New release sample: WHITE ROSES

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

 

"Likely prospect?" he greeted Angela, as she came back down the hall. They paused in front of the large room where the reporters worked.

"Maybe. But we really don't have any openings. Something about her caught my attention. I'm not sure what." She rubbed her temples and attempted a smile. "Please tell me Dad isn't trying to install another arcade game on the file server?" She gestured at the cluster of workers gathered around the stacked unit of CPUs and printers, with a jungle's worth of cables leading out to the other computers in the office.

Andrew Coffelt had inherited the Tabor Picayune from his father and had gladly embraced every advance in technology. Curt sympathized with Angela, because her father was a little too eager to rest on his credits as publisher, semi-retired yet still in the office every day. His delight in trying out new software on the office system was a constant source of frustration for Angela. The only thing that kept her from banning her father from the office was the fact that his experiments hadn't interfered with the publication of the paper. Not yet, anyway.

Curt suspected that even if Andrew caused a power blackout of downtown Tabor Heights for a week, Angela still couldn't ban her father from the paper. They both loved it too much. He just wished she wasn't stuck with being the adult while her father enjoyed his second childhood.

"I think he's just checking out the FBI site that Loni decided to access. Tracking the White Rose and identifying him has become the favorite hobby here," Curt offered.

"Unfortunately." Angela's brown eyes lost focus. Then she shuddered, wrapped her arms around herself, and continued down the hall to the lunchroom, her shoulder-length black hair streaming out behind her with the impetus of her exit.

"Something wrong?" He followed her.

"Everything lately reminds me of the White Rose. That woman who was just in here—”

"Looks like both his targets?" He nodded when she stared at him. "I noticed. She reminded me of someone I knew when I was a kid."

"You might have known her. Toni said she lived here for a few years. Toni Napolitano. Sound familiar?"

Curt started to say no, then choked. "Short for Antoinette?"

He remembered Angelique's little sister, trying to tag along with them when their gang from school went to play kickball. A scrawny kid, she pouted a lot when Angelique told her to stay home. Curt thought she was four years younger than him, putting her in third grade while the rest of them were in seventh.

"Yes, Antoinette. Her credits are impressive. She brought a folder full of clippings." Angela sighed and put down the coffee carafe without filling her mug. "We can't really afford another reporter on staff right now. But it wouldn't be fair to just tell her no without at least examining her work."

"Look at it this way." Curt's smile felt stiff. "She looks so much like the White Rose's targets, would you feel right giving her a job that would have her all over town, letting him get a good look at her?"

"That's not funny." She dumped cream and sugar into her cup before reaching for the carafe again.

"I wasn't trying to be funny." He glanced toward the open door of her office. "So, those clippings she brought. What did she write?"

"Everything. Her specialty seems to be investigative reporting. If you ever feel like you need a partner, I'd seriously consider her."

"Nah, not yet." Curt stayed in the kitchen when Angela went back to her office.

Investigative reporter, huh? He felt sick with the certainty of what brought Toni Napolitano back to Tabor Heights. Somehow, she had heard about the White Rose, the two women he had terrorized, the one he had killed. She heard about the notes, demanding undying love and purity; the white roses left on doorsteps and even inside the victims' houses. The threats against any men who trespassed on his territory. 

Just like he had done, had Toni made the connection between the White Rose and her sister's murder? Did she feel duty-bound to hunt him? Just like Curt felt duty-bound? After all, he found Angelique's body, left lying like so much discarded forest trash in the park.

 

Upcoming release: INQUEST

Ye Olde Dragon Books

 Releasing March 1

These are the adventures of  the E&D ship, AFV Defender. While they aren't quite as death-defying as a certain other notorious ship in the Fleet, they're developing a legend of their own. Some good. Some bad. But most important, they're a family, with all the benefits and drawbacks.

Every day is a new adventure. If their misfit luck doesn't finally run out on them.

 

INQUEST: AFV Defender Book 4

 

Signals are coming from beyond the edges of charted space. All indications are that they are being generated by the broken pieces of a Gate, used by the ancient Gatekeepers to scatter all the Human races across the universe.

 

Except that as far as anyone knew, nothing could dent a Gate, forget break it. Yet the legendary warrior, Etrusca, scattered pieces of broken Gate across known and unknown space. Now, a response is coming in. As one of the top E&D (Exploration and Diplomacy) ships in the Alliance Fleet, the Defender heads across the galaxy to find out just who or what is sending the signal.

 

Except this time, they've been partnered with the Inquest. The only ship in the Fleet with a stranger reputation and record than the Defender. The notorious Captain Illean Shryne and her crew of rule-breakers and miracle-workers always manage to escape from the jaws of death and return covered in glory. Unfortunately, the ships sent on missions with them don't fare so well …

 

New release sample: BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

 

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

“He claims I broke his heart,” Cilla said, punctuated by the snap of the measuring tape as it retracted back into its case. She snickered as she wrote down the measurements of the display window.

“Grandpa should have broken his head.” Melba chuckled. “Our grandparents had that big old house the Gallery took over. We used to have sleepovers, all the cousins, maybe once a month. Ernie decided he would play Romeo and tossed rocks at the dormer windows to get Cilla’s attention. The problem is, he used really big rocks and broke Grandpa and Granny’s bedroom window. The big buffoon actually refused to pay to replace the window, because he claimed Granny insulted his family, getting her landscaping rocks from someone else. Can you believe that?”

“Ernie’s father and uncles had a landscaping business,” Cilla explained.

“Well, that’s a chunk of Cadburn history I never heard,” Tracy said, punctuated with a chuckle. “So Miss Cilla, you’re a heartbreaker, are you?”

“There’s gotta be a heart to break,” she muttered, and stepped over to the built-in counter that divided the front room in half, lengthwise. She extended the measuring tape down the long side and paused to run her fingers over the dings and gouges and dents and what certainly looked to Melba like burn marks in the wood.

“Some common sense would have been nice, too,” Melba added. “Remember the time he showed up to take you on a date, and he wouldn’t take no for an answer because he had paid Boyd for the right to take you out? He wanted exclusive access to you for the entire week.”

“Wait,” Tracy said. “Who’s Boyd?”

“Our money-grubbing cousin.”

“Makes those stereotyped ambulance-chasing lawyers on TV look like Boy Scouts,” Cilla added. Then she giggled. “Remember the time he tried to convince Aunt Myrna to join some pyramid scheme, and when she didn’t give in fast enough, he stole the old glass piggy bank where she put her egg money? She went chasing after him with her rolling pin and he fell going down the steps and …” Her laughter faded into a sigh and she shook her head. “Oh, my, listen to me. Gossiping.”

“It’s not gossip if you’d take Ginny’s advice and put all those family memories into a book and sell it as humor,” Melba said.

“And get sued by three-quarters of the family for embarrassing them.”

“They did it to themselves!” She snickered. “We really should. Even if it’s just as a joke. Let’s talk to Charli Hall, since she knows writing. Or Saundra Bailey. What do you say?”

“It might be fun,” Cilla admitted and chuckled.

New release sample: WHITE ROSES

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

 

"The White Rose?" Ted Gruber, the senior advertising rep, sauntered into the room. "Bet you anything he got rejected by e-Harmony. Maybe we should get the cops to subpoena them to open up their records."

Curt and Max exchanged glances. She muttered about a queue full of stories that needed to be edited and hurried out of the lunchroom. Ted sidled up next to Curt and went up on his toes to see through the gap into Angela's office. He whistled.

"Who's the cutie? Looks kind of familiar... Hey, is she victim two? What's her name, Karen? Kate?"

"Katrina," Curt muttered. "That's not her."

His stomach twisted and he stared at the young woman, standing now and shaking hands with Angela. Make her hair longer, exchange that brown blazer for a fuzzy pink sweater, and make her twelve years old… she could be Angelique Napolitano.

But Angelique was dead. Nearly twenty years now.

Curt shook his head. He was seeing Angelique everywhere, lately. He had nearly knocked himself out on the basketball court two weeks ago, when he looked up in the stands and thought he saw her sitting there, cheering for Tabor Christian's team in the inter-church basketball tournament. The look-alike was Sheila McGuire, Officer Frank McGuire's niece. Her parents were Army doctors, both on duty overseas.

Ted stomped over to the coffeemaker and tossed a quarter into the donation jar. Everyone was supposed to put in fifty cents for the coffee. "Some loony thinks he's in love and plays Cyrano DeBergerac, spouting love poetry from the bushes. When the girls get scared, he gets nasty." He spilled coffee on the counter, then scattered as much sugar as he put in his coffee. He picked up the sponge from the tiny sink, made a half-hearted swipe at the mess, left it sitting there, and headed out of the lunchroom. "What happened to the good old days when a guy saw a girl he wanted, clobbered her over the head and dragged her back to his cave?" He disappeared down the hall to the front of the long, narrow office space.

"I bet you got rejected by e-Harmony, too," Curt muttered.

He heard the doorknob click and pretended to read the six-month-old copy of Writer's Digest. He sauntered to the doorway of the lunchroom, watching from the corner of his eye as Angela walked the stranger to the front of the office. The long hallway down the far side of the office unit went from front to back, giving Curt a clear view of the traffic at the front door. He watched Angela and the Angelique look-alike shake hands. Several knots of tension in his gut and shoulders loosened when the young woman walked out the door.

Upcoming release sample: INQUEST

Ye Olde Dragon Books

 Releasing March 1

 

“We need you to find them.”

“Two elderly Nisandrians in a galaxy with nearly four dozen Human-habitable worlds, three times as many orbital stations and platforms, and that’s just what belongs to the Alliance. Knowing Great-grandfather, he’ll decide the smart move is to hide on a planet unfriendly to the Alliance, because no one would expect him to go to a place that would gladly sell him out to Nisandros.”

“Well, not exactly …” Jeyn glanced at Ashrock. He nodded.

“You know where they went?”

“Not where, but to who. At least, we hope so.” She shrugged again. Yes, M’kar was getting irritated by that gesture. “Your brothers.”

“My brothers?”

“Ashar, Bannar—” Ashrock began.

“I know their names. Why would Great-grandfather and … No.” M’kar’s head hurt with the new load of possibilities and theories cramming into her brain. “Oh, yes, that will make them so much easier to find. Just look for a free-trader ship broadcasting Nisandrian registration, with several pirate-for-hire ships chasing them across the universe. Just how do you expect me to talk my captain into putting the Defender in the middle of that fight? We have families on board. Most of those children consider you their adopted grandparents.”

“Yes, and that reminds me, we want to have a festival, now that—”

“Po’pa!” Her fists ached slightly from the single, hard slam that made the bowls and serving platters and mugs bounce a good five centimeters.

“It isn’t that bad.” Jeyn reached to pat M’kar’s arm. “Your brothers are the logical choice, because they’ve been in constant contact with Aquid for years now. In fact, we found out they’ve been in contact since the day they fled Nisandros, going on missions for Etrusca.”

“How?” M’kar shook her head. “No, don’t tell me. I can guess. All three of them are just rebels and idiots enough to think Great-grandfather’s crazy notions are good ideas. I wondered how Etrusca managed to send pieces of the Gate off planet all these years. Now I know. It makes too much crazy, twisted sense.”

“If it’s any comfort, they also left because of the pressure to kill you,” Ashrock offered. “Most of our clan didn’t have any problem obeying the prophets who demanded your death, but your brothers did. They were tired of getting into battles with their cousins.” He chuckled. “Mostly because it got so boring, winning all the time.”

A strained bubble of laughter escaped M’kar. Maybe in a few days she would find some comfort in knowing that yes, her brothers did like her, enough to not want her dead. And yes, it was some comfort to know a thirst for adventure had sent them away from their homeworld. They hadn’t left because they didn’t want to be around their half-blood sister.

“All right. I’ll ask Genys what we can do. Treinna will have to pull a couple dozen strings to get people watching to catch the gossip. But that’s about all I can do without taking leave and hiring a courier ship and going hunting on my own.”

Ashrock accepted that just a little too easily. M’kar had the awful feeling there was still much he hadn’t told her.

All in all, she was glad to watch Le’anka and Anwesta vanish behind the Defender as the ship headed out on its next assignment. It was a blessedly boring one for a change, making a wide circle of stations, dropping off and picking up equipment and personnel and dealing with various technical problems that required the miracle-working skills of Jasper Lore and his Engineering department.

New release sample: BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

 

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

“Okay.” Cilla took a deep breath and put down the last page of the leasing agreement. “I think we’re ready.”

“I’m glad to welcome you to the Creekside Family.” Tracy picked up the pen with deep green ink that matched the letterhead for Creekside Shops, and the paint on the trim around the shop windows.

Fifteen minutes later, after leaving a generous tip, because after all, they had taken up a table at the café far longer than a normal breakfast hour, the three of them stepped out the door and walked two doors down, to the shop that was now officially the future home of Brighten Your Corner.

Tracy held her breath as she unlocked the front door, pushed it open, and leaned in. She sniffed cautiously. Winced. Turned back and handed Melba the keys. Three sets of five keys. For the front door, the back door, the utility box that served all the shops on that side of Creekview, and two for the gates on the concrete deck that ran behind the stores and extended out over the rocky drop down to Cadburn Creek. One set of keys for Melba, one for Cilla, and one set of spares, to be safely hidden somewhere at home, and hopefully not forgotten.

“These look new,” Melba said, turning the ring of keys over in her hands. They made a nice, solid jangle.

“They are.” Tracy stepped into the shop and spread her arms, welcoming them in. “Sorry about the smell. It’s actually better than it was. I don’t know what that man was doing in the back room …”

“We never did understand what he did here.” Cilla pulled out the tape measure from her tote bag and headed for the left-hand display window.

“I’m pretty sure he didn’t understand, either.” Tracy shook her head. “He definitely wasn’t dealing in collectibles, which is what he stated as his business when he signed the lease. I could have evicted him just on that detail alone. There were more deliveries to this place, at all hours, in all weather, than the entire street combined. A couple people complained about yelling screaming arguments, and the smells that seeped into the shops on either side weren’t …” She shrugged. “They just weren’t natural.”

“He wasn’t cooking meth or anything like that, was he?” Melba asked. Cilla muttered, “Meth” and sighed. Melba wrinkled up her nose at her, and they both chuckled.

“I almost wish he was.” Tracy shook her head. “He still owes me five months’ rent, and replacing the glass on the front door, twice, and the lock on the back door three times. I could legally charge him for replacing the locks on this shop and the back deck gates and copying keys for everyone.”

“It’s a crying shame,” Cilla said. “Ernie used to be such a nice guy, back in high school. What happened to him?”

“Besides going anti-establishment and running off to some commune and then advocating burning down the White House every time a new president got into office, no matter which party?” Melba shook her head. “Haven’t the foggiest.”

CELEBRATE! New release and get-it-before-it's-officially-out SALE!

 

WHITE ROSES, book 4 of the Tabor Heights series, is NOW available.

To celebrate the release, you can get the EBOOK and the AUDIOBOOK and save $$$ on the downloads.

How?

Go to Ye Olde Dragon Books and visit the storefront.

That easy.

Normally the ebook is $4.99 and the audiobook is $9.99, but you can save $2 on each if you buy THIS WEEKEND.

The sale price is only good THIS WEEKEND. That means come Monday morning, it's back to regular price.

PLUS!!!!!!

COMING MARCH 1:

INQUEST

AFV Defender series, Book 4.

You can get the ebook and audiobook NOW, before everyone else, by again, going to Ye Olde Dragon Books and visiting the storefront. Same price -- same savings. How can you miss out? Find out what the crew of the Defender is up to before everyone else AND save $$$.

By the way .... if you haven't heard, the Defender books are kinda-sorta based on stories and friends and personnas from when I belonged to the USS Defiance of Sacramento, a Star Trek club .... and in INQUEST, the Defender is sent on a mission with the most notorious ship in the Fleet. The Inquest has a reputation like a certain other notorious ship and rule-breaking captain .... not naming any names. But the rumors are that if you're sent on a mission with the Inquest, it's kind of like going to serve Vader .... your chances of survival are pretty slim .....

So, will the crew of the Defender survive this mission? Get the book and find out!!!

Don't leave yet!

There's MORE to the celebration -- and your savings.

THE BEASTLY BEAUTY, Book 2 of the Enchanted Castle Archives, is due out April 1 (nope, not joking!).

You can listen to chapters on the Ye Olde Dragon's Library storytelling podcast right now. We're up to Chapter 12 as of yesterday.

BUT, you can get the ebook at Ye Olde Dragon Books, going to the storefront, and .... here's that word again .... SAVE through this weekend. Regularly $4.99, but you can get it for $2.99.

So, celebrate the release of WHITE ROSES with me, and go get those savings!!!

New release sample: WHITE ROSES

RELEASE DAY!!!!

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

 

"Who's that?" Curt Mehdlang moved back from the table in the lunchroom at the Tabor Picayune, until his shoulders touched the top of the hatch window looking out over the river behind the building. It gave him the perfect angle to see through the gap in the curtain over the porthole window into Angela Coffelt's office.

A dark-haired young woman sat opposite Angela's desk while the editor looked through a sheaf of papers. As assistant editor for the twice-weekly newspaper, Curt would have known about any interviews. So what was she doing there?

"Hmm?" Max Randolph, one of the copyeditors, pulled her mug of hot water out of the microwave and stepped over next to Curt. "Oh. She's here for a job interview. I heard her tell Myrna she was a reporter at a newspaper out in Iowa somewhere."

"Job interview?" Curt shook his head. “When did we advertise?”

"We didn't." Max raked her fingers through her mop of dark hair and twisted her combs back into place to hold it out of her eyes. "I heard her say she just moved back to town. Takes a lot of guts, moving without a job to go to, in this economy."

"A lot of confidence," he muttered, still watching the composed, familiar-looking woman. "Not much going on to warrant new staff."

Something about her oval face, those big, dark eyes and the way she tipped her head to one side. He knew he should recognize her.

"Hmm?" He jerked, startled when Max touched his arm. "Sorry. A lot on my mind."

"I said, how can you say there's nothing going on, when the White Rose is still on the loose? That's kind of exciting. Sick, but exciting."

"You and Tony aren't going to use it for your next book, are you?"

"Spare me." Max rolled her eyes and ripped open two packets of raspberry hot chocolate mix for punctuation. "We write romances. Sickos preying on innocent girls, demanding love, sight unseen—that’s not romantic."

"Maybe we should check the personal ads at the PD and any other papers, to find someone who's been advertising for months and can't find his true love." Curt's stomach twisted and his mouth tasted like he had bitten into moldy bread. How could he make a joke about the White Rose Killer? Gretchen McKenzie was dead, and now Katrina Harper alternated between terror and frustration.

"I don't think someone like the White Rose would waste time and money on advertising. He's the kind of guy who sees what he wants and punishes anyone who won't give it to him."

Upcoming release sample: INQUEST

 

Ye Olde Dragon Books

 Releasing March 1

Later, M’kar realized she had been planning her days of laziness a little too loudly, and the universe heard.

Ashrock dropped the bomb over dinner.

“What do you mean, Etrusca and Great-grandfather are missing?” M’kar put down her mug of seooli tea, grateful he told her before she took a mouthful.

“They’ve vanished altogether from Le’anka,” Jeyn said, punctuated with a little shrug. “And no, they weren’t assassinated. We’ve been receiving messages from both sides of the growing battle, asking where they are, demanding we hand them over, and threatening all sorts of dire punishments.”

“Battle?” M’kar’s brain latched onto that word, among all the other bad ones.

“Someone tied Etrusca’s emergence from the surbda crater to the disappearance of the Ancestors’ voices,” Ashrock said, with a shrug that mirrored his wife’s. M’kar wondered how soon that little gesture would grow irritating. Her parents weren’t the kind of people to shrug and signal something was of little importance. Unless …

“What do you know? What haven’t you admitted to those indiferps and how could … Oh.” She sat back and wished they were eating indoors instead of in the pavilion by the firefish pond. She needed to shove back a chair and stomp away from the table and work off the shivers of apprehension as all sorts of images raced through her mind. It was hard to rise dramatically when she was sitting on a thick cushion on the tile pavement. “So Etrusca was right, and the Ancestors’ voices are actual voices, pulled in through the dimensional warping of the broken Gate. Once we moved most of the pieces off Nisandros, the dimensional warping stopped, and the voices stopped and …” A chuckle escaped her. “And all the lunatic prophets have no excuse to do crazy things.”

“Etrusca is uniting most of the worst of the clans by their hatred for her. Our clan is getting blamed for silencing the Ancestors and disrupting the totally idiotic traditions and structure of government. Your uncle Rokas sent you an enormous chest full of family treasures to thank you, by the way.” He snorted, grinning so half the tattoos on his face twisted or disappeared into folds in his skin. “All my brothers and cousins and uncles are delighted, preparing for war, strengthening the clan house defenses, answering honor challenges. You wouldn’t believe all the apologies I’ve been receiving on your behalf, expressing regret for trying to kill you when you were a child.”

“Nisandrians are insane.”

“Yes,” her mother said, “but life is never boring when you’re married to a Nisandrian.”

“I warned you, na’nooshki.” Ashrock reached across the table and intertwined his fingers with hers.

If her parents started making smoochie noises or even got up and started kissing, M’kar might throw herself into the pond. 

“So what’s the other boot you’re about to drop on me?” she asked, to head that off. It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy evidence that her parents were still silly, sloppy in love, but she suspected that dropping sensation she got was something like envy.

New release sample: BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

 

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

“Investigator?” David blinked a few times. His mouth moved like he was going to say something else, but didn’t.

“Yes, you remember our friend Eden, from when Charlotte tried to move in with Cilla?” Melba said.

“Oh, yeah, right. I remember. You threw me off track. I’m talking about security for your house, keep someone from breaking in, or at least send for the cops if something happens, and you talk about that lunatic.” He chuckled, but the sound didn’t entirely convince Melba.

“Never to worry.” Cilla gestured at the back door. “Ted keeps an eye on things, and if he thinks the situation is dire enough we need a burglar alarm, he’ll help us with it. Not that we don’t appreciate your help, but he is a police officer, he lives here, and he knows how things are done.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said with a grin that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’m big city and you’re little township, with nothing in common.”

“I wouldn’t put it that way.” She chuckled. “Now, would you like to join us for dinner? I’ve got a lovely batch of chicken and potato wedges I put in the slow cooker this morning, and we’ve got the last of the corn on the cob from Dalrymple’s. Their corn is always so good.”

“Thanks, but …” David shrugged. “Got a business meeting on this side of town. Just thought I’d check on you before I headed over there. You didn’t get back to me, so I figured maybe you were out of the house all day, or out of town or …” Another shrug. “Glad you’re okay and on top of things.”

He turned like he would head down the winding path of paving stones through the middle of the garden, and out the back of the yard, then stopped after two steps and headed up the driveway to the street.

“Give our greetings to your folks,” Melba called. “How are they doing, by the way?”

“Fine, fine. You know how it is with them. Always running around.” David walked backward a dozen steps as they made their farewells. He turned left at the end of the driveway and in a few steps vanished behind the house next door.

“Huh, that doesn’t make sense.”

“What doesn’t?” Cilla was already on the back porch and fumbling with her key. “How about dinner outside tonight? It’s cooled down enough.”

“Fine.” Melba couldn’t recall seeing any cars parked on the street between Overview and their house, so where was David going? A sigh escaped her as she turned and headed down the path through the flowerbeds. She stopped halfway there, so she was partially hidden by the line of skinny evergreens that stood as a threadbare sort of barrier between their back yard and the parking lot of the apartment building behind them. Sure enough, she saw David jogging down the sidewalk and turning left into the parking lot to a car parked next to the driveway. 

He had come up through the back of the house, like he had done dozens of times before when he came over for picnics or brought his parents for a family get-together, whenever relatives dropped in from out of town. That explained why Heinrich went after him, coming through the trees like that. The old curmudgeon certainly wouldn’t have believed David when he claimed he was there on a legitimate visit, if he didn’t come to the front door “like an honest man with nothing to hide,” as he often finished so many of his complaints nowadays. But why didn’t David want them to know where he had parked?

Upcoming release sample: WHITE ROSES

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

Snow frosted the stiff grass over Angel's grave. Toni shivered, seeing in her imagination the white roses that had been there every time she came to the cemetery, until her parents couldn't take the pain, the cruel, silent taunting from the unidentified killer, and moved them to Indiana. Shaking, she crouched and leaned against the simple cross that held Angel's name, and her dates of birth and death. She had a hole in the index finger of her driving glove, but she ignored the wet and cold to clear out the engraved letters in the gray and pink granite.

There were no roses on Angel's grave. She supposed she should be grateful. How long had the roses continued? Until he found a new true love to haunt with notes and roses and demands for eternal loyalty?

"He's doing it again," she whispered, and her throat tried to close up.

Toni blinked away tears that felt as if they had been building up for years, just waiting to burst out. Her head ached from the pressure. She rubbed the tears away with the back of her fist. Now wasn't the time for crying. Not yet. When the White Rose was caught, exposed, and punished, then she could cry. Then she could finally ask her parents to forgive her for keeping Angel's secrets from them. Why hadn't she tattled on her sister? Their parents wouldn't have approved if they found out Angel had a boyfriend. They would have made her break up with him. She wouldn't have gone to the park to meet her boyfriend. She wouldn't have died, strangled by fencing wire and left lying in the dirt.

Tabor Heights still felt small, quiet, and safe. Just like it had when Toni, Angel and their parents had moved here. She had liked her small classes in school and the quiet, tree-shaded streets. She had felt safe going anywhere she wanted.

Toni hadn't felt safe since Curt Mehdlang went to the park to look for Angel and came back with the police, pale-faced and red-eyed from crying.

She had to get that job at the Picayune. She needed a job, and working for the local newspaper would give her all the information she needed, immediately. People expected reporters to ask questions.

"Please, God, if You're listening to me anymore, I have to have that job. I have to do it for Angel."

Standing, feeling a little wobbly in her knees, Toni stepped backward from the grave. She wondered where the other murdered girl was buried. She wondered what the current target of the White Rose Killer was doing right that moment. Did she feel curious about the man who wrote her those demanding, frightening love notes? Did she feel angry?

Toni thought about contacting the police, to ask to talk to the girl. Would they believe her, if she told them about Angel and her theories about the White Rose? Would they think she was a crackpot, capitalizing on someone's terror? Would it do any good to tell anyone? 

Bottom line: she had to do something. Even if she had to do it alone.

 

Upcoming release sample: INQUEST

Ye Olde Dragon Books

 Releasing March 1

“We have a … development,” M’kar reported, stepping onto the bridge less than half an hour after the Defender settled into orbit around Le’anka. She gestured at the forward viewscreen, where Anwesta slowly rotated in orbit, growing larger as the ship approached.

“Don’t tell me.” Genys looked around the bridge. “Granny got on board, despite the newest update to the drac-proof fence?”

“Exact opposite. Ask Axe where all the teacher dracs are.”

Battleaxe chirped and twisted her head, looking around the bridge. Genys would have liked to have laughed at her little black drac’s confusion, but that sort of worried her.

“She can’t find them.”

“On the ship,” M’kar said. “I can’t feel them anywhere on the ship. I sent out the call and got …” She shrugged. “Not exactly echoes, but this definite feeling I was shouting into an empty room.”

“They have to be on the station already. Probably teleported over as soon as we were close enough.” Decker stepped up to join them. Spitfire crooned and rubbed his cheek with her muzzle, then chirped in what certainly struck Genys as a relieved tone. “Did you get that?” His eyes narrowed and he twisted his head to look at his drac.

“An impression they’re gone and not coming back?” M’kar leaned on the arm of the command chair. “I reached out to the dracs on the station, and I get a strong impression of a cold shoulder, but with a lot of regret.” She snorted. “Granny is behind the effort to ignore us. Sour grapes, I say.”

“Please, Enlo …” Genys stopped herself there. She had the awful feeling that despite her best efforts, a wide grin was about to split her face.

“Well, I did get—” M’kar paused, her head cocked to one side, eyes narrowing, in what was clearly a listening pose. “Dulit’s contacting me through our dracs …” After a few seconds, she nodded. “It’s official. The kids are old enough to be on their own. No more overseers.”

“No more spies for Granny,” Decker added.

New release sample: BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

 

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

“What in the world …” Cilla sat forward, resting her hands on the dashboard, as Melba navigated the corner onto their street, preparing to pull into the driveway of their duplex.

“What? Who’s—is that Heinrich?” Melba tapped the brake, but Heinrich and the young man he stomped after, up the driveway, stepped onto the sidewalk before she pulled in. Not that she would ever willingly hit Heinrich, or even tap him with the bumper, but she thought some honest fear might be good for the old curmudgeon. She swore he had been impossible to live with ever since Cilla turned him down in eleventh grade and went to the prom with Eddie McGillicutty.

“Is that David?”

Melba didn’t turn her head to look. She pulled into her usual parking spot in front of the garage, put the car into park, and turned off the ignition first. By the time she got the door open, Cilla was sliding out of the passenger seat. David walked down the driveway to meet them, alone. Heinrich wasn’t visible, out in front of the house, but Melba thought she heard his stomping, slapping footsteps and his grumbling voice as he headed back to his house three driveways down the street.

“Gee, I come over here enough times, you’d think the neighborhood watchdog would recognize me by now,” David greeted them, and grinned.

“He’s just being a good neighbor,” Cilla said. “You were walking around the house, weren’t you? Checking the doors and windows, like you always do?”

“Well, yeah. Gotta look out for you, y’know?” He shrugged. “I’d feel a lot better about you both if you’d let me install that home security system my company designed. Especially with all the weird stuff that’s been going on in town lately. Who’d ever have thought sleepy little Cadburn would have murders?”

“We appreciate your concern, but we’re fine.” She patted his hand. “Now, I’ll just bet you’re here to follow up on that message you left before. Not to worry. We got our investigator friend working on the problem. She says we’re well protected against Charlotte’s schemes, thanks to all the preparation we’ve been doing for our business.”

Update: Time to Look Ahead -- Pre-Orders, Anyone?

 WHEW!

I just finished narrating the last chapter of INQUEST, the next AFV Defender novel.

The book releases March 1, so there's no time to waste, getting the audio files edited and polished and uploaded. The ebook version has been uploaded and should be available for pre-order in the next few days from your favorite online store. I hope to have the print book uploaded, and also available for pre-orders, within the next week!

I'm also working on a guidebook to the AFV Defender universe. This will include a timeline, so you know where you are between the books and the short stories, wherever you happen to be reading. I'll also have some nifty character art that I've been working with a wonderful Fiverr artist on producing, slowly but surely. And, if you've ever wondered what some of the Nisandrian and Gatesh and other phrases mean, that the crew of the Defender throw around from time to time ... that will be in there too!

Speaking of pre-orders, THE BEASTLY BEAUTY, the next novel in the Enchanted Castle Archives series, is available for pre-order in paper and ebook. PLUS, it's the current story being told, two chapters every week, on the Ye Olde Dragon's Library storytelling podcast.

If you pre-order from Ye Olde Dragon Books, you'll get a new, free short story that won't be released until BEASTLY BEAUTY releases. It's called ASH, BREAD AND THE BOY, and follows our heroine, Ash, as she has an odd little adventure during her first courier run. This is a story that takes place "between the pages" in the first few chapters of BEASTLY BEAUTY.

If you're interested in pre-ordering either of these books, keep checking back here, on my website, or Ye Olde Dragon Books for the announcement and the link to the pre-order page. 

It's RELEASE DAY!

 It's a BOOK BIRTHDAY!

Newly released today!

BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

Book & Mug Mysteries #3

Ready for another search for clues in Cadburn Township?

Ready for another visit to your favorite coffee shop and bookstore, Book & Mug?

BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

When the Tweed cousins, Melba and Cilla, set out to open their candle shop, Brighten Your Corner, obstacles pop out of the woodwork. And from out of the walls and under the floor. Starting with an overbearing cousin who wants to take over, insisting the shop was her idea, a nasty former tenant with shady business associates, who insists the shop they now lease still belongs to him, and a family mystery tangled with rumors of a treasure hunt.

 

The cousins at Book & Mug consider the Tweeds family. Eden, Kai and Troy, with the help of Saundra and Rufus are determined to help them through the threats and contradictions and increasingly odd and frightening incidents that just don't make sense. The situation gets serious enough that even the help of mysterious, cynical Nick West, with his powerful connections, is more than welcome.

 Check it out today -- buy it today from Mt. Zion Ridge Press, or anywhere you prefer to shop online. It's waiting!