Coming June 18th - Davenport Designs

Former Sheriff's Office detective Ray Davenport now owns the Wood U gift shop on Victoria Square, but it’s his talented younger daughters who steal the show with their displays and packaging designs. The girls believe they can earn money with their window-dressing skills for the other businesses on the Square, but the only merchant who hires them conspires to reap the rewards of their labor without paying a cent. Will they have to swallow their pride and ask Katie Bonner for help to get what’s owed them?

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Would you wear one of these?

I polled reader on my Facebook Group about author swag a while back. Now I need to know what series they (and you) might be interested for T-shirts, totes, and mugs.

Below are my logos (and I have others, like Sweet Sue's from Victoria Square, etc.)

What would you like to see on a shirt, tote, or mug?

New For You Today!

Now available: Life On Victoria Square #

THE RELUCTANT BRIDE

Don Parsons and Nick Ferrell bought a ramshackle Victorian spinster and plan to transform her into a Painted Lady. Weddings and other parties are a part of their business plan. They’ll be hosting a small ceremony and reception for bride-to-be Lauren Washborne … except she doesn’t seem all that enthusiastic about her upcoming nuptials. Don wants to know why—but Nick is against the idea. Will Lauren have a chance to live happily ever after, or will her suitor be left at the altar?

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The story behind the story - YULE BE DEAD

When my co-writer, Gayle Leeson, and I were deciding what we'd write about for Victoria Square #5, we made a conscious decision to set the book during the holidays.

I've written several short stories that take place during Christmastime, but never a whole novel. (You can check out all my holiday stories on my website. Just click this link.)

When I signed the contract, my publisher decided they didn't want to buy the rights to certain countries, which means that I could publish it in those countries on my own. (So I own the rights to the UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and a few other countries.) That's why there are two different covers. (P.S. I like my cover better. How about you?)

Gayle and I make a great team and we're already in the home-stretch of writing Victoria Square #6 (Murder Ink).

Yule Be Dead is now available! Here's the description:

It's the holiday season, but not everyone is jolly--especially not Vonne Barnett. Her dead body has been found near Victoria Square. Katie Bonner, the manager of Artisan’s Alley, happens to be at the tea shop Vonne's mother, Francine, owns when the news is delivered.

Vonne left a trail of men behind her so the suspects are many--but the clues are few. A broken teacup* leads Katie to one of the suspects, but before she can investigate, she’s attacked. Katie may be closing in on a killer, but time is ticking because the killer is definitely closing in on her.


 GET IT NOW!

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* The Broken Teacup is a short story in my companion series, Life on Victoria Square.

P.S.  I'm having a launch party today on my Facebook Group Page from 7 to 9 pm EST. Be there for the fun and the giveaways! Click this link to get there!

Baking with my characters

I was speaking with my hairdresser the other day (got my roots done -- I'm YOUNG again!) and she was telling me that her husband doesn't like to eat. She has to remind him to eat.

A person who doesn't like to eat??????????

I smell cake/cookies/muffins/Yorkshire pudding and I gain weight. Therefore, I live vicariously through my characters who love to bake. Among them: Katie Bonner, Kathy Grant, and most recently Tricia Miles. These ladies are baking up a storm--and they can do it and not get fat because they have an audience they can feed. Katie has her vendors at Artesans Alley, Kathy has been experimenting with recipes for her B&B and feeding her friends Tori, Anissa, Noreen and Paul. Tricia has her employees, Pixie and Mr. Everett (and when you read A Killer Edition, which will be out next year, this will become really obvious.)


But I like to bake, too. And the other day my neighbor, who has a huge garden, put out a little stand for veggies his family can't eat. It's so cute with a colorful umbrella to shade the veggies during the day. And I picked up a zucchini, tomato and a chili pepper. The zucchini was too big for stir fry, but I knew when I picked it up it was destined for zucchini muffins.

Who's my audience? Mr. L. He loves baked goods for breakfast and this will be my second batch of zucchini muffins this summer. In fact, I will need to make a double batch because it is such a big zucchini. That doesn't worry me!  Here's my recipe.

Zucchini Muffins
Ingredients
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 large eggs
1/2 cup canola oil
2 cups finely shredded unpeeled zucchini
1 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup dried currants or chopped raisins

Preheat oven to 350° In a bowl, combine the first six ingredients. Combine the egg and oil; stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Fold in the zucchini, walnuts and currants. Coat muffin cups with cooking spray or use paper liners; fill three-fourths full with batter. Bake for 22-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack.

Yield: 12 muffins

Who do you bake for? (And care to share a recipe, too?)

==========================================

Recipes to Die For: A Victoria Square Cookbook, was the first companion book I did for my New York Times bestselling  Victoria Square Mystery series. In it, Katie Bonner shares her favorite recipes, and those of her vendors and the merchants on Victoria Square, plus each contributors signature drink and anecdotes about their lives on Victoria square.

Treat yourself today!

Amazon (trade paperback)

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Yule Be Dead now available for Preorder

Happy Monday!  It certainly is for me and Gayle Leeson, my co-author on Victoria Square #5, YULE BE DEAD, which is now available for Preorder. No cover yet -- but I'll share as soon as I get it.

 Read all about the next book is the series by clicking one of the links below.

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Books A Million
Chapters/Indigo
IndieBound 

Kindle US
Kindle Worldwide
Nook
iBooks
Kobo

I turned it around FAST

Back in October, I put my latest Life On Victoria Square story, It's Tutu Much, for pre-order. But oddly enough, readers didn't seem interested in the story. I wondered if it was just the fact that the holidays were coming up, or if it might be the cover.  My beta readers liked the story and they liked the cover. But when it came to debut day, the pre-orders were 2/3 less than the previous three stories.

Something wasn't right.

I kept focusing on the wrong aspect of the story. I kept thinking it was about the children in the dance class, but the more I thought about it, the story is really about their teacher, Dana Milton.

I asked my review crew what they thought, and they were split. Some like the cover, some thought it looked like it was a children's story.  I didn't like hearing the latter, but I had to listen.  Although it's only been 10 days since the story has been out, the sales went right down the toilet. In fact, I've already had a couple of days without a single sale. That's not good.

So yesterday, I asked the members of my Facebook Group (Lorraine's Perpetual Tea Party -- if you haven't joined--why not???) what they thought of the current cover and a dummy cover I put together.  I'm no Photoshop wiz, and I couldn't get the ballet dancer to stay on a colorful background. After a lot of trial and error, I managed to get her on a gray background.

Readers thought the covers were bland. They wanted color. They wanted a proper tutu. They wanted whimsy. They did NOT want a photo on the cover. The original cover didn't mesh with the other covers in the series.

They were right.

However, that didn't tell me what I needed to convey to my cover designer. So, I decided to let her decide what to do. I told her what the readers said, I showed her what I had done, and let her play with it.

I love what she came up with. It's whimsical, it's bright, there's color -- and the ballet and tap shoes say there's more than just one kind of dance being taught in this studio.

Being quickly able to correct something like this is one of the best things about being an indie author.  Had this been a traditionally published story, it would have been stuck with a "bad" cover for eternity. I was able to turn it around in less than two weeks from publication.

Now, see if you're more interested in the story.
 
 Dana Milton opens a dance studio on Victoria Square. Can she teach her students kindness,  respect, and shuffling off to Buffalo, or is it all tutu much?

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What do you think?

Life on Victoria Square

My Victoria Square Mystery series has had a few ups and downs. It came out like gangbusters in 2011--and bam bam--two of the books hit the New York Times bestsellers list.  But then ... there was a nearly four-year lag from the time One Hot Murder came out and Dead, Bath and Beyond was published.

A lot of readers forgot about Katie Bonner and Artisans Alley.

I'm now writing the series with a co-author, but nobody told me my first co-author only had a one-book contract. I assumed we'd write the rest of the books in the contract together. Since her life had taken another turn, I had to find another author. Meanwhile, Victoria Square was once again taken out of the publishing schedule. My agent found the wonderful Gayle Trent (who also writes as Gayle Leeson and Amanda Lee), and we're hard at work on the next book in the series. (So far not titled.) We're back on the publishing schedule, but not until December 2018.  That's 18 months from now. So the big question is -- will readers forget about Katie and Artisans Alley once again?

Hopefully not -- because I've begun a companion series called LIFE ON VICTORIA SQUARE. In the Victoria Square Mysteries, Artisans Alley takes center stage, but the merchants--and their businesses--are just as intriguing. They all have stories to tell ... and that's what the Life on Victoria Square companion series is all about.

I began the series featuring Ray Davenport, the former homicide detective who has retired and opened a gift shop on Victoria Square.  In CARVING OUT A PATH, a young shoplifter not only swipes a couple of hand-carved figurines from Ray's Wood U shop, but barrels into and injures Katie Bonner, manager of Artisans Alley. Upon his escape, the police are called, but before the ink is dry on the report, the boy’s grandmother drags the would-be thief back to return the purloined items. She’s got an agenda and great expectations. Can Ray come through in a pinch?

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The second installment, A BASKET FULL OF BARGAINS, comes out on Tuesday. This one features Gilda Ringwald-Stratton, owner of Gilda's Gourmet Baskets. Iris Drake is an odd duck. She knows everyone at Artisans Alley arts-and-crafts arcade, but nobody knows her. When she walks into Gilda’s shop on Victoria Square, she’s a stranger there, too—but not for long. Yet she hasn’t to come to Gilda to buy her wares—she’s there to sell some of her own. All goes well until Iris’s secret is exposed. Should Gilda step in to make things right, or walk away from an unpleasant situation?

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I've already written a third story (now available for Pre-Order, and to be published on September 8th) called THE BROKEN TEACUP. I hadn't meant to feature Katie Bonner in any of the stories in this series, but I was inspired by a teacup I bought an an estate sale. Katie Bonner needs a pick-me-up one cold and gloomy fall day, and the US Mail delivers—literally. A mysterious package arrives at Artisans Alley with her name on it, but the return address is obscured and the treasure inside, a beautiful bone china teacup, is broken. Before Katie can open the accompanying card, she’s called away and one of the vendors mistakes the package for trash. Katie makes a quick rescue, but the card is gone. Who sent the cup? What is its significance? Can Katie solve this mini mystery?

I'm already plotting the next story, which will come out in either late December or early January.  My goal is to write a new story every three months -- at least until the new novel comes out.

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If you've enjoyed the Victoria Square Mysteries, perhaps you'll enjoy Life On Victoria Square, too.

To find out more about the stories, please check out my website.

To check out my videos, please visit my Youtube Channel.

Happy Book Day To Me!

YAY -- the 2nd installment in Life On Victoria Square series, A BASKET FULL OF BARGAINS, is now available!

Iris Drake is an odd duck. She knows everyone at Artisans Alley arts-and-crafts arcade, but nobody knows her. When she walks into Gilda’s Gourmet Baskets on Victoria Square, she’s a stranger there, too—but not for long. Yet she hasn’t to come to Gilda to buy her wares—she’s there to sell some of her own. All goes well until Iris’s secret is exposed. Should Gilda step in to make things right, or walk away from an unpleasant situation?


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I hope you'll enjoy Gilda's story!

Check out the Book trailer!

There's some of me in everything I write

One of the fun things about writing is you can incorporate tiny pieces of your life into your stories.

There was a time when I hated to shop. (Yeah, sounds weird now.) Of course, I still hate to shop for certain things. (Like clothes. No matter what I buy, I always look like a barrel. Yeah, hate clothes shopping.) One of the reason I became a vendor at an antiques and crafts arcade was because I loved to shop there. I was furnishing our home and they had the best stuff! That's about the time I also started to go junking (which sounds a lot cooler than saying I went to yard sales).

You can get all kinds of GOOD stuff at yard sales.  I was recently in Florida, and they have yard sales ALL YEAR LONG! (Imagine that!!!!!) Mr. L collects cocktail shakers. I found these three shakers for $2 -- TWO BUCKS!!! (Love that the left and middle one are etched. I figure the one on the left is from the 1950s; the other two are much newer, but were unique enough that he wanted to add them to his collection.)

But (as usual) I digress.

I'm working on my second Life on Victoria Square story (A companion series to go with The Victoria Square Mysteries) featuring a minor character who has shown up in a couple of the Victoria Square Mysteries. We're talking a walk-on character who never even had a line of dialogue. But she stuck in my mind and I knew she had a story to tell ... I just didn't know what it was until this week, that is. She didn't even have a name. They just referred to her as "the woman who never pays more than a buck for anything." And what's her claim to fame?  A rose made of crepe paper. I'm having fun describing all the treasures she's picked up while shopping at Artisans Alley and I hope my readers will enjoy getting to know her, too.

The first Life on Victoria Square story goes on sale on today. It's called CARVING OUT A PATH, and features Ray Davenport, the cranky police detective who clashed with Katie in the first three novels.

A young shoplifter not only swipes a couple of hand-carved figurines from Ray Davenport, owner of Victoria Square’s Wood U gift shop, but barrels into and injures Katie Bonner, manager of Artisans Alley. Upon his escape, the police are called, but before the ink is dry on the report, the boy’s grandmother drags the would-be thief back to return the purloined items. She’s got an agenda and great expectations. Can Ray come through in a pinch?


Kindle US | Kindle Worldwide | iBooks | Nook | Kobo

I have plans to write about all the merchants on Victoria Square.

(P.S. So happy my cover designer could add three of my Dad's carvings to the cover.  Aren't the Santas adorable?  At the end of the story, I added the Story BEHIND the Story to tell readers about those carvings.)

I hope you'll give Ray (and later Iris) a chance!

Coming soon!

Theres’s good (and some bad) news for my Victoria Square readers. First, due to personal considerations, Laurie Cass will not be working with me on the next two books. (Yes, at least two more!) which makes me sad. But I'll be teaming up with another well-known cozy mystery author to write the next two books (and--cross your fingers--possibly beyond). I need to wait for her to ink the contract before I can announce her name, but I'm looking forward to working with her.

And now for the BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!

I've started a companion series called Life on Victoria Square. Every couple of months, I'll be putting out a new Victoria Square story featuring the merchants on Victoria Square, as well as some of the events they celebrate. The first story, available April 11th, features Ray Davenport, the former homicide detective turned shopkeeper.

A young shoplifter not only swipes a couple of hand-carved figurines from Ray Davenport, owner of Victoria Square's Wood U gift shop, but barrels into and injures Katie Bonner, manager of Artisans Alley. Upon his escape, the police are called, but before the ink is dry on the report, the boy's grandmother drags the would-be thief back to return the purloined items. She's got an agenda and great expectations. Can Ray come through in a pinch?

PREORDER NOW!

Kindle US | Kindle Worldwide | Nook | Smashwords

Coming soon to iBooks and Kobo!

Read more about the series by clicking this link. Follow my blog with Bloglovin