Agatha Christie

I've been watching the new season of Miss Marple on PBS and once again I've been filled with wonder when I see how complicated Agatha Christie's plots are.  Just when I think I've figured out "whodunit", she pulls the rug out from under me once again.  It seems like everyone has a motive in her stories and I love when her Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, gathers all of the suspects together in one room at the conclusion of the stories and drills them one by one in front of everyone else.

The first book my husband and I wrote together was in the spirit of Agatha Christie.  We took my experiences of working in a library and put together a cast of suspect librarians, each of whom has a motive for killing the U.S. Depository Inspector who comes to see if the library meets the exacting requirements of the depository program.  In our story, the victim dies when the mechanism that electronically opens and closes the compact shelves malfunctions and crushes him.  I was witness to a friend almost getting crushed between them, so it does happen.  I'll never forget her blood-curdling scream; luckily we were able to save her!  You will never look at librarians and library shelving the same after reading our homage to the "Queen of Mystery".

Death Among the Stacks: the Body in the Law Library

eBook at $2.99 at all your favorite online bookstores

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Honeymoon in NewOrleans

I wrote this romance novel and included all the fun places and experiences my husband & I have had in New Orleans and Louisiana.

Honeymoon in New Orleans

eBook available at most online bookstores for $1.99

New Orleans

I went to New Orleans for the first time on my 25th birthday.  Up until then, the farthest place from my home in Southern California where I had ever been was Colorado.  My husband and I arrived in New Orleans before dawn, and when the taxi drove us through the French Quarter to our hotel, I was amazed.  It was nothing like I'd seen before, and reminded me of what I'd always dreamed Europe would be like.  It was the first of many subsequent trips and the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

 Here are some of my favorite places:

Oak Alley Plantation  http://www.oakalleyplantation.com

Commander’s Palace  http://www.commanderspalace.com

Creole Queen  http://www.creolequeen.com

Palm Court Jazz Café  http://www.palmcourtjazzcafe.com

Park View Guest House  http://www.parkviewguesthouse.com

Lamothe House  http://www.frenchquarterguesthouses.com/lamothe-house-en.html

Felix’s Restaurant and Oyster Bar  http://www.felixs.com

#NewOrleans #Travel #Louisiana 

#Environmentalists against the #CatholicChurch

Here is Southern California, an ongoing protest movement against the building expansion plans for St. Michael's Abbey is a story that just won't go away.  There are very few open spaces left in Orange County and some people think that the priests shouldn't be allowed to build a nunnery, a cemetery, and a vineyard on their property in Silverado Canyon.  I would love to live next door to them any day.  I've lived here all my life, and have realized that the County is going to keep on developing more homes as long as people continue wanting to live here. You can't stop progress here in "The OC". More protests about the abbey's plans were scheduled for today.

Here's an interesting article about it:

http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2014/09/norbertine_silverado_canyon.php

We wrote about this controversy in our murder mystery novel entitled Murder at the Abbey: A Detective Santy Mystery.  It's available as an eBook or paperback at your favorite on-line bookstores.