MYSTERY AUTHOR LESLEY A. DIEHL ON GROWING OLDER AND WRITING OLDER

Mystery author Lesley A. Diehl learned early on that cows have a twisted sense of humor. While growing up on a farm, they chased while she tried to herd them in for milking, and one even ate the red mitten her grandmother had knitted for her. Realizing agriculture wasn’t a good career choice, Lesley has she uses her country roots and her training as a psychologist to create stories designed to make people laugh in the face of murder. Learn more about Lesley and her books at her website. 

 

Growing Older, Writing Older

I can tell I’m getting older. Not only do birthdays begin with higher numbers, but the body has a way of informing me with aches and pains that the years are going by. For authors who write series books, aging of a protagonist faces the same issue. How does the writer age the main character? Slowly by months, less slowly by years, or not at all. The latter is difficult especially with the intrusiveness of technology changes and world events. For example, does the writer ignore the pandemic or insert it into the book? Cozy writers like me prefer to keep our work light—mine includes quite a bit of humor. I’m not quite up to the task of making the pandemic funny. I don’t really know how to do that, and I really don’t think I want to.

 

One author who managed the aging protagonist issue was Sue Grafton who didn’t age Kinsey. However, characters’ arcs found in most cozy mysteries often include experiences that take place over time such as a divorce, marriage, changes in relationships, births, deaths, or just the daily happenings humans confront. So our characters age. It’s just a matter of how fast.

 

I have begun a new cozy mystery series. My last one (the Eve Appel mysteries) featured a protagonist who, at the end of the series, was in her late thirties. That was several years ago. My new series (the Maddie Sparks series) features a woman who is on the far side of seventy, closer in age to me. Maddie and I may not survive a ten-book series because I only write one book a year (like I said, I’m old!), but I’ve decided to set each book in a season. The first of the series, Spiked Punch, takes place during a typical Upstate New York summer. The weather is, as usual, changeable with hot humid days and nights, periods of torrential downpour and massive thunderstorms. The fall to come is the setting for the second book. Six books or so in, Maddie will only be a year and a half older, and I think she and I can manage that.

 

One might think that with an older protagonist, the action would be slower, but I’ve discovered it gets speeded up. Maddie meets a retired county sheriff, and they quickly fall in love. I make that happen in a few weeks. Too fast? Perhaps. We shall see in the second book, but as Maddie suggests, there’s not a lot of time available for putting off action. By the end of the book Maddie and her sheriff have moved in together, Maddie has adopted a rescue cat, one son has been accused of murder, Maddie has begun a new writing project in a new genre and developed a new friendship. It leaves you breathless to see how much ground Maddie has covered. I hope it leaves the reader breathless and yearning for more also.

 

Because I write cozy mysteries with humor in them, I set myself the task of not only developing a good mystery with intricate plotting and complex characters, but I have the additional undertaking of providing laughs along the way. Humor is not easy to write. Sometimes it seems to simply emerge from the situation, or I use it as a tension reducer where needed. In other cases, it’s really work. What I find easier with Maddie is that I know her well, understand her experiences because I’ve lived many of them myself, and instinctively know a humorous quip I might engage in would be what Maddie might also say. As with humor, Maddie and I are on the same wavelength with respect to what we like. We’ve lived the same social, political and, oftentimes, emotional history. You could call the humor in the book, “seasoned humor.” As such, it should appeal to any age.

 

The question that arises is will younger readers find Maddie interesting? Will they want to follow her through the series? One reviewer of Spiked Punch mentioned that the book would be for those readers who enjoyed a mature sleuth. Frankly, I like all my sleuths to be mature, up to using their life experiences to sort through clues and solve the crime. Flighty protagonists do not appeal, and I assume readers will love Maddie’s nosy and adventuresome nature and respect what aging brings to the sleuthing process. I hope you enjoy Maddie and her sleuthing team of Zack, the retired sheriff, and Spike, the brilliant rescue cat.

 

Spiked Punch

A Maddie Sparks Mystery, Book 1

 

On the other side of seventy, Maddie Sparks decides to spice up her life by changing her writing interests from cozy mysteries to romance. She also determines her appearance should reflect this transformation in her writing career. A sassy new haircut and more fashionable clothes complete the newer Maddie Sparks. Before she can begin this new chapter in her life, a stabbing death in the quiet country village she has made her home shocks the town's residents. 

 

When her son is accused of the murder, Maddie and the acting county sheriff come together to find the real killer. Their relationship soon blooms into more than one of shared determination to solve the murder. As they enjoy a hike in a nearby park, someone shoots the sheriff, barely missing Maddie. Another killer could be loose in the area, and the person may be closer to Maddie than she realizes. Maddie discovers parts of herself she didn't know existed: real life romance with the sheriff, a talent for sleuthing and room in her life for a fuzzy, orange cat named "Spike." This recent lease on life may be more exciting and more dangerous than Maddie expects.

 

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MYSTERY AUTHOR LESLEY A. DIEHL GAVE HER SLEUTH A GUN...

Lesley A. Diehl relies on her country roots and her training as a psychologist to concoct stories designed to make people laugh in the face of murder. “A good chuckle,” says Lesley,” keeps us emotionally well-oiled long into our old age.” She is the author of several cozy mystery series and numerous short stories. Learn more about her and her books and stories at her website.  

Character Development in a Cozy Series: I gave her a gun, but she can’t shoot.

Here’s what I know about Eve Appel Egret’s character: She is the same spunky, in-your-face protagonist we met in the first of the Eve Apple Mysteries. Transplants from the Northeast and referred to as “Yankee gals” by the community, Eve and her friend Madeleine had opened a high fashion secondhand store in rural Florida when, on opening day, Eve found a dead body on their dressing room floor. 

 

From that point (A Secondhand Murder) until the most recent episode of the series (Murder in the Family) Eve has snooped her way through illegal game hunters, members of the Russian mob, drug and human traffickers and just plain bad guys in the swamps of Florida. Along the way she’s eaten her skinny weight in barbeque ribs and cole slaw, drunk a lot of sweet tea and a bit of scotch and found the love of her life. And then in the middle of her exploits she became a private detective, a choice I never saw coming, but now see as the right thing for me to have done as the creator of this series.

 

Protagonists in my other series have been snoopy gals, but never as snoopy or as filled with bravado as Eve. So why morph her into a private eve? Because, simply put, she deserved it. Her favorite weapon against bad guys (and gals) was her stiletto heels, but how long could Eve use her mouth (also a lethal weapon) and footwear to fight off mobsters and killers, not to mention a few alligators along the way?

 

Eve’s mobster friend Nappi Napolitani (is he really a Family man or simply a family man?) has been impressed for years with Eve’s sharp mind and her ability to put together disparate clues to track down criminals. She’s depended upon him and her police detective friend Frida Martinez as back-up for her sometimes impulsive schemes to take out killers, perhaps counting on them to produce the firepower to overwhelm armed opponents. Lately Eve’s enemies have gone from evil guys trying to escape the law to evil guys wanting to take down the law. And her. And her family. And that makes Eve mad, really mad.

 

In addition, for a cozy writer like me, I have grown impatient with amateur sleuths who through the series, always run across dead bodies. How many corpses can one woman stumble over in her line of work as a consignment shop owner? I needed others in the community to encounter dead bodies and for Eve to intervene, as when she took her Yankee environmental stance against mud bog racing (for those unfamiliar with it, it tears up natural habitat and breeding grounds for many native species) or in Old Bones Never Die in which Eve challenges a land developer. Most of Eve’s cases don’t need her to find the bodies. The deaths have emerged from events in the community.

 

Because I kept throwing more and more dangers her way, I decided Eve needed more than a pair of stilettos and a smart mouth to get her out of jams. So, I apprenticed her (with the permission of her loving husband Sammie, her grandmother and other family members, somewhat reluctantly her best friend Madeleine, and half-heartedly police detective Frida Martinez) to the town’s only private detective, Crusty McNabb. 

 

Due to retire soon, Crusty agreed to take on Eve, thinking he could assign her to sit surveillance on insurance fraud cases and keep her out of serious detective work, but he soon found Eve’s brilliance in solving cases an asset. And if her friends and family thought detective work would keep her out of trouble, they were, predictably, wrong. Eve still had her snoopy nature and her crime-solving nature, but she was missing one thing in her detective work: she needed a gun. A dangerous proposition for one as impetuous as our Eve. And, besides, Eve couldn’t hit a broad side of one of Florida’s famous mountains (translation, garbage dump hills).

 

“Open your eyes when you pull the trigger,” Crusty told her, but Eve couldn’t bring herself to shoot without closing her eyes.

 

So, I armed her, gave her detective training, and sent her to the shooting range, but I fear Eve is still the same gal she was when she moved to rural Florida. She has grown, of course, the kind of development a reader expects in a cozy heroine. No better at wielding lethal weapons, Eve now is mother to several children, which has taught her patience. She’s become a bit less in-your-face when confronting the people in her newly adopted rural Florida home, and she sometimes calls for help instead of going off like the Lone Ranger when she chases down criminals. 

 

But she still remains the Eve who is fiercely loyal to friends, old or newly acquired, an attitude she expects others to exhibit. Woe to the person who violates that code of ethics. And, of course, she still wears her stiletto heels and her gelled, punked hair. Eve still doesn’t quite fit into the swamps of rural Florida. We don’t expect her to. And she still can’t shoot.

 

Murder in the Family

An Eve Appel Mystery, Book 8

 

The past comes back seeking vengeance. To save her family and friends, Novice PI Eve Appel, pregnant with her second child, must outwit the bad guys in a final act of desperation, risking her life and that of the man she's asked to help her, her mob boss friend, Nappi.

 

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#COOKING WITH CLORIS--PORK CHILI VERDE WITH MYSTERY AUTHOR LESLEY A. DIEHL

Believing humor to be good therapy, former psychologist Lesley A. Diehl has published several not-your-usual cozy mystery series and short stories featuring sassy, zany protags. Protagonist Emily Rhodes is only one of the characters to emerge from Lesley’s somewhat sane yet peculiar mind. Learn more about Lesley and her books at her website and blog.  

To Cook or Not To Cook

I love to eat, and I love to cook. The combination of these has gotten me into trouble throughout my life. But mostly it’s my passion for eating that has been an issue. Several years ago, I gained enough weight that I decided I needed to reduce, especially because I have back issues and don’t need to carry around more pounds than necessary. I returned to my tried and true diet approach. I used WW. For me it’s a sane way to reduce because it’s easy and provides a balanced approach to food. In my younger years, it took only several months for me to diet and reach goal weight, but because I cannot exercise the way I used to (even walking is difficult now), and my metabolism is wonky, it took 9 months for me to lose 15 pounds. My husband can attest to the fact that I do not cheat when I diet, so the slow rate of loss was frustrating, but worth it.

I have kept off the weight for over a year, and I’m terribly proud of myself. Recently, I visited a spine specialist who said he’d be happier if I was 10 pounds lighter! I told him it was not going to happen, so he finally backed off when he learned how long it took me to get to the weight I now am. Of course, he’s in his forties and very buff. His philosophy is that we should eat only to have the fuel to do what we really like doing. For those of us who are older, what we like doing is eating, having a glass of wine and talking about our medical issues. Why are all our medical people mere children who think they will never end up where we are? Didn’t I, a few years ago, scoff at those who talked about their illnesses all the time? Funny how a few years changes one’s perspective. 

I now practice moderation because it is necessary, but not fun.

As for the cooking passion, I still do it and make healthy, but tasty meals. Now here’s the odd part: none of my protagonists are cooks. Most of them don’t cook, and some of them can’t cook. For those who try cooking, they usually fail at it. It may be that I want to be better at something than the characters I’ve created who are younger than I, blonder than I, taller or thinner than I, and with the exception of the psychologist modeled after me, none of them have ever had weight problems. Do you suppose there’s a connection between their lack of weight issues and not cooking?

In the Big Lake Murder mystery series, the protagonist, Emily Rhodes is shorter than I, but much tinier. She was a preschool teacher who came to Florida and retired early, found she needed money because her life partner upon whom she was financially dependent died and left her not a cent. She took up a new career as a bartender and does a smashing great job of mixing drinks, which is kind of like cooking, especially if you load the drinks down with several olives or a lot of fruit. But here’s the interesting side of Emily’s life—she lives next door to a woman who loves to cook and bake and who makes Emily and her friends goodies daily. The most recent book in the series is Scream Muddy Murder, and it contains some of the neighbor’s recipes. None of them are healthy, but all of them are yummy. If you’re yearning for the best Key Lime pie, the recipe is included in the book.

Years ago, crockpots were all the fad. I have the one I bought in 1970 something. It still works, and I have discovered it is great for chili and for pulled pork. The wonderful thing about it is that it makes cooking easy. You throw the ingredients in with minimal preparation and let the pot, unwatched, do the rest. I understand there are updated versions of the slow cooker that do everything for you except eat the food. Although I’m tempted to buy one of these new cookers, I don’t feel like dedicating the space to it because both of my homes, New York and Florida, are small. 

Assuming Emily can find her slow cooker, I think this recipe for Pork Chili Verde might be something even Emily Rhodes could accomplish, or she could suggest it to her cooking fanatic next-door-neighbor.

Pork Chili Verde

Ingredients:

2-3 pounds boneless pork country ribs

Half an onion

8-10 tomatillos*

16 oz jar of salsa verde (I prefer mild, but go hotter if you like)

1 small can tomato sauce

16 oz can diced tomatoes

1 can cannellini beans, drained and added the last hour of cooking

salt and pepper 

Optional seasonings: I use Cajun seasoning, but you can add what you like: oregano, paprika, chili powder, cumin, garlic powder, cilantro

Cut the pork into 1-inch chunks, season and brown in a large skillet. Place in crockpot. 

Sauté onion. 

Peel the little papery jackets off the tomatillos, cut into half inch pieces and add along with canned tomatoes and tomato sauce to the large skillet. 

Add the jar of salsa verde, cook down the concoction (about 10-15 minutes), then add to the crockpot. I then cook all on high for 6 hours. Your slow cooker may need less time or more. The pork comes out very tender, and the other ingredients blend together well. You know your croc pot, so test for tenderness.

Serve like chili in a bowl with shredded cheese on top if you like and warm corn tortillas on the side. If you have some left over but not enough for another full meal, add the heated leftovers to cooked macaroni or brown rice.

*Tomatillos look like green tomatoes with papery, beige jackets on them. Be certain you peel off the jackets. If you can’t find them, increase the amount of salsa verde. The dish will not taste as bright and fresh without the tomatillos, but it will be good.

While your chili verde is cooking away, I have another special treat for you. The first book in the series is only .99 cents until the end of November. Read it while you smell your evening meal cook.

Dumpster Dying

Emily Rhodes came to rural Florida for the cowboys, the cattle, and to do a little country two-step, not to fall headfirst onto a dead body in a dumpster. Ah, the golden years of retirement in the sunshine state. They’re more like pot metal to Emily, who discovers the body of the county’s wealthiest rancher in the Big Lake Country Club dumpster. With her close friend accused of the murder, Emily sets aside her grief at her life partner’s death to find the real killer. She underestimates the obstacles rural Florida can set up for a winter visitor and runs afoul of a local judge with his own version of justice, hires a lawyer who works out of a retirement home, and flees wild fires hand-in-hand with the man she believes to be the killer.

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BOOK CLUB FRIDAY--AUTHOR LESLEY A. DIEHL'S DETECTIVE TALKS ABOUT HER AMATEUR SLEUTH

Lesley A. Diehl is the author of several series and short stories, all featuring country gals whose snoopy attitudes and smarts make them great candidates for taking down the bad guys. From the river valleys of Upstate New York, to the swamps of rural Florida to the cornfields of the Midwest, these sassy sleuths never let anything get in their way. Today Lesley’s Detective Stanton Lewis stops by to talk about the positives and the negatives of her amateur sleuth Emily Rhodes. Learn more about Lesley and her books at her website and blog.

Both Sides Now: Detective Stanton Lewis on Emily Rhodes

My name is Detective Stanton Lewis, and I work for a police department in rural South-Central Florida. I’m told you’d like some information about Emily Rhodes, something positive about her and something negative. I can think of about a million negative aspects of her but saying anything good about the woman may be harder.

(At this point Emily’s daughter, Naomi, intervenes by pointing out that Detective Lewis is biased because he has had a crush on Emily since they first met. He has been reluctant to admit to this, and Emily has always disavowed any affection between the two of them. As Naomi says, “They are honest to a fault about everything else in their lives, but in denial about their feelings for each other.”)

The detective continues: Okay, then, let me do the easy part first. If I tell you Emily is a Yankee and a woman, that says everything about her. She’s meddlesome, thinks she’s smarter than me, and always manages to get me to tell her more about my cases than I should. Well, I guess she thinks she owns the three murders I’ve been assigned to investigate because she finds the bodies. She’s like a bloodhound when it comes to murder victims. This last one she stumbled onto in the mud and then I tripped over her, so we both were responsible for finding the guy, but the case was mine. In her usual way, she promised to stay out of the investigation, but she lied about that. She had her fingers in that pie from the time she talked with one of my suspects to when she solved the murder.

But let me say in my defense that it was serendipitous she found out who was responsible. Of course, being a woman, she has a way of getting folks, especially other women, to talk to her, but it was only a matter of time in all these cases before I would have broken through my witnesses’ resistance.

(Naomi interrupts again by reminding him he has a habit of underestimating her mother’s sensitivity to people. “Mom was a preschool teacher, so she’s tuned in to nonverbal cues. She knows how important body language is.”)

Lewis emits a sound something akin to a growl and continues with his comments:

Emily also is naïve about people, especially men. A friend of mine, Donald Green—great fisherman, but not great with the ladies—has taken a liking to Emily, but she thinks he’s just a “friend.” She even hired him as a bartender to work with her at the country club. Everyone knows he’s a hound.

(From Naomi again who says she told her mom about Donald’s crush on her, so Emily is aware, and when she hired Donald, she was desperate for another worker, and she’s regretted the decision ever since. And adds Naomi, “Donald is not a hound about any woman other than Emily. You are correct about her being naïve about some men, like you. It took her forever to figure out you were sweet on her.”)

I remind Lewis that he was supposed to talk about one negative aspect of Emily, not malign her entire character. Stanton wraps up his negative aspects of Emily by using the words “uppity” and “snoopy.”

As to those aspects of Emily’s character that are positive, Stanton continues: I would have to concede she is smart, an attribute easy to ignore because her looks are deceiving. She’s tiny, barely five-foot tall, blonde, blue-eyed and cute.

(Naomi chuckles at this, chiding Lewis for calling a fifty plus gal “cute.”) In his defense, he says he is over six feet tall, so calling her “cute” makes sense and continues: I’ve got to think about some on this. The positive parts of this woman are kind of hard to see right off.

(Naomi rolls her eyes and says, “Only for you, only for you.”)

The detective again: I’m going to ignore Naomi’s comments. She has no appreciation for how difficult it is for a detective to solve a crime if there’s some woman constantly second-guessing him and chasing down clues he thinks are dead ends. Now that I think of it, Emily is a beautiful little woman who’s really, really smart figuring out motives in a murder, she’s loyal to her friends and family, has tried hard to fit into her life here, she makes a mean martini, and… Okay, one positive aspect of her. I’ll sum it up this way: I asked her to marry me, didn’t I?

Scream Muddy Murder

A Big Lake Murder Mystery, Book 3

EMILY RHODES DOES IT AGAIN! This time she nosedives into a mud puddle at a Seminole War battle reenactment and finds she’s sharing the muck with a dead body. As usual the hunky detective she loves to aggravate, Stanton Lewis, cautions her against getting involved in the case, and as usual she ignores him. Emily’s sleuthing pays off, revealing disturbing information about the victim’s past. Is it the reason behind his murder? With the help of her family and friends, Emily sets out to uncover secrets kept too long and puts herself and the people she loves in the killer’s path. Too late she realizes Detective Lewis was right. Her snoopiness proves to be a deadly idea.

Bonus feature inside: Emily’s neighbor shares her recipes. Make them for your favorite sleuth!

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GUEST AUTHOR LESLEY DIEHL ON SETTING A MYSTERY SERIES IN RURAL FLORIDA

Lesley A. Diehl is the author of several mystery series and short stories, all featuring country gals whose snoopy attitudes and smarts make them great candidates for taking down the bad guys. Whether in the river valleys of Upstate New York, the swamps of rural Florida or the cornfields of the Midwest, these sassy sleuths never let anything get in their way. Learn more about Lesley and her books at her website and blog. 

A Great Place for a Murder

The country is where I set all my mysteries. I am, after all, a country gal raised on a dairy farm in the Midwest. I know the country. I’ve lived in it most of my life. Setting is important to my writing because it influences the make-up of my protagonists as well as the people they encounter. Setting is, for me, inextricably intertwined with character as well as plot.

Two of my series are set in rural Florida, a place few tourists explore. Most people coming to the sunshine state prefer to stay on the coasts for blue water and great sandy beaches. Traveling inland usually means a trip to the land of that mouse fellow to enjoy entertainment with the kids or grandkids.

Go west of Palm Beach and you will find the land changes. Not that there no longer are palm trees waving in the breeze, but there you’ll find wild sabal palms as well as cypress trees, strangler figs and live oaks. So, a shady place, you say? Somewhat, but most often the eye sees broad stretches of Florida prairie and herds of cattle. It’s like a tropical version of Texas. And yes, it’s not unusual to spot cowboys on horses herding these cattle.

There is one of the largest fresh water lakes in the US here.  It is surrounded by a high earthen damn and a canal, build to control the water of the Big Lake, Lake Okeechobee, to prevent hurricanes from destroying lives the way a big one did in the Belle Glade and Pahokee area in the 1930s. Small mammals such as otters, raccoons and rabbits abound here along with bird life—herons, egrets and others. This is the home of the endangered Florida panther, many varieties of turtles and snakes, lots of snakes. At the top of the food chain is the alligator, or the human, depending upon how you look at it.

I’ve described the land in detail because so few know this wild place and because it is against this backdrop that I set my mysteries. Both protagonists in my rural Florida series experience the same reactions as I did when I chose to live here part of the year. They are interlopers who hope to become part of the communities they have moved into. Moving my protagonists into rural Florida accomplishes two objectives in my writing. It creates a physical setting that is alien and can seem threatening. A reader cannot help but feel this from the sense of threat the swamps and wildlife create. Live next to a swamp, see one of those thirteen-foot alligators swim by, and the impending danger from the environment feels real.

On the other hand, a wading great white heron in the backyard is grace and beauty personified. This contradictory sense of the world in which my protagonists move creates a sense of tension into which I write plot and character development.

A “Yankee” moving here is both awed by the area and stands in the position of outsider, an exciting place for a protagonist to be in terms of character development and for setting her up as the sleuth who tracks down the killer. Outsiders can be mistrusted, but they also can be underestimated. Emily Rhodes, the protagonist in my third book in the Big Lake Murders is prone to stumble upon dead bodies. She’s done this twice before, but this time it’s at a re-enactment of the Battle of Okeechobee. It is rainy, it is muddy, it allows me to bring in the setting, the murder and Emily as the unlikely sleuth.

Rural Florida is the last wild place in the state, and its character is under threat from overdevelopment, overpopulation, destruction of wildlife habitat, careless handling of water resources and conflict between environmentalists and big business. Setting takes on political, social and ethical overtones, which I use as the themes that drive my characters into conflict and sometimes into cooperation. Emily Rhodes wants to belong in her adopted home, but she also brings to the story values that may conflict with those held by the ranchers, farmers, and developers who dominate the area. I couldn’t ask for a better mix of physical setting and local conflicts as the place a killer does his work and a sleuth finds him out.

Join Emily in her latest adventure on the edge of the “Big Lake” and see how being a displaced Yankee gal helps and hinders Emily’s search for a killer. Oh, there are recipes in the book. People there eat well, you know (no gator dishes, however).

Scream Muddy Murder

 Murder in the mud. Romance in the swamps. And RECIPES!

EMILY RHODES DOES IT AGAIN! This time she nosedives into a mud puddle at a Seminole War battle reenactment and finds she’s sharing the muck with a dead body. As usual the hunky detective she loves to aggravate, Stanton Lewis, cautions her against getting involved in the case, and as usual she ignores him. Emily’s sleuthing pays off, revealing disturbing information about the victim’s past. Is it the reason behind his murder? With the help of her family and friends, Emily sets out to uncover secrets kept too long and puts herself and the people she loves in the killer’s path. Too late she realizes Detective Lewis was right. Her snoopiness proves to be a deadly idea.

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RECYCLE, REUSE, & REPURPOSE WITH GUEST AUTHOR LESLEY A. DIEHL

Some of Lesley's second-had finds

Mystery author Lesley A. Diehl retired from her life as a professor of psychology and reclaimed her country roots by moving to a small cottage in the Butternut River Valley in upstate New York. In the winter she migrates to old Florida—cowboys, scrub palmetto, and open fields of grazing cattle, a place where spurs still jingle in the post office, and gators make golf a contact sport. Back north, the shy ghost inhabiting the cottage serves as her literary muse. Learn more about Lesley and her books at he website. 

Channeling the Queen of Recycling, Reusing, Repurposing

I had no idea growing up that my tiny grandmother, eccentric to an extreme with her insistence on repurposing my aunt’s clothes for her own use even though they were sizes too big for her, taking auntie’s shoes and tying them on her feet with grosgrain ribbon and even reusing her bath water to wash down the second floor hallway, would have such an impact on my writing. She died when I was in college, and I’m embarrassed to say I didn’t think much about her and then, whammo! She wriggles her way into my protagonist’s choice of business.

Eve Appel is a gal who believes in fashion, and why not? She lived in Connecticut and had access to all the best stores in Hartford, and on the Connecticut coast. Travel to New York City took little time. But then Eve moves to Florida, and not to Miami or Naples or to West Palm. No. She chooses the wilds of rural Florida, the pastures and swamps of the Okeechobee area.

What can a fashionistia do there? Not only can she get away from her philandering hubby, but she can set up a high-end consignment shop with her best friend, Madeleine, selling gently used fashion from the society matrons of West Palm. Eve firmly believes, as did my grandmother, that used merchandise is not only cheaper than new, but better because finding it is like a scavenger hunt—fun for everyone and with a reward at the end. Just like a mystery.

 Who wouldn’t just die for a pair of Manolo Blahniks at less than half the price?

And, of course, that is just what happens. Someone dies. In her shop. In her dressing room. Trying to get a size 14 body into a size 8 gown. That’s only the beginning of Eve’s need to push her nose into every murder in the county.

In her newest caper, Eve encounters an unpleasant owner of a game ranch who, she is sure, is responsible for the murder of a client on another ranch owned by Madeleine’s current squeeze. In A Sporting Murder, Eve finds the killer with the help of her weapons of choice—her friends and relatives. And we’re off and running on yet another caper in the swamps of Florida. Oh, and by the way, thanks, Granny, for being the role model for secondhand shopping. You’d be so proud of Eve.

A Sporting Murder

An Eve Appel Mystery, Book 3

It’s smooth sailing for Eve Appel and her friend Madeleine, owners of Second to None Consignment Shop in rural Florida’s Sabal Bay, land of swamps, cowboys, and lots and lots of ’gators. Eve and her detective boyfriend Alex have joined Madeleine and her new beau David Wilson for a pleasure cruise on his boat. But cloudy, dangerous waters lie ahead. A near fatal encounter with Blake Reed, David’s supremely nasty neighbor, is soon followed by a shooting death on the dividing line between David and Blake’s land. Both men run sport-hunting reserves, but Blake imports “exotics” from Africa and promotes gator killing, while David stays within the law, pointing clients toward the abundant quail and turkey as well as the wild pigs that ravage the landscape. Nevertheless, when a mutual client is killed, it is David who is arrested and charged with murder.

Blake’s nastiness is only exceeded by that of his wife, Elvira, who forces Eve and Madeleine out of their shop, intending to replace it with a consignment shop of her own. It seems that bad luck looms over them all, even Eve’s brawny and hard-to-resist Miccosukee Indian friend Sammy, whose nephew has disappeared.

As the case against David grows stronger and his friends’ misfortunes multiply, Eve and her strange and diverse group of friends, including her ex, a mobster, her grandma, and Sammy’s extended family, band together to take on the bad guys. But the waters are getting muddier and more troubled, and Eve and Madeleine may end up inundated in every sense of the word.

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HEALTHY LIVING--GUEST AUTHOR LESLEY DIEHL & THE CHOCOLATE-FILLED DONUT DIET

photo by Pbj2199

Mystery author Lesley Diehl retired from her life as a professor of psychology and reclaimed her country roots by moving to a small cottage in the Butternut River Valley in upstate New York where a shy ghost serves as her literary muse.  In the winter she migrates to old Florida—cowboys, scrub palmetto, and open fields of grazing cattle, a place where spurs still jingle in the post office, and gators make golf a contact sport.  Learn more about Lesley and her books at her website and blog. 

The Chocolate-Filled Donut Sleuthing Approach to Losing Weight

(This diet won’t kill you!)

Don’t be put off by the protagonist in my newest cozy mystery, Murder Is Academic.  Sure, Laura Murphy, college professor, has a lot of degrees, but at her stage of life, they don’t mean a lot when she spends so much time plunging her head in the freezer to corral her hot flashes. And she notices something else.  She can be described as a short, voluptuous blond whose best asset according to herself is her chest and narrow waist, but a look in the mirror tells her something is going south.  Could it be that a combination of being a woman of a certain age and all those chocolate-filled donuts are catching up with her—  metabolically-speaking?

Here’s Laura’s so-easy, chocolate-filled donut approach to getting back in shape.  You can eliminate any one of the steps, although the results won’t be as radical.

First, try an exercise program.  Oh, sure you say.  Everyone recommends that.  But this one is different.  Laura and Annie, her best friend decide to enter a fifty mile canoeing race, although neither of them had tried the sport before.  The first day on the water they discover the dead body of the college president shoved under a pile of gravel at a bridge construction site.  You may want to just skip this last part.

Next you should extend your exercise program to include a variety of activities, not simply one.  Laura discovers dinner with a hunky biker dude can result in more than messed up hair from the wind.  It can result in messed up hair from a night spent in bed.  This is a highly recommended part of the diet regimen.  Don’t skip it.

On to the next part of the plan in which Laura investigates the murder of her president and gets herself into all kinds of trouble, but all the running around is a kind of exercise (see step two above, variety in your exercise program).  Another unexpected benefit of this is she also creates trouble for others, some of them people at the college she doesn’t really like.  Here is where you give yourself permission to be annoying to others you find annoying.  It doesn’t burn calories per se, but it is satisfying. 

Snooping a la the Laura Murphy approach results in a diminished appetite for donuts while maintaining an excellent appetite for the biker in her life.  If you think this part of the diet is easy, you should be forewarned that too much snooping can make the killer angry and lead to attempts on your life.  Take on this part of the plan only if you’re either a good runner or really smart.  Laura can’t run, but she’s pretty smart, smart enough to outwit a killer.

Once your weight has stabilized at the desired level of maintaining a zealous interest in the biker guy or any man of your choice, and the bad guy has been caught because of some clever, rigorous sleuthing, you may begin the donuts once more.  You didn’t really think you were going to give them up forever, did you?  That’s why it’s called the chocolate-filled donut approach to dieting.  Duh.

A final note: Taking up chocolate-filled donuts again will result in weight gain, so like Laura, you’ll have to find another murder to solve.  Laura does, and it’s called Failure Is Fatal.  In this one, the bad frat guys give her a real run around.  Expect Laura to be positively slim at the end.

Murder is Academic

Laura Murphy, psychology professor, thinks there’s nothing she likes better than coffee and donuts on a summer morning until she says yes to dinner with a Canadian biker and finds herself and her date suspects in the murder of her college’s president. Laura’s friend, the detective assigned the case, asks her to help him find out who on the small upstate New York college campus may be a killer.  The murder appears to be wrapped up in some unsavory happenings on the lake where Laura lives.  A fish kill and raw sewage seeping into the water along with the apparent drowning suicide of a faculty member complicate the hunt for the killer.  And then things become personal.  The killer makes a threatening phone call to Laura. With a tornado bearing down on the area and the killer intent upon silencing her, Laura’s sleuthing work may come too late to save her and her biker from a watery grave.

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COOKING WITH CLORIS - GUEST AUTHOR LESLEY A. DIEHL AND KEY LIME PIE

Last week mystery author Lesley Diehl told us about her microbrewing mystery series set in upstate New York and gave us a recipe for Ginger Stout Muffins. Today she returns to talk about her Big Lake mystery series set in rural Florida and offers a recipe for Key Lime Pie. Learn more about Lesley and her books at her website and blog. -- AP

Sweet and Savory Characters, Sweet and Savory Food, Part 2

In my series set in rural Florida (Dumpster Dying and Grilled, Chilled and Killed), my tiny woman protagonist, Emily Rhodes, is a retired preschool teacher who, out of financial necessity, takes a job as the head bartender at the local country club. 

Small she might be, but Emily is not sweet Sally.  She’s a tough woman who’s herded around her share of preschoolers and survived.  As a bartender these tough qualities make her able to keep the cowboys, bass fishermen and even a local detective sweet on her in line.

The sweet woman in these tales is Emily’s next-door neighbor Vicki, who loves to bake pastries and pies and has won prizes for them.  Vicki comes through in some touchy moments, offering the cantankerous bass fisherman, also fond of Emily, and the detective a piece of Key lime pie sweet/tart, enough to take the edge of both these difficult men. 

Emily is fortunate Vicki is not as conservative as the rest of the community.  Vicki is horrified that Fred, Emily’s partner, wrote no will, leaving Emily without a house or car, possessions in Fred’s name only, but she doesn’t blame Emily for the situation.   

It is Vicki’s idea that Emily take a mixologist class to become a bartender.  Emily has other friends, but Vicki’s sense of fun always keeps Emily seeing the bright side of every situation.  Fun and a pie.  What could be better?

There are many recipes for Key Lime Pie, but I think this one is the best.

Vicki’s Key Lime Pie

1 9" graham cracker crust or make your own

14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk

3 egg yolks

1/2 c. Key lime juice (this can usually be found at most supermarkets in bottles, see note below)

Combine milk, egg yolks and juice.  Blend until smooth. Pour filling into crust. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. 

Allow to stand for 10 minutes, then refrigerate.  Cool several hours. 

Top with whipped cream and decorate with key lime slices if you have them.

Note:  Do not make this with regular lime juice (you know, the green limes; Key Limes are tiny and yellow) unless you want a regular lime pie, not Key Lime pie. 

Grilled, Chilled and Killed

In the second Big Lake Mystery, Emily Rhodes, retired preschool teacher and bartender turned amateur snoop, wonders if she is destined to discover dead bodies. This time she finds one of the contestants at the local barbeque cook-off dead and covered in barbeque sauce in a beer cooler. She should be used to stumbling onto corpses by now and the question of who killed the guy should pique her curiosity, but Emily decides to let Detective Lewis handle this one, at least until she figures his theory of who did the deed is wrong, wrong, wrong.

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