K is for Killer and ...

K is for Killer and…In most modern mysteries that is true. 

There is a tote bag picture floating around the internet with the phrase, "Don't annoy the author. She will put you in a book and kill you…" What an absolute good idea. 

To dispense with what annoys you whether it's a sibling, boss or company. The solution has potential for monetary value without criminal charges.

Got an editor who drives you to drink or thoughts of putting up your pen for good? Perhaps it' s time to write a new novel. An insurance company or agent pushes you to seek recourse? Reach for the pen instead of the sword. Skull Music takes insurance companies to task, as Arnold Beeblebox, former agent of an insurance company rebels against their harsh treatment but did he carry it too far? 

Do you see big business stomping the little guy? Read Ghost Music of Vaudeville or My Brother's Keeper for non-violent solutions, well the book may off a few people…but figuratively speaking you are off the hook, no malice or mayhem on your record.

K is for killer and Knapsack Secrets has its share, a modern mystery that shares the stage with homelessness, corporate greed and jealous rivalries in competition.

A good read is better than a small cell any day. So do the write instead of the murder.

P.S. Go to Amazon Kindle to get your hands on three deeply discounted

Kindle editions of Adrift ( a treasure trove of flash fiction) One Woman's 

Garden (organic gardening tips and tricks) or Mystery A-Z all three are only 

99 cents for a limited time. 

H is for Homeless, Helpless, Hero or...

H is for Homeless, Helpless and Hero or…Knapsack Secrets. Why? 

Homeless, yes; Helpless, yes; Hero it takes a while for her to discover that. Because Audrey is all of the above or so she thinks. 

Sometimes all that is needed is something to test our metal to determine if any or all of our thoughts are true. While Audrey is homeless, sort of, she finds a new home that is full of more love and life than the old one ever was. She may be jobless, but she is not without a purpose.

While Audrey is feeling quite helpless, when someone else needs help, she finds her own strengths and courage to help them and thus erase her own feelings helplessness.

Audrey is a hero to Valentine Azusa, and to her young friend Zip (you can meet him again in his own story Cold Water) she actually is her own hero when she makes up her mind to uncover what happened to her career, her husband, and her life but she also helps Valentine survive, and Zip come to grips with his quandary with gangs, homelessness and abandonment.  

Yes, Audrey went from homeless, helpless and destitute to friend, survivor and never homeless or helpless, at least for now. And now is where we live and all that really matters.

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Z Is For Zero, Zealot, Zip and...

Z is for Zero, Zealot, Zip in Cold Water and Zero Cemetery Lane

The grand finale of this A to Z Blog Challenge tour should end with a huge number, but instead it ends with the least number, zero. It could be Zero Cemetery Lane (A Cricket Sawyer paranormal Romantic Suspense) 

Or the address of The Bed and Breakfast Murders.

 Or, perhaps, our little friend Zip from Knapsack Secrets in his own young adult mystery suspense Cold Water.

All of these novels have one thing in common, the mystery element. Zero itself is a mysterious number, it holds the place of miniscule amounts or unfathomable mega amounts. 

The strangeness of the address number, Zero Cemetery Lane, is no accident. It is a real address in a tiny burg in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The address itself led to the creation of the mystery based on a piece of real estate not far from that address. Ask yourself who would feel safe having their address zero—no one—nothing could exist at zero—but it did— and the cemetery was close at hand with room for more to be planted.

Then whatever possessed a mystery novelist to name a character Zip, the character himself. Once profiled, an active African American teenager preferred the nick name to the moniker Ziegfeld. His nickname fit because of his restless, hurried manner of zipping from this to that and here to there. ADD, no, just super hyper activity of a busy mind and a need to move and the circumstances that wouldn't allow him the peace of home and mind.

All three novels play with Z. It may be the last letter of the alphabet, but when you are always last you try harder. And Z seriously delivers for a mystery suspense author.

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