Category Archives: Guest Blogging

10 Tips about…COOKING! (one of my favorite things in the world!)

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome award-winning author Peggy Jaeger to the Power of 10 series. Today, Peggy shares cooking tips and her latest release, A Shot at Love.

Here’s Peggy!

I love to cook…and I love to eat what I cook. But I don’t only like to eat my cooking. I enjoy dining out, and I especially love when I visit friends and they cook. Sharing a meal is something intimate – whether it’s shared by 2 people, or twenty. I feel we don’t spend as much time together, just relaxing over a home-cooked meal, as we used to. Busy lives, ridiculous schedules, endless social media outlets. All these things pull us away from a fundamental facet of the family: meal time. Sharing thoughts and events about our day, simply talking to one another face-to-face. As we fill and nourish our bodies, we fill and nourish our souls, our relationships, our minds.

And since I lovelovelove to cook (and eat!) I’m sharing 10 thoughts/tips concerning cooking and baking that I abide by.

1. Whenever you can, use fresh herbs. If you’re lucky enough to have a garden, make sure you give yourself a little plot of land devoted to cooking herbs. Basil, Oregano, Parsley, Thyme, Cilantro. The list is endless. Dried, container herbs are…okaaaaaaaay, if you have no other choice. But fresh picked is best.

2. Always use fresh produce. I can’t say this enough. Fresh is best. First, last, always. I understand that not everyone can get to the market everyday for the freshest ingredients. I get that! But if you can grow it in your backyard or even in a window box – do!

3. Baking uses formulas; cooking uses recipes, so you can experiment with recipes and should! The difference? You can’t change basic baking formulas. Bread will not rise if you don’t think you need to add the yeast the formula calls for! Just saying. But recipes are flexible. Want to add lobster to that mac and cheese? You can. Think some asparagus tips will taste great thrown into that alfredo? Toss them in. Be flexible here and experiment. It’s fun.

4. Cooks cook; chefs create. Be a chef whenever you can.

5. Involve the kids. What’s that old parable saying? Give a man a fish and he has dinner; teach him to fish and he can feed himself for a lifetime? I learned to cook young out of necessity. I was a latch key kid and my parents didn’t get home until after 8 most nights due to traffic concerns. I either learned how to feed myself or I starved until they came home. I learned to feed myself by learning how to cook. And by that I don’t mean I read the instructions on a box. I actually had a cookbook purchased at a library fair for 10 cents and taught myself how to cook from its pages. When my daughter was two years old I started teaching her how to mix, add ingredients, etc. Today she is a fabulous cook.

6. Have tasting parties. Remember tip number 4? I like creating stuff but I’m never sure it’s going to be a hit or a miss. Inviting a few friends over and telling them upfront what you’re serving and why, and you’ll be sure to have a fun evening, even if the creation falls flat. And having said that…

7. Never serve something new that you haven’t sampled first at a dinner party. I did this once. Once was too many times too much! I won’t embarrass myself with telling you what I served but suffice it to say for the next five years after my in-laws always took us out to dinner when they visited. ‘Nuff said.

8. Be willing to fail. And you can see this goes hand in hand with Numbers 6 and 7! Learn from your failures. Why was that bread so doughy and tasted uncooked? Did that chili really need that extra tablespoon of powder? Learn from you mistakes and failures.

9. Savor the old recipes. I have cookbooks that date back to the 1920’s in my collection of over 130 cookbooks. These were found at fairs, library sales, etc. Yes, most of the recipes call for real, heart attack inducing items like REAL Fat milk (not skim) and REAL butter ( not margarine) and REAL mayonnaise ( not low cal salad dressing). But the food from the recipes tastes delicious!! Every now and again it’s okay to make something the old fashioned – or pre-fat-hating way. I can’t imagine biscuits or fried chicken made without Crisco! And I won’t. Ever.

10. Give a family recipe book as a wedding gift. I started doing this about 5 years ago and every bride I’ve given it to has been overjoyed. I purchase a blank recipe book ( usually found in the scrapbook sections of stores like Michael’s Crafts store, AC Moore, or JoAnn’s Crafts) and then I insert several of my time honored and family recipes into it, leaving blank pages for the bride and her family to add their own loved recipes. I’ll even put in a few photos I’ve taken along the way of the way the dish is supposed to look. This is a gift from the heart that will feed and nourish the new family for generations to come.

Blurb

Nothing’s impossible when love is on the menu. In Peggy Jaeger’s luscious series, the only thing more tempting than a delicious meal is a truly delectable romance…

Look for exclusive recipes in each book!

Photographer Gemma Laine is looking for arresting faces on the streets of Manhattan when her camera captures something shocking—a triple murder. In that moment, she becomes a target for the mob—and a top priority for a very determined, breathtakingly handsome, FBI special agent. With deadlines to meet and photo shoots on her calendar, Gemma chafes at the idea of protection, but every moment she spends under his watchful eye is a temptation to lose herself in his muscular arms . . .

With two of his men and one crucial witness dead, Special Agent Kyros Pappandreos can’t afford to be distracted. But Gemma is dazzling—and her connection to Kandy Laine’s high-profile cooking empire makes her an especially easy mark for some very bad people. Keeping her safe is much more pleasure than business, but as the heat between them starts to sizzle, Ky is set to investigate whether they have a shot at love…..

Buy Links

Amazon | Kensington | Nook | Apple | Kobo | Google

Bio

Peggy Jaeger is a contemporary romance writer who writes about strong women, the families who support them, and the men who can’t live without them.

Family and food play huge roles in Peggy’s stories because she believes there is nothing that holds a family structure together like sharing a meal…or two…or ten. Dotted with humor and characters that are as real as they are loving, Peggy brings all topics of daily life into her stories: life, death, sibling rivalry, illness and the desire for everyone to find their own happily ever after. Growing up the only child of divorced parents she longed for sisters, brothers and a family that vowed to stick together no matter what came their way. Through her books, she has created the families she wanted as that lonely child.

Tying into her love of families, her children’s book, THE KINDNESS TALES, was illustrated by her artist mother-in-law.

Peggy holds a master’s degree in Nursing Administration and first found publication with several articles she authored on Alzheimer’s Disease during her time running an Alzheimer’s in-patient care unit during the 1990s.

In 2013, she placed first in two categories in the Dixie Kane Memorial Contest: Single Title Contemporary Romance and Short/Long Contemporary Romance.

In 2017 she came in 3rd in the New England Reader’s Choice contest for A KISS UNDER THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS and was a finalist in the 2017 STILETTO contest for the same title.

A lifelong and avid romance reader and writer, she is a member of RWA and her local New Hampshire RWA Chapter.

Where to find Peggy…

Website/Blog | Twitter | Amazon | Facebook | Pinterest | Goodreads | Instagram


Spotlight on Trixie Stilletto

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome journalist and author Trixie Stilletto. Today, Trixie shares her inspiring journey and new release, Do Grave Harm.

Here’s Trixie!

I grew up in eastern Tennessee where storytelling is a huge part of everyday life. My dear departed husband used to say we were all experts at telling whoppers. And in a sense, he was right. Sunday afternoon was for family. The first question? What’s new?

If you stuck to the truth, it’d be a mighty boring story. So my family expounded more than a little. We didn’t consider it “lying” just making the story more entertaining. I never considered writing those stories down until I took a high school creative writing class. Though I excelled and my teacher urged me to continue, it wasn’t a “job.”

Fast-forward to college. I was on track to become a lawyer. Mostly for the money. While yawning through pre-law classes, I thought about where I’d be going drinking that night. A classmate suggested I take a journalism course.

I went to the “Intro to Newspapers” class the next day and I was hooked. (My mother lamented that day until she died.) My path was set. I spent the next twenty years working for different newspapers all over the eastern United States, meeting my husband, another journalist, along the way.

In my free time, I read. Voraciously. Yes, newspapers but also romance, mysteries, science fiction, anything. In 1988, I wrote my first romance novel. It was terrible. Life intervened. I was still working as a full-time journalist and on my books when I got my first publishing contract in 2001. I thought my life was set.

As often happens when we’re on one path, it veers away from where we think it should go. A series of deaths (both my parents and my husband), two moves, and finally a diagnosis changed me forever.

In 2014, my doctors discovered a small lump in my left breast. It was a particularly aggressive type of cancer called Her2+. Surgery, chemotherapy and radiation followed. I may never be completely free of this disease.

While undergoing my first treatment, I came up with the idea for my newest release, Do Grave Harm, and Jennifer Atkinson. Like me, she’s a cancer survivor. Unlike me, she’s plucky, determined and dedicated. I hope you’ll visit my website to learn more. There are links listed with this post to online retailers where it is on sale.

A percentage of all proceeds will be donated to metastatic breast cancer research. Each October, Breast Cancer Awareness month, 100% of the proceeds will be donated to these charities.

Blurb

“Helpless” and “vulnerable” aren’t normally part of freelance writer Jennifer Atkinson’s vocabulary. But there’s nothing normal about her regularly scheduled radiation treatment, especially when she discovers that while she was fighting claustrophobia inside the massive machine aimed at her breast, someone was murdering the technician at the controls.

As the gruesome scene plays over and over in her mind, small details that didn’t seem significant at the time start the wheels turning. Soon she’s asking more questions than she’s answering for the seriously attractive investigating officer, Blue Bald Falls Detective Ben Manteo.

Despite Ben’s warning she should keep her nose out of it, Jennifer can’t resist using her limited energy to pick up seemingly unrelated threads that, inevitably, begin to weave themselves into a narrative. A story of lies, deceit, and betrayal that someone will go to any length to make sure never gets told…

Excerpt

Something wasn’t right. I didn’t want to panic, but I was starting to feel claustrophobic. Having a two-ton radiation machine sitting only inches from your chest will do that to you, especially when it seems you’ve been forgotten.

You’re not truly alone, Jennifer, I reminded myself. There were dozens of people down the hall in the waiting room. And this was a hospital. People were constantly moving around, even though they kept the radiation section closed off.

Repeating these things and more didn’t help. At that moment, I felt abandoned, as if no one knew where I was.

“Excuse me,” I finally called, hoping the radiation technician who’d brought me in here would answer, reassuring me.

Robert. I picture his name tag in my mind. Raising my voice, I called again, “Robert?” Nada. The room was probably soundproof with the door shut.

Panic sped up my breathing as I stared at the machine. It hadn’t moved after my radiation treatment had ended. That was the problem.

In my mind, the six inches between me and it had shrunk to three. My arms were starting to go numb, as well as my feet and legs. No one was coming to help me. I had to do something. Now.

Moving while under the machine was kind of tricky. I was a large woman, and I’d never been dexterous on my back, much to my rat ex- husband’s lament, I guess.

I kicked my legs out of their rubber support and, after several tries, scooted my butt down the metal table. Then I did an ungainly slide, like I was slipping under a barbed-wire fence. Except this particular fence was the size of a VW Beetle, and it seemed to be inching closer to me with each passing second.

When I moved enough that my head and neck were no longer in the plastic mold that kept me still during treatment, I banged the back of my skull against the table. “Ow, ow, ow,” I muttered, inching my way farther down it until I cleared the machine.

Finally, my legs dangled off the end. I sat up, took my first relieved breath in eons, and waited for my head to stop spinning. Freedom! I looked around the room, and everything seemed normal. Walking over to the plastic chair to my left, I picked up my long-sleeved cotton jersey and put it on. Since I got topless for my treatment, most of the time I didn’t bother wearing a bra when I came here. It would be one more thing to take off.

I moved to the doors. They’re made of thick steel and tightly sealed. No wonder no one answered me. They wouldn’t have heard me even if I’d shouted. I pushed on one a bit, staggering under the unexpected weight. When it opened a scant few inches, I peered around the edge. I don’t know why I was acting like a guilty person, doing something or going somewhere I wasn’t supposed to.

I hid a giggle behind a cough. Jeez, Jennifer, get a grip. Something still wasn’t right. In fact, I felt an overwhelming sense that things were horribly wrong.

“Robert?” Still no answer, so I pushed the door open a little wider. Now I could see the second lab and computer station. It was as dark as it had been when I came into the radiation lab at the Blue Bald Falls Cancer Center no more than ten minutes ago. I opened the door wide enough and stepped into the bright lights of the hall.

Robert had his head down on the computer keyboard like he was napping. The scalpel sticking straight out from the side of his neck and the blood pooling on the table down to the floor told me sleep had nothing to do with it.

Buy Links

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iBooks | KOBO

Bio

A southern girl, Trixie traveled north when she found the love of her life. Together, they enjoyed more than 20 years working as journalists. Now back home in Tennessee she’s writing stories that range from short hot romances with a kiss of humor to southern-flavored mysteries. She lives seven miles from the neighborhood where she grew up with two cats, an aging beagle and a host of characters waiting for her to tell their stories.

Get updates and win prizes by signing up for Trixie’s newsletter here.

Where to find Trixie…

Website | Facebook | Twitter

Find more information on Metastatic Breast Cancer Research here.


Born To Be A Storyteller

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

Welcome to my Second Acts Series!

Today, we have Soul Mate author Rayanne Haines sharing her inspiring journey and her debut novel, Fire Born.

Here’s Rayanne!

Finding my way to this second act of my life has been less painful, and more painful than I ever thought it could be. I grew up quite sheltered on a small horse farm. Naïve but also desperately unhappy in my home life and wanting something more. At nineteen, I married my teenage sweetheart. At twenty-three I had my first son. At twenty-six my second. At twenty-seven I was divorced, with only a high school diploma, and living in support housing trying to raise two little boys.

I always dreamed of being a writer. I often felt I was born to be a storyteller. Frequently felt that my dream world was more real than reality. My children are everything to me. But I also knew the only way I would survive being a single parent was to fight for myself and my dreams. So, at twenty-eight I enrolled in college to take a Cultural Management degree. From there I worked for different Arts organizations—An activist film festival, a record label, a local choir. My children were with me every step of the way, often attending meetings and work functions when babysitters were unavailable or unaffordable.

Six years ago, I made the decision to focus on my own art. I became the executive director for The Edmonton Poetry Festival and began my journey into writing. Yes, later than planned, but completely and organically the way it was meant to happen. In 2013, I released my first collection of poetry. For the next several years I focused on submitted poems to magazines and anthologies, as well as honing my performance style as a spoken word poet.

In 2015, the idea for Fire Born, Book One of the Guardian Series, came to me in a dream. I began the work of writing a novel, with no previous training and no real understanding of what I was embarking on. I muddled my way through the first draft, and the second before asking for support from a few authors I knew and respected. Their advice? Go back to the drawing board and ask your characters who they are, instead of trying to guess. It took me a while to understand what they meant. But eventually I got it. I looked at my own life, where I’d come from, what I’d overcome. I had to know my characters as well as I knew myself if I wanted other readers to engage with them.

After a year of learning, and re-working, Fire Born was picked up by Soul Mate Publishing. Very quickly after, they signed me to a four-book deal! I’ve just completed book two of the series and am starting on book three.

I’ve also completed a Novel-in-Verse that will be released in the April of 2018. The poetic novel tells the story of an Italian family’s immigration from Italy to Canada, through three female voices, in poems.

I’m also marrying the love of my life three days after the release of Fire Born. My Italian lover has been very much an inspiration for all the heroes in my novels. My children will be walking me down the aisle.

My second act was hard fought and worth every bumpy step. I truly believe I would not be here if I’d never divorced. The struggle created a strength in me that helped push me to reach for my dreams, to search for great love, and to write about strong women who will accept nothing less.

Blurb

Independent, tough as nails, and fierce to her core, Alex Taleisin can’t quite believe it when she has to fight for her life against something not-quite-human in the YMCA parking lot.

hat’s when her Aunt lets her in on the family secret. They’re Immortal – Elementals to be precise and Alex is the long-lost daughter of one of the strongest female warriors of their time.

Her Guardian (a freaking Dragon!) and the sexiest man Alex has ever seen gives her a choice. Go with him, learn how to control fire, and find her father’s people or try to survive on her own. It’s an easy choice considering she’s only twenty-six and the Elders may already be on her trail thanks to the run in with the nut job in the parking lot kick-starting her dormant DNA.

Enter an insane grandfather, a shifter with a hidden agenda, and a witch with a shoe addiction. Suddenly Alex is wishing for a quiet house in the hills with the dragon she’s falling for. But a fight is coming and Alex knows the only way find her answers is to trust her powers and become the warrior she was destined to be.

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Where to find Rayanne Haines…

Website | Twitter | Facebook

Joanne here!

Rayanne, your remarkable journey is an inspiring one that will linger in my consciousness. Thanks so much for sharing and best of luck with Fire Born.


10 Bridal Attire Superstitions

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome Soul Mate author Catherine Castle to the Power of 10 series. Today, Catherine discusses ten bridal attire superstitions and shares her new release, A Groom for Mama.

Here’s Catherine!

In my romantic comedy, A Groom for Mama, the minute Mama finds a suitable man for her daughter’s groom, she begins urging the heroine, Allison, to start looking for her wedding dress. So, I thought it would be fun to discuss 10 superstitions about bridal attire. Maybe I can come up with some you’ve never heard before.

Did you know…?

1. White wasn’t always the preferred color for a bride’s dress. The white wedding dress didn’t come into vogue until Queen Victoria wore white. Until then many women were married in their Sunday best. But to avoid problems in their marriages they had to be careful which colors they chose to wear. Here’s a handy rhyme they used to make sure they got the color scheme right.

Married in Red, you will wish yourself dead. Married in Yellow, ashamed of your fellow. Married in Green, ashamed to be seen. Married in Pink, your spirit will sink. (Some sources disagree with pink, stating ‘Married in Pink, of you he will think.) Married in blue, you’ll always be true. Married in Grey, you will go far away. Married in Black, you will wish yourself back.

Additionally, brown was not a favorite choice, because “Married in brown, you’ll never live in town.” A statement that meant to say their husbands would never rise in business or acquire riches that would enable the family to move on up. Purple was also out because it was considered a mourning color, favored by widows from their second year of bereavement on.

2. A bride should never make her own dress. This wedding superstition states that for every stitch of the wedding dress the bride sews herself, she’ll shed one tear during her marriage. Considering the amount of fabric that goes into a wedding dress, I’d think this could be a considerable amount of weeping. Best to let someone else shed those tears on your account.

3. The material the dress is made from is also important to the marriage’s success. Satin brings bad luck, and velvet threatens the wearer with poverty. A dress constructed with a silk, unpatterned fabric is best. If you use a patterned material, avoid birds or vines. Don’t ask why, because I could find the answer to why you avoid birds or vine patterns.

4. Finding a spider inside your wedding gown before you walk down the aisle is good luck. According to English legend, this creepy arachnid is actually a “best of luck omen.” Personally, this would freak me out.

5. Wearing pearls with your wedding attire can be a good thing or a bad thing. This wedding superstition goes both ways. For those with a glass half-empty view, pearls represent future tears. Wearing them will bring many tears and heartache in the marriage. For the glass half-full kind of gal, the luckier version of this states that the pearls take the place of the bride’s real tears, thus she’ll have a happy, tear-free wedding and life.

6. Just as pearls on your neck or ears can bring bad luck, so can an engagement or wedding ring made with pearls. The tears the pearls represent bring bad luck.

7. Once your man gives you that engagement ring, don’t let your girlfriends, or anyone else, try it on. If you do there’s a chance your wedding will never happen because the person who tried it on will steal all your happiness and luck—as well as the heart of your husband. I remember my mother telling me this superstition when my sister asked if she could try on my engagement ring.

8. If you’re thinking about going veil-less consider this: your wedding veil offers you protection from evil spirits, according the ancient Roman tradition. Hiding the bride’s face keeps evil spirits away. And if you wear flowers in your hair without a veil, you’ll be sorry you married.

9. Never try on your complete wedding outfit before the big day. To do so tempts fate. If you just have to see how you look in the whole ensemble, leave some piece off. Consider leaving a stitch open in the dress, or slip on just one earring, or one shoe. That might keep the fickle fates away, since the wedding outfit won’t be complete.

10. No wedding attire is complete without the bouquet, but take care in the flowers you choose. Brides are destined for happiness if the first flower they see on their wedding day is white. But if you see a red flower first you will have unhappiness and heavy care in your married life. You might want to consider the meaning of the flowers you choose, too. Flowers have a language of their own which has been used throughout history to express emotions from the giver. Roses represent love, that’s why they are a favorite of brides. A bouquet of yellow carnations could symbolize rejection or disdain. White carnations stand for pure innocence and love, and would make a lovely addition to a bouquet of red roses. So choose wisely when fashioning your bouquet and create the language of love you want for your special day.

I know I said I was going to give you 10 Bridal Attire superstitions, but I just can’t leave without talking about the one wedding attire superstition we all know and have probably followed to the letter in our marriages and the marriages of our daughters:

“Something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue.”

Something old represents the couple’s desire to hold onto important memories, something new represents the new union, something borrowed should be from a woman who has had a long and happy marriage, so her luck will transfer to your marriage, and something blue represents fertility in the marriage. And if you can find a sixpence for your shoe, stick it in that sole. You’ll have good fortune if you do.

Blurb

Beverly Walters is dying, and before she goes she has one wish—to find a groom for her daughter. To get the deed done, Mama enlists the dating service of Jack Somerset, Allison’s former boyfriend.

The last thing corporate-climbing Allison wants is a husband. Furious with Mama’s meddling, and a bit more interested in Jack than she wants to admit, Allison agrees to the scheme as long as Mama promises to search for a cure for her terminal illness.

A cross-country trip from Nevada to Ohio ensues, with a string of disastrous dates along the way, as the trio hunts for treatment and A Groom For Mama.

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About the Author

Multi-award-winning author Catherine Castle has been writing all her life. Before beginning her career as a romance writer she worked part-time as a freelance writer. She has over 600 articles and photographs to her credit, under her real name, in the Christian and secular market. Besides writing, Catherine loves traveling with her husband, singing, and attending theatre. In the winter she loves to quilt and has a lot of UFOs (unfinished objects) in her sewing case. In the summer her favorite place to be is in her garden. She’s passionate about gardening and even won a “Best Hillside Garden” award from the local gardening club.

Her debut inspiration romantic suspense, The Nun and the Narc, from Soul Mate Publishing was an ACFW Genesis Finalist, a 2014 EPIC finalist, and the winner of the 2014 Beverly Hills Book Award and the 2014 RONE Award. Her most recent release, A Groom for Mama, is a sweet romantic comedy from Soul Mate Publishing. Both books are available on Amazon.

Where to find Catherine…

Website | Blog | Amazon | Goodreads | Twitter | Facebook | Stitches Through Time | SMP Authors


10 Things about Susan Hogan…and Cozy Heroines

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome multi-published author Judy Alter to the Power of 10 series. Today, Judy shares ten interesting facts about Susan Hogan, the protagonist of her latest release, Pigface and the Perfect Dog.

Here’s Judy!

Susan Hogan is the protagonist of my Oak Grove Mystery series. I meant her to be a bit different than the stereotypical cozy heroine. To some extent, I succeeded, because my main beta reader confessed he didn’t like her as well as the women in my other series, and one reviewer called her “prickly.”

With this list, I give readers a chance to judge for themselves, but I hope the list will make you want to read about Susan’s crime-solving adventures.

–Susan Hogan, associate professor of English at the fictional Oak Grove University, is thirty-five, single, and never married; she has, in fact, a bit of a fear of commitment that sometimes gets in the way of her relationship with Jake Phillips, chief of campus security.

–Susan Hogan’s romance with Jake pairis, a cop (pardon, law enforcement officer) and falls into the cozy cliché trap of heroine and police officer but works well for plot purposes.

–Susan is an energetic, stimulating classroom teacher; her field is American literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

–Raised by a maiden aunt in Wichita Falls, Texas Susan would like to feel she’s a free spirit, but she clings to many of Aunt Jenny’s preachings about life, morals, and manners.

—-She can cut up a salad and set a proper table, but don’t ask Susan to cook. Jake is a master at the grill, and Aunt Jenny cooks everything from pots of soup to King Ranch chicken, but Susan can’t figure out Hollandaise sauce.

–Susan wears her hair in a spikey cut and runs her hands through it all the time. She can’t be bothered with hair-styling and prefers jeans or, at the least, slacks, hasn’t worn a skirt in years.

–Susan is not status conscious. She drives a battered, old Honda but would really love to go back and forth to campus on Jake’s moped. Since she once wrecked it, Jake fears for the safety of both Susan and his moped and has forbidden her to ride it.

–Susan was at odds with the former chair of the English department, and she finds university rules and regulations cumbersome and restrictive. Professors whose field is Renaissance literature seem to irritate her.

–Susan is cautious about warming up to people—the city police lieutenant, the sheriff—and she can get crosswise, as she does with Marge the waitress who thinks she’s guilty of murder, but she’s fiercely loyal to those she loves—Jake, Aunt Jenny and her paramour Judge John Jackson, her fellow teacher Ellen Peck, and newcomer to the series, Gus Conroy.

–Susan Hogan is, at best a free spirit, representing contemporary feminist thinking in moderation and without the extremes, but tempering her freedom with a bit of the traditional role of women.

In short, Susan Hogan is someone I’d like to meet and hang out with.

Blurb

Susan Hogan thinks she’s about to meet her maker when she confronts a rifle-carrying man, who looks like a pig, in a grocery store. Jake investigates the body of a young college student, shot in the back and found in an empty pasture. Aunt Jenny showers love on the new puppy a young man from the grocery gave her but she has to get rid of that heavy collar.

Susan is associate professor of English at Oak Grove (Texas) University; her partner, Jake, is Chief of Campus Security. Aunt Jenny, the maiden lady who raised Jenny, came to Oak Grove to help Susan, who was accused of murdering a coed in The Perfect Coed, first book in the series How much help Jenny was is debatable, but she made a fast friend in Judge John Jackson and stayed in Oak Grove.

Trouble in Oak Grove begins with the open-carry protestors in the store and leads to a shooting, breaking and entering, threats and an attempted kidnapping, a clandestine trip to the woods late at night. Will Susan Hogan land in trouble…or the hospital…again? Will Susan and Jake survive this as a couple? Susan is still prickly but she learns some lessons about life, love, and herself in this second Oak Grove Mystery.

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Bio

Judy Alter is the author of seven books in the Kelly O’Connell Mysteries, two books in the Blue Plate Café Mysteries; and two in the Oak Grove Mysteries. Pigface and the Perfect Dog follows The Perfect Coed in this series of mysteries set on a university campus. Judy is no stranger to college campuses. She attended the University of Chicago, Truman State University in Missouri, and Texas Christian University. For twenty years, she was director of TCU Press, the book publishing program of the university. The author of many books for both children and adults, primarily on women of the American West, she retired in 2010 and turned her attention to writing contemporary cozy mysteries.

The single parent of four and the grandmother of seven, she lives in Fort Worth, Texas, with her perfect dog, Sophie.

Where to find Judy Alter…

Blog | Amazon | Facebook


Adulting Writer Awards

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome Soul Mate Author Elle Hill. Today, Elle shares some of her inspirational and motivational designs.

Here’s Elle!

About a week ago, I received some grump-inducing news. As is my recent habit, come afternoon, I plunked down before my desktop and slapped my fingers on the keyboard. Writing time! That day, though, I glared accusingly at my computer, which, just hours ago, had delivered some pretty obnoxious information.

But slowly, peck by peck, all the while sighing and muttering angrily, I penned a little over 1000 words. After limping across the finish line, I’ll admit I felt pretty smug. I hated the world that day, and still I managed to write something.

I deserved a medal, or at least a merit badge. An author merit badge.

You know those adulting awards that show up from time to time on social media? I propose we authors have our own adulting award but for, you know, literary stuff. Given this, I have designed some awards. Please feel free to print out, distribute, or tattoo as needed.

Where to find Elle Hill…

Website | Twitter | Goodreads | Amazon


Spotlight on Anna Dowdall

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome Wild Rose Press author Anna Dowdall. Today, Anna shares her writing journey and debut novel, After the Winter.

Here’s Anna!

I love twentieth century romantic suspense, domestic suspense, Gothic suspense. There’s nothing more relevant today than these stories, currently enjoying a renaissance and often very well written—think Charlotte Armstrong, Patricia Wentworth—about women in danger and what they do about it. I wondered if I could write something like that. But spiked with a modern ending, otherwise how to bring in the unexpected every reader wants. And so I did. After the Winter is that book, a tribute to a lot of writers who went before me, and the first of a romantic suspense/mystery series called The Ashley Smeeton Files.

I’ve always loved to read and write. I had a working class upbringing, maybe they were forms of escape. When I was nine or ten I spent the summer writing a melodrama about Gwendolyn, Marigold and Ali, and their adventures in and out of a gated city redolent of the mysterious East. The paper I wrote on was some by-product of paper milling, maybe the ends of rolls, who knows. I don’t know where I got my flowery language—Gwendolyn had eyes like twin sapphire pools for example. Even then I was drawn to romantic suspense it seems! A few years passed, I did lots of things. I was a nurse’s aide, journalist, perpetual grad student, bureaucrat, translator, graphic artist and mother, I flew a small plane, I lived in the far North. It was all cool. But I still wanted to write.

First I tried YA fiction. (Sometimes I think I must be a glutton for punishment.) Book one was a listed semi-finalist for the American Katherine Paterson YA prize, and book two was same for an Unhanged Arthur Ellis—the unpublished category in Canada’s annual mystery prize. No takers though, among publishers or agents. And I still don’t have an agent.

I’ve learned a lot from my professional life. Writing is, after all, a job. Every published writer I’ve ever spoken to has routinized their work. When in the active writing phase I try to sit at my desk every day at around 9. I write as many days a week as I can for a few hours. I aim for a minimum of 1000 words a day.

I spend about four months planning a book. Planning consists of writing notes that eventually take a definite shape, with a list of characters, an ever-expanding synopsis and a timeline. I’m always impressed when people use special software for this, but I don’t. I have a notebook and pen always handy during the writing phase and write every random thought down. I also saturate myself during the planning phase in anything I think will be helpful for the story. My third book will have scenes on a train and I got into several novels involving train journeys. Even Zola’s La Bête humaine, cripes, which (spoiler alert) is all about people thinking about killing other people on and off trains, and then actually killing them—also on and off trains. I spend about six weeks revising, although revision is getting easier now as I write more and make fewer booboos.

The main thing is, though, I read a lot, 200 books a year I’m sure, maybe more.

I seek inspiration from books, my thoughts and feelings, paintings if you can believe it, real life. Someone once asked me if anyone ever recognized themselves in my work. I sincerely hope so. Of course, the resemblance would be 100% accidental! Book 2, The Au Pair, will be out in a few months and my denials will be twice as vehement.

Blurb

Rudderless after betrayal by her former fiancé, Montreal heiress Sally Ryder discovers her deceased mother had a secret life and she has a half-sister. Helena has written to Sally, inviting her to Midwinter, an isolated estate in Quebec. But before they can meet, Helena and her husband die under disturbing circumstances.

Sally decides to visit nearby Waverley for a few days nevertheless, to learn what she can about the sister she never knew. Her first shock is to find that her brother-in-law left everything, including Midwinter, to his beautiful secretary Janine. During a storm, Sally is unexpectedly snowed in with Janine and an assortment of Midwinter guests. It isn’t long before Sally becomes entangled with a handsome doctor from Boston in an effort to uncover the truth about her sister’s mysterious life, and death.

Meanwhile, the bodies pile up.

Buy Links

Amazon (Canada) | Amazon (US) | Barnes & Noble | The Wild Rose Press

Where to find Anna…

Website | Twitter | Goodreads | Facebook


In Praise of Handwriting

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

For decades, I eschewed cursive handwriting in favor of keyboarding and printing. That’s right—printing. After several students had complained about my illegible board work, I switched to printing on the blackboard and inputted almost everything else onto digital devices. I did sign report cards, checks, and other legal documents, taking extra care with my penmanship.

Since retiring, I’ve rediscovered the benefits of expressing my ideas the old-fashioned way. I have Julia Cameron to thank for that epiphany. A fan of Julia’s books, among them The Artist’s Way and The Prosperous Heart, I found myself incorporating Morning Pages into my daily regimen. At first skeptical, it didn’t take me long to realize the wisdom of her logic: “When we write by hand, we go slowly enough to record out thoughts with accuracy. On a computer, we whiz along, dashing our thoughts to the page.”

Continue reading on the Sisterhood of Suspense blog.