AN INTERVIEW WITH MYSTERY, SCI-FI, AND HORROR AUTHOR JOANNE McLAUGHLIN

Today we sit down for a chat with mystery, science fiction, and horror author Joanne McLaughlin who assures us that her vampires are more darkly romantic than scary. Learn more about her and her books at her website and blog.

When did you realize you wanted to write novels?

When I was about nine years old, after reading Little Women for the first time.

 

How long did it take you to realize your dream of publication? 

Several decades. I first attempted novel writing in my late twenties, but then I spent many years doing things other than creating fiction.

 

Are you traditionally published, indie published, or a hybrid author? 

All of the above. My first novel, Never Before Noon, was published by a small traditional press that later folded. I regained my rights and republished the novel. By then, I had already independently published the second book in the trilogy, Never Until Now, because the small press was foundering. I also indie-published the trilogy’s final installment, Never More Human. My latest book, Chasing Ashes, is a hybrid publication with Celestial Echo Press, whose owners, Ann Stolinsky and Ruth Littner, I had already known for a decade as writers and the editors behind Gemini Wordsmiths.

 

Where do you write? 

At my dining room table, where I have more room to spread out. Also, a better view than my tiny office offers.

 

Is silence golden, or do you need music to write by? What kind?

I need silence now, after too many years listening to news radio while I was an editor at newspapers and public media. 

 

How much of your plots and characters are drawn from real life? From your life in particular?

All of my published novels include journalists—I worked as a reporter or editor for decades. And I try to keep my plots true to the era in which they are written. In my vampire books, for example, the reporter is covering the pre-Brexit European Union and eurozone. I wrote those novels when I was a business editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer. Chasing Ashes includes a scene loosely inspired by an incident I observed with two of my college roommates many years ago, and several characters in that book are composites based on those roommates. 

 

Describe your process for naming your character? 

My main Chasing Ashes character, reporter Laura Cunningham, is a reserved, hardworking, and fiercely loyal woman who grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia. I gave her a name that felt strong and steady, not trendy or something pegged to the decade in which she would have been born. But I named the protagonist of my vampire novels after my first cat, Chloe, who was my pal during many early novel-writing sessions. 

 

Real settings or fictional towns? 

Both, though many of the fictional settings are based either on places where I have lived or where friends have lived. 

 

What’s the quirkiest quirk one of your characters has? 

Laura suffers from stage fright in Chasing Ashes, complete with nausea and panic attacks.

 

What’s your quirkiest quirk? 

I’m claustrophobic, so I’m extremely uncomfortable in library buildings with tall shelves all around. As a hungry reader and a writer, I’m obviously grateful for libraries, but I can’t remember when I last had a library card. Probably in elementary school.

 

If you could have written any book (one that someone else has already written,) which one would it be? Why? 

Room by Emma Donoghue. The claustrophobia of the setting struck a chord, as did the child’s POV. Amazing. 

 

Everyone at some point wishes for a do-over. What’s yours?

I wish I could remake some career decisions made when I was just out of college. I thought I knew all there was to know. Hah!

 

What’s your biggest pet peeve? 

Finding toothpaste blobs in the bathroom sink.

 

You’re stranded on a deserted island. What are your three must-haves? 

The people I love most, books, and warmth. I’d prefer a deserted tropical island.

 

What was the worst job you’ve ever held? 

In college, I made credit collection calls for a major retail-store chain that was also noted for its catalog sales. On Saturday mornings, I would contact military families stationed overseas. No fun calling Okinawa, who knows how many time zones away, to ask why the refrigerator still hadn’t been paid off. Lots of awkward pauses on that far end of the phone line.

 

Who’s your all-time favorite literary character (any genre)? Why? 

Jo March. She’s smart, talented, a bit impulsive but wise enough to see her mistakes and shift gears as needed; a 19^th-century woman who figures out the work-family thing in her own, unconventional way.  

 

Ocean or mountains? 

Ocean

 

City girl/guy or country girl/guy? 

City, but not downtown. I like a small yard and a front porch. 

 

What’s on the horizon for you? 

My romantic mystery, A Poetic Puzzle, will be published February 1^st. A second book in the series I call Verse Case Scenarios (only half-joking here) is in progress. Fingers crossed.

 

Anything else you’d like to tell us about yourself and/or your books? 

I try to inject humor and family dysfunction into all my books. I’m a funny, snarky girl too chicken to try improv or stand-up, so there you go. Just don’t give me a straight line.

 

Chasing Ashes

Reporter Laura Cunningham’s childhood friend and college roommate vanished the day a deadly fire destroyed The Challenge, a residential counseling center for troubled students. Not something Laura could just forget—not after a year, not after almost twenty-five. So Laura writes a true-crime book demanding a new investigation, and envisions uncovering past secrets. What she can’t imagine is the fresh torment her book will unleash.

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MEET MUSICIAN AND AMATEUR SLEUTH JASON DAVEY FROM AUTHOR WINONA KENT'S JASON DAVEY MYSTERIES

Image by gazrock from Pixabay

Today we sit down for a chat with Jason Davey (aka Jason Figgis) from author Winona Kent’s Jason Davey Mysteries.

What was your life like before your author started pulling your strings?

To be honest, it wasn’t ever ordinary. My parents were the founding members of the 60s British folky-pop band Figgis Green. So my sister and I grew up in the spotlight. And when I became a musician myself, I started out busking in interesting places like Covent Garden and the London Underground. Then I joined a few bands, and spent time touring. And then, after my wife died, I ran away to sea to work on cruise ships. Which is, in itself, quite adventurous. And then after Winona discovered me in Cold Play—and then abandoned me!—I went travelling around the world for a few years. After I came back, a few mates and myself auditioned for a gig at a tired old rock and roll club called Diamonds…we failed the audition but then the owner got murdered…and his brother turned it into a jazz club called The Blue Devil…we auditioned again…and the rest is history.

 

What’s the one trait you like most about yourself?

My habit of completely rearranging pieces of music to create new forms of audio fusion. You can do it with food, so why not with music? Case in point: Aria Sopra la Bergamasca by Marco Uccellini. Composed in 1642. Traditionally performed with two violins and a basso continuo. My band and I do it with a Gretsch solid body G5135 CVT, a harpsichord patch on a Roland XP-80, a tenor sax wailing out the baroque melody line, and a polite little snare drum keeping us all well-behaved. My drummer Rudy sums it up nicely—the perfect synthesis of the unnatural with the bizarre. 

 

On the other hand, I once rearranged Variation X (“Dorabella”) from Elgar’s Enigma Variations into a jazz piece. After two performances at The Blue Devil, I was unceremoniously informed by my band that if I was going to subject them to much more of my “idiosyncratic wankery” (as Dave, my keyboard guy, put it), I might consider continuing my gig at the club as a solo act.

 

I still firmly believe classical music should never take itself too seriously.

 

What do you like least about yourself?

If you’d asked me that before I went on the road with my mum’s band, Figgis Green, I’d have said, my addiction to nicotine. But I gave up smoking halfway through the tour and I haven’t looked back since. Now, it’s my lack of any kind of physical fitness—other than a daily walk, which, admittedly, does often cover a couple of miles. I’m in my fifties now and I want—I need—to work on having a healthier lifestyle. Somebody famous—I can’t quite remember who—once said, “Whenever I’m overcome with the feeling I ought to exercise, I lie down ‘til it goes away.” That might have described me in days gone by—but no more!

 

What is the strangest thing your author has had you do or had happen to you?

In Ticket to Ride, while I was on tour with my mum’s band, she made me deliberately drink some seafood chowder prepped by our catering crew. My mum had been laid low by what we thought was an allergy to mussels—which I also suffer from (as does Winona, so she has first-hand knowledge). Rather than wait for a toxicology report, she had me sample the stuff. She knew the results would make themselves apparent almost immediately. And they did. With predictably unfortunate results.

 

Do you argue with your author? If so, what do you argue about?

Most definitely.

See below!

 

What is your greatest fear?

What Winona’s going to do to me next! She seems to take a perverse joy in making me suffer. I’ve nearly died in a fire, been thrown into the sea, almost been welded to death, beaten up and had my feet burned by a thug, struck by lightning, overdosed on insulin and fallen head first out of a two-story window. I’m afraid to think about what she has planned for the next book. I anticipate strong words will be exchanged.

 

What makes you happy?

Marmite. Branston Pickle. Yorkshire tea. Maltesers. Chocolate digestives. Fireball XL5. Pat Metheny.

 

If you could rewrite a part of your story, what would it be? Why?

I’d probably rethink Notes on a Missing G-String. It’s got dodgy subject matter (a runaway teenaged daughter, Soho’s sex trade)…as well as some very “descriptive” scenes… at the time Winona wrote that story she was literally still trying to find her audience—as well as an agent and a traditional publisher—and I’m pretty positive both she and I thought sex might sell. And the book did sell quite a lot of copies. But it’s probably dead last in my list of favourite Jason Davey adventures. 

 

Of the other characters in your book, which one bugs you the most? Why?

My old nemesis, Arthur Braskey. I first crossed paths with him in Notes on a Missing G-String. He’s an elderly, old-fashioned Soho crimelord—clever, with a somewhat twisted sense of humour, and an absolute bastard. Especially to me. He forced me to take part in a charity firewalk—and then he burned the bottoms of my feet for real. I thought I was done with him at the end of the novel, but he showed up again in Bad Boy. He's someone I do truly fear—for obvious reasons—but somehow I found the courage to stand up to him. And I’m quite proud of myself for that. 

 

Of the other characters in your book, which one would you love to trade places with? Why?

In another life I’d love to write cozy mysteries. My sister does that, under the name Taylor Feldspar. I would absolutely love to be a bestselling author with about 30 books on the shelves, never out of print, featured in high-profile interviews and hobnobbing with the great mystery novelists. And, of course, there would be series deals for television. My sister shows up in most of my adventures. In the latest, Bad Boy, she helps me get the answer to one of those damnable train-time-distance problems—which I’ve never been able to solve.

 

Tell us a little something about your author. Where can readers find her website/blog?

Winona’s been writing for quite a long time. Her first book was published in 1989. It was called Skywatcher,and it was a finalist in a well-known (back then!) first-novel competition. Then there was a bit of a gap, and she wrote a second book about the same characters (spies!) called The Cilla Rose Affair. And then she discovered me! Although I wasn’t a sleuth at the time…I was just a jobbing musician working onboard a lovely old cruise ship sailing between Vancouver and Alaska. That was in 2012, in a novel called Cold Play. She and I both had a lot of fun with that one—at the time, I was obsessed with Twitter (my handle was @cold_fingers)…and so was she, to be honest! I remember she asked a whole load of her followers if they’d like to be characters in the book. They could pick their fictitious names and also what they did for a living. They all ended up passengers on the cruise ship. 

 

After that, she abandoned me! She went on to write three “accidental time-travel romances”, although I always suspected she had me at the back of her mind when she created Shaun Deeley, the time-hopping companion of the series heroine, Charlie Duran.

 

And then, in 2017, Winona discovered that she quite enjoyed writing mysteries. And she remembered what a good time she’d had with me five years earlier in Cold Play, and thought to herself, why don’t I bring Jason back as a private investigator? Still a musician, mind—and now with a permanent residency at The Blue Devil jazz club in London’s Soho. But also a somewhat reluctant amateur sleuth. So that was Disturbing the Peace, and now there are four more novels, for a total of five, with the latest one (Bad Boy) released in September 2024.

 

The thing that always amazes me is that Winona has twelve books out there (including an anthology of short stories)—and all but the last three were written while she was working full-time at completely unrelated jobs. 

 

She’s now happily retired (and she’s just turned 70, which utterly amazes me—she’s about twenty years older than me) and has turned plant-rescuing into one of the things she does when she’s not writing or researching or being the Chair of Crime Writers of Canada. She searches for potted plants that people have tossed into the compost bin at the apartment building where she lives. And she picks up bits of succulents that have dropped off mother plants at the linear park along the river across the road. She’s got quite a collection of those currently occupying her sunny bedroom window. In the summer, she’ll move them all outside to her balcony. 

 

Learn more about Winona’s and her books at her website and at her blog on Substack.

And lots of sample chapters.

 

What's next for you?

Well…as I mentioned, I have a residency at The Blue Devil nightclub in London, and nearly all of my adventures, for the most part, have happened in England. So I’m very pleased to reveal that my next story is going to take place in Vancouver, Canada. When I was working as a musician aboard the Star Sapphire (doing the Alaska run), my home port was Vancouver, so I’m quite familiar with the city. In fact, it’s one of my favourite places. I’ll be visiting Vancouver with my sister Angie, the one who writes those cozy mysteries under the pseudonym Taylor Feldspar. Angie’s the guest of honour at a crime-writing festival, and I’ve volunteered to accompany her because her husband hates flying. Plus, I’m a real-life amateur sleuth, so who wouldn’t want me along as a tell-all sidekick? While I’m in Vancouver, I may pop ‘round to visit an old mate from my cruise ship days…and that’s when things are going to get very interesting. I’ll say no more…my overworked author has yet to put this into Plottr and get the outline going…but I know she’s been thinking about this since she attended Left Coast Crime in both Vancouver and Seattle…and a recent fire in the apartment building where she used to live has ignited all kinds of possible complications!

 

Bad Boy

A Jason Davey Mystery, Book 5

 

Fresh from a 34-day, 18-city tour of England, professional musician and amateur sleuth Jason Davey accepts an invitation from a fan, Marcus Merritt, to meet at Level 72 of The Shard to sign one of his band's programs. Marcus hands him the booklet, then leaps to his death from the open viewing platform. Thus begins a week-long quest, during which Jason is tasked with retrieving a stolen collection of scores by England’s most famous composer, Sir Edward Elgar.

 

Marcus shared Elgar's love of eccentric puzzles and games, and the challenging clues he's assembled for Jason seem to mirror the 14 themes in Elgar's renowned Enigma Variations. Jason's journey takes him to Derbyshire and then back to London, and a four-hour walking tour of Soho's lost music venues where, in Denmark Street, he faces a life-threatening battle with two adversaries: a treacherous Russian gangster who is also hunting for the stolen collection, and Marcus's sister—who holds the key to a decades-old mystery involving a notorious London crime lord's missing daughter.

 

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HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

 

AUTHOR HARINI NAGENDRA'S LATEST HISTORICAL MYSTERY SET IN INDIA

image from Wikimedia Commons

Harini Nagendra is a professor of ecology at Azim Premji University, and a well-known public speaker and writer on issues of nature and sustainability. The first book in her Bangalore Detectives Club series was a New York Times Notable Book of 2022, and shortlisted for the Agatha, Lefty, Anthony and Historical Dagger. Harini lives in Bangalore with her family, in a home filled with maps. She loves trees, mysteries, and traditional recipes. Learn more about her and her books at her website.

Image from Wikimedia Commons

Juggling with danger - circuses and street magic in 1920s colonial India

In my day job, I am an academic and university professor who conducts research on the ecology and history of Indian cities – and I come across many fascinating nuggets of information which I’d love to share with readers from different parts of the world. The Bangalore Detectives Club, my historical mystery series set in 1920s colonial India, was inspired by this desire to showcase the many, very interesting stories and anecdotes that needed to flourish outside the pages of scholarly academic literature. While I write non-fiction, too, it’s sometimes easiest to do this through a story.

 

Book 3 in the series, A Nest of Vipers, takes us into the world of jadoo—Indian street magic—with sleight-of-hand magicians and rope tricks which have fascinated me since I was a young child, growing up in Delhi in the 1970s, where it was common to see snake charmers, fortune tellers with parrots, and animal trainers with performing bears. Some of these forms of street magic have since been made illegal, especially the ones that involve caging and mistreating wild animals – and rightfully so. But others still survive to this day on the streets of India. 

 

Jadoo had an uneasy relationship to western stage magic in the early 20^th century. Indian street performers and circus artists made their way to Europe and America, and public interest in their performances began to attract the attention of Western magicians like Harry Houdini, who dressed in blackface at the Chicago World Fair in 1893 and pretended to be a Hindu Fakir. 

 

Houdini may not have known, but he was following in the footsteps of his illustrious predecessor Charles Dickens, who also stained his face and enacted the part of an Indian magician at children’s parties. Houdini’s biggest rival Howard Thurston travelled to India to learn the secrets of street magicians, which he then exploited on stage, but at the same time, denounced those that he learnt from, calling them charlatans and tricksters.

 

By 1922, when the Indian independence movement had spread across India, a few prominent circuses had begun to integrate acts that incorporated elements of anti-British sentiment, flirting with danger. The Bengali magician Das, who plays a key role in A Nest of Vipers, disappears in the middle of a dramatic performance, soon after making his distaste for the British Empire public on stage. His story was inspired by all the stories I read about Indian magicians, and by the nimble street acrobats I still see in Indian cities today, who are bold and imaginative, yet languish in obscurity - in contrast to their more successful Western counterparts. 

 

A Nest of Vipers

A Bangalore Detectives Club Mystery, Book 3

 

Death stalks the streets of Bangalore when the Circus comes to town . . .

It's January 1922. The Bangalore Constabulary is on high alert as The Prince of Wales is scheduled to visit the city to redeem his reputation after disastrous visits marked by violent anti-British riots.

Kaveri has none of these concerns on her mind, not when she has just been given VIP tickets to the famous Bangalore circus. But when a celebrity magician, shackled in an iron cage filled with deadly snakes, disappears into thin air, she is stunned to discover her friend and favourite policeman, Inspector Ismail, is telling her to leave the case well alone.

After solving two murder cases, Kaveri Murthy thought she had cemented her reputation as Bangalore's favourite lady detective. But when death threats are left at her doorstep, former friends become foes, and the bodies start to pile up, Kaveri realises she has never been in this much danger…

 

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MYSTERY AUTHOR ERICA MINER SENDS HER SLEUTH CAREENING FROM MISADVENTURE TO MISADVENTURE

Erica Miner is a violinist turned award-winning author, screenwriter, journalist and lecturer. Learn more about her and her books at her website.

A Protagonist’s Journey from Misadventure to Misadventure

As an author of a series, I’m always thinking about how the next book can be totally different from the current one, yet continue seamlessly from where we left off. The main character is the crux of this issue, and in Book 3 of the series I put her in a situation that would challenge the most intrepid violinist-cum-sleuth.

In the first book of my Julia Kogan Opera Mystery series, Aria for Murder, the young protagonist, Julia, starts off as a starry-eyed neophyte violinist about to make her debut in the orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera, the most prestigious company in the world. She’s excited and thrilled. But she has no idea something terrible is about to happen, and before long she finds herself entangled in a murder investigation, with her life in peril.

 

Julia survives, and in Book 2, Prelude to Murder, Julia heads to Santa Fe to perform at the Opera. Here she finds further in-house violence, this time at an outdoor theatre set between two mysterious mountain ranges, where both ghosts and murder proliferate. Unable to resist becoming involved in an investigation, Julia ends up the target of a ruthless killer and is barely able to defend herself to save her own life and return to the Met. 

 

Now, at the beginning of Book 3, Overture to Murder, five years have passed, during which Julia has managed to stay out of trouble. But San Francisco Opera calls on her in desperation: their concertmaster (first of the first violinists) has suffered serious injuries in a hit and run accident. Would she be able to replace him while he recovers? 

 

Challenge is something Julia is drawn to like a wasp to a piece of prosciutto on the brunch table. She loves the violin, she loves opera, and she has fond memories of when her father showed her the delights of the City by the Bay, even though she was only five years old at the time. San Francisco 

 

Opera is the second most prestigious company in the US, after the Met. Serving in the all-important position of concertmaster, even if only for the summer, would be a life changing experience, too good to pass up. The entire season would be focused on the monumental Ring of the Nibelungen, the masterful but fiendishly difficult four-opera cycle written by the 19^th century German giant, Richard Wagner. Being a prominent orchestral leader for this astounding work would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, too good to pass up. There’s just one slight detail that might make her hesitate.

 

Her five-year-old daughter.

 

At the end of Prelude to Murder, Julia had been flabbergasted when she discovered she was pregnant. She never had considered having children, least of all at the age of 23. Her career was her primary focus, her obsession in almost every way.

 

But she cared deeply for Larry, her significant other, and figured it must have been her destiny to have his child, even if she was not quite ready to become a parent. When Rebecca was born, Julia was delighted to have a little girl—a “mini-me,” as Larry insisted on calling his daughter. He took to being a dad as if he had been born to it. Now if only Larry would stop bugging her about getting married, Julia thought, everything would be perfect.

 

Julia also loved San Francisco. Now Rebecca was the same age as Julia when her father had shown her the entrancing city, and Julia thought it the ideal age to do the same with Rebecca. She would be busy fulfilling her obligations at the opera, not to mention teaching violin to her rebellious five-year-old, but Larry would take up the slack. Surely Julia would find a bit of time here and there to join her family in availing themselves of the joys of the iconic landmarks of San Francisco. Julia gladly accepts the job offer, and she and her loved ones head west.

 

It turns out her job is not the only challenge that confronts Julia. Despite the expertise she has gained from six years of experience at the Met and Santa Fe, she is not prepared for the unexpected stress from a theatre with more than its share of detestable divas of both the male and female categories, irritable stage directors who have it in for her…and murder.

 

Once again, Julia succumbs to the lure of a brutal crime needing to be solved. In between the arduous rehearsals and tense performances in the theatre she follows her natural curiosity to the clues that are hidden in the recesses of the eerie basement with its ancient, dangerous looking equipment and the upper reaches of the theatre where, she is told, ghosts have been encountered. 

 

As before, Julia’s sleuthing attracts the ire of a brutal killer. But she could not have anticipated the dreadful surprise that the perpetrator has in store.

 

Overture to Murder

A Julia Kogan Opera Mystery, Book 3

 

After jeopardizing her safety investigating killings at the Metropolitan Opera and Santa Fe Opera, intrepid violinist Julia heads to the San Francisco Opera to replace ailing concertmaster, Ben, who has suffered serious injuries in a hit and run accident. Julia suspects the mishap might not have been accidental, especially when a prominent company member becomes the victim of a grisly murder. As before, Julia cannot resist becoming involved in the investigation. Fiery artistic temperaments and danger lurking in the dark hallways and back stairways of an opera house with its own ghosts provide a chilling backdrop to Julia’s sleuthing. This time, however, it’s not only her own life that is in peril.

 

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MY AUTHOR'S HOLIDAY GIFT TO OUR READERS

You Get a Mystery! And You Get a Mystery! And You Get a Mystery!

‘Tis the season for holiday cheer, getting together with friends and family, festive parties, and exchanging gifts. I love this time of year because my author, Lois Winston, is too busy with holiday festivities to dream up new ways to torment me with assorted murder and mayhem. She says it’s her holiday gift to me.

 

But this year she’s also got a gift for all our blog readers.

 

Back in August, Lois attended the Killer Nashville Mystery Conference. One of the workshops she went to was about how to grow your newsletter subscribers list through Reader Magnets. Lois decided to give Reader Magnets a try.

 

What’s a Reader Magnet, you ask? It’s a freebie, usually a short story or novella, that readers receive as a thank-you for subscribing to an author’s newsletter. If you subscribe to Lois’s newsletter, you’ll receive a free e-copy of Mosaic Mayhem, one of the three Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mini Mysteries that are connected to the Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series (otherwise known as those books Lois writes about me.)

 

A reluctant Amateur sleuth, bumbling kidnappers, mistaken identity. What could go wrong?

 

So much for a romantic getaway...When cash-strapped mom and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack is offered an all-expense paid three-day trip to Barcelona, her only worries are whether her passport is still valid and arranging care for her semi-invalid mother-in-law during her absence. However, within hours of landing in Europe, she finds herself staring down the barrel of a gun and needing to convince a Spanish crime syndicate they’ve kidnapped the wrong person. Why do people on both sides of the Atlantic keep trying to kill this pear-shaped, middle-aged single mom, and magazine crafts editor? 

 

Click here to join Lois’s newsletter and get your free copy of Mosaic Mayhem.

 

Lois is also taking part in the “Detectives (Who Aren’t Detectives)” promotion this month, which features stories by authors who write about amateur sleuths. If you subscribe to any of the participating authors’ newsletters, you’ll receive a free mystery from them. This is a great opportunity to fill your virtual stocking with stories to read throughout the cold winter months ahead. And hopefully, you’ll find some new favorite authors. Click here to find all the participating authors and their free books.

 

Meanwhile, if you’re looking for some holiday-themed mysteries, Drop Dead Ornaments and Handmade Ho-Ho Homicide, the seventh and eighth books in that series Lois writes about me, are sure to put you in the holiday spirit. Both books are available as ebooks, paperbacks, hardcovers, and audiobooks, as well as in a 2-book ebook bundle. They also make great gifts for the mystery lovers in your life. So grab your beverage of choice and curl up in your favorite chair to join me as I’m once again involved in solving a murder or two (or possibly more!)

AN INTERVIEW WITH AMATEUR SLEUTH JUNIPER BLUME FROM AUTHOR DAPHNE SILVER'S RARE BOOKS COZY MYSTERY SERIES

Today we sit down for a chat with Juniper Blume from author Daphne Silver’s Rare Books Cozy Mystery Series

What was your life like before your author started pulling your strings?

I had been a rare books librarian at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. I thought I had found my place and settled down… but Daphne apparently had other things in mind for me. She took me on a real expedition - scouring for an ancient Celtic manuscript in a cemetery near the Chesapeake Bay. It’s funny because I had spent a lot of time traveling before becoming a librarian, and it never occurred to me that there might be so many adventures in my home state. 

 

What’s the one trait you like most about yourself?

Like a lot of librarians, I’m endlessly curious. Everything fascinates me. I believe everything has a story to tell, and I want to know it all. I’m never bored as a result. 

 

What do you like least about yourself?

Remember how I want to know it all? Well, I’m also a big “know-it-all.” I have a tendency to run my mouth and share pretty esoteric information, especially about Maryland and book history. In one of Daphne’s books, I get dubbed “Encyclopedia Blume,” like the Encyclopedia Brown children’s series. 

 

What is the strangest thing your author has had you do or had happen to you?

Hah. She loves to mess with me. The strangest was probably in the climax of the first book Crime and Parchment, but I don’t want to give that away, so instead, I’ll come back to what I mentioned earlier about searching for an ancient Celtic manuscript in a Maryland cemetery. Did I include that it was at midnight? And that I hid the truth about my going from my sister? Not only did I not find that book then, but I did find a body instead!

 

Do you argue with your author? If so, what do you argue about?

She thinks she’s in control, but really, even she knows she isn’t. One time she was working on a story about me, and I asked her why she had glossed over this whole other story? Daphne claimed not to know what I was talking about, but I crossed my arms and gave her my patented librarian look. Then she put away that story to start the new one. It’s going to be book 3, coming out in November next year. The one she had been working on will be book 4, coming out in November 2026! Daphne knows I have a lot of stories, and I won’t let her slide on telling them. 

 

What is your greatest fear?

Something happening to my family. Losing my grandmother Zinnia - or Nana Z as everyone called her - really upset me and kept me away from my sister Azalea. I’m glad we’ve reunited, but all these mysteries make me worry for her, my niece, and my rescue pup Clover. Fortunately, we have a great support system, and I won’t let anything happen to them. 

 

What makes you happy?

Finding out the story behind a book. Each book has two stories: the one we read in it, but also the one we bring to it. Every reader adds to their book’s story, and I love discovering those journeys. 

 

If you could rewrite a part of your story, what would it be? Why?

Easy. I’d never have waited so long to get back in touch with my sister Azalea. I’m relieved we’ve reconnected now. 

 

Of the other characters in your book, which one bugs you the most? Why?

Probably my neighbor Cordelia, as she was my grandmother’s nemesis. She can be quite haughty and has always thought she was better than my grandmother. That’s really frustrating. 

 

Of the other characters in your book, which one would you love to trade places with? Why?

There is this one guy, Leo, who gets to sponsor archaeological digs around the world. Right now, he’s leading expeditions in Europe. How absolutely incredible would it be to go there and search for these historic treasures in Italy and England? 

 

Tell us a little something about your author. Where can readers find her website/blog?

Daphne Silver is the Agatha-winning author of the Rare Books Cozy Mystery series. The first in the series, Crime and Parchment, won the Agatha Award for Best First Mystery Novel. She’s worked more than twenty years in museums and symphonies and has the great fortune of being married to a librarian. When she’s not writing, she’s drawing and painting. She lives in Maryland with her family. Although she’s not much of a baker, she won’t ever turn down a sweet lokshen kugel.

 

Learn more about Daphne and her books, find links to her other social media, and sign up for her newsletter to receive a free short story from Juniper’s cozy-verse, at her website. 

 

What's next for you?

The Tell-Tale Homicide, the second book in the Rare Books Cozy Mystery Series, just launched on November 19th, so I’m hoping readers will continue along with Juniper’s journey! Rare books librarian Juniper Blume lands her dream job: creating a new museum in her Chesapeake Bay town of Rose Mallow, Maryland. But on her very first day, she makes a shocking discovery—a dead man clutching a book by Edgar Allan Poe, stolen from the collections!

Crime and Parchment

A Rare Books Cozy Mystery, Book 1

 

Rare books librarian Juniper Blume knows this much… an ancient Celtic manuscript shouldn’t be in a Maryland cemetery. But that’s exactly what her brother-in-law claims.

 

Last year, Juniper saw the 1,200-year-old Book of Kells in Ireland. She learned how their bejeweled covers were stolen centuries ago, never to be seen again. So how could they have ended up in Rose Mallow, a small Chesapeake Bay town? Being Jewish, the Book of Kells might not be her sacred text, but as a rare books librarian, the ancient book is still sacred to her, making it important to Juniper to find out the truth.

 

Rose Mallow is the same place where Juniper used to summer with her sister Azalea and their grandmother Zinnia, known as Nana Z. Ever since Nana Z passed away, Juniper’s avoided returning, but her curiosity is greater than her grief, so she heads down in her vintage convertible with her rescue dog Clover.

 

Juniper discovers that her sister Azalea has transformed their grandmother’s Queen Anne style mansion into the Wildflower Inn, backing up to the Chesapeake Bay. Although Juniper isn’t much of a cook, Azalea has kept their grandmother’s legacy alive, filling the house with the smells of East European Jewish treats, like sweet kugels and tzimmes cake. Will coming back here feel like returning home or fill Juniper with a deeper sorrow? Can she apologize to her sister for not being there when she was needed most?

 

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