SUMMERTIME SIZZLING #MYSTERY #SALE

Summertime, and the living is anything but easy for me. It’s a hundred and ten in the shade, and my already over-complicated life just got even more complicated, thanks to my author Lois Winston, who’s plunged me into yet another murder investigation.

You’d think she’d give me a bit of a reprieve since my extremely difficult communist mother-in-law Lucille Pollack is in a rehab center recovering from a minor stroke. But no, at least half the center’s staff overhears Lucille threaten to strangle her roommate. Less than twenty-four hours later the woman is found dead in her bed—and not from natural causes.

Of course Lucille becomes the prime suspect in the roommate’s murder. I know Lucille is all bluster and no action, but the cops aren’t willing to take my word for it. And no matter how much easier my life would be without her living under my roof, my conscience won’t allow me to look the other way while they lock her up for a crime she didn’t commit.

You can read all about the mayhem Lois gets me into in Revenge of the Crafty Corpse, which is on sale throughout the month of August on Amazon for only .99 cents. Read it in the comfort of your air-conditioned house or while sipping an ice tea while relaxing on vacation. That way at least one of us will enjoy the summer.

Revenge of the Crafty Corpse

Anastasia Pollack’s dead louse of a spouse has left her with more bills than you can shake a crochet hook at. Teaching craft classes at her mother-in-law’s assisted living center seems like an easy way to supplement her meager income. But when Lyndella Wegner—a 98-year-old know-it-all with a penchant for ruffles and lace—turns up dead, Anastasia’s cantankerous mother-in-law becomes the prime suspect in her murder. Upon discovering that Lyndella’s scandalous craft projects—and her scandalous behavior—made her plenty of enemies, Anastasia sets out to find the real killer before her mother-in-law ends up behind bars.

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ANOTHER CRAFTING SLEUTH--THIS ONE BY AUTHOR JOANNA CAMPBELL SLAN

(We don't generally post new blogs on weekends, but we just couldn't turn down a request for a spot by the author of a fellow crafting sleuth, and the weekend was all we had available.)

National bestselling author Joanna Campbell Slan has had five stories in the New York Times’ Bestselling Chicken Soup for the Soul series. She’s also won the Daphne du Maurier Award of Excellence for Literary Fiction. The author of nearly 40 books, Joanna lives on Jupiter Island in Florida. Learn more about her and her books at her website.

A Season of Creativity

(and a Beach Escape for Only 99 Cents)

The four female characters in my Second Chance Series hope for a second chance at love and life. MJ Austin, Skye Blue, and Honora McAfee all work for Cara Mia Delgatto in a store called The Treasure Chest, a décor shop that features upcycled, recycled, and repurposed goods. Because Cara Mia has a very tight budget, she and her employees are always looking for ways to turn simple items into desirable, one-of-a- kind pieces of merchandise. For me as an author that adds a fun challenge to each of my books, since I have to come up with cool trash-to-treasure ideas as well.

For example, later this week I’ll be decorating a Christmas tree made from pieces of driftwood I found on the beach. A friend drilled a hole through the pieces and threaded them onto a dowel, putting the large pieces of wood at the bottom and the smaller ones at the top. I plan to hang empty quail’s eggshells from the limbs, along with garlands of paper beads and ornaments of seashells. These are all items that Cara Mia might sell in her store.

My biggest creative project this year has been a dollhouse for the annual Creatin’ Contest run by Miniatures.com. I’ve been working on my entry for nearly a year. Not surprisingly, Honora is also a miniaturist. Like me, she creates one-of-a-kind dollhouses. Both of us make all the pieces for our house s by hand, including any dolls we use.

Here’s a picture of Amelia T. Byrd, the owner of the dollhouse I’ve made. She’s only five inches tall. I sculpted her from clay. Her hair came from a lock of my dog’s tail. (No animals were hurt while making this project. I promise!) Can you see the tiny bird perched on her finger?

If you like reading about women’s friendships, if you like a sweet romance along with your mysteries, and if you like crafts, I think you’ll enjoy my Second Chance Series. Right now I’ve put Book #1—Second Chance at Love—on sale for only 99 cents. Since the series is set in Florida, it might just be the perfect mental escape you’ll need this holiday season.

Happy Holidays!

Second Chance at Love

(Previously published as Tear Down and Die, Book #1 in the Cara Mia Delgatto Mystery Series)

At sixteen while on vacation in Florida, Cara Mia Delgatto lost her heart to Cooper Rivers. But her interfering parents didn’t approve. They moved Cara away from the Sunshine State and cut off all communication between the two young lovers. 

In an act of rebellion, Cara makes a nearly fatal mistake—and almost destroys both her family and their business. To make up for her rash behavior, Cara spends the next twenty years of her life being “a good girl,” working in her family restaurant. 

When her parents die within six months of each other, Cara decides to take a road trip and visit her son at University of Miami. On a whim, she buys a vacant building in Florida and opens a trash-to-treasure décor store. She believes with all her heart in second chances…but then Cooper Rivers walks back into her life. Can Cara and Cooper rekindle the love they felt that magic summer so long ago?

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ANASTASIA TAKES ANOTHER #CRAFTS STROLL DOWN MEMORY LANE

I recently took a stroll down Memory Lane by featuring a Halloween Door Witch that I designed years ago for one of the craft magazines. I’m still wandering around Memory Lane today to showcase these jack-o-lantern tableware designs from back when plastic canvas was all the rage among crafters. Once upon a time so many people were stitching plastic canvas projects that entire magazines sprung up featuring nothing but plastic canvas designs. (I’ll admit, we weren’t as sophisticated in our crafting tastes back then.) These days you’d be hard-pressed to find sheets of plastic canvas in many craft stores, but you can still find plenty of Halloween items for setting your Halloween table.

Meanwhile…time is ticking toward the end of the month and with it, the end of the Amazon discount of A Stitch to Die For. For the next three days you can still pick up a copy for only .99 cents. Come November, the price will return to $4.99. And if you prefer paperbacks, Amazon currently has the paperback version at a dollar off the regular price.

A Stitch to Die For

An Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery, Book 5

Ever since her husband died and left her in debt equal to the gross national product of Uzbekistan, magazine crafts editor and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack has stumbled across one dead body after another—but always in work-related settings. When a killer targets the elderly nasty neighbor who lives across the street from her, murder strikes too close to home. Couple that with a series of unsettling events days before Halloween, and Anastasia begins to wonder if someone is sending her a deadly message.

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CHRISTMAS IN JUNE! A SPECIAL SNEAK PEEK AT THE NEXT ANASTASIA POLLACK CRAFTING MYSTERY

Today we say goodbye to spring and hello to summer. If you're like me and prefer cooler weather, you're probably starting to complain about the heat. So I thought I’d offer a treat to keep you cool, at least psychologically, with a sneak peek at the next Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery. Drop Dead Ornaments, which will be available in October, begins in December on the same day Scrapbook of Murder ended. Click here to read the first chapter. 

Drop Dead Ornaments

An Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery, Book 7

Anastasia Pollack’s son Alex is dating Sophie Lambert, the new kid in town. For their community service project, the high school seniors have chosen to volunteer at and raise money for the county food pantry. Anastasia has helped them by tapping her craft industry contacts to donate materials for the students to make Christmas ornaments to sell at the town’s annual Christmas bazaar.

While at the bazaar, Anastasia meets Sophie’s father, who appears evasive regarding his profession and where he and his family had formerly lived. She also notices a stranger hanging around, apparently attempting to eavesdrop on their conversation. She points the woman out to Mr. Lambert, but he denies knowing her.

When the woman turns up dead later that evening, Sophie’s father becomes the primary suspect. Alex begs his mother to help find the real killer. Anastasia has had her fill of dead bodies, especially since they keep endangering her own life. She’s vowed to retire forever from amateur sleuthing, but how can she say no to her son?

Meanwhile, for those of you who still haven’t met Anastasia, Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun, the first book in the series is currently on sale at Amazon as an ebook for only .99 cents. The sale ends Sunday, June 24^th, after which time the book will return to its regular price of $4.99.

Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun

When Anastasia Pollack's husband permanently cashes in his chips at a roulette table in Vegas, her comfortable middle-class life craps out. She's left with two teenage sons, a mountain of debt, and her hateful, cane-wielding Communist mother-in-law. Not to mention stunned disbelief over her late husband's secret gambling addiction, and the loan shark who's demanding fifty thousand dollars.

Anastasia's job as crafts editor for a magazine proves no respite when she discovers a dead body glued to her office chair. The victim, fashion editor Marlys Vandenburg, collected enemies and ex-lovers like Jimmy Choos on her ruthless climb to editor-in-chief. But when evidence surfaces of an illicit affair between Marlys and Anastasia's husband, Anastasia becomes the number one suspect.

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BLINGING IT UP WITH GUEST AUTHOR NANCY WARREN

Can you imagine if your mother borrowed something like this and wore it all over town?

Nancy Warren is the USA Today bestselling author of more than 70 novels and novellas. She’s been nominated for the Rita award by Romance Writers of America three times, was the answer to a crossword puzzle in Canada’s National Post newspaper, and was featured on the front page of the New York Times. Learn more about Nancy and her books at her website. 

Mothers and Daughters and Fashion, Oh, My!

Why is makeup and fashion so seemingly easy for some people and so darned difficult for others? I have a daughter who was born with fashion sense. Literally born with it. She’s been my style consultant since she was about thirteen years old. Those who’ve known me a long time say I’ve been looking a lot better since Emma grew old enough to say, “No, Mom,” roll her eyes and actually fix me. Bless her. She is the only person I’ve ever known who dreams about putting outfits together.

As a writer, one of the really fun things I get to do is to put myself in the skins of characters who are entirely different from me. My amateur sleuth Toni Diamond is such a woman. She’s all about style and makeup. She’s a big-haired Texan with a big personality to match and she sells makeup to women through home parties and by giving free makeovers. Lady Bianca cosmetics not only keeps her in the bling and flashy outfits that would have my daughter locking me in the house if I attempted to wear them, but her job also puts Toni in the paths of a lot of different kinds of people, some of whom end up dead! There are three novels in the Toni Diamond mystery series so far.

I was very excited to be asked to join some other really fun cozy mystery authors for Happy Homicides, a collection of novellas out in time for the holidays. In my story, Toni’s mother, Linda Plotnik, who also sells cosmetics for Lady Bianca, gets a bit caught up in the law of attraction and decides the best way to bring really expensive jewelry into her life is to borrow some from her local jeweler and wear it to the Christmas party she hosts in her trailer park home.

Since Linda’s not exactly keeping quiet about her fabulous bling and insists on wearing it everywhere, Toni’s worried that something will happen to the fabulous necklace, her mother, or both. Naturally, something does!

I love these characters so much. I hope you will, too. A Diamond Choker for Christmas is just one of thirteen fun and fabulous holiday cozies. The collection is only 99 cents.

A Diamond Choker for Christmas

One of the novellas featured in Happy Homicides

In order to borrow an extremely expensive diamond and sapphire necklace to wear at Christmas party, Toni Diamond's mother Linda offers her home as collateral. But the necklace is stolen right off her neck, and Toni has to solve the crime or her mother will be homeless for the holidays!  

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