#DECORATING WITH JEANIE--GUEST AUTHOR P.J. MacLAYNE

P.J. MacLayne is a computer geek by day and a writer by night. When she's not in front of a computer screen, she might be found exploring the back roads of the nearby national forests and parks, finding inspiration for her books in their landscapes. Learn more about her and her books at her blog.

When I first started writing my mystery series, I decided to set the books in the fictional town of Oak Grove, somewhere north of Pittsburgh, PA. Having grown up in a similar town, it was easy to picture my main character, Harmony Duprie, having an interest in the architecture of the town. And since she lives in a third-story apartment of a Victorian style house, it was a short leap to imagine her getting involved in remodeling an old home.

There are plenty of houses scattered throughout northwestern Pennsylvania that need a little help. Or, in some cases, a lot of help. And some have already been remodeled with various levels of success.

But Harmony's goal is to keep the style of the houses she fixes up intact while bringing them up to more modern standards for electricity and appliances. And since she does Internet research for a living, she wants to make sure that it's easy to jump on the web no matter what room of the house she is in!  And she does this in-between her various adventures.

She's not alone in her quest to bring old houses back to their original glory; she has friends to help her out. Friends who know where to find period hardware and have the tools to re-create spindles for staircases and missing bits of gingerbread. Friends who help her out of the situations she finds herself involved in.

Harmony develops personal connections to the houses she works on, imaging their voices speaking to her. Despite this, she knows she'll give them up and sell them when she is done with them. As she says, they deserve to have a happy family living in them, filling their rooms with laughter. So as hard as it is, she knows that they will have to be sold, since she is a single woman with no children of her own.

Her Ladyship's Ring

Harmony Duprie is back, and so is trouble in Oak Grove.

When a man is murdered in the backyard of the old Victorian house she is remodeling, Harmony is determined to locate his next-of-kin so he can be put to rest properly. But with her ex-boyfriend Jake out of prison, back in town and one of the suspects in the murder, she takes on the challenge of solving the crime.

With Eli, her current love interest, in Florida and Jake close by, old emotions come back to haunt her. Can Harmony clear Jake's name and solve the mystery of her own heart?

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