My Holiday Story is Available for FREE Download!

Sniplits.com has chosen my holiday story, "Biscuit Connection," as their free story available for download to members for the week of December 23 - 29. I hope many of you will become members on Sniplits (for free) if you are not already, download my story and listen to it! I'd love to get some feedback on it, too. The link is:

http://www.sniplits.com/

Happy Holidays!

I want to wish all my readers and friends a very happy holiday spent with those you love and full of health and good cheer. Also, may the new year fulfill your wishes and bring you joy!

A Rolicking Good Time at Adams Mystery Playhouse!

Thursday evening, my hubby and I joined 28 other stalwart sleuths from the Rocky Mountain chapter of Mystery Writers of America for our holiday party at the Adams Mystery Playhouse, complete with dinner and a mystery play (http://www.adamsmysteryplayhouse.com/). The play was "Death for Dinner." It included a police detective who sounded like a cross between Borat and Inspector Clouseau and who had the audience in stitches with his impromptu asides. Our table was one of three who correctly identified the killer at the end of the evening, so I'm feeling pretty smug.

The whole mystery dinner theater event was a heck of a lot of fun, complete with a conga line and audience members brought up on the stage to dance with the actors. I laughed until my sides hurt, and laughter is indeed the best medicine for whatever ails you. Suspense and romance author Colleen Collins made a great strumpet suspect, mystery author Christine Goff was making sure not to get her fingerprints on the evidence, and mystery short story author R.T. Lawton's lap got a lot of use. A good time was had by all! Now I'm off to shop for some of that blood-red vodka the bartender was mixing drinks with...

Guest Blogger Jean Henry Mead!!

As I promised in my last blog entry, Jean Henry Mead is my guest all day tomorrow, and she will be ready to answer any questions you post to my blog during the day. Remember that if you post a comment or question to my blog, you are automatically entered into a drawing for three signed copies of A Village Shattered. To get you stimulated, here's an interview with Dana Logan, one of the two sleuths featured in A Village Shattered.

Dana Logan, why do you think the author made you the main character?

Probably because I’m the most like her: tall, stubborn, eccentric and impatient. Novelists deny that they pattern their characters after themselves or people they know, but even if it’s only subconscious, it’s bound to happen. Who else do they know as well as themselves? Or friends and family members?

Other characters in the novel say that you look like the actress Gina Davis and that your friend Sarah resembles Shelley Winters. How do you feel about that?

Gina Davis happens to be one of my favorite actresses. And I’m glad the author also likes her. In the unlikely event they make a film about my life, I’d like Gina to play my role. But that’s never going to happen. Sarah and I have a real knack for getting involved in murder cases. Sarah always wanted to be a private investigator because she typed reports for her late husband, who was a PI. That’s how we got into this serial murder case, and it has nothing to do with the way we look.

Couldn’t you have just said NO! when your friend asked you to help her solve the first murder of your club member?

And let Sarah wonder around in the San Joaquin Valley fog all by herself? Not on your life! The killer is watching all of us and might even be a Sew and So club member. That’s who’s getting killed. Our friends all belong to the club and we discovered that the killer stole our membership roster and is killing our members alphabetically. First it was Alice, then Betty and Candice. My first name begins with a D so I may be next on the killer’s list, although there’s a member named Carole, so she could be the next victim. That’s why we have to discover who the murderer is, before he or she strikes again.

But what about the sheriff and his deputies?

Sheriff Grayson was recently elected and his only law enforcement experience was training police dogs. Some say he’s trying to run his department like a kennel , and half his staff resigned when he took office. Now maybe you understand why Sarah and I have to put our crime solving skills to work in order to save our lives.

What crime solving skills?

Sarah understudied her husband for years and knows the private investigating business thoroughly. And I have a large library of mystery and crime novels that I read at a rate of three a week. So we’re well aware of how law enforcement operates.

But doesn’t the sheriff object that you’re trying to do his job, and risking your lives in the process?

Of course he does, but would you cringe in a corner if you knew a killer were stalking you? Sarah and I may have recently joined the ranks of senior citizens but we’re a long way from being attached to rocking chairs. We’re quite capable of defending ourselves and sifting through clues to determine the killer.

I’ve heard that Sheriff Grayson has a crush on you? Do you think that’s why he’s giving you preferential treatment?

I’m aware of his infatuation but he’s a recently divorced man so I’m not taking his attentions seriously. And I would hardly call it preferential treatment when he takes Sarah and me down to police headquarters for exhaustive questioning. He even made us go to the morgue to identify a body he thought was our neighbor Harold Samuels. Sarah’s blood pressure skyrocketed and it didn’t do mine any good.

Who do you think is killing your friends?

I’m not sure. Sarah insists that it’s Harold Samuels, a sixtyish neighbor whose eyesight rivals Mr. Magoo. He disappeared the night that we had him over for dinner. Sarah put some cloral hydrate in his drink so we both feel responsible for his disappearance. Betty Wilson’s husband Pat is a likely candidate. He got rid of all his wife’s things, except for heirloom silverware and her jewelry within hours after her body was found. And everyone knows he’s a womanizer. There are other suspects as well.


Dana sure has whetted my appetite for this novel! Here are some links if you want more information:

Jean's blog tour schedule can be found at: http://myblogtour.blogspot.com/
Her website is: http://jeanhenrymead.com/
The print copy of Jean's book just went up at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/5alkkr
The multi format edition is currently number one at Fictionwise-ePress-Online: http://tinyurl.com/6rdzm5

My First Guest Visits on Saturday

I will be hosting my first guest on this blog on Saturday, December 6th, and I hope folks will stop by and read the blog and comment on it. My guest will be Jean Henry Mead, who writes senior sleuth mysteries and western historical novels. She's a former award-winning photojournalist and magazine and small press editor as well as a news reporter/editor. The book that will be featured in this blog visit is A Village Shattered, the first novel in her Logan & Cafferty series. It will be followed by Diary of Murder next spring. The third series book, Dying Laughing, Jean's fifteenth book, will be released during the fall of 2009.

Jean's visit to my blog is part of her two week blog tour promoting the release of A Village Shattered. Jean promises that everyone who leaves a comment at any of the host blog sites will be eligible for the drawing for three signed copies of A Village Shattered, a senior sleuth novel featuring Dana Logan and Sarah Cafferty, who set out to solve the serial killings of their friends. Dana's beautiful daughter is nearly killed in the process. And I will have the privilege of interviewing Dana on Saturday! This should be a lot of fun.

A Late Fall Newsletter and Website Updates

My website guru, my handsome husband, has made quite a few tweaks to my website in preparation for promoting the release of To Hell in a Handbasket next year. The covers of both A Real Basket Case and To Hell in a Handbasket now appear on the Books page and you can click on either one to go to its individual book page complete with reviews, excerpts, etc. Also, we’ve updated my Frequently Asked Questions page and made some minor updates on just about every page of the website. Click on "Beth's Web Page" under Links to see the changes. I think this update is going to cost me a bottle of single-malt scotch!

Also, we've been working on my October/November email newsletter. We've added all the new subscribers' email addresses and tested the links, so it should be sent out this evening. If you think you are on my subscriber list and don't see an email newsletter in your inbox by Monday, please sign up again on the Newsletter page of my website. My old newsletter service, Zinester, seems to have been blocked by some email providers, and those bounced addresses were deleted from my subscriber list. I'm now using Vertical Response, which seems to have much better luck getting through.

"Biscuit Connection" on Sniplits

My holiday story, "Biscuit Connection," has just been posted on Sniplits.com and is available for download at a very cheap price of 88 cents. Here's the blurb: Samuel's been dragged from one of his wife's volunteer activities to another. Now it's Christmas, he's stuck dishing up mashed potatoes at the food kitchen, and he's hungrier then he realized. Winner of the Mom Writers' Literary Magazine Short Fiction Contest in 2006. Family friendly....

I've listened to the story myself and I'm very pleased with the job the male voice actor did with the character's voices and their emotions. Sniplits also has another story of mine on their website, "Covered Dish Casseroles," available for the same low price and read by a very skillful female voice actress. If you click on "Authors" at the website, then on my name, you'll see both stories listed.

The website includes a wide variety of high-quality short fiction in many genres read by trained voice talent. I've listened to quite a few myself and have really enjoyed them. I hope you enjoy the site!

http://www.sniplits.com