Thursday, September 29, 2022

Not Miss Havisham @MaddieDay


LUCY BURDETTE: Today we welcome prolific writer and friend of the Reds, Maddie Day aka Edith Maxwell to the blog!


MADDIE DAY: Thank you for welcoming me back to the front of the blog, Lucy! It’s always a pleasure to share a bit about my new book with you all, in this case, Murder in a Cape Cottage. 



But first, something remarkable happened this month – I marked the ten-year anniversary of being a published mystery novelist. That’s right. Novel Number One, Speaking of Murder (first published from a very small press under the name Tace Baker), released in September, 2012. I was such a newbie, but I decided to aim high and asked both Hank and Julia if they would blurb it. And they did, along with Kate Flora and Sheila Connolly. It was my first full-length mystery, and I’m sure all four of them were kinder to the story than they should have honestly been. Nobody has ever been more grateful than I. And the book is still in print, re-released with a much-improved new cover and a fresh edit from Beyond the Page two years ago. 



I also should thank all the Reds for supporting my career. Rhys blurbed my first Quaker Midwife mystery, native Hoosier Hank also blurbed my first Country Store mystery, Hallie and Lucy taught and mentored me early on, and Jenn and Debs have never been anything less than a cheerleader for my books. I feel blessed to have had such role models and friends in all of you. More detail about my last ten years as a published author was over on the Wicked Authors on the 19th.

Back to Novel Number Twenty-Eight, about which I am still pinching myself. 



I realized in all those years and twenty-seven manuscripts (plus another five completed), I’d never included a decades-old skeleton in the wall. With Murder in a Cape Cottage, which released two days ago, I thought it was about time to fix that oversight.


I wouldn’t be the first, of course. I read Judy Alter’s contemporary Skeleton in a Dead Space six years ago. Just last winter, after I had turned in my manuscript, my friend Ann Parker’s eighth Silver Rush mystery released, The Secret in the Wall, with a skeleton clutching a bag of gold in late nineteenth-century San Francisco. And Leigh Perry has an entire Family Skeleton series featuring a live skeleton. But, as with any plot, I knew I could make finding a skeleton behind the studs a unique and intriguing story.

The new book is the fourth Cozy Capers Book Group mystery. Not being a fan of stretching out fictional romances indefinitely – or heaven forbid, romantic triangles – I decided to let bike shop owner Mac Almeida and her hunky baker Tim (who is modeled on my own hunky boyfriend Tim of fifty years ago…) get married in this book (we didn’t…). Don’t worry, they had some conflict along the way.



Mac moves her tiny house from behind her shop to the yard of Tim’s Cape Cod cottage. They decide to create an ensuite bathroom out of a closet and begin the demolition five days before their wedding. But there’s a hidden space behind the closet wall, and Mac finds a skeleton in an antique wedding dress with her wrists chained to the wall behind her.

Ooh! Cool, says the author after this image pops into her head. Mac can solve the decades-old mystery as well as the one in the present. And then the research began. What would my bride look like ninety years later in terms of skin, bones, clothing? What might a wedding dress from about 1930 look like? What’s in that suitcase next to her feet? What color were passport covers back then? How does Mac figure out what happened to the bride and her erstwhile groom? Who chained her and left her to die – in her wedding dress? Off I went.



You’ll have to read the book for the details, but I will say how grateful I was to find forensic anthropologist Sean Tallman. The Boston University School of Medicine professor gave a presentation to the New England chapter of Mystery Writers of America, but I had a conflict that evening. Still, he was happy to connect with me later. He told me what to expect (small bones of hands and feet often fall off, and sometimes the skull), how her skin would look (like leather) and her clothes (stained and or rotted away), and he even read over the discovery scene. Thanks, Professor – the book is in the mail.

After the book blurb started emerging, more than one person said, “You mean like Miss Havisham?” Having read Great Expectations almost as many years ago as poor Bridey’s skeleton was old, I had to go read up on the jilted bride. And no, my skeleton has nothing in common with Miss H except for wearing matrimonial garb.

Harry Furniss, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons











This is also my first ticking clock mystery. Mac knows she won’t be able to relax at her own wedding if she and her book group haven’t figured out the skeleton’s story – and put a stop to more than one contemporary attack, too. She has five days.

Readers: Do you know of other books or movies with a skeleton in the wall? If you found a human skeleton, would you lean in and investigate like Mac does or run screaming for help? I’d love to send two commenters a signed copy of the new book.

Murder in a Cape Cottage 

ʼTis the day after Christmas, following a wicked-busy time of year for Mac’s bike shop. It’s just as well her Cozy Capers Book Group’s new pick is a nerve-soothing coloring book mystery, especially when she has last-minute wedding planning to do. But all pre-wedding jitters fade into the background when Mac and her fiancé, Tim, begin a cottage renovation project and open up a wall to find a skeleton—sitting on a stool, dressed in an old-fashioned bridal gown . . .
 
As Mac delves into the decades-old mystery with the help of librarian Flo and her book group, she discovers a story of star-crossed lovers and feuding families worthy of the bard himself. Yet this tale has a modern-day villain still lurking in Mac’s quaint seaside town, ready to make this a murderous New Year’s Eve.


“She’s handcuffed to the wall,” I whispered. “The poor thing. Somebody seriously didn’t want her to get married.” My heart broke for her, but this was also feeling like a horror movie. My own wedding was only days away. 


Maddie Day pens the Country Store Mysteries, the Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries, and the new Cece Barton Mysteries. As Agatha Award-winning author Edith Maxwell, she writes the Quaker Midwife Mysteries and short crime fiction. Day/Maxwell lives with her beau north of Boston, where she writes, gardens, cooks, and wastes time on Facebook. Find her at EdithMaxwell.com, wickedauthors.com, Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen, and on social media:

Twitter

Facebook

Instagram

82 comments:

  1. Congratulations, Maddie/Edith, on your newest book . . . it does sound as if Mac has quite a mystery to solve. I’m looking forward to reading it [and to the wedding!]

    J.D. Robb’s “Concealed in Death” has several skeletons hidden in the wall . . . Guillaume Musso’s “The Reunion” has a skeleton in the wall of the prep school gymnasium . . . . Lois Ruby’s “Steal Away Home” has a skeleton in the wall of twelve-year-old Dana’s home . . . .
    No movie comes to mind, but “Murder, She Wrote” had an episode with a skeleton in the wall . . . . If I found a skeleton in my wall, I think I would want to investigate . . . .

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  2. Congratulations on your book release. Having just finished the book and loving everything about it. What would I do, I would not investigate but would hone in with questions.

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  3. Welcome Edith--We're all in awe of how much you've accomplished in ten years!

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    1. Thank you so much, Roberta, and thank you for hosting me! By the way, I just finished A Dish to Die For and loved it. Excellent read.

      How did Key West fare in Ian?

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    2. some flooding, but luckily it was a glancing blow compared to the west coast

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  4. Congrats on the new release! One of Kate Carlisle's Lighthouse books had a skeleton discovered. I remember it not being as old, so not as much true historical info, but a fun way to move the mystery for sure! Jholden955(at)gmail(dot)com

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  5. I loved the book as my review of it on Goodreads made clear.

    Given how I've lived in my house for almost 5 decades, if I found a skeleton in the walls I'd be really curious to know how it got there. So I wouldn't run screaming from the room or anything. But I probably wouldn't do any amateur sleuthing either. With my luck, the cops would think of me as a suspect and charge me with interfering with an investigation if I started snooping around.

    MURDER IN A CAPE COTTAGE is a great read and Edith, I'm looking forward to your event at the Falmouth Library on Wednesday August 5th from 6:30 - 8:30pm!

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    1. Also, a nice news story about the talk and the book popped up today on the Cape! https://www.capenews.net/arts_and_entertainment/new-cozy-mystery-is-set-on-cape-cod/article_52f43196-edb6-5a13-b261-95a059d20d78.html

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  6. EDITH/MADDIE: Happy 10th writing anniversary! You know I enjoy reading each of your series, and MURDER IN A CAPE COTTAGE was great. I would freak out if I found a skeleton in my (new) home but I'm glad that Mac had the determination to solve this cold case for the poor bride and keep herself distracted from her own upcoming wedding.

    Don't include me in the giveaway since I got a signed copy from you at Minneapolis Bouchercon.

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  7. Congratulations on… all of it, Edith! And no I’ve never found so much as a single bone. Though we have a little hamster burial ground in the yard

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    1. Thank you, dear Hallie. Yes, we have a kitty graveyard in our yard.

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  8. So many congratulations on your 10-year milestone, Edith -- and your latest book!

    Unless you count what my cat Holly leaves behind from her fresh-food hunt at the cottage, I've not ever found, nor do I wish to, any human bones anywhere. I'd like to think I wouldn't scream, but who knows...

    I'd love to hear about how you decided to ask Hank and Julia to blurb your first book: Did it take you time to screw up the courage to send the request?

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    1. Thank you, Amanda. I had met Hank and Julia at the New England Crime Bake and at SINCNE workshops. I saw cover endorsements friends like Sheila Connolly and Barbara Ross were getting. And thought I'd aim high! I'm ever grateful for their generosity.

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    2. Good for you, Edith. You're a role model for many of us...

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  9. Ten years! And still going! Here's to lots more books to come, Edith.

    I shiver for that poor bride, imagining what a horrible way to die that would be. Ditto on finding human remains in my house. I'd be calm at first, but have nightmares evermore.

    I'm sure I've read at least one skeleton in the wall story--I have read Toni Kelner's "Sid" series, after all, but I can't remember others. Joan's list is impressive, though!

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    1. My third try to answer you, Karen! It would be a horrible way to die, and I try to have Mac dwell on that, which increases her need to find the culprits.

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  10. Congratulations Edith for your tenth anniversary and for your new book: Murder in a Cap Cottage .
    I’m always glad to read a new book from you and I’m looking forward to reconnect with Mac solving this mystery while preparing for her wedding.

    Fortunately, I won’t find a skeleton in my walls because we all redid the house when we bought it in 1981. Facing a big surprise like finding a skeleton, I would be more of the type to freeze than scream.
    And even if I would ask myself lots of questions, I would let the investigation to someone else.
    Danielle

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    1. Thank you so much, Danielle. I hope you love the story.

      No skeletons left in this house, either. Hugh took it down to the studs after we bought it. He found a few interesting artifacts in the walls, like the beaded pink leather baby moccasins - which made me think of the famous Hemmingway 6-word short story: For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn.

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    3. OMG, that reminds me of Debs' book, Water Like a Stone, where the baby's skeleton is found in the wall of an old barn that Duncan's sister is renovating just before Christmas. That book is remarkable for its examination of narrow boats.

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    4. Thanks, Judy! I was going to mention that myself!

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  11. Edith, congratulations on all of your accomplishments! Murder in a Cape Cottage is on the way as we speak. I love hearing about how the writing community has embraced you. You have certainly returned their help by everything you do to promote the work of other writers.

    In one of Jenn's first series, written as Josie Belle, All Sales Final, the protagonists find a skeleton in their new home. I also read the Kate Carlisle book where a body is discovered in an old home that is being renovated. That would be pretty creepy and I don't know how it wouldn't smell awful. If you've ever lived in a house where a creature died in the chimney or under the porch, well, that's yucky enough.

    I would not investigate any human bones on my own even if found on my property. That would be the job of some detective, which is exactly what all you mystery writers are when you research these historical mysteries!

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    1. So many books with skeletons I'd either not read or had forgotten about!
      And thank you for your kind words.

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  12. Congratulations, Maddie and Edith! You and alternate persona have really been working overtime! I have never found a skeleton (human, that is. I have found mouse skeletons) and I would just as soon not find one!

    But I really want to know what your hunky boyfriend of fifty years ago thinks about his name being used in your books.

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    1. Thank you, Judi - not sure I've told him (we do remain friends)!

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  13. Congrats on your well deserved success, Edith, and LOVE the cover! And as the author of a book that features a skeleton (in the attic) I can assure you the skeleton theme is something that readers seem to love. All the best with the book and your ongoing writing endeavours.

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  14. Speaking of skeletons in the closet/wall didn't Edgar Allen Poe have a story (maybe two) about someone buried inside a wall. He was such a great writer! I can't wait to read Murder in a Cape Cottage! Sounds great.

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    1. The Cask of Amontillado! I read it as a girl and was both fascinated and terrified.

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    2. Also in "The Black Cat" . . . he walls his wife's body in, but the cat is in there as well and . . . (worth reading if you haven't). I would RUN if I found such . . . and it has been years since I ran, so I'm not sure how that would go. I can hardly wait for this mystery to be solved (and the wedding, too, of course <3)

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  15. Edith, you're a marvel! Congratulations for Murder in a Cape Cottage! And I'm not sure which one, but I won one of your Tace Baker novels once!

    A skeleton in a wall story? One of the most satisfying I ever read was Anya Seton's book Green Darkness. The skeleton turns up late in the book. Hmmm, I wonder if I still have my copy....

    Now, if I found a human skeleton in a wall, I'd secure the scene and call the county sheriff, who would notify the county coroner. I've found human remains in the ground and sometimes in completely unexpected locations--it's those unexpected ones that need to be reported. And often, the coroner leaves the identification to us. If you're ever driving east of Columbus, there's a monument to a Late Archaic Native American burial off of I-70. We found him, went through the proper channels, including the Eastern Band of the Shawnee Nation--they requested that we leave him in place and so we did. There's a fenced memorial, so he will never be disturbed again.

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    1. A fascinating story, Flora - thanks for sharing it.

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    2. I've driven that way many times, Flora, and have never noticed a sign. Can you pinpoint the location a bit more? I'd love to see it someday.

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    3. Karen, it was off the Kirkersville exit, it's been a long time since we did that project. I can't remember the details. I'm not sure it's in a location that can be viewed by the public. We would've been involved because a development project needed to do cultural and environmental surveys before proceeding. I think it was a municipal water/sewer project.

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  16. Hooray! This sounds absolutely great— and congratulations on 10 wonderful years!
    . What would I do? Well… Our house was built in 1894, and in the basement, there’s this place that’s like… Maybe a coal scuttle? Or something? It has a metal mesh screen in front of it, and then sort of a tunnel behind it and I am completely afraid to look.

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    1. Have you used that coal tunnel in a story Hank? (Without actually looking at it, of course, LOL)

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  17. Murder In A Cape Cottage sounds like another wonderful read! I so enjoy reading your book series!

    Nancy
    allibrary (at) aol (dot) com

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  18. 10 years and 28 books! Holy cow, Edith, you need to teach a class on productivity and planning at the next Crime Bake! Congrats on your new baby. I'm a reader who LOVES old tropes and seeing what interesting new things an author can do with them. (Show me a group of people stuck on an island/trapped in a resort/cut off by snow and I am THERE.) There's a particular pleasure to recognizing, "Ooo, this is going to be a book about X," and settling in to see what a different imagination has done with X.

    Also, I'm both delighted to realize it's time to start seeing Christmas-time mysteries and appalled that it's time to start seeing Christmas-time mysteries. Where did the summer go?

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    1. I have taught such a class, Julia, just not at Crime Bake!

      Yes, I'm not even ready for Halloween. Christmas can wait - except in new books.

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  19. Congratulations Edith! On all your accomplishments! Over the years at 9-1-1, we received a few calls about possible human remains--usually the medical examiner would have to go to figure out if the bones were human. I would definitely call the police if I found human remains. The idea that someone died chained to the wall in her wedding dress is just horrible!

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  20. Well, my house is 89 years old, and I've been here 37 years (can that be?) but it's far too small to allow for any hidden space large enough to hide a human body.

    That said, long ago, in the little ash cleanout hole at the base of the chimney, in the basement wall, I did discover a bird's skeleton.

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  21. Edith/Maddie: So sorry to be late to the party this morning! I overslept! I love that the Jungle Reds wrote blurbs for your novels. I would be so lucky to have JRW authors write blurbs for my first novel. Currently writing a novel.

    Yes, I read an advanced copy of ASHTON HALL, a novel set in modern England. The main character's young child discovers a skeleton in a part of the big country manor that has been closed for centuries. Trying to recall if it was a wall or a room?

    In America, I cannot imagine finding a skeleton in the wall unless the house has been here since the Colonial times. Too many houses have been torn down. I had this image of Meghan and Harry finding a skeleton in one of the old houses in England, which prompted their decision to leave England. Writer's imagination here.

    If I discovered a skeleton behind a wall, I would contact the local Missing Persons squad ? and ask if the skeleton matches anyone who went missing years ago. If the skeleton is centuries old (more likely in Britain than in the USA?), then perhaps a forensics anthropologist? historian? is the person to contact?

    Your book sounds intriguing and I want to read that book. I have been hearing about "tiny houses". And I was reminded of scenes from Midsomer Murders where someone set up a homemade tiny home out of twigs ? in the woods.

    Look forward to reading Christmas mysteries! And big congratulations on so many years of writing and your Quaker Midwife is my favorite, since I read History at University. I am open to reading modern cozy mysteries like your new Murder on Cape Cod novel.

    Diana

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    1. p.s. I can imagine a wedding dress from the 1930s when you look at American movies from that time in history. I can also imagine wedding dresses from the 1920s too. I was just looking at the wedding dress that Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon wore when she married Prince Albert of York.

      Diana

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  22. Congratulations, Edith, on the new book and the ten year anniversary! And what a gorgeous cover! Your productivity continues to astound. I did write a book, as Judy mentioned, where the skeleton of an infant is found in the wall of an old barn on the Shropshire Union Canal. The idea for that book came, not from another mystery, but from a newspaper story I read about a couple renovating a house in west Texas finding a baby in the wall.

    Our house is going on a hundred and twenty years old, but no basement, and as it was pretty thoroughly renovated when we bought it I doubt there are any secret more interesting than layers of old wallpaper!

    Can't wait to read Murder in a Cape Cottage! Oh, and I love the tiny house!

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    1. I know I've read that book, Debs, and how much more horrific it would be to find baby bones than adult.

      I went to a tiny house exhibit in the next town a few years ago and took lots of photos! It's been fun writing about Mac living there in the first three books.

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  23. I know there's no skeleton in our current house since it was built new. But I wouldn't be surprised to find one out at our family farm.
    I recently read The Coloring Crook by Krista Davis that had a walled up skeleton, and one of my favorite true crime books- No Stone Unturned profiles NecroSearch, a group of various scientists, forensics, law enforcement, etc. searching for bodies of missing persons presumed dead to bring closure and justice to them and their families.

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    1. Krista is great. In the new book, the Cozy Capers book group is reading one of her coloring book mysteries!

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  24. Ten years! Congratulations Edith. That is quite a milestone. Skeletons in the walls. . . seems like there should be a Victoria Holt novel with that event. Or on TV, Bones. I can see a man discovering it, shrieking, and running off. Loved those openings! I think The Curse of Braeburn Castle featuring Heathcliff Lennox (just call him Lennox) has a skeleton found behind stone walls. My current house was built in 1915 and if I found a skeleton I would probably emulate the man on Bones.

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  25. Hey, everybody. Just back from routine procedure with blessedly clear results (they found polyps last time), but I'm still groggy. Will reply to all after I nap

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    1. Good news, Edith! Enjoy your nap and we'll check back later!

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    2. Great news, Edith! And, oh, a nap sounds so good right now!

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    3. The couch nap was great, and our non-cuddler cat Martin curled up on the quilt with me! I'll have to do that more often. I think the blanket was the key.

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  26. Congrats on the book and 10 years, Edith. Wow.

    I don't think I'd investigate a skeleton, but I'd certainly have questions.

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  27. Congratulations, Edith! What a spectacular achievement. I'm looking forward to diving into your latest!

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    1. Thanks so much, Jenn (I wrote this reply three times yesterday and it kept disappearing). I'll never catch up to you, but I'm paddling as fast as I can!

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  28. Edith, this sounds so interesting, I am going to order it right now...and I still have a couple of Midwife books to catch up on too. Apologies for this BSP.,but you did ask... My own first book for Poisoned Pen, Brooklyn Bones, has a skeleton, only a few decades old, hidden behind a wall in the very first chapter. I live in a gentrified urban neighborhood, and I heard a few stories about contractors finding bones...Turns out they do, usually mice, etc, but what if...? So I answered that question. Now I'm looking forward to seeing you answered it. (hi to all the Reds and friends. Back from a busy month)

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  29. Congratulations Edith, on absolutely everything! What awesome things you’ve accomplished in ten years. Excelsior!!!

    As for skeletons in the closet, I have plenty, metaphorically speaking. Best discussed in a dark bar some evening

    Besides Debs’ book, already mentioned, my first memory is Agatha Christie’s By the Pricking of My Thumbs. That’s the one with the baby skeleton hidden behind the chimney, a Tommy and Tuppence adventure

    Our house is a hundred years old but no old bones found so far. We do have the odd bat invasion, which should count as spooky. Julie is a pro at getting them back outside. I pass on that!

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    1. Ann, I replied earlier and blogger ate it. Would love to talk skeletons in the closet at dark bar one day soon!

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  30. Edith, I forgot to speak to the coloring book cozy! Is this sort of like a DIY graphic novel, or something else? New concept to me!

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    1. Yes, Krista's series is a cozy that features adult coloring books, and the book covers are colorable.

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  31. Congratulations, Edith, on your ten year published anniversary! You have certainly had a productive ten years. I went out of town for an overnight visit for the first time since the Covid shut-down, and when I got back late yesterday afternoon, Murder in a Cape Cottage was waiting in the mail. I'm really looking forward to this story with a skeleton in the closet. It also got me to thinking about living in a house where someone was killed/murdered. How people felt about that? A couple in their early 70s was murdered in their house last November in the town where my daughter lives (well, she lives out in the country from the small town), and my daughter knew them, more directly knew the woman's sister. Their house is up for sale now, and it is a dream home, one I would have loved to buy to be closer to my daughter's, but it made me stop and wonder if I could live in a home where someone had been murdered.

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    1. Thank you for ordering the book, and I hope you love it!

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    2. Sorry, I didn't realize I'd commented as Anonymous. It was Kathy Boone Reel, Edith.

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  32. I have replied to every comment here, sometimes three times, and some keep vanishing. I love you all! Maybe it'll work tomorrow...

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  33. Congratulations on your success, Maddie/Edith! You made a brave decision, 10 years ago, to ask for author blurbs, and it sure paid off! As to the skeleton in the closet, I was born and lived for 35 years in a renovated barn. We found out years later than a farm hand had hung himself from one of the rafters.

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