Isabel Long Mystery Series

Missing the Deadline now in paperback

It’s a fact of my writing life that most of my book sales are digital. I’ve grown to accept that because it means attracting — and hopefully keeping — readers far from where I live. But I have great news for those who prefer a book in hand. Missing the Deadline, no. seven in my Isabel Long Mystery Series, is now available in that format.

So I will jump right to it, here is the link to Missing the Deadline.

As my publisher, darkstroke books, prefers, the Kindle version is released first, typically three months before the paperback is released. Frankly, I find the release of both an exciting development.

So, what’s this book about?

As it has happened before, Isabel finds her next case in an unlikely place — at a poetry reading. Cyrus Nilsson, aka the Big Shot Poet, is trying to make amends to the late Cary Moore, who you might remember was a highway worker who wrote poetry good enough for him to steal. He was even a suspect in that case, Isabel’s third. But the reading is to promote Cary’s book, ‘Country Boy,’ which Cyrus worked hard to get published.

Cyrus asks Isabel about taking on a case after the event, which was SRO at Penfield Town Hall. So, what’s this one about? Cyrus’s first literary agent, Gerald Danielson, was found shot in the head and near death outside his home three years ago.

Gerald survived but is not the same hotshot literary agent who moved from New York City to the village of Meadows Falls. Police ruled a failed attempt at suicide. But Cyrus has serious doubts. 

And as Isabel pursues this case, she quickly accumulates a list of possible suspects, such as a vindictive ex-wife, a jilted local writer, and even an apparently devoted sister who lives with him. 

Isabel also delves into the often frustrating world of publishing, which includes a trip to a literary conference in Vermont. She also explores a part of the hilltowns that is unfamiliar to her.

(By the way, Maria, Isabel’s mother and “Watson,” is glad to have a case once again. She says it’s boring without one.)

The books in my Isabel Long Mystery Series can stand alone, so you don’t need to read the first Chasing the Case. But it’s always my hope is that I will hook you into reading the rest.

PS I am half-way through Finding the Source, no. 8. 

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Isabel Long Mystery Series

When a Cat Becomes a Character

One of the amusing parts about being an author is having people ask if a character could be someone they know in real life. That happens a lot with my Isabel Long Mystery Series, which is inspired by the hilltowns of Western Massachusetts, where I live. I’d like to think that I’ve created such authentic characters, readers believe they could be living among them. But, no, I made them all up.

Missing the Deadline, no. 7 in the series, has an exception: the cat is based on a real being — our cat, Stella. They even have the same name. 

The fictional Stella is the pet of Gerald Danielson, a literary agent who was found shot in the head and left to die outside his Meadows Falls home. Gerald survived but is not the same hotshot agent who moved there from New York City. The cops ruled it an attempted suicide, but the person who hires Isabel feels differently.

Gerald lives with his devoted sister and has an aide who assists him. But his cat is the one who brings him comfort when he’s feeling agitated. Having witnessed how animal can do that in real life, I wanted to use that observation in this novel. (I also didn’t mind giving the real Stella a plug.) 

Gerald’s Stella is a stray that just showed up one day and took a liking to him. This Stella is also a Maine coon cat, who is particular about humans. She doesn’t pay any attention to Isabel when she comes for the first interview. Here’s an excerpt in which Gerald’s sister, Wendy, who has taken over the agency, talks about her brother. 

“Sometimes at night I read aloud from their manuscripts and he tells me in his way which ones we should consider. He appears to like that. And he has his cat, Stella. She’ll sit on his lap for hours. Inside. Outside. It doesn’t matter. That helps a lot. You can see her right over there. He calls her Stelzee.” 

Wendy points toward the window seat on the other side of the room. A cat, a Maine coon breed in multiple shades of brown, I believe, is curled, presumably asleep, on a mat in the sunlight. She shows no interest in meeting us.

My best guess is that non-fictional Stella lived on her own after being dumped by her owner during Covid. A good friend, who started feeding her outside her home, put a notice on Facebook looking for a home for the cat. And so she became ours. I named her Stella, so I could channel Marlon Brando when I call for her outside. We do call her Stelzee as well.

An amazing assassin, Stella spends time outdoors, killing any rodent that dares to come near our house, and indoors, often hours lying on Hank’s extended legs. All it takes is a light touch from a human and she purrs loudly. Stella has only sat on my lap twice and after three years has finally gotten used to me holding her in my arms but not for long. 

Eh, I don’t hold it against her, obviously not if I make her a character in my latest mystery.

Missing the Deadline was released Dec. 21 in Kindle. (Paperback readers will have to wait a couple of months, my publisher’s rule.) Thank you if you read my book.

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Isabel Long Mystery Series, Uncategorized

Writing about Strong Women

When I began writing my mystery series, I aimed to create strong women characters who know what they want and go after it. Topping the list, of course, is Isabel Long, the protagonist of the series, including the latest, Missing the Deadline.

From the start, Isabel was going to be a woman with some good miles on her. A recent widow, she has grown kids and a granddaughter. As for looks, she’s attractive enough to gain the attention of older men, like Jack, the owner of the Rooster Bar where she works part-time.

Isabel had a long career as a journalist — starting as a reporter covering the dinky hilltown of Conwell where she lives to being the top editor of the newspaper until that ended after it went corporate. When the new owner told everybody they had to reapply for their job, Isabel said, “To hell with that.”

Yeah, Isabel is a bit on the sassy side. She’s also savvy, which made her a great journalist. Now, those qualities and other transferable skills come in handy as a private investigator.

For her ‘Watson,’ I chose a 93-year-old mother, who lives with her. Maria Ferreira, a big reader of mysteries and smutty romances, gives her daughter ideas to ponder and even goes on interviews with persons of interest when there isn’t danger. Ma, as Isabel calls her, says she’s bored when they don’t have a case.

I will admit there is a lot of me in Isabel, which makes sense since I write the series in first person. I was also a longtime journalist. Maria was inspired by my late mother. The rest of the characters are fabricated.

I carry many of my characters throughout the seven book, thus far, including a favorite, Annette Waters. Annette — aka the Tough Cookie, Isabel’s secret nickname for her —  runs a garage and junkyard that used to belong to her SOB of a father. In the second book, Redneck’s Revenge, she hires Isabel to investigate her father’s death.

I so enjoy Annette’s no-holds-barred personality the men in her life enjoy. Her latest venture is singing lead in a band, fittingly called The Junkyard Dogs. In Missing the Deadline, she develops an interesting and unexpected romance , but no spoilers here.

Also in Missing the Deadline, we encounter new female characters. Wendy Danielson is the devoted sister to Gerald Danielson, a literary agent who was shot and left to die. He survived but isn’t able to run the agency, so she does. There’s also a vindictive ex-wife and a jilted local writer. One of my favorites is Tammy, a tough local gal who cleans for the Danielsons. She happens to be the sister of Lisa, Jack’s pain-in-the-ass ex, who unfortunately for Isabel keeps appearing in these books.

Other interesting women in the series have included Jack’s sister, Annette’s cousin Marsha, Isabel’s daughter Ruth, a woman police chief, a hoarding grandmother, plus the fearless editor of a small town newspaper. So far, only two women have turned out to be criminals. My lips are sealed about that.

But back to Annette. Here’s a scene from Missing the Deadline. In this case Isabel is investigating the shooting of Gerald Danielson outside his home. Isabel and her mother have stopped at a country store after meeting with the man’s sister.

Annette shakes her head.

“You two crack me up. So, what is it? Murder or missing person? Those appear to be your specialties.”

“So far. This one may be an attempted murder, but we don’t know for sure. Right now, people think it was a failed attempted suicide. Poor guy’s a New Yorker who moved to Meadows Falls. Maybe you’ve heard of him. Does the name Gerald Danielson mean anything to you?”

“Ol’ Gerry?” She laughs. “Yeah, I remember him. He used to have my Pop work on his car since we were a lot cheaper than the garages in New York. I believe Pop met his match. A real piece of work that guy. Kind of an asshole. Sorry, Maria,” she says. “I heard he tried to off himself. Didn’t it happen at his home in Meadows Falls? Too bad. Pop got killed in that fire earlier that year. Gerry came to his funeral. He asked if I needed anythin’. I told him to just keep bringin’ his car for me to fix. Course, that changed in the fall.”

I smile while Annette takes a bite of her muffin.

“You have a good memory,” I say. “You said he was a piece of work. Tell me more.”

“Typical New Yorker. He came here with heavy pockets and let us know all about it. Lives on Gorman Road in Meadows Falls. Bought himself a big ol’ house and had it fixed up. Lots of land came with it. But he and Pop got along okay. I’d be workin’ on a car in the garage and hear them go back and forth like two barkin’ dogs. Pop called him Gerry just to get his goat. Gerry called him Waters. He was kind of a dirty old man. The things he’s say to me when Pop wasn’t around. One day I picked up a wrench and said if his dick needed an adjustment, I’d be glad to do it for free. He got the message.”

“I bet he did.”

“We actually got along just fine after that,” Annette says.

As Isabel would say, you don’t mess with the Tough Cookie.

Missing the Deadline, which was released Dec. 21, is available in Kindle. Paperback readers will have to be a little patient.

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Isabel Long Mystery Series

A New Book at the Solstice

Today is the Solstice, in which winter takes its turn on the shortest day of the year. It also means the launch of my next book, Missing the Deadline, no. 7 in my Isabel Long Mystery Series.

I began this series with Chasing the Case when we still lived in Taos, New Mexico. That was in late 2016. One day I got it in my head that I wanted to write a mystery. I had already written books for adult and young readers, literary fiction and magical realism, respectively. One is even bilingual.

So, I sat down at my computer and the pieces came together fast for Chasing the Case. Extremely fast. That’s how it works for me.

It made sense that my protagonist, Isabel Long, would tell the story, so I wrote it in first-person, and because I want my readers to feel they’re in the middle of the action, in present tense as well

Here’s Isabel’s back story: she’s just come off a bad year after her husband died and she lost her job as a newspaper’s top editor when it went corporate. She is what the French call une femme d’un certain age. Isabel’s bit of a smart ass but she has a caring heart. Yes, I’ll admit there is quite a lot of me in her.

After a year of properly grieving, Isabel is ready for a new life. And that’s when we first meet her. She decides to solve a 28-year-old mystery of a woman who went missing in her town of a thousand people. It was Isabel’s first big story as a rookie reporter.

Isabel uses the tools she relied on as a journalist to solve this case. And she has a ‘Watson’ — her 92-year-old mystery-loving mother who’s come to live with her. (My late mother inspired this character.) Isabel also takes a part-time job at the local watering hole, the Rooster, where not only does she find clues for her case, but a love interest in its owner, Jack, a local guy.

I had such fun writing Chasing the Case, I quickly went onto the next, Redneck’s Revenge. Hey, I thought, maybe I’ll turn this into a series.

I struck out querying agents and publishers until I found Crooked Cat Books. Here was the message I got from Laurence and Steph Patterson in Fall 2017: “Thank you very much indeed for reaching out to Crooked Cat with your submission recently. We loved what we’ve read so far of Chasing the Case, and would therefore welcome the remainder of the story for our further consideration. Do please be in touch.”

And now Crooked Cat through its imprint darkstroke books has stuck with me through this series as well as publishing two of my hilltown books, The Sacred Dog and Northern Comfort.

Writing a series means I can hold onto the characters I love but let them do something else. That’s what happens in Missing the Deadline. Cyrus Nilsson, the noted poet who was once a suspect in a previous case, becomes a client wanting her to investigate the shooting of his first literary agent.

Gerald Danielson was found shot in the head at his home in Meadows Falls. He survived but isn’t the same successful agent who moved there from New York City. The police ruled it an attempted suicide, but Cyrus has his doubts. Certainly there are people, including a vindictive ex-wife, a jilted local writer, and even an apparently devoted sister, who might have motive. 

I will be telling you more about the characters, themes and settings for Missing the Deadline in future posts.

But for now I want you to know Missing the Deadline is live on Kindle. Paperback readers will have to wait a few months. Thank you to those who continue to read my books. 

Oh, one another announcement: I am well into writing no. 8, Following the Source. Wait ‘til you read what Isabel is up to next.

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Isabel Long Mystery Series

A Bar in Every Isabel Long Mystery

One constant in my Isabel Long Mystery Series is that each book has a bar. Make that two in Missing the Deadline, the seventh, which has Dec. 21 release.

The fictional hilltowns of Western Massachusetts are the setting for this series. I am talking about towns that have a thousand people or so. Many are a one-store, one-school, and one-church kind of town. Some might even have one bar, and for those that do, it is often a gathering spot for the locals. That’s certainly true in Conwell, where Isabel Long, the series’ protagonist, lives. 

Jack Smith owns the Rooster Bar and Grille, and Isabel pours beer and the occasional mixed drink or cheap wine from a box on Friday nights when a band plays. She and Jack have a relationship, which makes for some interesting interaction since he’s a local guy and she’s a newcomer.

And the Rooster’s customers, especially those Isabel calls the True Blue Regulars, are often great sources for the cold cases she’s taken on as a private investigator. Keen-eyed Isabel also observes the romances, lasting or not, that happen at the Rooster. My lips are sealed but Missing the Deadline has one of the most unlikely romantic hookups that starts at the Rooster.

Jack Smith runs a friendly bar, but do something stupid and you’re out for six months. Do it again, and you might be banned forever. It took an intervention from Isabel to allow the Beaumont brothers back in, but then again, they did come to her rescue in a couple of her cases.

Baxter’s is another bar in my series. It’s more of a biker bar, and Dave Baxter, the owner, isn’t so particular about who drinks there. In fact, many of the people who got kicked out of the Rooster are customers. Isabel will visit Dave because he knows what’s going on in the town of Caulfield and beyond. Sometimes she meets people of interest there. It’s a little tricky because Dancin’ Dave, his secret nickname, obviously has the hots for Isabel, but the feeling isn’t reciprocal.

One other bar has appeared in my series, Red’s Corner Lounge, in Dillard. This is a seedy little joint that was the setting for a pivotal scene in Killing the Story, the fourth in the series. The way the eighth book is going, I imagine Isabel will be making another visit there.

My hilltown books that are not part of the series have their own bars; The Sweet SpotThe Sacred Dog, which is actually the name of a bar, inspired by the owner’s loyal pet; and Northern Comfort

One of the fun parts about writing this series is coming up with the band names. Here’s a sampling: Junkyard Dogs, The Plowboys (all highway workers), and Country Bumpkins. Their genres as you might imagine are country, rock and maybe a little bit of blues.

I’m not a big drinker — one good craft beer will do it for me. But I’ve enjoyed the time I’ve spent in bars, raising a glass or bottle, and dancing with Hank when there’s a band. And bars are great place to people watch, a definite hobby of mine, and have conversations with people you barely know. 

I actually dedicated one of the books in the series, Working the Beat, to the former owners of a country bar in the hilltown where we once lived that has definitely been an inspiration.

And I feel fortunate our son, Zack, has created Floodwater Brewing in Shelburne Falls, the village where we live in Western Massachusetts. That’s a glass of one of his hand-crafted beers in the photo above.

Here’s a scene from Missing the Deadline. Isabel shows up on a Thursday night. Fred is Jack’s often annoying cousin who Isabel has dubbed ‘el Creepo’ for past misdeeds.

Jack greets me with a “Here’s my gal” as I walk through the front door of the Rooster. I don’t normally come Thursday nights. It’s typically quiet, so my services behind the bar are not needed. Burgers and fries are solely what’s on the menu. The only music comes from the jukebox, currently playing Toby Keith’s “I Love This Bar,” which could be a theme song for many of the drinkers here tonight. Although most have another workday tomorrow, they’re getting a jumpstart on the weekend, playing pool or just hanging around drinking and yakking about what’s going on in their lives or somebody else’s. As I’ve mentioned before, gossip is the biggest pastime in this town. The television in that part of the room broadcasts a baseball game with the sound off, but nobody is paying much attention since the Red Sox aren’t playing.

I take a stool opposite Jack, who places a cold draft in front of me. 

“You can put it on my tab,” I joke.

“I believe it’s time to make you pay up, Isabel,” he says, winking.

Jack’s cousin, Fred aka el Creepo, who sits four stools down, groans. He and I are the only ones at the counter. Fred’s got the best seat in the house, the one where you can rest your back against the wall that’s shared by the men’s room. Of course, the sitter is privy to whatever is going on there, which can be entertaining or disgusting. Maybe someday I’ll time how long the men in there take to drain a bladder full of beer and make a score board. I’m only kidding. 

“I don’t know how much of this I can put up with,” Fred says.

I take a drink before I dish back a comment.

“Where’s that gal of yours tonight? She dump you already?”

“Funny, Isabel. Very funny. Nah, she had to do somethin’ with her mother tonight. Things are just fine between us.”

“Glad to hear,” I tell him.

BOOK NEWS: Missing the Deadline has a Dec. 21 release on Kindle. Price? $3.99. Paperback readers will have to be a little patient. 

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