National Relaxation Day

Are you celebrating yet? My opinion is that this should be a national holiday. Everyone should get to just…relax. I know, most of us have to work, but couldn't we just set aside a couple of hours for doing nothing?

It's also Lemon Meringue Pie Day, National Goat Cheese Month, and National Peach Month. Let's all at least get something good to eat today.

What's your idea of relaxing? Do you like to curl up with a good book? Listen to music? Watch movies?

I know a lot of writers who NEVER take a day off. Of course, I know others who take time between projects, or even during projects. Family emergencies come up, illness befalls, and nothing can be predicted. I'm not sure where I was going with this paragraph. I think I'm already on vacation. I'll try to kick back for a couple hours in front of the TV or with a book today.  Join me!

All photos from wiki commons. Beach is South Padre Island in Texas.

Book Review: “No Mark Upon Her” by Deborah Crombie

This review originally appeared in "Suspense Magazine" earlier in the year.

How nice to step into the world of Gemma and Duncan again! The reader is entering not only the world of the Metropolitan Police of London, but also the world of English sculling. And, along with the police department, the milieu of search dogs and their handlers.

Everything is set in motion when Becca, a Metropolitan Police officer who had a chance at the Olympics in single shell fourteen years ago, decides to stage a comeback and make another try. Her previous attempt at the Games was aborted under mysterious circumstances. Even now, she's training in secret. She's recently divorced from Freddie, but they maintain cordial relations, as far as anyone can tell. Freddie is an unlikely mate for a police officer, as his occupation is a bit shady. Kieran Connolly, former Combat Medical Technician, is a Search and Rescue dog handler and boat builder with a troubled past, but increasingly fond feelings for Tavie, fellow dog handler. Their animals, Finn and Tosh, are great characters. Something is off about Kieran when Becca's body is discovered, but Tavie can't quite figure out what.

Detective Gemma James and her husband, Detective Superintendent Duncan Kincaid have recently wed in a small ceremony and are the parents of a varied brood. The theme of complicated family affairs runs through the book. Duncan is called in to work the case, but Gemma figures heavily too, of course.

The ends of all the threads are simultaneously tied up and left leading to the next adventure. This is a lovely, satisfying British police procedural with many relationship subplots that lend texture.

Adding New Lanes to my Road

I've talked here about taking new paths and taking turns along the road. This week, it's more like I'm adding a couple of lanes.

LANE ONE: I'm a classically trained violinist and have been playing since I was ten. That's quite a few years by now. I've played in many community orchestras and string quartets, have done several string quartet arrangements and one full orchestration. So, if by osmosis if nothing else, I've absorbed a bit of music knowledge.

When I first started writing mysteries, I used a classical musician as my sleuth, adhering to the adage "Write what you know." My experience was, well, dismal after awhile. I queried agent after agent. Several of them liked parts of it, some of them liked all of it. None of them thought they could sell it. They didn't think enough people would be interested in reading about classical music. I cited community orchestra and band participation numbers in my query letters to no avail. If Dick Francis can base a mystery on banking, I thought, why can't I base one on music? I wrote a sequel and queried it. Finally, in defeat, I turned to something else.

Eventually, my mystery, CHOKE, got picked up by a small press. That was last year and things have been happening rapidly in the publishing world lately. Small presses are proliferating and lots of good writers are getting their stuff published without having to query for ten years like I did.

One day, out of the blue, a publisher asked to see my musician series. I call is my Cressa Carraway series. She's looked at my website and was interested. She didn't pick it up, but I reviewed if after letting it lie dormant while I worked on other things. Not bad at all, I decided, and started sending it out again.

Here's the good part--I'm signing a contract with Barking Rain Press to publish the first book in that series! Isn't their logo cute? The schedule is ambitious, so I hope to go through edits and publication and have more news on this before you know it. You'll see a bit about the book on my webpage, at the bottom. It's called SONG OF DEATH there, but the title is changing.

LANE TWO: A short story anthology came out yesterday with one of my stories inside its covers! The antho is called HE HAD IT COMING and my story is MY HUSBAND. Some of my friends have decided they need to warn my husband about me (actually, a lot of them say that), but there's no need. Ramona DeFelice Long, in a recent exchange, said she thinks women can write bad things about people they're secure with. The book is just about fun ways to…kill guys. Try the free sample, you'll see.

Road sign image used  under GNU Free Documentation License, 

Lazy, hazy, crazy

In honor of those above mentioned days, I'll give in to sloth and post some links to other things I've been doing lately.

I guested a LOT in July, I've just realized. My fellow writers are so gracious and so good at sharing their space. That is appreciated more than I can tell them.

Feel free to drop in at any of these and leave a comment, or just glance over the other postings at these places.

7/7, a post on mystery sub-genres, for Lynn Mann at http://lynnmannauthor.com/2012/07/07/guest-blog-on-sub-genres/

7/10, Kristi Belcamino interviewed me at http://www.kristibelcamino.com/writer-interviews-kaye-george/

7/13, Pat Bertram posted an excerpt from my latest novel http://dragonmyfeet.wordpress.com/2012/07/13/excerpt-from-smoke-an-imogene-duckworthy-mystery-by-kaye-george/

7/17, I related my fond childhood memories of the Fourth of July at a setting I've used for a novel I hope to get published one day. This is at Joanne Troppello's Mustard Seed Blog http://joannetroppello.weebly.com/1/post/2012/07/do-you-know-author-kaye-george.html

7/19 saw the first issue of a new venture by Bobbi Chukran, A Murder is Announced. I was privileged to be in this one at http://a-murder-is-announced.blogspot.com/2012/07/a-murder-is-announced-first-issue.html

On the 25th I was a guest on two blogs. At Lois Winston's healthy living place, I talked about the therapeutic value of pets.

 http://anastasiapollack.blogspot.com/2012/07/healthy-living-with-janice-guest-author.html

The same day, Sheila Boneham hosted my musings on short story writing versus novel writing. http://www.sheilaboneham.blogspot.com/2012/07/writing-on-wednesday-with-guest-kaye.html

Yesterday, an excerpt from SMOKE was featured by Chris Redding.

http://chrisredddingauthor.blogspot.com/2012/07/excerptuesday-kaye-george.html

I only have 4 guest posts scheduled for August, so I hope to gets lots and lots of writing done!

Photo from http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=23233&picture=lazy-red-panda

The All Mystery Newsletter is back!

I'm very late posting today, but I have a good scapegoat--some medicine that says it will make me sleepy. It's living up to its promise.

Meanwhile, I am absolutely thrilled to report that Rebecca Dahlke has decided to resurrect her newsletter.  A mention on this publication in its last incarnation gave me the biggest bump in sales of anything I've tried. I hope it keeps going for a long while now!

Since I'm going to give in to the medicine any moment now, I'll be brief, but will mention that I'm a guest on two very different blogs today. I'm talking about pigs and other pets at Killer Crafts and CraftyKillers and about short stories vs. novels at Sheila Boneham's blog. This last one was mistakenly advertised last week here, but it's up now!

Book review: “Magical Alienation” by Kris Neri

This is a neat cross between fantasy and suspense, with romance overtones thrown in. The duo of Samantha Brennan, fake psychic, and Annabelle Haggerty, FBI agent/real Celtic goddess make their second appearance here. The first, “High Crimes on the Magical Plane,” was nominated for a 2010 Lefty for Best Humorous Mystery Novel.

It’s a stretch to call these books mysteries, since there's no murder in this one, but they sure are fun and there's a lot of mysterious stuff. A good bit of suspension of disbelief is needed, but you can tell that, right? An aging rock star, who may be some sort of supernatural being, or not, hires Samantha to be his personal spiritual advisor for his upcoming tour: Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll. It pays well, so she flies to Sedona for the kickoff concert. However, that first concert is going to be a benefit for an onerous person, Normal Frankly, who has been accused to trying to kill a senator and is holed up with his personal militia and some hostages. Two gangster-types accompany Sam and the rocker on the private jet trip to Arizona and Sam can’t tell who’s in charge, the bodyguards or her employer. Her old nemesis god, Angus, the hunk she can't resist, tests her resolution and muddies the waters.

Sam soon realizes she’s receiving signs when Camelback Mountain sticks a tongue out at her. The reader becomes privy to the thoughts of the Area 51 creature as a harmonic convergence that will be accompanied by a full moon approaches. The creature and others are determined to make use of this phenomenon, but Annabelle seems to have lost her powers and needs Sam to help her through the event. Some are putting the harmonica-thingie, as Sam calls it, to good use, some plan evil deeds. But which group is which?

It’s hard, at some points, to see how Samantha is going to land on her feet in the end. A whole lot of subplots converge in Sedona for the thrilling climax of this magic-studded read.

Reviewed by Kaye George, author of “Choke” for Suspense Magazine

New Moon, New Things!

Tomorrow, the 19th, is a new moon. I don't study moons and stars, so I don't know what it means, but I'll pretend it means time for new things.

First New Thing: Did you know that I can autograph your e-book for you? From here? Just go to  my Kindlegraph page and click on a cover. The old cover for CHOKE might still be there, but it'll take you to the new edition.

If you don't have a Kindle, you can still get an autograph! When you're asked for the email address of your Kindle, just put any address you want and you will be able to download the autograph in any format, such as PDF.

Second New Thing: I've written a lot of short stories, and even gotten a fair number of them published. But I've recently been asked to JUDGE a short story contest by the Mary Roberts Rinehart Chapter of Sisters in Crime based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. How cool is that? There are three of us judging, and I'm honored to be in their company. The others are David Shifren and Laurie Stephens. David has been a film reviewer, short story and novel writer, and teaches at Seton Hill. Laurie has experience in school and public libraries and is the new owner of the award-winning Mystery Lovers Bookshop in Oakmont, PA.

Third New Thing: I'm starting work on a brand new series that may materialize or may not, but I'm very excited about it! IF it comes to fruition, I'll be announcing it here.

Moon picture is public domain, http://astro.unl.edu/misc/moonpics/