Goodreads asked Sandra Balzo:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Sandra Balzo Murder on the Orient Espresso is the 8th book in the Maggy Thorsen Coffeehouse mysteries and I decided Maggy needed a vacation. She accompanies her main squeeze, Sheriff Jake Pavlik, to South Florida to a mystery writers' conference, where Pavlik is to speak. I have to admit this was not as much of a stretch for me as it was for Maggy. I now live in Fort Lauderdale and a member of the Florida Chapter of Mystery Writers of America, which puts on the premier mystery writers conference in the world, Sleuthfest.

[Disclaimer: Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is unintentional and purely coincidental. Objects in mirror may be closer than they appear.]

For the record, Sleuthfest does NOT pile various warring factions of writers, reviewers and fans onto a night train into the Everglades to re-enact Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. And if we did, we'd make damn sure the weather was good, the tracks were solid and . . . well, I can't promise you an absence of pythons. They are becoming a bit of a nuisance down here. :-)

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