Auntiemwrites Crime-Mystery Author M K Graff

Kate George: Crazy Little Thing Called Dead Sunday, Sep 16 2012

Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for Auntie M Writes Crime 12:02 am

Please welcome Daphne Du-Maurier Award-winning author Kate George:

Death Can Be Funny

There are people in the world who think my taste is questionable and my choice of mixing humor and murder is downright wrong. But here’s the thing, I like the contrast between a lighthearted tone and a serious subject. I enjoy making people laugh.

Here’s a little background: Like most people in the world I’ve had my ups and downs. Several years in particular, while I was dealing with a family member’s health issues, were more challenging than usual. I was pretty unhappy. But during that time I discovered an author that made me laugh. It was such a relief to laugh, I decided if I was ever going to write again the writing would be driven by my sense of humor.

I am writing again, and it is driven by my slightly wacked sense of humor, but that doesn’t make it easy. It’s challenging to get the ratio of humor to danger just right. Believe it or not there are people in the world that like their murder straight up, and others who prefer their laughs not be sullied by death. Not that I will ever please everybody. In the immortal words of Fitzwilliam Darcy, “That’s not possible for anyone.”

What I can do is strive to get the balance right. Keep the pace lively. Make my protagonist a little off center, quite irreverent but strong. Create a believable plotline and crimes that are sufficiently severe. The villain? Self-centered and unconcerned with others. Totally without conscience – a sociopath. And in the end? Our protagonist must save herself. She can have a love interest, and he can help with the take down, but it has to be clear that if our love interest wasn’t there, she’d be capable of doing the job herself – and make you laugh at the same time.

The newest Bree MacGowan, Crazy Little Thing Called Dead, is a little more serious than the first two books in the series. Bree loses almost everything, and is pushed beyond her normal boundaries. But the humor remains. Hopefully it’s a book that will let you experience a range of emotions from dark to light.

Kate George is the author of the Bree MacGowan Mysteries: Moonlighting in Vermont (2009), California Schemin’ (2011) and Crazy Little Thing Called Dead, which will be available September 30, 2012.

Ms. George lives in the wilds of Central Vermont, coming to terms with mud roads, ice storms and occasionally moose and black bears. Find free short stories at http://www.kategeorge.com.

Leave a Response »

Judy Nichols: Sportsman’s Bet Sunday, Sep 9 2012

Uncategorized British protagonist; NC mystery; small town murder Auntie M Writes Crime 12:32 am

Please welcome author Judy Nichols, with details of her newest e-book.

What do you do when your husband thinks your writing is just a misguided hobby and constantly drops hints about giving it all up for a nice steady job at Target?

You make him a character in your latest e-book.

The inspiration for Ian Dodge, the private investigator featured in my book Sportsman’s Bet, was inspired by my curmudgeon of a British ex-pat husband, Nigel (Yes, his name really is Nigel. I did not make that up). Even though he’s lived in the States for more than half his life, he refuses to be Americanized. He’s still a fish out of a water, the guy who’s from Some Place Foreign, and damn proud of it.

Ian Dodge lives in a small town of Tobias, somewhere in Brunswick County, North Carolina. He’s methodical and always speaks his mind, not that anyone ever listens to him. He has a passion for British sports cars and a soft spot for his border collie Shep, as well as a fondness for using Cockney rhyming slang.

What is Cockney rhyming slang you ask? Exactly what it sounds like—using a rhyming phrase to stand for another word. “Pork pies” for lies. “Trouble and strife” for wife. “Butcher’s hook” for look. The story goes that the Cockney workers created it as a kind of secret code so their upper crust bosses wouldn’t know what they were talking about.

When the body of Velma Saunders is found in the old municipal bomb shelter and the town’s good old boy of a mayor, Mike Ellis, is charged with the murder, Ian steps in to find out who else wanted her dead. Velma was the woman everyone loved to hate, but who hated her enough to kill her? In the course of his investigation, Ian discovers her connection with a shameful chapter in North Carolina’s history, and what happened to make her so mean.

I had a lot of fun with Ian Dodge, in fact, with all the characters in Sportsman’s Bet. I hope you have fun reading it. It’s available in Nook and Kindle format.

Judy Nichols grew up in a Batavia, Ohio a small town 20 miles east of Cincinnati and eventually found herself living in Aurora, Indiana, a small town 20 miles west of Cincinnati. She would be there still if GE Aircraft hadn’t made her husband Nigel an offer he couldn’t refuse– a chance to live near the ocean with GE footing the bill for moving expenses. So now the family lives in Wilmington, North Carolina.

She started her novel Caviar Dreams while her daughter was napping one day. Five years later it was finished. The biggest challenge arrived once her daughter stopped taking naps and eventually lost interest in watching the “Toy Story” video.

Judy holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Kent State University. She has been a newspaper reporter, a teacher, a temporary office worker, a customer service representative, and currently stay-at-home mom with way too much time on her hands. (And never mind that her daughter is a year away from going off to college.)

In April of 2012, Judy achieved her lifelong goal of appearing on the quiz show “Jeopardy!” She was a two day champion winning a total of $46,500 and the distinction of being officially named the smartest person in a room full of smart people.

She has earned only two awards in her lifetime. Neither of them has anything to do with writing, but she is immensely proud of them nonetheless. Adia Temporary Agency presented her with the “Temp of the Month” award for March, 1987 and The Ohio Chapter of The Nature Conservancy gave her a Volunteer Appreciation Award in 1991.

Her experience with The Nature Conservancy inspired her second novel Tree Huggers, about the deadly clash between an unscrupulous developer and a militant environmentalists, published in 2008

Sportsman’s Bet is her third book and the first in the Ian Dodge detective series. Ian is a British national, living in a small town in rural North Carolina and stubbornly hanging on to every shred of his Britishness. Any resemblance to Ian Dodge and her own prickly British husband is purely intentional.

Leave a Response »

Judy Alter: Trouble in a Big Box Sunday, Sep 9 2012

Award winning novelist and great read and Series not to be missed Auntie M Writes Crime 12:16 am

An award-winning novelist, Judy Alter has written fiction for adults and young adults, primarily about women in the nineteenth-century American West. Judy’s western fiction has been recognized with awards from the Western Writers of America, the Texas Institute of Letters, and the National Cowboy Museum and Hall of Fame. She has been honored with the Owen Wister Award for Lifetime Achievement by WWA and inducted into the Texas Literary Hall of Fame at the Fort Worth Public Library.

Now she has turned her attention to contemporary cozy mysteries. Trouble in a Big Box, the third Kelly O’Connell mystery, follows Skeleton in a Dead Space and No Neighborhood for Old Women, which received good reviews and popular enthusiasm. Welcome, Judy!

In Trouble in a Big Box, Kelly O’Connell has her hands full: new husband Mike Shandy is badly injured in an automobile accident that kills a young girl, developer Tom Lattimore wants to build a big-box grocery store in Kelly’s beloved Fairmount neighborhood, and someone is stalking Kelly.

Tom Lattimore pressures her to support the big box, and when his pressure turns to threats, Kelly activates a neighborhood coalition to fight the project. She also tries to find out who is stalking her and why, and her sleuthing puts her in danger that terrifies Mike.

But he isboth powerless to stop her and physically unable to protect her and her young daughters from Lattimore’s threats or the stalker. After their house is smoke-bombed and Kelly survives an amateur attack on her life, she comes close to an unwanted trip to Mexico from which she might never return.

Kelly is fighting to save her neighborhood and its old-time small-town atmosphere and historic buildings, to keep from displacing a lot of mom-and-pop businesses. But she’s fighting a larger battle, though she doesn’t realize it. We’ve seen it played out across the country for years: Wal-Mart moves in and the small businesses in a town are forced to close; syndicates take over newspapers until there are only a few if any locally-owned papers in major cities; chains force independent bookstores to close. What do we value? Big business or the individual? Of course I didn’t realize all this when I wrote. I simply wanted to involve Kelly in a new adventure and tell a good story.

I’m reminded of Dorothy Johnson who wrote A Man Called Horse, The Hanging Tree, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, among many others (you have to be a bit old to remember). Dorothy once wrote me that she was astounded at all the symbolism critics—and teachers—found in her work, because she didn’t put it there. Maybe we’re all that way, even though our goal is simply to be good storytellers.

Follow Judy on Facebook (at https://www.facebook.com/#!/judy.alter) or http://www.judyalter.com or her two blogs at http://www.judys-stew.blogspot.com or http://potluckwithjudy.blogspot.com. Her mysteries are available in print or as e-books, and some of her western fiction is in e-book form.Judy lives in Fort Worth, Texas, with her two dogs and frequently sees her four children and seven grandchildren.

Leave a Response »

Gabriel Rheaume: The Shores We Walk Sunday, Sep 2 2012

writers drug addiction, emerging writers, rehab, St. Francis Auntie M Writes Crime 4:15 pm

Auntie M believes in bringing new voices to your attention from time to time, so please welcome author

Gabriel Rheaume. Gabriel will describe his history and what led to his unusual premise for his book book, as well as sharing an excerpt.

Before I tell you a little bit about myself and my novel, I’d like to announce that my novel The Shores We Walk is on sale at Amazon
Kindle for 99 cents for the month of September!

The idea to write The Shores We Walk came from a statement I made to my
girlfriend, who is now deceased. I told her that her family was so
dysfunctional that someone should write a book about them. As time
passed, I became more interested in the idea and of pursuing it
myself.

When she took her life at the age of 19, I made a vow that
this book would transpire. I took a creative writing
class in college and it started there.

But her death led me to alcoholism and drug addiction. As my addiction
became worse, my writing style transformed into surreal and delusional
accounts of memories and life itself. As time progressed, my best
friend died of a heroin overdose in my apartment while I was sleeping,
and another one of my close friends passed away due to unexplained
causes.

All of these things continued to come out in my writing, and I
decided to write the book as a tribute to all of them, and to write it
in a way that felt like being on drugs, combined with bouts of psychosis
and visits from beyond the grave.

The book grew while I was in and out of rehab, but it wasn’t until I
got my own addictions under control that I was able to wrap up the
story, obtain an editor and self-publish The Shores We Walk.

Although it is a tragedy, there is a ray of hope. I recommend the book
to those struggling with addiction or who have a family member who is an
addict, and even to those just curious about the lifestyle of a junkie.

It is a fast-paced read, brutally honest and painful, but also
written in lyrical prose.

What is the book about?

When all of the people close to Francis end up dying, a lot of
questions are left in the air while he falls into a deep psychosis.
The story is written through a veil of drugs and visits from beyond
the grave. It is a love story and a tragedy; a struggle with faith and
some brief moments of hope. Through the darkness there is also much
beauty.

Francis, based on a postmodern St. Francis of
Assisi, narrates this story of four people as they slowly self-destruct
and battle drug addiction, homelessness and poverty. When I
attended Wayne State University, I saw such tragic things every day.

But I was inspired by the fact that even though these people had nothing,
they never lost sight of what really mattered to them. I realized
that life contains more joy than sorrow and wished more people would
recognise that simple fact. When asked about my experiences in
downtown Detroit, I simply say, “When you see a homeless man with a
larger smile than a rich man, you have to question what’s actually
important in your life” (Sandusky Tribune).

Excerpt:

“If the weathered barns along the road did not reveal their age, it
would seem like going back in time. He had not visited her cottage
since the snow had fallen. It is off one of Michigan’s Great Lakes
with a beach that has a coast with no near end. There is no view
beyond the lake and sky. Sometimes freight ships sit near the horizon,
slowly drifting in time with the clouds. At times the sky and the lake
become indistinguishable. There is not a better easel for the sunset
than the framed sky above this vast oasis. To sit afloat in the center
of any large mass of water has an unfathomable magnificence. It is
like analyzing the one infinite living second that is recognizable as
life. The horizon can be divided by two shades, that of the water, and
of the air. There is no end to this one-second as there is seemingly
no end to the polar vision of the water and the sky.
Each season is equally enchanting. Lake Huron in winter is deep
blue with waves frozen to the white beach. The barren rolling,
snow-covered hills are like a desert. The wind forms drifts that are
small cliffs.
The spring is a time of new life. The green is so vibrant that
plants glow in the daylight. Blossoms decorate trees like white and
pink ribbons. The air is as fresh as rich, black, soil.
In the summer, the purple chicory grows in fields of grass. Queen
Anne’s Lace makes groups of wild plants flowers look like bouquets.
The breeze from the lake is cool and comforting.
The colors of the leaves in autumn are almost unnatural. A
rainbow falls from the sky and the land becomes a palette of trees.”

Links:

E-store: http://www.createspace.com/3523749

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Shores-We-Walk-Gabriel-Rheaume/dp/145644431X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343859333&sr=1-1&keywords=the+shores+we+walk

Amazon Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/The-Shores-We-Walk-ebook/dp/B006GCD82I/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1343859370&sr=1-1&keywords=the+shores+we+walk

Facebook book page: www.facebook.com/theshoreswewalk

Leave a Response »

Simon Toyne: The Key Sunday, Sep 2 2012

Continued series winner and great read action, Catholic Church, Garden of Eden, Middle East, Rome, Ruin, suspense, thriller, trilogy, Turkey Auntie M Writes Crime 12:23 am

Simon Toyne, author of the first in the Ruin trilogy Sanctus, returns with book two in the series and The Key is every bit as compelling as the first.

A vertical mountain of carved rock, The Citadel of Ruin is the oldest continually inhabited edifice known to Man, and the seat of the Catholic Church.

After the events detailed in Sanctus, an explosion has left three people with intimate knowledge of the secret of the Sacrament, previously only known to a handful of elevated Santi monks.

One of those three is New Jersey journalist Liv Adamsen, who traveled to Ruin to find the truth surrounding the death of her Sancti brother. As The Key opens, Liv lies in a hospital bed, suffering the effects of post-traumatic amnesia. Four doors away, survivor number two, Kathryn Mann, nearly deaf from the explosion, ponders her fate and that of her only son, Gabriel, survivor number three.

In the Vatican City, The Group, composed of three world financial heads, hastily meet with their fourth member, Cardinal Secretary Clementi. Clementi holds his own key: to the Vatican’s Bank. He’s used the Church’s independence and secrecy for the past years to hide the practices of past centuries that have left the Church rich in priceless arts and property but virtually without cash.

For The Group, Liv and the others represent ticking time bombs, threatening to destroy their carefully crafted plan. While inside The Citadel, with the abbot and prelate both dead from the explosion, elections must take place to secure The Citadels’ hierarchy. But their centuries-old secrets are slowly unraveling, as disease spreads and with it, unrest inside the compound.

The Key sucks you in, with its detailed settings and complex sense of history and traditions. The Globe and Mail says: This is a gripping read, as fast-paced as any action movie and covering Rome to Ruin, and New York to the Middle East deserts, as Toyne fits together his complicated plot until it all makes horrible and terrific sense.

Leave a Response »

Wendy Corsi Staub: Nightwatcher Sunday, Aug 26 2012

Award winning novelist and mystery to die for and new series 9/11. serial murder, fashion world Auntie M Writes Crime 12:08 am

Today I received an incredibly haunting book trailer from New York Times bestselling author Wendy Corsi Staub for her upcoming release of NIGHTWATCHER.

NIGHTWATCHER Official Book Trailer

Staub is the New York Times bestselling author whose thrillers have a wide following. This is the first installment of a trilogy featuring Allison Taylor, a sympathetic heroine from the Midwest determined to overcome her start in life and conquer New York’s fashion world.

The book opens on September 10th, so the setup couldn’t be more powerful right in the opening pages. What happens after the shock of 9/11 spins a new angle on those horrendous days, when a murderer is cut loose on a town already trying to comprehend the enormous tragedy they are living through.

Allison has few friends but does talk to several renters in her apartment building: her upstairs neighbor, Kristina, and a young man, Mack MacKenna, whose insomnia finds them sharing the front stoop before the events that will change everyone’s lives so dramatically.

Mack’s wife perishes in the disaster, and as Allison reaches out to help him cope, Kristina is found savagely murdered. Allison’s carefully wrought existence in her adopted city falls apart even more than the buildings that have crashed to the ground. As more women die at the hands of a mad serial killer, it becomes apparent that Allison is the only one who can identify the killer. With her life in danger, Allison tries to help catch this crazed madman, even as she realizes she could be his next victim.

Staub evokes the atmosphere of 9/11 in a vivid and powerful way and uses the events of that day as the catalyst of this new thriller. She captures the shock, paranoia, and tension of New York City as she weaves this suspenseful thriller into the enormous ongoingdisaster. Suspense Magazine called it, “Suspenseful, powerful, tense and—as usual—wonderfully written with an ending that will leave you guessing. A great read!”

Getting inside the minds of many of the key players broadens the action and put the reader right into the thick of the tension and escalating terror. The action never lets up and the results are startling. There’s plenty here to keep you turning pages, and the ending will leave you waiting for the next installment, SLEEPWALKER, coming this fall.

Leave a Response »

John Harvey: Good Bait Sunday, Aug 19 2012

Award winning novelist and great read and mystery to die for and Series not to be missed Cornwall, drugs, London, money laundering, people trafficking, pollice procedural Auntie M Writes Crime 12:44 am

Auntie M is a huge John Harvey fan, and he doesn’t disappoint in his newest Good Bait, teaming up characters from previous novels in a winning way with overlapping storylines.

DCI Karen Shields heads the Homicide & Serious Crime Team, always working a multitude of cases and hoping for a result. Shields is still grieving over the death of her father and realizing her work commitments have left her with only one good friend. When the body of a teenaged boy is discovered on Hampstead Heath, their investigation leads to a connection with the small Eastern European country of Moldova. At first drugs or illegal trading is suspected as the impetus for the boy’s death.

Miles away on the western coast in Cornwall, DI Trevor Cordon is nearing retirement, which can’t come quickly enough. Passed by for promotions by colleagues with more modern attitudes, he’s part of the old guard and set in his ways. Then the mother of an young woman he’d taken under his wing in the past appears on his doorstep, begging him to look into her daughter’s disappearance. Cordon had tried to put Letitia on a different path from her mother’s life of drug addiction and prostitution. Cordon is soon drawn to London after the mother’s unexpected death, where he enlists the aid of former colleague Jack Kiley, now a private detective.

The working methods, personalities and private lives of Shields and Cordon couldn’t be more different, but the one thing they have in common is that both feel like outsiders. We feel their loneliness in their private lives as we follow the complicated path of Shields’ many cases and the thread of Cordon’s hunt for Letitia.

International money laundering, drug operations, and people trafficking are all involved, along with a heavy dose of Cordon’s music. It is the contrast of Shield’s aggressive and exhausting police work against Cordon’s melancholy and slower investigation that will result in an overlapping link in both cases that will lead to the ultimate resolution.
Harvey manages to weave in socio-economic issues by illustrating how they impact on police work without hitting the reader over the head with these issues. One of Harvey’s greatest strengths is his ability to develop his characters on a rich but subtle level, and this in inherent in all of his works, including the Charlie Resnick and Frank Elder novels.

This is a skilled craftsman writing at the top of his game, and any reader who enjoys a well-crafted police procedural illustrating different detecting methods will enjoy Good Bait.

Leave a Response »

Mark Billingham: Good as Dead Sunday, Aug 12 2012

Award winning novelist and Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for and Series not to be missed hostages, Met police, police procedural, suicide, UK, youth prisons Auntie M Writes Crime 12:48 am

A word first on television made from novels:

Mark Billingham’s novels include a stand-alone, In the Dark, and the DI Tom Thorne series, a character Lee Child has compared to Morse and Rebus. Thorne is now a television series in the UK and Auntie M has seen each of the three-parters that illustrate Billingham’s first two in the series, Sleepyhead and Scaredy Cat. Actor David Morrissey, also executive producer, read a Thorne novel and enjoyed it; then was pleasantly surprised to read he was exactly the actor whom the author pictured playing his detective inspector one, who plays close to, and sometimes, over the line.

The teleplays follow the the original story-lines closely, with the exception of a few casting changes, as in making Thorne’s superior, Brigstocke, a woman. His best friend, pathologist Phil Hendricks is described in the books as a tall, bald, heavily pierced and tattooed Mancunian. In the series, he’s aptly played by shorter Irishman, Aidan Gillen, whose head full of bushy dark hair nonetheless conveys the spirit of the original character as drawn by Billingham. But these are small changes.

What’s in full force is the power of the stories Billingham originally told, and Morrissey’s ability to get Tom Thorne’s ambivalent character just right. Here’s Gillen on the left and Morrissey on the right.

More of the novels are planned for future filming by Sky1; check the local satellite listings in your area.

Now on to the newest Thorne novel, Good as Dead (The Demands in the US).

Change is on Tom Thorne’s mind after upheaval in his personal life. He’s sold his beloved but not fixable old BMW for an updated model he’s still getting used to; he’s put his flat on the market; and he’s even considering a job transfer.

Then he finds himself called for by name, requested by a shopkeeper who has barricaded himself and two hostages into his news shop.

Thorne remembers the man’s name from a prior case involving manslaughter and the man’s son, who received an unusually long sentence in prison for what seemed to be manslaughter in self-defense.

The hostages are a cowardly banker and a DI from the Child Protection Unit whom Thorne remembers from a former case.

Helen Weeks’ partner was killed when she was pregnant with her son, now eight months old. Both hostages are in Amin Akhtar’s shop when harassment by local thugs causes him to snap, a classic case of being in the wrong place at just the wrong time.

Yet Amin has a specific point to holding these two by gunpoint. They are the leverage he needs for Thorne to investigate the apparent suicide of the his son in prison.

Convinced the youth wouldn’t have taken his own life, Amin tasks Thorne with unraveling the secrets behind his son’s death.

The threads Thorne pulls will have unexpected and surprising twists, in the way that Billingham does so well, as Thorne puts his career on the line to find the truth. Time is against him as hours and then days pass as he tries to find the truth about what happened at the youth institution housing Amin’s son.

And in the end, not everyone will walk out of that shop alive.

Billingham’s novels are complex and compelling, filled with with the right amount of psychological insight into his very human character’s mental state. The tension is taut and Billingham manages to keep getting better with each novel. The can’t come fast enough.

Leave a Response »

Two-fer Opposites: Andrew Kaplan and Linda Lovely Sunday, Aug 5 2012

Continued series winner and great read and mystery to die for action, Iowa, murder, spies, thriller, Ukraine Auntie M Writes Crime 12:39 am

Auntie M has two books that are as far apart as you can get on the setting scale, but both satisfying reads of different kinds.

First up is Andrew Kaplan’s entry in his Scorpion series, Scorpion Winter, a thriller that takes place largely in the Ukraine with stops in the Middle East and Europe, featuring a killer pacing that never lets up. Kirkus Reviews says: “Kaplan takes the thriller genre at its word, moving as fast as Ludlum but with ten times the eye for settings and crisp characterizations.”

Scorpion is a former CIA covert operative who operates on a freelance basis. This means he has friends–and enemies–in almost every country in the world.

His newest assignment is to prevent the assassination of a Ukraine politician on the eve of an election that has world-wide consequences and interests. Assisting him, despite his initial misgivings, is the very lovely Iryna Shevchenko, whose father founded the Independent movement in the country.

But everything goes horribly wrong, and Iryna and Scorpion soon find themselves on the run, hunted down as the assassins themselves as they become caught in the trap of an unknown enemy. With NATO, Russia and US forces ready to become involved in a war, they race against time to find the real murderers and clear their names. Along the way, there are plenty of deaths, sleight of hand maneuvers, impossible getaways, and enough violence told in a matter-of-fact disturbing way to keep you awake at night.

The pacing is relentless as the couple, whose attraction to each other becomes too strong to ignore, face the brutal realities of too many sub-culture political parties operating under the radar. Acronyms abound: The SVR, the SBU, the NSA and even Chinese mobsters are involved at different points.

Scorpion proves himself to be a master of deception, with false identities and useful fighting and burglary skills learned over the years that keep him just one small step ahead of his opponents–until a false step lands him in prison and in the hands of a sadistic madman. The torture he endures is horrific; with no salvation in sight, his death is imminent. How he gets himself out of that situation, and the eventual unraveling of this twisted plot, will leave readers stunned. When Scorpion says near the end: “Sometimes you need your enemies more than your friends,” you will understand the complicated life he’s chosen to lead.

Kaplan has done exhaustive research, and the cold winter of Siberia looms real enough to make your joints ache. The use of phrases in Russian and other languages are thoughtfully translated for the reader but add to the feel of being on the other side of the world. This is an action thriller that will leave you breathless at its end.

Doing a hard 180 degree turn, we travel to the Midwest and the Great Lakes area of Iowa. Linda Lovely first introduced retired military intelligence officer Marley Clark in the SC low country mystery Dear Killer, where Marley’s security job formed the basis for that mystery. In No Wake Zone, Marley travels to a family reunion for her feisty Aunt May’s birthday, expecting a totally different kind of vacation from the one she encounters.

Marley gets roped into helping her tourist-boat captain cousin aboard his boat on West Okoboji Lake for a wedding reception, but never dreams she’ll find herself diving into the cold depths of the lake in a vain attempt to save the life of a billionaire.

The founder of a biotech company is the unlucky groom, only he’s dead before he hits the water. When it turns out an old college friend is the bride, Marley finds herself deeply embroiled in the murder investigation.

Each member of the tycoon’s family try to top each other as Nastiest Relative of the Year in the greed department. Adding to the mix is the head of an international security company who has his own issues against Marley from their previous association.

Things heat up even more when Marley’s former Pentagon boss enlists her aid in the investigation and intrigue abounds.

Then a handsome attorney with his own secrets steps into the case and Marley finds herself attracted to him, despite her inner turmoil over trusting him, all under the inquisitive eye of Aunt May. When the deaths start to mount up, the killer soon targets Marley and her family and the suspense rises as the pace continues to pound along.

There’s plenty of action here and a gripping plot with as many turns as the amusement park rides that feature in an action-packed climax scene. The dialogue is snappy and you’ll be longing for another adventure with Marley Clark when you turn the last page.

The author spent summers in the Spirit Lake area with her family and her real-life captain cousin played a major role in the creation of the Maritime Museum, which also becomes a setting. Her familiarity with the area, including local landmarks and restaurants, brings it to life for those not familiar with this area of the Midwest.

It’s refreshing to have a well-written series with an engaging protagonist who is 52, smart and witty, and with a zest for life that is engaging.

One Response »

Mary Daheim and James Runcie: Polar Opposites Sunday, Jul 29 2012

Award winning novelist and great read and new series and Series not to be missed amateuer sleuth, Cambridge, cozy, Little Bavaria, multiple stories, murder, vicars Auntie M Writes Crime 12:49 am

This week Auntie M brings you a repeat performer AND she introduces a new series from across the pond.

Seattle native Mary Daheim’s newest in hardcover from William Morrow is The Wurst is Yet to Come. It continues her hallmark bed-and-breakfast mystery series filled with word play and humor.

This time Judith and her cousin Renie travel by train over the mountains to man a booth featuring B&B’s at Oktoberfest in Little Bavaria.

Every German association you can think of has been put into the town for the event, from lederhosen and oompah bands to sauerbraten and wursts. There’s even a life-szied dancing bear running around the streets.

Judith is stinging from criticism from the state B&B association, threatening to pull her license due to the number of bodies that have piled up at her B&B, Hillside Manor. When she enlists Renie and heads off to Little Bavaria, she’s hoping to avoid murder and mayhem and bring new business to her inn.

But things kick off decidedly differently from her plans. In the middle of the opening celebration, which includes a band of German dancers, the town’s beloved patron, Dietrick Wessler is murdered.

Despite her best efforts to avoid being involved, Judith finds her reputation has preceded her. When the local police chief, a man with a huge appetite and dubious investigating skills, begs her to help solve the murder, Judith knows she can’t refuse.

Then she finds herself also investigating a death from the previous summer, and amidst a bewildering number of locals thrown in with the various people showing up for Oktoberfest, she agrees to help out, but with one twist: Renie will pose as the sleuth to keep her reputation from becoming even more tarnished.

She’ll meet more of Wessler’s extended family than she wants to, and come to know the menu of the local pancake house inside and out as she tries to juggle her hours at the association booth while using her investigative prowess without calling attention to herself.

Whether this works out or not is half the fun for fans of the series in this 27th offering, who will enjoy the goofy turns of events and pure brain candy as a murderer is unmasked.

Next we have The Grantchester Mysteries from the artistic director of the Bath Literature Festival, James Runcie, author of four other novels, and with a resume that includes stints as a theater director, award-winning filmmaker, and scripts for several BBC television films. Sidney Chambers and The Shadow of Death takes a leap to Cambridge and a trip back to 1953, where Runcie introduces his unlikely sleuth: the Canon Sidney Chambers, vicar of Grantchester, an unusual detective at first glance, whose guilty pleasure is an affection for jazz and warm beer.

The 32 year-old bachelor, an unconventional clergyman at best, also has an unconventional friend: Inspector Geordie Keating, whom he meets every Thursday night at the pub for an evening of mutual relaxation–until the night Keating convinces Sidney to help him investigate the suicide of Cambridge solicitor Stephen Staunton.

Sidney can go where Keating cannot, and that includes talking at length with the dead man’s wife, partner and secretary. He also finds the company of the new widow, the German Hildegard Staunton, an accomplished pianist, to be surprisingly soothing. Sidney’s own gentle manner and unassuming ways soon lead him to unearth the truth behind Staunton’s tragic death, but this is only the first of a string of crimes where he will find his tact and position called into play to use in an investigation.

Sidney’s detecting skills will try the patience of his housekeeper and his own conscience, as he continues his church duties and takes tutorials at his old college, Corpus Christi, while defining what a vicar should be for himself and for his parish family.

A jewelry theft will occur right under his nose at a New Year’s Eve dinner party; the murder of the daughter of a former mob boss at a jazz club will find him closely involved; a death which may be a mercy killing will find him questioning ethics; a case of art forgery will bring involve him and bring danger to his friend, Amanda, whom Keating thinks Sidney should marry; and a murder in the middle of an amateur production of Julius Ceasar becomes a matter of reputation.

Runcie has done a lovely job with the period details, down to the music and behaviors that match the time. In Sidney Chambers, we have a vicar who quotes poetry and muses on the meaning of love: ” … It was the most unpredictable and chameleon of emotions, sometimes sudden and unstable, able to flare up and die down; at other times loyal and constant, the pilot flame of a life.”

These consecutive stories were a pleasure be immersed in, transported back to a time when the world was regaining its footing after World War II. It is to be hoped that Runcie will continue the Canon’s adventures for our reading pleasure, brain candy of a very different sort, but just as satisfying.

Leave a Response »

« Previous Page — Next Page »

	Anonymous on RADEGONDE AND THE FIRST CRUSAD…
	Anonymous on Bruce Robert Coffin: Bitter…
	mel westemeier on SJ Bennett: The Queen Who Came…
	Anonymous on wreck Your Heart: Lori Ra…
	Anonymous on Sally Smith: A Case of Mice an…

Auntiemwrites Crime-Mystery Author M K Graff

Kate George: Crazy Little Thing Called Dead Sunday, Sep 16 2012

Judy Nichols: Sportsman’s Bet Sunday, Sep 9 2012

Judy Alter: Trouble in a Big Box Sunday, Sep 9 2012

Gabriel Rheaume: The Shores We Walk Sunday, Sep 2 2012

Simon Toyne: The Key Sunday, Sep 2 2012

Wendy Corsi Staub: Nightwatcher Sunday, Aug 26 2012

John Harvey: Good Bait Sunday, Aug 19 2012

Mark Billingham: Good as Dead Sunday, Aug 12 2012

Two-fer Opposites: Andrew Kaplan and Linda Lovely Sunday, Aug 5 2012

Mary Daheim and James Runcie: Polar Opposites Sunday, Jul 29 2012

Death Unscripted: A Trudy Genova Manhattan Mystery

THE GOLDEN HOUR shortlisted!

THE GOLDEN HOUR: The 4th Nora Tierney English Mystery

The Blue Virgin

Winner Best British Cozy

Death at the Dakota: A Trudy Genova Manhattan Mystery 2

The Scarlet Wench

The Green Remains

Author Page

Blogs I Follow

Archives

Contact Auntie M: bluevirgin.graff@gmail.com

Recent Words

Recent Comments

Picture

Goodreads reviews for The Blue Virgin Reviews from Goodreads.com

Blogs I Follow