooked and the results were delicious. I finally confessed to Bill. He took me through the covid checklist. The lethargy was my only matching symptom. But I started taking my temperature.

By the fourth night I had a fever of 100.3. We waited until the grandchildren were in bed and called the adults into the living room. I told them I had a fever. I felt terrible. I had been hugging and kissing their kids and preparing food.

They were enormously relieved. “We thought you were going to say you were dying!”

“I wouldn’t tell you I was dying in the middle of a vacation,” I insisted.

Everyone started looking up where to get covid tests, but every place we found required proof of Massachusetts residency, something I couldn’t supply. I felt worse as the night went on and in the morning called a friend with connections to the healthcare industry in Massachusetts. She forwarded an email I wrote describing my symptoms to a friend who is a hospital administrator and a former emergency room doctor. He got right back and said I certainly should have a covid test, since I was staying with so many people, but given my symptoms, the low community transmission rate in Maine and how careful I had been, he thought something else serious was going on with me and I should go to an emergency room right away.

[image error]A boatride

My husband dropped me at UMass Memorial Hospital’s emergency room and I walked in on my own. They put me in a covid room with negative airflow since I had a fever and my status was unknown. On that last day in June, the emergency room seemed perfectly normal. There was someone who’d had a heart attack in the next room. There was a kid who’d broken his arm.

My rapid response test came back two hours later as negative. I was happy to be able to call my family and report that. The hospital continued to treat my status as unknown, awaiting the results of the longer test. Aside from the fact that the medical personnel put on fresh PPE every time they entered my room and discarded it when they left, the biggest difference I noticed was I was cared for by a very small team. Two nurses, the attending physician and a resident did all the work, whether it was starting my IV or wheeling me down to have a CAT scan. I assumed this was so the smallest number of personnel had contact with me.

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The results of the CAT scan showed a large kidney stone, dangerously infected and going nowhere. At six at night the urologist called to say I needed a procedure to put a stent around the stone. By that point I was starving and lonely and my phone was dying. I thought he meant a procedure while I was awake and I didn’t think I could handle it. I was panicky and weepy until he assured me I would be unconscious for the surgery, at which point I said, “Oh, then do whatever you want.”

Now I’m embarrassed for falling apart. When I think about what must have gone on in that emergency room all spring, and I’m there crying because I’m hungry. I am deeply grateful to have been in a Massachusetts hospital on June 30th, and not on March 30th, or April 30th, or even May 30th.

By the time I woke up in recovery my second covid test had come back negative. They moved me to a non-covid floor in the hospital and the next day I was back at the rental place in time for dinner, with no restrictions except not to lift anything heavier than a gallon of milk.

[image error]All recovered

After a couple of courses of antibiotics, I had a second day surgery to remove the original stent, blast the stone, and put in a new stent. The day surgery place at the hospital was pretty normal, except fewer people than usual and everyone wearing masks. The second stent was removed a week ago.

Now I’m at the beach with my brother’s family and my son’s family. I feel fine and I’m so happy to be here.

Readers: Have you had an unusual experience in the time of Carona? Tell us about it.

[image error]The whole family together!

Welcome Back, Lucy Burdette and #giveaway

Many Wickeds readers know author Lucy Burdette is a friend and mentor to all the Wickeds. Her latest book, the tenth Key West Food Critic Mystery, The Key Lime Crime, will be released on Tuesday. We’re thrilled to welcome her back to the blog.

Lucy is giving away a copy to one lucky commenter on the blog. To enter, answer the reader question toward the end of the post or simply say, “hi.” (Or anything else that strikes your fancy.)

Take it away, Lucy!

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Thank you dear Wicked writers for inviting me to guest on your blog to celebrate the publication of my tenth Key West mystery, The Key Lime Crime. I’m hoping you’ll be interested in chatting about characters—I’m always amazed at how much some of them grow and change over time and even evolve into independent people who I didn’t expect.

Eighty-something year old Miss Gloria has become the character I probably hear most about in my Key West food critic mysteries. In the first book, I envisioned her as an old lady living a few boats up the dock on Houseboat Row from where my main character, food critic Hayley Snow, was living. I needed her as a throwaway character who would get bashed on the head and propel the plot along. Here, I’m a little embarrassed to admit, is Miss Gloria in that first book, An Appetite for Murder, Haley is a suspect in a case of poisoned key lime pie: 

 Two boats in along the wooden finger and more often than not one season ahead of the rest of the world, Miss Gloria had strung Christmas lights on her porch. They winked a cheerful welcome. She was watching the news in her living room, one eye on the dock. I waved and called hello through the screen.

“Your place looks fantastic,” I told her.

She smiled modestly and ducked down to stroke her feline, a slim black cat named Sparky. “How’s Evinrude settling in?”

“He’ll never be a sailor,” I said with a laugh, “but we’re surviving.” Then, since Miss Gloria hardly ever left her boat, it occurred to me to wonder if she’d be able to vouch for me with the police. I hopped over onto her porch, her boat rocking almost imperceptibly under the change in weight. “Did you happen to notice that I was here this morning working?”

“This morning?” she asked, looking puzzled. “I don’t know, were you? That nice young policeman came by, though. He’s got such a strong chin.”

“I know,” I said glumly. Her touch of dee-mentia, as she called it, wasn’t going to help me in this situation.

Only as the books evolved, it became clear to me and everyone else that Miss Gloria does not have dementia. Reviewer Phil Jason had this to say in the Florida Weekly about her in Death on the Menu:  “Miss Gloria is also a comic character, an older woman who doesn’t take her limitations seriously and becomes a kind of role model for senior citizens.”

Over the course of the series, Hayley and I have realized how lucky she is to have Miss Gloria in her life—this amazing and unlikely roommate. When we first met her, we both sized her up as a frail but quirky old lady, a relic living out her last shaky legs on Houseboat Row. We couldn’t have been more wrong.

[image error]Lucy with Marilyn

Whenever I need a character to speak up on a subject or stand up for someone, Miss Gloria is there. She has a job giving tours at the Key West cemetery, plays mahjong with her “girlfriends” and drives an enormous old Buick Park Avenue that I borrowed from the car my in-laws drove for years. (My mother-in-law was also a spunky woman role model.) I always get a smile on my face writing about her. I imagine her looking like my friend Marilyn, who is 80-something and full of life. Here’s Miss Gloria in the tenth book, The Key Lime Crime:

We zipped up to Houseboat Row where Miss Gloria was waiting in the driver’s seat of her big Buick with the engine running. She had the windows open and some kind of rock music pumping out from the radio.

“Want me to drive?” I asked.

“No thanks,” she said cheerfully. “I don’t want to get rusty. And we don’t have far to go, so how much damage can I do?” She cackled as we got in, then craned around to grin at Helen in the back seat, gunned the engine, and lurched out onto Palm Avenue. I gripped my door handle and gritted my teeth, waiting for the sound of blaring horns and the crash of metal. Mercifully none of that came.

“We’ve got a lot on the schedule today, don’t we?” Miss Gloria asked. “I figure we’ll park in the garage on Caroline Street and then walk to the Pie Company, right?”

“Right,” I said. “And Helen and I have agreed, we aren’t investigating. On the other hand, if some tidbit related to Claudette falls in our laps, we’ll gather it up and pass it on to Nathan.”

“Remember to think about the person behind the crime,” Helen a.k.a. my mother-in-law said, leaning forward and grabbing the driver side headrest. “We’re not only collecting recipes, we’re understanding a murderer. And his victim.”

“Oh, Hayley is unbelievable at that,” said Miss Gloria, glancing in the rear view mirror. “She has more friends than anyone I know—and that’s because she knows what makes people tick. And even if she doesn’t care for somebody, she works at understanding why they’re crabby. And the next thing you know, they’re friends. I’m certain Nathan’s told you how she solved a couple of crimes. Not that he appreciates that one bit.”

She chuckled, and I squeezed her arm to thank her for sticking up for me, but then let go fast so she would concentrate on swinging around the curve that led into Eaton Street without taking out cars in the oncoming traffic.

How about you Wickeds? If you write, have you watched one of your characters grow into someone you didn’t expect?

Readers: can you think of a character who has grown over time into someone you love and depend on?

About The Key Lime Crime: With her intimidating new mother-in-law bearing down on the island and a fierce rivalry between Key lime pie bakers to referee, food critic Hayley Snow is feeling anything but festive…

 It’s the week between Christmas and New Year’s and Key West is bursting at the seams with holiday events and hordes of tourists. Adding to the chaos, Key lime pie aficionado David Sloan has persuaded the city to host his Key Lime pie extravaganza and contest. Hayley Snow can’t escape the madness because her bosses at Key Zest magazine have assigned her to cover the event. Every pie purveyor in Key West is determined to claim the Key lime spotlight—and win the coveted Key Lime Key to the City.

Another recipe for disaster—Hayley’s hubby, police detective Nathan Bransford, announces that his mother will be making a surprise visit. Newlywed Hayley must play the dutiful daughter-in-law, so she and her pal Miss Gloria offer to escort his mom on the iconic Conch Train Tour of the island’s holiday lights. But it’s not all glittering palm trees and fantastic flamingos–the unlikely trio finds a real body stashed in one of the elaborate displays. And the victim is no stranger: Hayley recognizes the controversial new pastry chef from Au Citron Vert, a frontrunner in Sloan’s contest.

Hayley must not only decipher who’s removed the chef from the contest kitchen, she’s also got to handle a too-curious mother-in-law who seems to be cooking up trouble of her own.  

“Charming characters, an appealing setting, and mouthwatering bonus recipes make this a perfect choice for foodie cozy lovers.” Publishers’ Weekly, May 2020

“The well-described Key West setting nicely complements the foodie frame in this satisfying cozy, which is a natural for fans of Joanne Fluke’s Hannah Swensen mysteries.”

—Booklist

Clinical psychologist Lucy Burdette (aka Roberta Isleib) is the author of 18 mysteries, including THE KEY LIME CRIME (Crooked Lane Books,) the latest in the Key West series featuring food critic Hayley Snow. Her books and stories have been short-listed for Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity awards. She’s a past president of Sisters in Crime and the current president of the Friends of the Key West Library.

www.lucyburdette.com

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Thanks For Your Support!

[image error]It’s been a week and two days since From Beer to Eternity came out. Launch week is a crazy busy time. With each new book I’m reminded how generous and supportive the crime fiction writing and reading community is.

I did two Facebook parties. The first was with other Kensington authors whose books came out the same day. Jen J. Danna organized and did most of the work setting up the party. Her first book in the new NYPD Negotiators series is Exit Strategy. Here’s a bit about her book: In this taut new suspense series featuring NYPD detective Gemma Capello and her close-knit law enforcement family, a madman brings a halt to the heart of the city that never sleeps . . .
 
After her mother’s death during a bank robbery when she was a child, Gemma Capello grew up to become one of the NYPD’s elite hostage negotiators. In a family of cops, there’s rarely a day when a Capello isn’t facing down some form of threat. Still, despite their unpredictable schedules, they always find time for their annual family summer picnic. But this year, a sudden phone call changes everything.

The next night I did a Facebook party with Catherine Bruns. Her second book in her Italian Chef mystery series, It Cannoli Be Murder launched the same day as mine! Here’s a bit about it: Six months after her husband’s death, Tessa Esposito is hoping to drum up reservations for her restaurant’s grand opening. And since a signing with bestselling author, Preston Rigotta, is sure to draw a crowd, Tessa agrees to cater her cousin’s bookstore event—whipping up some of her famous Italian desserts. But the event soon takes a sour turn when Preston’s publicist, an old high school rival, arrives and begins to whisk up their old grudges.

That night, a fight breaks out in front of the crowd, and it becomes clear there’s bad blood in Harvest Park. And when the publicist is found dead on the bookstore floor the next morning, a stray cannolo at her side, Tessa knows who will be framed as the prime suspect.

To clear both her cousin’s and her own name, Tessa must investigate the murder. But Preston’s publicist has many secrets to hide, and in the end, the truth is bittersweet…

Friday night I was interviewed by fabulous bookstore owner Eileen McKervey. Eileen owns One More Page Books in Arlington, Virginia. She is so supportive of the crime fiction community here in the Northern Virginia/DC/Maryland area. (You can order signed copies of my books and many other authors books through One More Page.) Here’s a link to the interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NchLg_VI3jE

[image error]Another fabulous bookseller is Kelly Hebert Harrington at the Barnes and Noble in Destin, Florida. Kelly was so excited about From Beer to Eternity and we’ve been talking about it since I signed the contract for the series. Kelly pointed me to books about Destin’s history that were so valuable for researching the history of the area. We were going to have a big launch, but of course those plans had to be scraped. Kelly has a special display of the books at the front of the store.

Then there’s all the blogs like Jungle Red Writers, Dru’s Book Musings, and the Dollycas Blog tour. If you’re interested in reading any of the blogs I did for them, they are all available on the Appearances section of my website. Click here. I also have to thank all the review blogs like Carstairs Considers. And a big thanks to all the people who share posts on social media. Word of mouth is still one of the best ways a book can be promoted.

I always have the love and support of the Wickeds. They listened to me freak out when I found out about a mistake that made it through all the readings and proof readings of the book. Sigh.

I can’t leave out the amazing Jen who always has my back and I’d be lost without her.

[image error]I have to thank the team at Kensington. My editor Gary Goldstein came up with the idea for a series set in a beach bar and agreed to let me set it in the Florida panhandle. Larissa, you are the best and I’m so lucky to work with you. Lou designs amazing covers and there are all the behind the scenes people like the social media team and the production team. Unsung heroes all!

My family takes the brunt of the emotional roller coaster of my writing life and still love me. Lastly, my mom who has been so excited about my writing career from the day she heard about Tagged for Death. I miss you.

Readers: Do you follow book launches? Writers: What’s your favorite thing about launching a book?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wicked Wednesday – Full Moons

Liz here, and this month’s Wicked Wednesdays are moon-focused in celebration of my new series, the Full Moon Mysteries. This month’s full moon is the Full Sturgeon Moon, named after North America’s largest fish. Even though the full moon was on the 3rd, I wonder if the Full Moon plays a role in any of the Wicked’s books (like maybe Barb with clamming and lobstah seasons, Edith with the birth of babies in the Quaker Midwife series, Sherry with crazy bargain hunters, Julie with planting season, and Jessie with some of Beryl and Edwina’s excellent adventures?) So Wickeds, tell me if the moon cycles play a role at all in your books or your writing! 

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Edith/Maddie: I wish I’d thought of that, Liz! I don’t think I’ve use the moon with births, but it does play a bit of a role in Taken Too Soon, Quaker Midwife #6, which will be out in September. In 1890, unless you lived in a city, it was hard to see outside at night without a moon to guide you.

Jessie: As much as I love looking up at the moon in my real life, I don’t tend to make much mention of it in my books. I seem to recall I mention a friendly moon keeping the sleuth in my very first mystery, Live Free or Die, company as she is wending her way through her village on a cold winter’s night. Besides that, no other moons are tickling my memory.

Sherry: Chloe Jackson has a small house right on the beach. She sits on her screened porch looking out at night and watching the moon reflect on the water. It reminds me a bit of when we lived on base in San Pedro, California. Our townhouse overlooked the Pacific Ocean and we loved watching the moon on the water.

Barb: I don’t think I’ve written much about the moon in the Maine Clambake Mysteries. I have written quite a bit about the stars because on Morrow Island where the family runs their clambakes and on their tour boat back to Busman’s Harbor after the second seating, they are out of the reach of ambient light and the stars are brilliant. I’ve always lived in cities and dense suburbs, so when I am in a place where it is fully dark and the stars really visible I always appreciate it.

Julie: I love this idea, Liz! The full moon doesn’t play a part in my series, but it should. I know that as a person, I’m paying more attention to the moon phases, since it does affect energy. I also love to watch a full moon rising, and have to remind myself to charge some moon water at some point soon.

Readers, do you use the moon to guide any aspects of your life? Tell us in the comments!!