Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

 JENN McKINLAY: Happy St. Patrick’s Day! Since I set LOVE AT FIRST BOOK in Ireland, I believe my feelings about all things Irish are pretty clear.

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One of my favorite memories in Ireland was when a cabbie was giving me instructions on how to drive (yes, I drove the Ring of Kerry). He said, "Remember you always want to keep your passenger safe, so you always want your passenger on the curbside of the street." I nodded. This was sound advice. Then he said, "Or as we like to remember it, keep the bitch in the ditch." LOL. Yes, I wrote that scene into the book.

How about you, Reds? Who’s been to Ireland? What did you love about it? If you haven’t been, do you plan to go and what do you want to see most?

RHYS BOWEN: Big fan of Ireland here (which you might guess as my first heroine was called Molly Murphy). John’s grandfather was Irish, his great grandfather an important figure in representing the Irish negotiations for independence at Westminster.  And one year we drove around the whole island–truly memorable. In almost four weeks we had one day of rain, which was a miracle. The scenery was spectacular, the people so warm and charming…and so quirky. I think one example sums it up best. We were staying at a B and B in Tralee. Our host told us about a hike over a waterfall that we would enjoy and gave us directions. “You drive along the loch and you’ll come to a lovely hotel. If you’ve a mind to have dinner there, it’s a lovely view over the water.”  He went on to extol the hotel then added. “Now if you come to that hotel, you’ve gone too far.”  You have to love the Irish. (Oh, and I loved LOVE AT FIRST BOOK, Jenn).

Jenn: Thank you, Rhys! I stayed in a castle in Tralee (exceeded all my expectations)!

Ballyseede Castle (my room was the windows
above the red door to the right - middle turret!!!)

HALLIE EPHRON: I have been to Ireland and absolutely loved it. LOVE the music which surrounds you at every turn. Walkable cities and towns. Gorgeous churches (see music). Verdant landscape. Absolutely a great trip. (AND they speak English!!)

Foodie that I am, I was prepared for the food to be “meh” but in fact it was sensational. I came home and bought a bottle of malt vinegar since it was so tasty on the wonderful fried fish but I’ve never used a drop. 

The Fish Box in Dingle had the BEST fish stew and fish and chips I have ever ever ever eaten. A must place to eat!

LUCY BURDETTE: I’ve had some spotty visits to Ireland–I was in Dublin for a couple of days and also spent one day at the Giant’s Causeway (hordes and hordes of tourists) and overnight at a storytelling barn in northern Ireland. However, I have ancestors from Ireland and DNA that appears Irish, so I feel the pull to return. We are going back in the fall, if the universe is willing! I love reading books set in Ireland and listening to Irish music and now I can’t wait to eat the food! Happy St. Patrick’s day everyone. For now, imagine me beating back the hordes of spring breakers in Key West:)

Tonka and the spring break girls :)

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: And picture me remembering not  to go into Boston today because it is FULL. And I know a lot of people are having fun, but I am not a fan of green beer or green bagels. (Green bagels. WHY??) 

Going to Ireland. Hmm. I have never been and I would absolutely adore to, it sounds magical, but I kinda think it’s not first on the list. But! You never know. 

(And do you know the musical Wonderful Town? It is the best song about the Irish–called My Darlin' Eileen. It's from 1953, and you have to imagine it– it’s sung by a chorus of (dancing)  New York cops, all Irish, who are welcoming the girl from Ohio, who happens to be named EIleen. 

You have to listen to the whole thing–it’s perfect for today! My Darlin' Eileen (From “Wonderful Town Original Cast Recording” 1953/Reissue/Remastered 2001)

And oh, I couldn't resist, here is it on  YouTube! Go to 1:12:46. SO funny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsxzyqJX5wY 

DEBORAH CROMBIE:

I am horrified to admit that I have never been to Ireland, although I would LOVE to go! Back when I was plotting what became NOW MAY YOU WEEP, my idea was to set it in Ireland, in a fictional version of the famous Ballymaloe cooking school–which of course I would have to attend for research. But my agent said no one was interested in books set in Ireland (one of the few times she’s been wrong) so I set the book in the Scottish Highlands instead. I wouldn’t change that book, but I’d love to get to Ireland someday, research or not!

How about you, Readers, who’s been to Ireland and who wants to go?

LOVE AT FIRST BOOK -- Jenn's release day!!!

 

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JENN: Today's the day!!!  LOVE AT FIRST BOOK is finally out. I feel as if I wrote this book years ago - it was 2022/2023. And the trip I took to Ireland also feels as if it were ages ago. It was Nov 2022.

Why is this romcom (which received a starred review from Booklist) about an illness anxiety suffering librarian and a change resistant bookshop owner set in Ireland? I mean I could have written about anywhere, right? Well...I really wanted a vacation. And it had been a long while since I'd been through Dublin, so it felt right. Below are a few of the photos and a story, a short one, that I used in the novel almost word for word.

The Fab Four

My mom, Sue, my college roommate, Annette, and her daughter, Alyssa (or as I call them -  the historian, the medic, and the navigator), and I all went to Ireland for a little over a week. In case you're wondering what they call me, I am the driver. Why? Because I thought it would be grand to drive around Ireland, a place littered with roundabouts whose drivers happen to motor on the left side of the road. 

Me driving and Mom looking super at ease...lol.

I was so confident about driving that I rented a car and never gave it a thought until the night before we were to leave Dublin. I stared at the ceiling -- while everyone else slept off our pub crawl around Temple Bar -- with the sudden realization that I was going to get us all killed. Panic ensued.

The next morning, I accepted that I had no choice if I wanted to get where I needed to go (the Ring of Kerry) and so we took a cab to the car rental place in Dublin and the lovely man driving us inquired about where we were headed.

Mom: We're going to rent a car.

 

Him: Who's driving?

Me: Me.

Him: (a slight pause and then) If you could just give me thirty minutes to get off the road.

Yes, we all laughed, even me. Then he offered some advice.

Him: When you're driving, remember you always want to keep your passenger safe. To do that, keep your passenger on the curb side then you'll always be in the correct lane.

Me: That makes sense.

Him: If you have trouble remembering it, just think to yourself, keep the bitch in the ditch.

Me: "Um, that'd be my mom."

Again, more laughter, which was pretty much how the entire trip went. Mighty craic, as they say.

All in all, I drove 1200 kilometers and I only made my passengers scream once, eh, maybe twice. Okay, three times but I swear that was it. And the above conversation with the cabbie? Yeah, it went right into the book. 

Another thing that went into the book? Sheep in the road.
Yup, they really do that. 

Below are some more pics. Please enjoy. And if you fancy a trip to Ireland without leaving your home, pick up LOVE AT FIRST BOOK. 

The Cliffs of Moher - just as majestic as you'd imagine.

More sheep - cute little bleaters are everywhere.

Gaillimh River in Galway - loved that town.

The bookshop that inspired The Last Chapter bookshop in the novel.

This one is for the Reds, They have a whiskey just for us!
Writer's Tears at the Whiskey Museum.

Flower boxes still blooming in November. 

Chatting with the Oscar Wilde and Eduard Vilde
- not the dazzling conversationalists you'd expect. *wink*
Our historian (Mom) has been to Ireland several times and
was an endless resource for information. Invaluable.
Everyone needs their own historian.

The medic (Nettie) yes, her nursing skills were required (long story), and the navigator (Lyss) - she talked me through every single roundabout -- I could not have managed this trip without them!

And, of course we had to stay in a castle (Ballyseede in Tralee) which also made it into the book but renamed. As I said to my Mom in regards to staying in a castle (she felt it was a bit bougie for us),
"If not now, when?" It was fantastic! Even Mom agreed.

I knew the Irish countryside would be beautiful
but it was truly breathtaking everywhere I looked.

One day we saw eleven rainbows! Eleven!!!


Those are the highlights so when you read LOVE AT FIRST BOOK,
I hope these pics help you imagine it just a little bit clearer. Now go pick up a copy and come to Ireland with me!

Here's more about the novel for the curious:

When a librarian moves to a quaint Irish village where her favorite novelist lives, the last thing she expects is to fall for the author’s prickly son… until their story becomes one for the books, from the New York Times bestselling author of Summer Reading.

Emily Allen, a librarian on Martha’s Vineyard, has always dreamed of a life of travel and adventure. So when her favorite author, Siobhan Riordan, offers her a job in the Emerald Isle, Emily jumps at the opportunity. After all, Siobhan’s novels got Em through some of the darkest days of her existence.

Helping Siobhan write the final book in her acclaimed series—after a ten-year hiatus due to a scorching case of writer’s block—is a dream come true for Emily. If only she didn’t have to deal with Siobhan’s son, Kieran Murphy. He manages Siobhan’s bookstore, and the grouchy bookworm clearly doesn’t want Em around.

Emily persists, and spending her days bantering with the annoyingly handsome mercurial Irishman only makes her fall more deeply in love with the new life she’s built – and for the man who seems to soften toward her with every quip she throws at him. But when she discovers the reason for Kieran's initial resistance, Em finds herself torn between helping Siobhan find closure with her series and her now undeniable feelings for Kier. As Siobhan's novel progresses, Emily will have to decide if she’s truly ready to turn a new page and figure out what lies in the next chapter.

So, Reds and Readers, if you could travel anywhere right now, where would you go?

Two Irish-Themed Stories from Maddie Day and Barbara Ross

Jenn McKinlay: Having just returned from Ireland myself, I can not tell you how happy I am to welcome -- Fàilte -- two of the  Jungle Reds fave mystery writers with their Irish-centric mysteries! Yay!

Hello to all. Maddie Day (then known as Edith Maxwell) and Barb (aka Barbara Ross) have traveled a lot of the same roads on this publishing journey. Our first books were published by small presses. Our first series with Kensington debuted in the same year. We’ve been blogging together over at Wicked Authors for nine years. We already knew each other from Sisters in Crime New England and the New England Crime Bake. And both of us have been mentored and supported by several Reds. 

 

And this month we have books with the same theme coming out on the same day. We’re giving away two each!

 

In Four Leaf Cleaver, by Maddie Day, a cooking competition on Saint Patrick’s Day at Robbie Jordan’s Pans ‘n’ Pancakes goes seriously awry.

 

 

In Irish Coffee Murder, a collection of novellas by Leslie Meier, Lee Hollis, and Barbara Ross, the holiday is Saint Patrick’s and the signature drink of the day is murder.

 

 

To celebrate, Maddie (L) and Barb (R) sat down at the (virtual) kitchen table to talk writing, research, mysteries, and series.

Maddie: Barb, your novella solves a cold case, a crime from the past. Have you written other cold cases in your Maine Clambake series? Is it easier or harder than having your protagonist evade a criminal lurking in the present?

 

Barb: In mystery novels, it’s not unusual to have a crime in the distant past informing a crime in the present. What’s different about this novella is there is no crime in the present. (Is that a spoiler?) Therefore I had to really work at maintaining suspense and keeping the reader interested in a very cold case. The novella length is part of what made that feasible.

 

Barb: Maddie, why did you choose to write about St. Patrick's Day?

 

Maddie: I usually come up with my own book idea, unless I’m asked to write a Christmas novella, for example. For this book, my (and Barb’s editor) at Kensington suggested I could do a cooking competition. Or, he said, “What about a St. Patrick’s Day theme?” I found the combination irresistible, so I did both! Batter Off Dead, the previous book in the series, takes place in July, but after that was “Scarfed Down,” a Christmas novella. A mid-March story slotted into book time perfectly.

 

Maddie: This is your fifth novella, and you've said before you like writing that length. Would you consider writing only novellas in the future? Why, why not?

 

Barb: I do love writing these 25,000 to 30,000 word stories. I’m writing one now to be published in the spring of 2024. (Red Julia Spencer-Fleming was part of a brainstorming session for this one.) I’m very lucky my publisher, Kensington, has offered me the opportunity to be a part of these collections of stories. However, I wouldn’t write only novellas for two reasons. 1) I would miss the opportunity to tell longer stories, And 2) getting novellas published outside the confines of these anthologies is very difficult.

 

Barb: This is the 11th book in the Country Store Mysteries. What do you find more challenging and what is easier when writing this far into a series?

 

Maddie: I’m writing book 12 now and have a contract through  book 13, which is kind of astonishing. What’s easier is that I know the world. I’m pals with my chef’s staff, hugely fond of her Aunt Adele, and adore Robbie Jordan’s husband Abe almost as much as she does. I know how hilly Brown County is and what fictional South Lick looks like. I love when it comes time on my rotation to write a new Country Store book so I can plunge back into that world and hang out with my imaginary friends.

 

As with any long-running series (looking at more than half the Jungle Reds right now), the challenges come in keeping the stories fresh. Making sure protag Robbie Jordan keeps changing and growing in her personal life and in her sleuthing. Finding plausible new people to murder and that Very Good Reason for Robbie to have to investigate. 

 

Maddie: Do you have Irish heritage? Or doesn't it matter for writing about an American holiday with little resemblance to actual Ireland? 

 

Barb: “Perked Up” takes place entirely in Maine, though Julia and friends do go on a roadtrip to the middle of the state while investigating the mystery. I knew next to nothing about the Irish in Maine and found a marvelous book, They Change Their Sky: The Irish in Maine, a collection of scholarly  essays edited by Michael C. Connolly. When we think of Irish emigration to the United States we tend to think of famine-driven immigration to big cities like New York, Boston, and Chicago. But that is only a part of the story. Did you know the oldest surviving Catholic church building in the US is in Newcastle, Maine? (Next town on the coast from where the Clambake mysteries take place.) Still in use, Saint Patrick’s was built  in 1807 by Irish immigrants who became wealthy shipbuilders.

 

As for me, last summer in Dublin, I had a really fun visit with a genealogist at EPIC: The Irish Emigration Museum. I have Irish ancestry, somewhat distantly, on both sides. My father’s great-grandmother, Eleanor Armstrong, was born in 1843 County, Armagh, now in Northern Ireland and my mother’s great-great-great grandfather was born in 1812 in Dublin.

 

Barb: How about your Irish heritage? What kind of research did you do to write this book?

 

Maddie: My maternal grandfather, Richard Flaherty, was a classic bullheaded Irish-American in San Francisco who didn’t speak to my mother from shortly before I was born until he died, as stubborn as ever and with a full head of dark hair, at ninety-four. He had twin brothers who didn’t speak to each other. On the other hand, one of those twin’s sons, my mom’s cousin Bill, is a sweet and devoted family man I’ve gotten to know a bit. I look forward to finally getting to Ireland sometime soon and digging more deeply into the Flahertys of my great-grandparents’ generation.

 

Unlike you, Barb, I didn’t dig too far into the Irish in Indiana, and my Maxwell family roots there are Scottish. For research, I adapted and tested lots of Irish-flavored recipes, and otherwise went full-on American interpretation of the holiday (except green beer). 

 

Maddie and Barb: Thank you to Jenn for hosting us! We hope you’ll all join us at the Wicked Authors blog every weekday, and find us at our web sites and on social media. We wish you happy Irish-styled reading.

 

Readers: What’s your favorite holiday to read about? Do you celebrate any obscure holidays nobody writes about? Do you have a St. Patrick’s Day tradition? We’ll each give away a copy of our new book to two commenters (that is two commenters, two books each).

 

In Four Leaf Cleaver, there’s no mistaking Saint Patrick’s Day at Pans ’N Pancakes, where  the shelves of vintage cookware in her southern Indiana store are draped with Kelly-green garlands and her restaurant is serving shepherd’s pie and Guinness Beer brownies. The big event, however, is a televised Irish cooking competition to be filmed on site. Unfortunately, someone’s luck has run out. Before the cameras start rolling, tough-as-nails producer Tara O’Hara Moore is found upstairs in her B&B room, a heavy cleaver left by her side. Now, not only does Robbie have a store full of festive decorations, she’s got a restaurant full of suspects . . .

 

In “Perked Up,” Barb’s novella in Irish Coffee Murder, It’s a snowy St. Patrick’s night in Busman’s Harbor, Maine. When the power goes out, what better way for Julia Snowden to spend the evening than sharing local ghost stories—and Irish coffees—with friends and family? By the time the lights come back, they might even have solved the coldest case in town . . .

 

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 award-nominated short crime fiction. Day/Maxwell lives with her beau and cat Martin north of Boston, where she writes, gardens, cooks, and wastes time on Facebook. Find her at EdithMaxwell.com, Wicked Authors, Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen, and on social media: BookBub,Twitter, Facebook, Instagram

 

Barbara Ross is the author of the Maine Clambake Mysteries. Her books have been nominated for multiple Agatha Awards for Best Contemporary Novel and have won the Maine Literary Award for Crime Fiction. Barbara’s Maine Clambake novellas are included along with stories by Leslie Meier and Lee Hollis in holiday anthologies from Kensington Publishing. Barbara and her husband live in Portland, Maine. Readers can visit her website at www.maineclambakemysteries.com, on her blog at Wicked Authors and on BookBub, Goodreads, Facebook, and Instagram.

 

 

What We're Writing: To Be Read by Jenn McKinlay

 Jenn McKinlay: Having just returned from Ireland, I am in the process of turning that adventure into my next romcom TO BE READ (2024). 

Woo hoo! Because I do love my research, I have entirely too much information and the book appears to be heading in the direction of being 100 pages too long. Oops. Sorry not sorry.

I mean I have to work ALL of this in, don't I?

Sheep in Kerry

Lady's View 

Ring of Kerry

Ballyseede Castle

Graveyard near Tralee

Cliffs of Moher

Kenmare

I do, I totally do!!! LOL.

TO BE READ: Emily Allen, a librarian on Martha's Vineyard, has always dreamed of a life of travel and adventure. Feeling trapped, she writes a letter to the Irish author Siobhan Riordan, who saved her life. By which, Emily means that Siobhan's books got her through some of the darkest days of her existence. 

Emily is shocked when Siobhan offers her a job as an author assistant/bookshop clerk in the Last Chapter, Siobhan's bookshop in Finn's Hollow, Ireland. Of course, Emily goes, but she doesn't reckon on the bookshop manager, Siobhan's son Kieran Murphy, being unhappy about her arrival. 

As Emily helps Siobhan write the final book in her acclaimed series--after a ten year hiatus due to a scorching case of writer's block--Kieran throws every obstacle he can think of in Em's way. When Siobhan's health takes a bad turn, Emily discovers that the novelist is dying, which is why finishing the book is so important to her. It's also why her son wants her to stop. Kieran believes that finishing the book will hasten Siobhan's passing and he can't face that. Emily is torn between helping Siobhan find closure with her series and her growing feelings for the mercurial Irishman, who is slowly staking a claim on her heart. 

Here's the very rough opener for anyone who wants a gander: 

Chapter One

     “Em, are you all right?” Samantha Gale, my very best friend in the entire world, answered her phone on the fourth ring. Her voice was rough with sleep and it belatedly occurred to me that nine o’clock in the morning in Finn’s Hollow, Ireland was four o’clock in the morning in Oak Bluffs, Martha’s Vineyard.

     “Oh, I’m sorry. Damn it. I woke you up, didn’t I?” I asked, knowing full well by then that I had and feeling awful about it.

     “No, it’s fine,” Sam said. “I told you when you left that I’m always here for you.” There was a low grumbling in the background and she added, “And Ben says he’s here for you, too.”

     That made me laugh. Sam and Ben had become couple goals for me. Not that I thought I’d ever find anything like the connection they’d made but they kept the pilot light of my innermost hope aflame.

     “Thank you and thank Ben,” I said. “I’m going to hang up now and let you go back to sleep. Forget I ever called.” 

     “Emily Allen, don’t you dare hang up on me,” Sam said. Now she sounded fully awake. Oops.

     “No, really I—” I began but she interrupted me.

     “Tell me why you’re calling, otherwise I’ll worry and no one wants that.” There was more grumbling in the background. Sam laughed and said, “Ben says he’s begging you to tell me so that I don’t drive him crazy with speculation.”

     I grinned. She would, too. Then I grew serious. 

     Glancing around the Last Chapter, the quaint bookstore in which I was presently standing, I noted objectively that it was a booklover’s dream come true. A three story brick building chock full of books of all kinds with a small café at the back of the first floor, where the scent of fresh brewed coffee, berry filled scones, and cinnamon pastry permeated the air. I felt myself lean in that direction as if the delicious aromas were pulling me toward them. 

     One of the store clerks had just unlocked the front door of the shop a few moments ago, and I had drafted in behind a handful of customers who’d been waiting. I’d been agog ever since. 

     This was it. The bookshop where I’d be working for the next year. My heart was pounding and my palms were sweaty. The black wool turtleneck sweater I was wearing, in an attempt to defeat the early November chill, felt as if it were choking me and I was quite sure the pain spearing across my head meant I was having an aneurysm.

     “I’m supposed to meet my boss in a few minutes, and I think I’m having a heart attack or potentially a stroke,” I said.

     There was a beat of silence on the other end of the phone. Then Sam said, “Tell me your symptoms.”

     I listed them all and she noted each one with an “uh-huh” which told me nothing whatsoever as to what she was thinking about my condition. I was three thousand miles away and starting a new job in a bookstore, having put my career as a librarian on Martha’s Vineyard on hold to chase some crazy fantasy where I traveled to a foreign destination and lived a life full of adventure.

      “I think I’m going to throw up,” I groaned. 

     “Take a deep breath,” Sam said. “You know the drill—in for eight seconds, hold for four, out for eight.”

     I sucked in a breath. My head pounded. “I can’t. It makes my head throb. See? Aneurysm.”

     “Or a lack-of-caffeine headache,” she said. “Have you had any coffee yet?’

     Come to think of it, I had not. I’d been too nervous to make any before I left my cottage this morning so the potential for this skull splitter to be from coffee deprivation seemed likely. 

     “No,” I said. “And I see where you’re going, but I still have brutal nausea and I’m sweating. I bet I have a fever. Maybe it’s food poisoning from the airplane food last night. I did have the beef stroganoff.”

     “You ate airplane food?” Sam sounded as incredulous as if I’d confessed I ate ice cream off the bathroom floor. She was a professional chef, so not a big surprise.

    “I know, I know,” I said. “It’s pure preservatives. I’ll likely be dead within the hour.”

     There was a lengthy pause where I imagined Sam was practicing her last words to me, wanting to get them just right.

     “Em, you know I love you like a sister, right?” she asked.

     Hmm. This did not sound like the beginning of a vow of friendship into the afterlife. 

     “I do,” I said. “I also know that’s how you would start a sentence that I’m not going to like.”

     “You’re panicking, Em,” Sam said. Her voice was full of empathy and patience. “And you and I both know that the bout of hypochondria you dealt with last summer was how you coped with your anxiety and your unhappiness.”

     “But I’m not unhappy,” I protested. “I’m living the dream, thousands of miles away from everyone I’ve ever known and loved, in a quaint village in County Kerry where the green is the greenest green I’ve ever seen and there’s an adorable sheep staring at me over the edge of every stone wall. Seriously, I’m drowning in charm, which is probably why I’m about to keel over dead.”

     A sound came from my phone that sounded like someone stepping on a duck. 

     “Are you laughing at me?” I asked. Rude but understandable.

     “No, never,” Sam said. She cleared her throat. “I just think you might be freaking out a little because it’s your first day of work at your new job.”

     “I’m not,” I protested. I was. I absolutely was. “I just think I need to get on the train back to Dublin and hop on the next flight home before they discover I have some highly contagious pox or plague and I’m quarantined to a thatched stone cottage to live out my days in a fairy-infested forest, talking to the trees and hedgehogs while farming for potatoes.”

     “Have you ever considered that you read too much?” Sam asked.

     “No!” I cried and I heard Ben, also a librarian, protest as well.

     Sam laughed. She did like to goad us. 

     “Just think if I leave now, we can meet for coffee and pastries at the Grape tomorrow morning. Doesn’t that sound nice?” I asked.

     “While I’d love to see you, you know that, you have to stay in Ireland and see your journey through,” Sam said. “Besides, if you go home now your mother will guilt you into never leaving again not to mention clobber you with the dreaded ‘I told you so.’”

     “Fair point.” I sighed. “I still think I might pass out and then I’ll likely lose the job and this entire conversation becomes moot.”

     “You’re not going to pass out,” Sam said. “Find a place to sit down. Can you do that?”

     “I think so.” I was standing in the stacks, okay, more accurately hiding in the fiction section. The shelves were dark wood, long and tall and stuffed with books. They comforted me. Scattered randomly amid the shelving units were step stools. I found one and sat down.

     “Are you sitting?” Sam asked.

     “Yes.”

     “Good, now put your head between your knees,” she ordered.

      “Um.” I was wearing a formfitting, gray wool pencil skirt. I tried to maneuver my head down. No luck. The skirt was too snug. The closest I could get was to look over my knees at my black ankle boots. “Sorry, Sam, nothing is getting between these knees not even a hot Irishman.”

     Sam chuckled, but over that I heard a strangled noise behind me and I straightened up and turned around to see a man in jeans and an Aran sweater, holding his fist to his mouth, looking as if he was choking. He had thick, wavy black hair and blue eyes so dark they were almost the same shade as his hair. Also, if I wasn’t mistaken, judging by the picture I’d seen on the Last Chapter’s website he was my new boss Kieran Murphy.

So, how about you, Reds? How much research do you have to cut out of your works in progress? Readers, do you prefer more or less when it comes to descriptions?