AUTHOR S. LEE MANNING WRITES A THRILLER WITH A UNIQUE SETTING

Award-winning author S. Lee Manning is a reformed attorney who now writes full time. Her novels reflect a lifelong interest in espionage and in Russia. Learn more about her and her books at her website. 

The Perfect Street

A number of years ago - I'd prefer not to disclose just how many  - my family went on a vacation in a little town in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, just north of the Vermont border. It was a pleasant vacation, except that the water in the house we'd rented smelled like rotten eggs and the house had been falsely advertised as being on the lake. It wasn't. But we managed to get ourselves to the lake; we practiced our French, and we had a lot of great meals. 

 

A bonus: my husband and I found an intriguing street in the town of Beebe Plains, close to where we were staying. One side of the street is in Vermont, and the other side is in Canada. Driving down the street, I could see US flags and Canadian flags waving at each other from yards on either side. Farther down, in neighboring Stanstead, is a library that straddles the two countries. The entrance is in the United States. The parking lot - Canada. Inside the library, a black line marks the border.

 

I talked with border agents, and then drove slowly from Beebe Plains to Stanstead, noting where the houses stopped and the fields began.

 

Border agents told me that neighbors couldn't even cross the street to say hello without checking in at the station. If you drive along the street, you're in Canada, but if you pull into a driveway on the Vermont side - unless it's been cleared, you'll get a visit from a US patrol very quickly.

 

Previously, goods of various sorts were frequently smuggled across the border, usually cheaper American products like jeans, sometimes drugs, but with 9/11 and increased security, smuggling became less frequent. It still happens - it just takes a little more skill not to get caught. 

 

I write spy thrillers, and I was fascinated - what a perfect location for something nefarious.

 

Canada is an easy drive from our home in Northern Vermont, where we moved a few years after that vacation. Before the world shut down, my husband and I would visit the Quebec towns near the border every few months. We found small and wonderful restaurants and kind people willing to endure our pathetic attempts at speaking French.

 

We also revisited the area that I had marked down for a future novel. Eventually, I wrote a description. I just didn't yet have the story to go with it. Of course, the story would have to involve smuggling - but what was being smuggling, who was smuggling it, and why - wasn't clear to me -  yet.

 

Fast forward: last year, I wrote Nerve Attack, the sequel to my award-winning novel, Trojan Horse. I needed to accomplish several things in this novel. Aside from the usual list of intricate plotting and in-depth characterizations, my protagonist Kolya Petrov, who had resigned at the end of the first novel, had to be enticed back into the spy game. Could I do all the above, and still use that fascinating street in Beebe Plains?

 

I came up with an idea: What if a smuggler brought something that could kill many innocent people - a poison - into the United States and what if the only person who had the contacts to stop the attack refused to work with anyone but Kolya? I had the perfect person to demand Kolya's return: Dmitri - Kolya's childhood best friend, whom he'd put in prison ten years earlier. 

 

I had the beginning of the plot and the perfect reason to insert Beebe Plains into Nerve Attack.

 

It took several drafts and eight months, but everything came together, plot, characters, locations. While Beebe Plains only plays a small role in the novel, it sets the tone - and I finally got to use the description I'd written.

 

Now that the border is finally open again, I can't wait to go back.

 

Nerve Attack

A Kolya Petrov Thriller, Book 2

 

Former U.S. intelligence operative Kolya Petrov, struggling with the physical and psychological aftereffects of kidnapping and torture, is drawn back into the game when Dmitri, his childhood best friend, holds the key to stopping an attack by terrorists armed with a deadly nerve agent. Working with Dmitri, however, is complicated. While their friendship had been forged during their years in an abusive Russian boys' home, the two men's lives took very different paths. Dmitri had headed the North American branch of a Russian gang until Kolya, working undercover, put him in prison. Ten years later, Dmitri's cooperation is essential to finding the smuggler of the nerve agent, and he refuses to work with anyone but Kolya.

 

Kolya reluctantly agrees to undertake one more mission, but to succeed, he must come to terms with the past. Can he trust Dmitri not to take revenge for the betrayal of their friendship? Can he rely on his own judgment and abilities, despite a leg injury and ongoing PTSD, to survive an elaborate plot that threatens his life and that of his fiancee, as well as the lives of hundreds of innocent people?

 

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A DYING CANADIAN TOWN BECOMES THE BACKDROP FOR KEN OGILVIE'S DETECTIVE MYSTERY

Ken Ogilvie worked in a variety of roles in the environmental field, including holding positions with three governments in Canada and serving as the Executive Director of Pollution Probe, one of Canada’s longest standing environmental groups. He’s active as an environmental policy consultant and has served on the Boards of Directors of several non-profit organizations. Learn more about Ken and his books at his website.

Rebecca Bradley is a 24-year-old constable with the Ontario Provincial Police. Her goal is to become a homicide detective and learn how to catch killers. Psychologically damaged by the unsolved murder of her mother when she was eight years old, Rebecca is driven by her mission to catch the perp. She’s obsessed with justice and retribution, and haunted by dreams of revenge.

In Her Dark Path Rebecca gets her first chance as an acting detective – to investigate the cold case of Abigail McBride, who vanished for 16 days and then was found dead in her own home. The brutal crime shocked the small Canadian town of Conroy.

Conroy is a neglected and dying Canadian town with a population of less than four hundred. It’s isolated from the main tourist destinations of Georgian Bay to the west, Lake Simcoe to the east, and the sparkling lakes of the Canadian Shield to the north. Only the McBride murder has put it on the map. The last decent jobs disappeared twenty-five years ago when Conroy’s sawmill closed. Young people flee town as fast as they can.

Although formally part of Lake Huron, one of the five Great Lakes, Georgian Bay is a massive body of water in its own right (about 80% of the surface area of Lake Ontario). The eastern side of the Bay is known as the 30,000 lakes and forms the largest fresh water archipelago on the planet. Revered for its stunningly gorgeous rocky and wind-swept landscapes, the eastern shore has been described as “a pink necklace of islands scattered on a turquoise sea.” In 2004, the area was designated as a world biosphere reserve by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

Her Dark Path

The Rebecca Bradley Detective Novel, Book 1

16 years ago, Rebecca Bradley’s mother was murdered. Rebecca was only eight years old. The killer has never been caught. Growing up, Rebecca vowed that one day she would track him down and make him pay.

Now Rebecca is a young policewoman in Ontario. She wants to become a homicide detective. Her first investigation is the cold case of a woman who vanished for 16 days and then was found dead in her own home. The brutal crime shocks the remote Canadian town of Conroy.

The puzzling case has uncanny similarities to the murder of Rebecca’s mother. Both victims were found strangled in their own kitchens.

Can Rebecca keep her emotions together as she closes in on a killer with connections to her family and tragic past? And will she finally get justice for her mother?

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BOOK CLUB FRIDAY--WHY AUTHOR MADDIE DAY SET A COZY MYSTERY SERIES IN INDIANA

Maddie Day writes the Country Store Mysteries and the Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries. As Edith Maxwell, she writes the Quaker Midwife Mysteries, the Local Foods Mysteries, and award-winning short crime fiction. With eighteen novels in print and five more in production, Maxwell has been nominated for an Agatha Award six times. She lives north of Boston with her beau and two elderly cats, and gardens and cooks when she isn’t killing people on the page or wasting time on Facebook. Today she joins us to talk about why she set a series in Indiana. Learn more about Maddie/Edith and her books at her website and the Wicked Authors blog. 

Why Set a Series in Indiana?

Several decades ago, I spent five happy years earning my doctorate at the flagship Indiana University campus in Bloomington.

Maxwell Hall

It’s a school that every generation of Maxwells has attended and of which my great-great-great grandfather was one of the founders (also: my great-grandfather was the first dean of the IU Medical school, my grandfather was captain of the IU basketball team in 1916, and my own father was an undergrad there). Think huge university in a small town. You can walk or ride a bike everywhere. People are friendlier and talk more slowly than in the northeast. And neighboring Brown County is as hilly and pretty as Vermont.

The seed for this series was this: a fellow grad student named Benjamin dropped out of the IU Linguistics PhD program in the late 1970s. With his girlfriend he bought a run-down country store in the town of Story fixed it up into a breakfast restaurant as well as a bed-and-breakfast establishment. They served whole-wheat banana walnut pancakes, which I make to this day, and which figure prominently in my books. The Story Inn still exists, although my friends don’t own it any longer.

Story Inn

When I was imagining how this series might play out, I conjured up a twenty-seven-year-old woman named Robbie Jordan who grew up in Santa Barbara, California. Three years after Robbie moves near her mom’s sister Adele in Brown County to work as a chef, Robbie’s carpenter mom dies suddenly. Robbie uses her savings and a small inheritance to acquire a run-down country store filled with antique cookware. She uses the carpentry skills she learned from her mom to transform the place into a breakfast and lunch restaurant, later adding three B&B rooms upstairs.

Bean Blossom Covered Bridge

I’ve been having a ball remembering and researching phrases and pronunciations from that part of the country. “I might could do it for you.” “Faster than green grass through a goose.” “I can’t eat another bite ’cause I’m as full as a tick.” Actual small town names are awesome: French Lick, Bean Blossom, Gnaw Bone, Floyds Knobs, and so on. When I saw South Lick Creek on a map, I knew that was the name of my fictional village. Strangled Eggs and Ham is the sixth book in this popular series, and there will be at least nine, plus a novella coming out in Christmas Cocoa Murder this fall.

(Note: a version of this post first appeared on the Wicked Authors blog in 2014.)

Readers: what are your favorite colorful sayings?

Strangled Eggs and Ham

A Country Store Mystery, Book 6

While Robbie scrambles through breakfast orders South Lick, Indiana, tempers run as high as the sticky August heat. A developer’s plans to build a towering luxury resort at one of the most scenic hilltops in Brown County infuriates opponents, who concoct protests and road blockades. When tensions boil over and a vocal protester is silenced forever at the resort site, Robbie ditches the griddle to catch the killer. But if slashed tires are any indication, she’ll need to crack this case before her own aunt gets served something deadly next . . .  

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#TRAVEL TO FERGUS, ONTARIO WITH GUEST AUTHOR DIANNE ASCROFT

St. Andrew Street East, Fergus, Ontario, Canada

Dianne Ascroft, author of the Century Cottage Cozy Mystery series and the World War II series The Yankee Years, is a Canadian who has settled in rural Northern Ireland, with her husband and an assortment of strong-willed animals. She is fascinated by the history of the places where she has lived, and when she’s not writing, she enjoys walks in the countryside and evenings in front of a roaring fire. Learn more about Dianne and her books at her website. 

A Street That Beckons To You

Sometimes you find a place that captivates you and it just lingers in your mind. For me that spot is Fergus, Ontario, Canada, a small town one hundred kilometres northwest of Toronto. In fact, it has made such an impression on me that it inspired Fenwater, the town in my Century Cottage Cozy Mysteries series.

Carnegie Library

One of the best things about Fergus is St Andrew Street East, the main street. The downtown section is only three blocks long but it has a diverse collection of shops and restaurants where you feel welcome as soon as you walk through the door. The last time I visited the town, I wandered along the street and stopped to admire the historic architecture of the squat, granite Carnegie Library, then walked a few doors farther to pop into an eclectic bookshop where I leisurely browsed without interruption. When I reached the end of the street, I rummaged in an old-fashioned market housed in a rustic, barnlike building. I also stopped at several craft and artisan shops. In one of them, I watched a craftswoman thread a beaded necklace together and another artisan paint stained glass decorations, and in another shop I sampled homemade chocolates.

Some of the other things you’ll find on the street are hot tubs, carpets and flooring, jewellery, health food products and fresh produce. There’s a wealth of unique items on sale that you won’t get in a chain store.

When you’ve had enough of browsing in the shops, you can indulge your taste buds at a tearoom, a public house, a tandoori restaurant or eat Italian cuisine in a 150 year old stone inn. There’s also a family-style diner where you can order something as simple as a grilled cheese sandwich.

Entertainment is provided by the Grand Theatre, which stages a variety of shows and concerts throughout the year. You won’t find wild nightlife on St Andrew Street East, but there are lots of reasons to be there day or night.

Fergus Grand River

And as you wander along the street, the soothing sound of the Grand River’s flowing water winding its parallel path behind the street accompanies you.

Many of the buildings were built from granite quarried locally more than a century ago, giving the architecture a distinctive, charming character. Life on the street moves at a slower pace than on busy city streets and it’s not surprising to meet someone you know and stop for a chat. It’s just the sort of place where my protagonist, Lois Stone, feels at home. She left the big city for a slower pace of life and that’s what she’s found in Fenwater, the fictional version of Fergus.

On the flipside of the coin and the town are the huge supermarkets and chain stores in shopping malls, surrounded by acres of parking spaces, which have sprung up outside the downtown area. While they provide necessary products and services, they are impersonal and boringly predictable. The same brand name shops can be found in any mall on the North American continent. I think these cloned shopping complexes leach away the individual character of a town.

Given a choice between the two, I would rather meander along Fergus’s main street, not race my shopping trolley down unending aisles piled high with no-name brand goods. Since neighbours and community, and getting away from the rat race, are important to my protagonist I won’t be sending Lois to a mall to shop. That’s the world she was desperate to leave behind when she moved to Fenwater. So she’ll stick to the peaceful, welcoming main street of her town where there will always be friends to meet, something unique to discover and an intriguing mystery or two.

A Timeless Celebration

A Century Cottage Cozy Mystery

Book 1

A small town, a big party, a stolen gift.

When an artefact from the Titanic is stolen before her town's 150th anniversary celebration, it's up to Lois Stone to catch the thief.


Middle-aged widow Lois has moved from bustling Toronto to tranquil Fenwater and is settling into her new life away from the dangers of the city. Then two events happen that shatter her serenity: her house is burgled and an antique watch belonging to a Titanic survivor is stolen from the local museum. Her best friend, Marge, was responsible for the watch's safekeeping until its official presentation to the museum at the town's 150th anniversary party, and its disappearance will jeopardize her job and the museum's future. Lois won't let her friend take the blame and the consequences for the theft. She's determined to find the watch in time to save her best friend's job, the museum's future, and the town's 150th anniversary celebration.
And so begins a week of new friends, apple and cinnamon muffins, calico cats, midnight intruders, shadowy caprine companions and more than one person with a reason to steal the watch, set against the backdrop of century houses on leafy residential streets, the swirling melodies of bagpipes, a shimmering heat haze and the burble of cool water.

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DEBUT AUTHOR JODI RATH ON CREATING A COZY MYSTERY VILLAGE

Moving into her second decade working in education, Jodi Rath has decided to begin a life of crime in her Cast Iron Skillet Mystery Series. Her passion for both mysteries and education led her to combine the two to create her business MYS ED, where she splits her time between working as an adjunct for Ohio teachers and creating mischief in her fictional writing. She currently resides in a small, cozy village in Ohio with her husband and her seven cats. Learn more about her and her series at her website. 

A Guide to ‘Setting’ up a Cozy Mystery Village

I’ve loved to write as long as I can remember. One of the biggest hurdles for me to jump over is setting. I always look to authors like the late great Sue Grafton, as she spun amazing roads both literally and figuratively throughout her novels. Sara Paretsky personifies Chicago in her V.I. Warshawski novels. Chaucer’s pilgrimage in the springtime to visit Beckett’s shrine in Canterbury gives life to the setting. So, why do I always find myself staring at a page full of words that round out characters, create sensory details, and advance the plot but have little pebbles worth of information on the setting?

When I first set out to write a cozy series, I held back for the longest time. Why? You guessed it: setting fears! I understood the need to create a cozy little village that entices readers to feel they live in that setting as they read the book. Talk about giving me the nervous sweats. How would I ever be able to do this when I struggle with the setting?

I’ve never been huge into fantasy as a reader. I’ve always leaned toward mystery first with English Literature a quick second (I was an English Lit major in my undergrad years and taught English Literature to HS students for two decades, so…).

When I got serious about writing that cozy mystery, I decided to visit the fantasy section of my local library where I grabbed several books with maps in them. I found a quiet little cubbyhole in the corner of the library to study those maps and took some detailed notes. Next, I went and found a globe and circled it for a bit. I always have my handy-dandy journal with me wherever I go, so I got that puppy out and began jotting down some notes on mapping out a world, a town, a street, down to a room.  

I made lists. From those lists, I created descriptions using sensory details. I looked up places online and realized (and duh, I was an educator after all so I should have known this) that I learn best visually.  Seeing those maps first, then writing, helped me so much. Looking at actual pictures of exact places online or searching for places based off of detailed terms I created in my head, gave me more of a visual to work from. I now had a strategy for writing setting.

So, off I went, back home to my office with my seven cat staff to begin developing The Cast Iron Skillet Mystery Series, which is set in Leavensport, Ohio. This is a fictional village, but I live in Ohio in a small village myself.  Leavensport is partially modeled after the village I live in, but a lot of visual research also went into creating my little world. I found several pictures that I studied and spent hours free-writing, trying to get the right spots in the correct places to be able to help me write this fourteen book series.

Once I did all that, I created a really bad map online.  It was truly horrible to look at, but fun to make. So, after putting that atrocity in my first book, my editor kindly said: “Having a map is a great idea, but why don’t you have a professional set it up for you?” 

Um….yes, that would be good. Writers, don’t ever think you don’t need an editor. I was so proud and puffed up from my research and time I committed to making the crappy map that I couldn’t really see (or smell) how crappy it was.  So, I got a professional who made me a black and white copy for e-books and a colored map for my website and blog interviews like this one. It is beautiful. I do love it. I love all the names I’ve come up with for the village, and I look forward to murdering people in just about every place in town—on the page that is!

Pineapple Upside Down Murder

A Cast Iron Skillet Mystery, Book 1 

Introducing Jolie Tucker, an introverted yet passionate restaurant co-owner of Cast Iron Creations, who, at her best friend Ava’s request, steps out of her comfort zone, which leads her into the shade of a killer in the small, cozy village of Leavensport, Ohio.  The victim is the village’s beloved Ellie Siler who runs the village sweet spot, Chocolate Capers.  Jolie finds her grandma Opal is a prime suspect and goes on a search for answer only to find out that her family’s secret recipes may not belong to the Tucker family at all.  Jolie’s job, family, and livelihood are all on the line. The answers are assuredly lethal.

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AUTHOR JUDITH COPEK SETS A MYSTERY AT BURNING MAN

According to author Judith Copek, she’s most likely the only person you will ever meet who was born in Montana. A former English major and Information Systems nerd, she

Enjoys putting a literary spin on technology, and showing technology’s humor and quirkiness along with its scary aspects. When not writing, cooking or digging in the garden, you’ll find her on a Baltic beach or at Burning Man in the Nevada desert researching her next novel. Learn more about her and her books at her website. 

Sometimes I take a vacation that inspires a novel. World of Mirrors came about from a visit to the Baltic Island of Ruegen. Festival Madness arrived after a couple of trips to the Burning Man Festival. Setting is paramount in my fiction, up there with characters and plot. When I know I’m going to write about a place, my camera is my best friend. There’s no pressure to take a wonderful photo. I just need to record an image.

The Burning Man Festival in the Nevada desert is a writer’s dream, with a hostile but scenic environment, (the Black Rock Desert), thousands of people, art, music, drugs, booze, fire, and total craziness. And isolation. It’s in the middle of nowhere, and you are nearly one hundred miles from civilization. There is one road in, two-lane and dusty. A perfect setting.

Anything can and does happen at Burning Man!

Everything is dusty: your vehicle, your luggage, yourself. Radical self-reliance is the watch phrase. You bring in what you need including food and water and carry away everything. Every speck of trash There’s always a dust storm. Rain turns the playa to gooey mud. Black Rock City becomes a vast chaotic circle of “camps” consisting of tents, campers, trucks, and people. The people are mostly in costumes, the more bizarre the better. Some of them are naked. Men wear dresses with ease. They are living their fantasies. The “Man” is the best place to do this because there is a pleasant anonymity. A more-perfect setting.

The desert is called the Playa, Spanish for beach, and it stretches forever, surrounded by bare mountains including the Black Rock. Somewhere there is always a techno beat. The statue of the Man looms over the Playa. The Temple does, too. Both are ultimately burnt to the ground. Art cars belch fire. A band marches by in women’s underwear. Beyond the city is the art. Stunning is the best word for this desert museum. You can get drunk on the art. I mostly ignored the drugs and the booze because I had a mission: to capture this compelling setting for my novel.

Weird stuff happens. Pilots at the airport offer rides so Burners can join the Mile-High Club. The women have a bare-breasted bicycle ride. Thousands of naked-to-the-waist women on bikes. With attitude. The “Critical Tits Ride.” There are parades. At dusk, the Lamplighters light lanterns throughout the city because most of the burners are on bikes and they need to see. Headlamps are everywhere, as is glowstick jewelry. Bad stuff can happen in the dark. Yes!

And the Burn? Saturday night everyone forms a huge circle around the statue of the Man. There is drumming and fire dancers and all the art cars (mutant vehicles) gather round with belching flames and the throbbing, pulsing, techno beat. You cannot help but dance. Fireworks explode, and the man starts to burn. He raises his arms. The flames burn higher. Everyone is shouting and dancing and drinking and drugging and screaming as the man burns. Enough drama for a half-dozen settings.

Sunday night the temple burns and the celebrants make their way off the playa through the dust. The drive is long, slow. and hot. Next year will be more of the same, but different. It’s addictive. A most-perfect setting.

Festival Madness

The Burning Man Festival, two murders and high-tech hi-jinx equal Festival Madness for a troubled cyber-sleuth. Boston-based computer security consultant Emma Lee Devens leaves her top-secret project in disarray and jeopardizes her marriage when she races to find her missing friend and colleague. Emma’s search takes her to the Black Rock Desert of northern Nevada and the Burning Man Festival where a unique experience of survival, ceremonial fire, danger, and transcendence awaits. Anything can happen at Burning Man. Even murder.

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#TRAVEL TO PORTLAND, MAINE WITH MYSTERY AUTHOR DALE T. PHILLIPS

Dale T. Phillips has published novels, story collections, nonfiction, and over 70 short stories. Stephen King was Dale's college writing teacher, and since that time, Dale has found time to appear on stage, television, in an independent feature film, a short political satire film, and compete on Jeopardy (losing in a spectacular fashion). Learn more about Dale and his books at his website.

The setting for my Zack Taylor mystery series is the great little city of Portland, Maine, a jewel by the sea. The people are terrific, there are a number of vibrant cultures, it’s a four-season vacationland alive with music, art, and literature, and it’s a foodie and craft-beer-lover paradise. I spent a lot of time there in years past, and wanted to set a mystery there. Why let the big cities of New York, L.A., and Chicago have all the sleuths and fun?

So when I wrote my first mystery, A Memory of Grief, I created a protagonist who comes to Portland in the 1990’s as an outsider, a complete fish-out-of-water. Zack Taylor has a troubled past and arrives on a mission to find the truth. He finds so much more and decides to stay in Portland for further adventures.

Although I use many real settings that those familiar with the area will readily recognize, I freely change things around. It sounds so attractive that some have asked if I work for the Maine tourism bureau. I always tell people that if they haven’t yet been to Portland, my series will make them want to go there. Still, I frequently show the dark side of Maine as well: the poverty, the widespread and chronic unemployment, the backwoods close-minded mentality, the small-town bigotry.

But I show Portland as a healing place, an environment so completely different from what Zack has known in glittery cityscapes like Las Vegas and Miami, that he turns his life around. He finds a love that has heretofore eluded him, although it is a difficult and complicated relationship, due to the violence that surrounds him. He finds a friend and mentor in Joshua Chamberlain (J.C.) Reed, a long-time reporter for The Maine Times. He also finds a host of enemies and has to deal with violent people, despite the fact that he doesn’t like or use guns, which puts him at a decided disadvantage.

Setting is vital to the events of the mysteries. In the first book, A Memory of Grief, Zack takes on a cadre of killers out at Fort Williams, the park that contains the iconic, oft-painted/photographed Portland Head Lighthouse. A Fall From Grace details Zack taking on a small Maine burg, which has turned against a single mother after the murder of the Town Manager. Later in the series we see Zack involved in the movie business, the coastal art scene, and a world where politics and crooked outside-money interests collide.

People know Stephen King writes about Maine, but Portland is also a rich ground for great mystery and crime writers, including: Kate Flora, Bruce Robert Coffin, Gerry Boyle, James Hayman, and Chris Holm. You can meet many of them at the Maine Crime Wave, an annual mini-con gathering of writers, fans, and special guests. Between this handful of writers, we’ve upped the annual murder body count of Maine by hundreds. They often paint Portland as a dark place of intrigue, although I like to show off the good points in my protagonists’ desire to set things right.

So when you’re in the mood for a trip to Maine, or a touch of murder and personal struggle, you can pick up the Zack Taylor series in many places, including, of course, the many Portland area bookshops: Letterpress Books, Sherman’s, Longfellow Books, or Nonesuch Books.

A Memory of Grief

Troubled ex-con Zack Taylor is haunted by the accidental death of his brother years before. Zack's guilt and anger have pushed him into a shadowy, wandering life, with little purpose and few attachments. When he hears of the death of his close friend Ben Sterling, a supposed gunshot suicide, Zack finds he now has a purpose—to find out what happened. Then his purpose becomes an obsession.

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#TRAVEL--GET TO KNOW PRAGUE WITH INTERNATIONAL THRILLER AUTHOR KATHRYN ORZECH

Prague city map

Author Kathryn Orzech writes mystery, suspense, and thrillers set in New England “and other exotic locations” where everyday women face chilling situations, flirt with romance, and brush with the supernatural. An avid film fan, news nerd and traveler, Kathy’s other interests include history and geopolitics, archaeology and psychology, earth science, and parapsychology, leaving few subjects off her literary table. Her real-life website, DreamWatch.com, true paranormal experiences of everyday people, has been online since the late 1990s and was the inspiration for Premonition of Terror when she wondered, What if…?  Learn more about her and her books at her website.

“Exotic Location” Prague, Czech Republic

After character development and plot, setting is next important to me. My world travels (30-plus countries) offer readers a glimpse of another place and culture. Most of Premonition of Terror, a psychic thriller with a global terrorism threat, is set in the northeast USA, with key scenes set in Prague.

A hoard of international souvenirs is stored in my basement, stacked in plastic bins labeled by country. When drafting Premonition, I was torn between an overseas setting in Budapest or Prague. I reviewed my stash of brochures, receipts and mementos including the street maps I used while there. Prague emerged the clear winner.

Prague overview

At first glance, districts on a city map can be confusing with the Old Town, New Town, Lesser Town, and more. I needed the big picture so my first stop was the elevated location of Prague Castle for a confusion-clearing overview. Prague’s most striking feature is the Vltava River that runs through the city, thus easing navigation to at least determine which side you were on.

Said to be one of Europe’s most haunted cities, I found Prague to be fascinating, vibrant, and affordable, an easy walking city with deep-rooted culture. From historical castles, palaces and cathedrals to underground cave restaurants with delicious food and “outstanding” beer (so I was told); from concerts and galleries to river cruises and ghost walking tours, it’s no surprise that Prague attracts visitors from around the world.

Protagonist as innocent tourist

I have no qualms about writing what I don’t know as long as my point of view remains that of a stranger, a visitor, a tourist. In Premonition of Terror, protagonist Kate Kasabian explores popular attractions including Old Town Square with the 600-year-old Astronomical Clock, the Charles Bridge, Powder Tower, Peace Wall, and Prague Castle.

Old Town Square. The Old Town looked to me like a fairy village with Romanesque and Gothic architecture in a labyrinth of cobblestone lanes, and there was always something interesting happening at the square. I especially enjoyed evenings with new friends at favorite sidewalk cafés to people-watch and listen to conversations at nearby tables in a medley of languages, background I used in the book.

The Charles Bridge (aka: Karluv most). An icon bridge and one of many river crossings. Completed in 1390 (30 mostly Baroque statues were added later), it connects Old Town with Lesser Town. More than 500 yards across, by 9:00 AM it is a gauntlet of hawkers, tourists, and an occasional pickpocket. I relished the incessant activity.

Lesser Town (aka: Mala Strana). A lovely area in which to walk, home to Prague Castle and foreign embassies. As my steps crushed fallen leaves against worn sidewalks, I felt I was back home in the Northeast.

John Lennon’s Peace Wall. Let me explain. Sometimes called Prague’s answer to the Berlin Wall, this graffiti-covered wall is often credited for having inspired the Velvet Revolution, a non-violent youth rebellion against Communism. The Peace Wall began with an image of Lennon, a remembrance following his murder. Lyrics from his songs and messages of peace, love and freedom soon followed. Located near the French Embassy, an impulse to find the Peace Wall draws protagonist Kate to Mala Strana where not all is as peaceful as it appears.

Writing this post stirred memories of the sights and sounds of Prague, so thank you all for that.

Premonition of Terror

DreamWatch.com, true paranormal experiences, began as a hobby. It was supposed to be fun—until premonitions from around the world predict the same catastrophic attack.

The last time reluctant psychic Kate Kasabian revealed a prediction, people close to her were hurt. But with thousands of lives at risk, she has no choice but to badger her FBI brother to investigate. He refuses to help. When she sets off to prove her suspicions, he thinks he’s heard the last of her supernatural silliness—until the legendary Matt Chase from Counterterrorism alerts agents to a credible threat eerily similar to Kate’s warnings.

Tracking clues from Prague to New England, Kate trusts dreams and premonitions while Chase relies on technology and global intelligence, but can their unlikely alliance stop the U.S. plot?

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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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