Combining my background in horticulture ... and murder?

Here's an excerpt from Lilacs, Litigation, and Lethal Love Affairs, the first book in the Deadly Landscaping series in which Cassie Whittington, a 50-something ex-IT professional, is finishing a college degree in horticulture when her life takes a couple of unexpected turns ...

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I went to the old greenhouse and pushed open the door, drinking in the humid smells of dirt, plants and the sharp tang of fertilizer. The odors were a balm to my winter-weary senses. March in Minnesota is a month of tantalizing hope and we still had half-a-foot of snow on the ground. This greenhouse was an oasis in the desert.

I walked along the narrow entry aisle, paved with flat stones that lay unevenly on the gravel floor. This walkway led into the greenhouse proper, the three-tiered tables on either side loaded with ficus, spider plants, dumb canes, bromeliads and ivy. The plants effectively blocked my view of all but the intersection ahead and the bright afternoon sunlight over me.

I reached the intersection for the main aisle and looked to my right. Four three-tiered benches lined either side of the aisle, each loaded with assorted plants. The Boston ferns were kept in the center of the greenhouse, where the humidity was less variable in the leaky structure. I turned to walk to my left, into the main part of the greenhouse and as I did, I almost fell over a body.

Michael Peavey was stretched out on the floor, overturned plants, dirt, and pots scattered over and around him. My first thought was that he’d fallen. Then I got a closer look at his face. I’ve never seen anyone with cyanosis before, but I recognized the symptoms. They were drilled into those of us who took Nursery Operations 101. Michael Peavey had all the signs of a man with pesticide poisoning — fixed and rigid limbs, a blue tinge to his face, bulging eyes, and protruding tongue.

I froze for one long, awful second. Then I realized whatever poisoned him could still be in the air if it had been released as a vapor. I turned to flee and that’s when I saw the thin trail of blood, bright red against the white of a broken ceramic pot on the floor. I hesitated—was he just injured or was he dead?

I hazarded another look at his face and what I saw convinced me to get the hell out while I could. I dropped the ferns in a crashing explosion of busted pots and dirt then dashed out of the greenhouse, almost overturning a bromeliad on the way. I burst into the hallway then into the potting room, barreling into Ed Jenkins, who chatted with a group of students near the door. I grabbed his arm, almost spilling his ever-present coffee cup from his hand.

He took one look at my panicked face and set the mug down on a nearby table. “Is there a problem?”

An important dignitary and the chief donor to the school dead of pesticide poisoning in the Horticulture Department greenhouse? A problem?

That was the understatement of the year.

Always end on a hook

I don't know where I heard this, but someone said once, "Always end your chapter with a hook. Make the reader want to turn the page."

So often I'll write the opening scene in a chapter, and the ending scene. Then I figure out how to get from point A to point B.

Here's the ending of the 2nd chapter of Candy, Corpses, & Classified Ads, one of the first books I wrote (25 or so ago). I think this has a nice hook ....

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Setup: Molly Lawson's thought-to-be-vanished husband, Sam, has turned up buried under a rosebush in her side yard, dug up by a neighbor's marauding pig. Molly's ex-lover, JT McCord, is the cop investigating the case. Molly, her mother, Yolanda, and JT are talking while the police dig up Sam's body.

Oh, and Molly sorts her M&Ms by color, to provide a 'boost' -- yellow for happiness, blue for honesty, etc.

"I saw Sam at the Ottertail County Flower Show five years ago. He and Bobbi Jo were in the potting shed, having sex. I read him the riot act in front of God and everybody then I went back to judge the dahlias." I recognized the unbelieving look in JT's eyes. "It wasn't the first time I'd caught him and Bobbi Jo doing the tango. I told him if I ever caught him again, he was out. I caught him. He was out."

"And you're a woman of your word, aren't you, Molly?" JT said softly.

My face got hot with embarrassment. I'd said almost exactly the same thing to him twenty years ago when I'd seen him and Shirley coming out of the Tangle Butte Palace Theater, their arms around each other. My stomach clenched at the memory of pain and humiliation. "Yes, I am." I met his eyes. I was surprised to see no hint of anger, just an expression of perplexed sadness that suddenly made me melancholy.

The look vanished and the hard cop was back. "What did you see when you returned to the house from the show?"

“Shit, JT, it was five years ago." I tugged off my other mitten and fumbled in my pocket for my emergency stash of M&Ms. These were all my brown rejects, which didn't provide me with any psychic boost but the chocolate would help.

"Well, did you see a body?" he prodded, watching me extract four candies from the round zipped pocket dispenser I'd gotten at M&M World in Las Vegas.

"Of course I didn't see a body. The hole was filled in when I got home. I remember because the crew had told me they'd fill it in while I was gone and I was surprised to find they'd really done it when I got back." I glanced at Mark. "It was Jimmy Hunt's crew."

He nodded. "They're not the sharpest tacks in the box."

"You don't have to be sharp to dig a septic hole." I tucked my stash away then tugged my mitten back on. I jumped when the door slammed on the ambulance. "Where are they taking him? Am I supposed to identify him or something?"

JT put a hand on my arm and pulled me aside as the ambulance began a stately crawl down my drive. "That won't be necessary."

"How did he die, John?" Yolanda asked. I'd almost forgotten she was there, which was surprising given her propensity to dominate any conversation within a city block. I looked closer at her. She was a bit pale.

JT noticed, too. "You ladies should go in the house. I promise we won't dig up anything without asking you first, Molly."

I watched the ambulance carrying Sam away. "You're sure?"

JT nodded. "Go inside. I'll check with you before we start digging."

Mark put a hand under Yolanda's arm. They started toward the side steps that led into the kitchen. I followed then paused to glance back at JT. "How did he die? You didn't say."

JT was watching the ambulance trundle down my lane. Then he swung his gaze to me, his expression unreadable. "Looks like somebody stabbed him with a pitchfork. Did one go missing, Molly?"

I gulped and took a step back, almost landing on my ass as I hit an icy patch. I'd been missing my favorite pitchfork since the day Sam disappeared. I considered lying then knew I had no choice. I nodded dumbly, feeling as though I was choking.

JT turned to stare at the gaping hole where Sam had lain. "Looks like we found it."

 

Too many ideas, too little time

I've written quite a few books (25 or so at last count), and the ideas just keep coming. Here are where some of those past ideas came from...

Autographs, Abductions & A-List Authors: I was standing in line at a book signing at RWA National Conference and I thought, "could I kill off an author here?" Lo and behold, yes, I came up with a good idea for that.

That led to an entire series of books. The second book is Sun, Surf, and Sandy Strangulation, about a writing conference in Florida. The third book is Marriage, Mayhem, and Murderous Mystery Manuscripts, about a writing conference in Northern Minnesota.

Candy, Corpses & Classified Ads: I know someone who was jilted by the love of her life. She went on to make a new life for herself, but I wondered ... what would happen if he came back into her life? And what would happen if a supposedly vanished ex-husband turned up dead?

I had similar ideas for another series (my Gypsy books). PhDs, Pornography, and Premeditated Murder; Homicide, Hostages, and Hot Rod Restorations; Ex-Wives, Extortion and Erotic First Editions.

Brownies, Bodies & Breaking the Code: How many times have you had a company potluck and you just blithely eat whatever is out there. What if somebody wanted to poison someone?

Mist: I saw a "Missing" poster on a bulletin board, faded with time. What would happen if the Missing girl escaped ... and got her revenge on her abductor?

If Not For You: What if you got a letter meant for someone else? And you call that person and you start to realize that someone is trying to bring you two together? Why?



Well, you get the idea! I've got a lot of stories, and they all seem to be triggered by something I see, something I hear....

Later this month I'll tell you about my science fiction stories ... now *those* are some interesting tales to tell!

Glenys O'Connell says: Enough of Hallowe'en Horror - Let's Have Some Romance!

While I love a well crafted horror story, aka, Stephen King, I can't write the stuff. But I do a good line in murders – that's why I have Romance Can be Murder as my tag line. For example, the heroine of Judgement By Fire is a reclusive wildlife artist, Lauren, who is being stalked by an increasingly threatening unknown lover. She has two powerful men in her life – but how can she trust either of them when one could be her stalker?

In Resort to Murder, police detective Ellie Fitzpatrick risked her life to confront and arrest a serial killer. But Ellie has also got on the wrong side of a gang of thugs who discredit her so she's suspended from duty, her stellar career crashing and burning. When a biography of her serial killer, The Sunshine Slasher, claims the convicted man is innocent and more murders occur, she has to decide if there's a copycat killer or if she has been instrumental in a colossal miscarriage of justice by arresting an innocent man. Her return to duty brings her into conflict with Liam Reilly, the lover she believed had abandoned her when she was disgraced. When it's obvious she's the next on the killer's target list, can she rely on Reilly to help her stay alive – or will he turn his back on her again?

So, enough of the horror of romance! Because this is, after all, a blog about romance and love, I want to tell you a couple of true stories that came my way recently.

The first is about a lonely young church minister. His parish was in a rural Ontario village and as there was no manse, his lodgings were in the village tavern. Recognizing the young man's loneliness, the sage tavern owner told him: "A man isn't meant to live alone!"

Transferred to a new parish, he picked up a copy of the newspaper to fill in some empty time on a Saturday afternoon. There, on the entertainment page, was the picture of a beautiful young vaudeville actress – yes, this happened over 50 years ago! – and the young minister was smitten. He immediately wrote to her, but received no reply. It seems the young lady was used to getting lots of letters from smitten young men.

But undaunted, he wrote again, and again. He told her of his life, and how her picture had lifted his gloom. And eventually he told her he loved her.

Finally, intrigued, she took pity on him and replied.

After an exchange of letters, they met – and the rest is history. The minister and his wife just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary.

The next story is about a young boy who had a crush on a little girl in the same grade at public school. Despite the teasing of his classmates, he finally worked up the courage to ask if he could walk her home. But he had blackboard cleaning duty that day, and so she told him: "No, because my Mom says I must go straight home." She saw how disappointed he was, and added: "But I'll walk real slow."

She did as promised, and he hurried through his chores and managed to catch up with her, walking slow.

Romance blossomed,  and they married after graduation.

Fast forward through 64 years of marriage and the little girl, now an old woman, is on her deathbed. The little boy, now a very old man, leans forward and kisses her, tears in his eyes. With her last strength, she reaches forward and puts her arms around his neck to draw him near.

"I'm going straight home to God," she says with a wink. "But I'll walk slow."

Despite her somewhat murderous taste in literature, Glenys O'Connell is a sucker for a sweet romantic story. You can read excerpts of her work at http://www.glenysoconnell.com/ or email her at RomanceCanBeMurder@hotmail.ca

I am here ... I am here ...

... and happy to be here! {waving to you in the best Horton fashion}

I'm J L Wilson and I write mysteries, romantic suspense, time travel, and paranormal novels. I've been published with the Wild Rose Press, Resplendence, and Cerridwen and lately I've taken some of my older books, edited them, and self-published them.

Let's see, what else to tell you? Vonnie and I may come to blows, because I went to school at Pitt (boo, PSU!) Actually, I went to school a lot of places. I worked at several different universities and got a degree from each one -- hey, they paid tuition! It made sense to rack up those college degrees. I have 2 degrees in English Literature, 2 in Computer Science, and one in Horticulture (just for the heck of it).

I've been very quiet on the Yahoo loops lately because my hubs and I just moved. This was my 29th move in about 40 years, so it wasn't too traumatic, but it's still a big hassle just getting phones set up, internet connections, finding the grocery store -- all while working full-time. Yep, I write fiction almost full-time and I write technical documentation full-time (Vonnie, I'm not copying you, I promise!) I work for a multi-national gigantic software company that is not Microsoft, and I can telecommute, which is one reason we moved -- I don't have to be chained to an office.

That's good, and bad. Good because the view out my "office" window is woods and the occasional deer who wanders by. But it's bad because I am always at work. I try to cut myself off from the computer by 6 at night, but I keep my cell phone handy in case I'm needed. The work-life balance thing is skewed right now because we're in the middle of deadlines. I hope once that deadline passes in October I can get a bit more balance in my life. I hope by then we've unpacked and found everything, too!

Enough about mundane junk like work. On to fun stuff: publishing. I read my first romance novel in 2004. Wrote my first one in 2005. Signed my first contract in 2006. And now I have about 20 books out. I have 3 more ready for next year, and two more in progress. Most of my books feature older heroes and heroines (folks in their 50s), because, hey, I write what I know {wink}. I like to envision typical, everyday situations that suddenly go awry, throwing people into adventures they never anticipated.

Most of my mysteries are first-person (the "I" voice), and my other books are third-person. I really enjoy writing in 1st POV because I truly get into the heroine's head that way. For the time it takes me to write the book, I almost "am" that other person. And that can be kind of fun! I like to write series, too, and I have 2 series with the Wild Rose Press: the Fatal Writers' Conference series (starting with Autographs, Abductions, and A-List Authors), and the Deadly Landscaping Romances (starting with Lilacs, Litigation, and Lethal Love Affairs).

For more information about me, my genres, the other spots where I blog (3 or 4 places), and current info, check my web slog (a blog/web site combination) at jayellwilson.com.