Witches, Crows and Murder Most Cozy

Witches and Salem are almost synomyns in the US.  Carol J. Perry makes good use of the convention in her cozy mystery series starring Lee Barrett, sometime TV personality. It Takes a Coven is an enjoyable example, so enjoyable that I decided to write a book review even though I'm on vacation.

Barrett's Witch City series is bubbly without being fluffy. She doesn't juggle as many characters as say Louis Penny does, but each of her secondary characters have ongoing subplots that progress from book to book. That for me is masterful writing. [Maybe because I have problems with it.] 

The best thing? I think you can read the book as a stand alone. I haven't read all the books [6] in the series, but I followed the mystery action well integrated with the daily stuff...though I thought the wedding sequences missed an opportunity to be sarcatistic about US wedding preps. The "compromise on the cake" was a throw-away when common sense ruled.

Integrating plot elements so there are no loose, dangling bits can be difficult. Barrett takes her crows, modern witches, and historical witches and weaves an interesting tale of cause and effect. Some plot elements from previous books have been "put to bed" in It Takes a Coven--which leaves me wondering what direction the next book will be taking. Guess I'll have to wait a year to find out.

Check it out for yourself on Amazon, B&N Nook, or kobo/lRakuten. For the record, these links include ebooks.

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Interesting Reading

Writer R. Mac Wheeler takes wonderful photos. Here recently posted some wonderful close-ups of flowers. You can check them out here. He also writes some fun fantasies.

An older Write Unboxed blog had a short, to the point blog on writing a synopsis. Anyone needing to write a short report can benefit from its tips. Take a look.

Ever wonder about what's actually in the food and care products you use? I found this interesting because so many heath articles blame inflamation for tons of bad health conditions. This one has links to the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Click here is you want to know what is lurking in your toothpaste, maybe.

Yeah, some of this weren't posted yesterday. Maybe it's another point we should all take...about how long items last on the web. You never know when a search engine might spit out one of your posts. You can't count on the ads taking up enough space to conceal things. I'm still bouncing around the web seeing what there is to see. Am really disappointed in how low search engine results have sunk in the last three-five years.

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My Writing Rut

Have been playing on Fivver, looking for something interesting to promote my books. Found an artist who might be able to create pictures of my characters in my demon books. Here's the one of Vetis, my arch villen, who proclaims in There Be Demons: "The Angeli have lost the war. They just don't know it yet." Now have to figure out how to use the picture.

Next illustration? Britt or maybe a group of demons?

Writing is going slow. Have been working for a week on my first demon fight in Rendezvous. Today I just got to the Freemages blowing a hole in the wall around the demon compound...in Docket's Diggings from Noticing Jamilla. Still, haven't gotten to the big fight.

A *chuckle*. When I "drafted" the book, Britt linking up with Cahal in Pacifica happened in the fourth chapter. I'm working on Chapter 10 on a demon fight I didn't contemplate until Britt got off the bus in the mountains. That fourth chapter was from Pillar's [Running from Demons ?, thinking of title change...] pov. Still have a major fight with a demon biker gang before they even get to Cascadia.

Groan. Do Cozy Mysteries Really Need a Pun?

Almost gagged when looking at the new arrivals in the mystery section awhile back, but I bought Grave Errors by Carol J. Perry anyway. Kinda liked the main character when I bought the first book in the series of five books and still do. Still, I object to having to read all the bad puns as I searched for authors I wanted to read.

[Don't get me wrong. I love cozy mysteries, especially ones that happen in a small interacting communities like English villages. It's the puns that gag me.]

Lee Barrent is one of those magical types whose magic is iffy at best. Makes for a good mystery protagonist. There's just enough psi ability for the book to be both an urban fantasy and a cozy mystery.

The setting of Grave Errors is a cliche, -- Salem, Massachusetts. But Dia de los Muertos  makes an appearance--something I haven't seen an American book do very often.

The plot centers on a closed suicide case that comes back to life as a murder investigation-- when Barrett's TV production class sets up a public service campaign to extend the town's Halloween festival by adding the Mexican holiday. Garrett's cop boyfriend isn't happy when the closed case comes back to bite him, but he's learned to pay attention to Barrett's sporatic visions. This book gives the reader a nice romp with well rounded characters, lots of red herrings, and an interesting cat. It all adds up to a fun read.

Check the listings for Grave Errors at these stores\

Amazon       Barnes & Noble      kobo/Apple Books

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My Writing Rut

Haven't written anything worth talking about. Just doing promo stuff. I think getting a book published turns your brain to mush. Even my traditionally published friends look at their Amazon stats at least two, three times a day. The good news is that I've sold a few copies of There Be Demons, even breaking through the 100,000 ranking...but not for long.

If you read this far, you deserve a reward. Night for the Gargoyles, the short story that inspired There Be Demons, is free on the links below. [I don't know if the Amazon link is free in foreign countries, but I fairly sure kobo is.]

Treat Yourself for Halloween:

Amazon       Barnes & Noble      kobo        Apple Books/iTunes

The best group of reviews are on Amazon.

Oh, I guess you can find me among the books at GoodReads . You can find reviews there too. I have several demon-focused short stories listed for free.

Wallowing in a Cozy Rut -- Mysteries, That Is

  Thought I was going to move away from reading cozy mysteries. Have almost finished the Anne Bishop trilogy and started Lee Child's latest Jack mass paperback, Never Go Back. Then, I picked up J. K. Rowlings' A Casual Vacancy. Can't seem to escape the genre...even though Rowlings did a snarky cozy.

  The above sequence tells how I relaxed over the Thanksgiving week. The week before I had picked up Carol J. Perry's Caught Dead Handed somewhere. The book won my reading derby, taking me cover to cover without interruptions. Need I say the book is a well-crafted, many threaded mystery with interesting characters?

  More important, Perry twists the cozy cliches and comes up with a fresh take on a paranormal mystery. Yeah, there's a murder, two in fact. Yeah, there's the psychic who doesn't know she possesses an unusual talent ... and a hunky love interest [light] ... and a Salem, MA setting where the town's witchiness is downplayed ... and an intriguing antagonist who doesn't come out of the woodwork at the end like a deus ex machina. The clues are there, right out in the open for all to see. Caught Dead Handed is the promising beginning of a new series, but I don't quite understand where the title came from.

  Plot summary. Lee shows up at a Salem, MA, TV station for a news job interview ... only to find that it's been given to someone else. Then, the station's psychic, late-night movie presenter is murdered. Lee not only finds the body [& meets the hunky cop] but is offered the psychic's show -- which pitches her into the middle of the efforts to solve the murder. Only Perry keeps coming up with interesting plot twists and turns to keep the reader engaged.

A well recommended light paranormal mystery story that appeals on many levels.

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A Writer How-To

  Read a blog by  K. M. Weiland -- Three Secrets of Three-Dimensional Antagonists. It's really stuck in my mind, maybe after spending a couple days with Perry's antagonist. If you are a writer, you might find some good ideas. If you're a reader, you might enjoy looking at the inside mechanics of characterization as discussed by a master.

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  Think -- maybe -- I'm done dinking with my new stories. Both The Ghostcrow and Hear That Damn Owl are scheduled for the next round of edits. Actually, Owl is at the content editor's as I speak and space for Ghostcrow has been reserved. Almost time to reserve slots with my formatter. Looking to self-publish Owl in January and Ghostcrow in February.

  For Owl, I ended up adding about 1500 words to a flash fiction piece which almost sold to publishers a couple times. Had some recommendations on enhancing the main character I didn't quite agree with, this time around. I did expand on the protagonist's anger and motivate the nemesis to do what it does. Yeah, "it". The story is set in Andor so strange, unnatural things happen. 

  So, I'm now beating my head against the promotional wall again. Ugh. The piece is going to be another free short read. Hopefully, I'll get it up on Amazon as well as Barnes & Noble, iTunes and KOBO.

  If anyone wants an review copy in late December, early January, email me at mkkaytheod-at-yahoo. I should have both a PDF and epub version to offer.  Someone also gave me the link to turn the manuscript into mobi, but I haven't tried it yet.

Here's my current draft of my blurb: 

  Crayton’s foul mood builds as he travels home at his mother’s command until he crosses with a spirit owl seeking revenge.