What Kind of a Tourist Are You? by Rolynn Anderson

I’m deep into the second release week of Cézanne’s Ghost, so forgive my many digressions.  My first announcement: I have a giveaway going on Linda Carroll-Bradd’s blog today, where all you have to do to get into the drawing is comment on novels that take you to exotic settings.  Like it…or would you prefer your novels were set in the USA?  If you’d take a moment to tweet about that preference discussion, I’d be grateful.  Here’s the tweet:

#Giveaway of an new #romanticsuspense e-book.Do you like novels with exotic settings? Leave response on http://blog.lindacarroll-bradd.com/interview/guest-interview-of-rolynn-anderson/ 1 winner!

Now, jump on over to http://blog.lindacarroll-bradd.com/interview/guest-interview-of-rolynn-anderson/ Comment, and you’ve got a chance to win an e-book of Cézanne’s Ghost. I’m calling my book Une turner de page; Une Grand Evasion, Danger et Amour à Aix.  (A page turner, a great escape; danger and love in Aix).  J Everything sounds better in French!

I have digressed.  Here's my topic for the day.  Aix-en-Provence is the setting of my novel, where an American tour guide, once Trip Advisor five-star rated, is suddenly losing tourists on his watch.  Where did they go?  And why does the FBI consider him a suspect?

What I want to know from you, more specifically, those of you who travel in the U.S. or abroad: Do you buy the services of tour guides when you travel to a foreign site?  My husband and I favor organized outings more and more these days; in fact, it was a trip to Normandy, France, that inspired my hero in Cézanne’s Ghost.  Our guide was a pro, highly rated online.  He also gave us lots of time to ourselves, to explore the sites, acutely aware the group had done their homework, and each individual/couple had certain goals in mind for the adventure.  Point is, he knew how to individualize tours.

Recently, in Quebec City, Canada (Quebec Province), one of my favorite tours was led by a culinary expert, who squired my sister and me and six other tourists, to the best, most interesting café’s and restaurants in the town.  We sampled specialties in each venue.  Yum!

The question is:  Are you the type to go it alone when you travel?  If you favor tours, do you remember a tour guide who did a good job for you?    

Cézanne’s Ghost-e-book and print… http://a.co/bQdl7jp

Three young American women vanish in 

Aix-en-Provence, France.

The FBI suspects their American tour guide.

Leon Beaudet, formerly a U.S. Olympic wrestler, is proud of his five-star guide business, but when tourists disappear on his watch, the FBI dredges up a violent episode in Leon’s past and tap him for the crime. Worse, his new tour group includes Aline Kerig, who is as beautiful and carefree as the three missing women. Leon is fascinated and puzzled by Aline even while he fears for her safety. She refuses to go back to the States, forcing the FBI and local police to involve her in the hunt.

           With the French tourist industry about to collapse and Leon as a prime suspect, how does he protect Aline and find his lost tourists?

Eight Suspense Novels Spiked with Romance and Exotic Settings

Cézanne’s Ghost-e-book and print… http://a.co/bQdl7jp

Web and Blog:

http://rolynnanderson.com

Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Rolynn-Anderson/188767867821613  

Twitter:

https://twitter.com/rolynnanderson

Goodreads:

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4990049.Rolynn_Anderson

http://www.amazon.com/author/rolynnanderson

She just inherited a million or so bucks ...

So why isn't Cassie jumping for you? To find out, you'll need to read a book or two from the Fatal Landscaping series ((Lilacs, Foxgloves, or Daisies). But here are few clues:

A million bucks? Really?

It's more than that, really. You see, I was raised alongside the Whittington family, who are rich as sin. When Granny Whittington died, she left me a boatload of money because she knew I needed it and the other kids didn't. She had some property and some good stock investments, and...

So has being rich-overnight changed your life?

It hasn't much ... yet. Oh, yeah, it added some complications. I just started a new job, working at a landscape nursery and my boss, Sam Barlow ... well, he and I are interested in each other. But it's awkward. There I am, with a bunch of money and there he is, just a working guy. He's a worried about it looking like he's after me for my cash, and I'm worried about spending too much and ..

But I don't have to worry much about it, at least not at first. The Whittington family -- some of them, at least -- don't think I deserve to inherit, so they've filed a lawsuit, stopping my inheritance.

That family always did have it's share of assholes, excuse my language.

How did you get involved with the family in the first place?

Man, that's a complicated story. You see, back in the day, my mother and I ran away from my father, who was an alcoholic -- a mean drunk, and one who took his frustration out on my mother. She took me and ran away and took refuge in a women's shelter. It was one of the first shelters of its kind in Minnesota, where women could truly hide. Mrs. Whittington (Charlie's mother) was a big supporter of women's rights and she helped us. She met us at the shelter and she offered Mom a job, being nanny to her kids -- Charlie, John & Becky, the twins, and Olivia.

Mom and I lived at the Whittington house (mansion, I guess it should be called) out in the rich part of time. Well, my dad got out of jail, tracked us down, and he came after us. He ended up killing Mrs. Whittington and he almost killed Charlie. I saved Charlie's life, but just barely. Mr. Whittington heard the gun shots and he killed my father. I was just a kid at the time -- hell, we were all just kids, Olivia was a baby and she almost died when my dad killed Mrs. Whittington.

What a mess, huh? Add to the mess the fact that my Mom and I remained with the family, Mom acting as nanny to the now-motherless kids. And I ended up marrying Charlie, but we got divorced after a few years. We stayed good friends, though, which complicated my life like crazy when Sam showed up.

How did you get involved in 3 murders?

I didn't "get involved". Well, okay, I did get involved because Sam was accused of Murder #1, and I was pretty sure he didn't do it. And Olivia's fiance was accused of Murder #2, and I was sure he didn't do it. And Charlie -- then I -- was accused of Murder #3 and I damn well knew we didn't do it.

So I ended up doing a bit of sleuthing. What else could I do?

Tell me more about the murders. Who was killed and who else was there? Who --

Nope. If you want to know more, you have to read the book to find out. I'll tell you this about me: I'm in my 50s, I'm happy being a landscape designer, I used to sing professionally and I still sing at weddings, funerals, and other occasions, I didn't mind being broke a lot of the time, and I'm accustomed to taking care of myself. Having Sam show up in my life was a shocker, that's for sure. And having Charlie tell me he still loved me after all those years ...

Oops. Just gave away a plot point. I'd better quit while I'm ahead!

My Very Special Muse Is Gone

 by Glenys O'Connell

We've been talking a lot about the women who've inspired us, motivated us, given us an example to follow or stood up for our rights to fulfill our dreams.

This might sound a bit hokey but I believe that sometimes we can draw our greatest strengths and inspirations from sources that aren't, shall we say, human. I know many people who quietly proclaim that their pet – whether that creature is a dog, a duck, a pot-bellied pig, a horse, goat or cat (I've heard them all) - have brought comfort, friendship, and motivation at times when loneliness, grief, health problems or some other bump in life's road has brought them to the point of giving up their hopes and dreams.

One such was my very special Muse, Miss Martha the Cat. You can see from her pic that she's special – one look in those deep eyes when I saw her Ontario Humane Society Shelter photograph had me hooked. A visit to the shelter in Kingston and I knew that Martha and I were meant to be together. We were soul mates.

When I first met Miss Martha (her Shelter name was Skittles – nowhere near dignified enough!) I was grieving deeply at the loss of my beloved LucyFur, a cat I’d adopted while in Ireland and brought back with me when I returned to Canada. I thought my heart would never recover from his loss, but Miss Martha seemed to sense the way I felt – she would curl up on my lap, purring loudly, and look into my eyes as if to say" "It will be all right – you'll see!"

It was a look I was to see many times from her in the five years or so I was privileged to know her. As every writer – indeed, every living human being – knows, life can deal some awful curve balls. Contracts you are sure of suddenly fail to materialize; jobs you'd set your heart on don't come; people let you down. But Miss Martha knew that there is one truth in life – you lie in a sunbeam for a while thinking, then you pick yourself up, dust yourself down and go on.

An independent minded lady, Miss Martha seemed able to look into your very soul. She'd known some hardship in her day. Her first owner had obviously loved her, despite having her declawed. But one day she had packed up her possessions in boxes and moved away, leaving Miss. Martha with a friend. Poor Martha had eventually settled in and, five years later, her new owner pulled out boxes and began packing. Martha found herself in a cage at the Humane Society. In her feline mind, two humans had betrayed her trust, and when we adopted her at the age of ten, she seemed to hold herself back as if afraid to trust us totally.

Then disaster happened.

Off wandering her domain, Miss Martha got lost. Maybe she was chasing a butterfly, maybe hiding from that nasty old tom cat who lived three houses away, I don’t know. But Miss Martha got lost. But we advertised, drove many, many miles to areas where people phoned to say they thought she'd been sighted, and shed many tears at each disappointment.

Then a notice appeared in our village post office: Male Cat Found. Grey & White. Desperate, I took a chance and called the number. The teen who answered said the cat was a neutered male (Oh, how Miss Martha would have railed at that indignity!) but when I asked if she was wearing a neon pink collar, it became obvious this lady was no tom cat! We drove over to the next township to claim her, paid a humingous vet's bill, and brought her home.
She was found five weeks after disappearing by some kind souls spending a summer weekend at a cottage on a nearby lake. She was in awful shape – skin and bones, her paw caught in her collar and her neck and shoulder seriously cut and painfully infected. We'll never know what she lived on in those weeks.

And from the moment she came home, Miss Martha found her trust again. She loved us – after all, hadn't we come and found her when she was lost? She would sit on my desk watching as I wrote, adding her own comments by walking across the keyboard, and she'd sense when the story wasn't going well and come and sit on my lap to make sure I didn't give up and walk away. Or she'd curl up on my office chair with her friend, O.J. (Orange Juice)- see below.. Her presence was an inspiration.

Sadly, when Miss Martha was almost 16 years old, she developed problems with her innards. Discreetly, she was seriously constipated. She lost weight, although she still caught mice which she presented on the door step as if a gift. But the day came we knew she had to go to the vet.

That's when we learned about Feline Megacolon. Apparently cats – usually older ones but not necessarily so – can suffer from a weakening of the bowel muscles. That's why it's important to ensure they get a diet that has some fibre, although not too much as that can actually cause constipation.

Miss Martha was kept at the vet's overnight for an enema. For some reason, and we still don’t know exactly why, the procedure led to her bowel being perforated.

Miss Martha died in my arms, peacefully, in the small hours of the next morning.

We buried her by the cedar tree close to her favorite napping spot in the long grass.. She left behind a family who still grieve, and a writer who wonders if she'll ever find a Muse like Miss Martha.

If you have a cat, do look out for bowel problems. There's lots of info on the Internet, but I also found a group of terrific people online who share information and support about Feline Megacolon – you'll find them here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Feline_Megacolon/  I found them too late for Miss Martha, but I'm writing this in hopes of helping someone else with a furfriend in need of help.

Cat lover Glenys O'Connell writes romantic suspense and cosy mysteries, and her work can be viewed on http://www.glenysoconnell.com/ She also writes non-fiction books such as Depression: The Essential Guide and PTSD: The Essential Guide, and when not writing enjoys poking about in other people's minds as a counselor.

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.

Introducing another Roses of Prose author: romantic suspense writer Glenys O'Connell

I'm delighted to join the talented writers at Roses of Prose, but I hate it when people ask me to introduce myself. I mean, I'm a writer – that's about the closest you can get to multiple personality disorder without being in a psych ward. Really.

Let's see, here's the mundane stuff. I'm a wife, mother of four, and slave to two spoiled felines. I'm a country girl at heart and I live out in what my kids call The Middle of Nowhere in Ontario, Canada. It's actually a beautiful area of lakes and forests, you know, the kind of place where even the poorest locals feel sorry for the 'summer' people who own the very expensive lakeside cottages – after all, we get to live here all year round, while they, poor things, just get to visit!

That said, I've lived in some big cities, too, and they're all reflected in my writing: Toronto, Canada; Dublin, Ireland; Leeds, Yorkshire, England; Cambridge & Bedford, England. I adore Italy and France; could wander around Rome for hours, although the traffic in Paris scares the…whatever out of me! But I'm at my happiest back in the Middle of Nowhere, tending my garden, feeding the birds, sitting out on the patio and writing (see the pic). And in my spare time, I'm a counselor and enjoy poking about in other people's minds.

That's the boring part. There's another part of me, too – the Woman in Jeopardy part. I've been a Canadian wildlife artist, loved by two powerful men and stalked by a killer (Judgement by Fire). I've been a struggling female Irish private investigator, making a living by testing the seducability quotient of husbands and boyfriends for the insecure woman in their lives while coping with a jewel thief, a crazy grannie and a homicide cop who writes sexy romances (Winters & Somers). I've been a British special crimes task force detective, framed by a gang of thugs and stalked by a psycho killer (Resort to Murder). Still in Britain, I've been an aristocratic lady, broke and determined not to be the last of the 500 year old line, so I've gone off with my BFF to snare an Irish millionaire (Marrying Money). I like a bit of mystery and the odd – with the emphasis on odd – murder with my romance.

I've also been a lonely little boy whose best friend is a magic talking pebble (the Pebble People Save the Day, The Pebble People Make a Garden) but we won't talk about that now.

In my next incarnation, I'm a counselor living in a small Ontario village. However, because characters are drawn from real life, no matter how we try to disguise them, I guess I'll have to move far away before that one hits the book stores.

And, in order to lure other unsuspecting would-be novelists into my strange world, I teach a quirky online creative writing course titled Naked Writing: The No Frills Way to Write Your Novel. Soon to be made into a book by the same title.

So that's my introduction, my life in a nutshell. I hope you're still awake and you'll come and visit the Roses of Prose often – especially on the 8^th and 29^th of each month. Those are my blogging days, and I don’t want to be all alone out here….

Glenys O'Connell is currently working on a romantic suspense series about a counselor who attracts more than her share of nutzoids, and a book on creative writing coming in September. Her work has been published by The Wild Rose Press and Red Rose Press (what is this with roses?) She also writes non-fiction, with her latest book, PTSD: The Essential Guide,  also due out in September. If you still want more, you can find her at her web site: Romance Can Be murder, www.glenysoconnell.com; on Twitter at http://twitter.com/GlenysOConnell; Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/glenys.oconnell. She also hangs around other blogs while trying to escape the voices in her head.