Death at High Tide by Hannah Dennison

Jenn McKinlay: I am absolutely thrilled to have one of my very favorite wine drinking pals, um, writing mates visiting all the way from the gorgeous Devon countryside to celebrate her latest release DEATH AT HIGH TIDE. Hannah and I have been friends for many years and many series now, and I am always pleased to see her even if it’s mostly on Facetime these days when we do one of our marathon catchups. Hi, Hannah! Welcome to the blog!

Available Now!

Hannah Dennison: Thanks so much for inviting me to Jungle Red Writers today. I have been a guest on this amazing blog a few times now and I feel very honored to have been invited back!

Eighteen months ago my domestic situation changed in a way that I could never have imagined. After twenty-five years of living in California followed by a short stint in Oregon, I found myself moving back home with my two Hungarian Vizslas, for good.  

My daughter picked me up at Heathrow airport and drove the two hundred miles to a tiny hamlet in south Devon where my sister Lesley was waiting in what would become my new home—a beautiful barn conversion that she had found for me to rent—along with a bottle of celebratory champagne. 

Although we’d been super close growing up, Lesley and I had drifted apart as the years passed, especially after my move overseas. As the oldest, I used to be the bossy one but I discovered that it was Lesley now who ruled the proverbial roost. As my mother, (a feisty ninety-year-old), said, “Your sister holds the rolling pin.”  

Lesley is a force of nature and has to be one of the most optimistic people I know. As a single mother of three grown-up sons, her life hadn’t been easy. She’s been an Avon rep, Brown Owl for the local Brownie pack and was a Weightwatchers lecturer for two decades. These days she works as an estate manager for a country house that was the location for the recent remake of My Cousin Rachel that starred Rachel Weisz. 

A relationship with a sister is like no other. Who else can I belt out songs from Queen, Genesis and David Bowie with or drive our mother to distraction with our signature—and disgusting—Hot Snot Bogey Pie schoolyard rhyme?

Sisterhood can be both wonderful and challenging. I find that being labeled Eeyore to her Tigger is still extremely irritating. “That was fifty years ago,” I’d grumble, sounding very Eeyore-like. If I were any character in the Pooh stories it would have to be Kanga. 

That’s the thing about sisters. They have a knack of telling it like it is. They also have an amazing ability to recall embarrassing moments that we’d much rather forget. But it was Lesley who insisted that I’d always wanted to be a writer—something I hotly denied. 

But six weeks ago, whilst going through old photo albums and storage boxes my sister presented me with a few handwritten pages with the words First Draft scrawled in pencil. “You see,” she said triumphantly. “You always wanted to be a writer.”

This First Draft was a murder-mystery story about two sisters, “one scatterbrained and one practical” that find a dead gamekeeper in the forest. I must have been twelve when I wrote it and even though it was, literally, just a first draft I was surprised that I had actually plotted the whole story out with bullet points. I honestly couldn’t remember writing it. Of course after that first rush of excitement Lesley presented me with another envelope. “Oh, and here’s that rejection letter from Woman’s Own magazine.” And it was at that moment I knew why I’d buried my writing dream. 

It concerned a love story that my twelve-year old innocent self (who had never been kissed) had sent off to a woman’s magazine. The return of my short story with NO, written in big red letters across the generic buck slip promptly stopped me picking up my pen again for a very long time.

Hannah and Leslie in a helicopter on a research trip 

So it seems fitting that my new series is about those two sisters but Death at High Tide was already in production when we found First Draft in that storage box. It must have been percolating in my sub-conscious for decades. In Death at High Tide there is no gamekeeper in the forest but there is plenty of murder. But most of all it’s about sisterhood. 

There is a saying, “Sisters by blood, best friends by choice,” and to that I shout Amen!

What about you, Reds and Readers, any sister stories out there to share?  

What's being said: 
"Winning...Two murders and a high tide cutting off the police heighten the suspense. Intriguing characters and an intricate plot lift this twist on Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. Cozy fans will look forward to further skullduggery on Tregarrick." ―Publishers Weekly

"Thrilling....Vividly described setting, effective plot twists, and a strong portrayal of sisterly love distinguish this 'locked island' mystery." ―Booklist

DEATH AT HIGH TIDE released on Aug 18th! 

Death at High Tide is the delightful first installment in the Island Sisters series by Hannah Dennison, featuring two sisters who inherit an old hotel in the remote Isles of Scilly off the coast of Cornwall and find it full of intrigue, danger, and romance.

When Evie Mead’s husband, Robert, suddenly drops dead of a heart attack, a mysterious note is found among his possessions. It indicates that Evie may own the rights to an old hotel on Tregarrick Rock, one of the Isles of Scilly. 

Still grieving, Evie is inclined to leave the matter to the accountant to sort out. Her sister Margot, however, flown in from her glamorous career in LA, has other plans. Envisioning a luxurious weekend getaway, she goes right ahead and buys two tickets—one way—to Tregarrick.

Once at the hotel—used in its heyday to house detective novelists, and more fixer-upper than spa resort, after all—Evie and Margot attempt to get to the bottom of things. But the foul-tempered hotel owner claims he's never met the late Robert, even after Evie finds framed photos of them—alongside Robert's first wife—in his office. The rest of the island inhabitants, ranging from an ex-con receptionist to a vicar who communicates with cats, aren't any easier to read.

But when a murder occurs at the hotel, and then another soon follows, frustration turns to desperation. There’s no getting off the island at high tide. And Evie and Margot, the only current visitors to Tregarrick, are suspects one and two. It falls to them to unravel secrets spanning generations—and several of their own—if they want to make it back alive.

The Mystery of Ireland by Sheila Connolly

LUCY BURDETTE: Happy St. Patrick's Day! How shall we celebrate? Corned beef? Goofy leprechaun costumes? Shots of Irish whiskey? Or how about, even more fun, a guest post from our friend and Irish expert Sheila Connolly, whose new Irish mystery, Cruel Winter is out this week? Welcome Sheila!

SHEILA CONNOLLY: I was going to put together a short, snappy, chatty post about why I write a mystery series set in Ireland. That "short" part kind of got lost. If you spend any time in Ireland, you'll find that things are slower there, and there are a lot of storytellers, and everyone takes the time to talk. I’ve had a stranger on the street spend fifteen minutes telling me what he likes about the European Union, and another in a pub asked what the Kennedy’s were really like. A very old man told me how my great-aunt Winifred had a new roof put on the Lawless family house to sell it—in 1949. He remembered it well.

When I first saw Ireland, in 1998, I wasn’t a writer. I wasn’t even thinking about being a writer. I arrived in the small town of Leap in a rainstorm, with no room booked for the night, and the first thing I saw was a pub called Connolly’s. It had to be an omen, right?

Put all this together and you'll see why I write a series set in a pub in a small town in the Wild West of Ireland. I learned quickly that pubs are not about drinking, they're about talking.

I made my protagonist a young American woman so she can ask all the stupid questions (yes, the ones that I asked). What do you call this thing? I need to take the bin to the tip? I’ll call you on my mobile. Want a packet of crisps with your pint?

If you go and just sit in a pub or restaurant and listen to how people speak, you realize that the language is soft and it flows. It has inflection and rhythm. People don't say, "Yo, you goin' to town?" They say, “So, you’re after going to the town, then?” It’s no wonder that Ireland has produced so many poets and bards—who were and are important to keeping Irish culture alive. Back before television, itinerant storytellers were welcome guests in rural parts of the country.

How could I not write about Ireland, and that corner of Cork in particular? My grandfather was born there, the last of ten children. Is there such a thing as inherited memory? To me the place felt familiar from the day I arrived. Last year I bought a cottage there, in sight of where my great-grandparents were born, married, raised their children. Every time I turn around in the area I find another relative. It’s the perfect place for a writer, and there are plenty of stories left to tell.

Do you read books set in other countries? What do you expect from them? What things do you like, and what turns you off when you see them on the page?

Readers, don't forget to leave a comment with your email to be entered in a drawing for a signed copy of CRUEL WINTER

Anthony and Agatha Award-nominated and New York Times bestselling author Sheila Connolly writes the Orchard Mysteries for Berkley, the County Cork Mysteries for Crooked Lane Books, and the Relatively Dead Mysteries for Beyond the Page Press. Her new Victorian Village Mysteries from St. Martin’s Press will debut in 2018. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband and three cats and has recently bought a holiday cottage in Ireland.

About Cruel Winter:

Snow is a rarity in Maura Donovan's small village in County Cork, Ireland, so she wasn't sure what to expect when a major snowstorm rolled in around Sullivan's pub. But now she's stranded in a bar full of patrons--and a suspected killer in a long-ago murder.

Maura’s been in Ireland less than a year and hasn't heard about the decades-old unsolved crime that took place nearby, let alone the infamous suspect, Diane Caldwell. But the locals have, and they're not happy to be trapped with her. Diane, meanwhile, seeks to set the record straight, asserting her innocence after all this time. And since no one is going anywhere in the storm, Maura encourages Diane to share her side of the story, which she’d never had a chance to do in court.

Over the next few hours, the informal court in Sullivan’s reviews the facts and theories about the case--and comes to some surprising conclusions. But is it enough to convince the police to take a new look at an old case? 

To Cozy? Or Too Cozy?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Okay, I’m just gonna step back and let LeslieBudewitz talk. She’s hilarious, brilliant, and a dear pal. She’s the immediate past president of Sisters in Crime—and did an absolutely stellar job. She's a nationally best-selling author who lives in the wilds of Montana, and she’s fearless.

As she proves in this essay.

TO COZY, OR NOT TO COZY?

            By Leslie Budewitz

Ah, the poor cozy. In some circles—and I know you’ll be shocked—it’s fashionable to denigrate the cozy. To dismiss the amateur sleuth as a busy-body who should stick to running her book shop, her catering business, or her spice shop, and leave the down-and-dirty world of investigating murder to the cynical and jaded private investigator or his cousin, the cynical and jaded police detective.

I’m not buying it.

There is a reason we love the amateur sleuths of cozy world, and I’ve got a theory.

It’s not because we love the food they cook or the sweaters they knit. Well, not just because of the food and sweaters.

I’m not going to define the cozy—I could, but that would be another post! Suffice to say, as the late Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said of pornography, we know it when we see it.

But here’s the key, for me. Whether the cozy is set in a small town or a community within a larger city, in the past or the present, whether the amateur sleuth is single or widowed, young or old, whether we like the victim or think she needed killing, the murder is a shock that disrupts the norm. It must be solved—and this is key—to restore a sense of order. Of course, there’s one in every book, so the reader isn’t shocked, but the residents are. They share an underlying belief is that people are basically good, and natural order can be restored.  

Some writers don’t like the term cozy. The great Carolyn Hart, whom I adore, says what’s more uncomfortable than murder in a small town where everyone is affected? I live in a small town, and she’s right. I never want to forget that murder is not just a means to tell a story—it’s real, and it hurts everyone.

But I like the term, because ultimately any book with an amateur sleuth is about community. Our intrepid sleuth steps away from her busy life to investigate because it’s necessary. The job of the professional investigators is to restore external order by making an arrest and bringing the killer into the justice system. But the job of the amateur sleuth is to restore internal order within the community. To restore the social order.

How does she do that? She’s part of the community—sometimes new to it, sometimes a local girl who returns home. Her occupation—running a coffeehouse or a pet-friendly hotel, catering, or midwifery—puts her at the heart of the community. She knows everyone. She understands the dynamics. She can see things the professionals can’t see and ask questions they can’t ask, because she knows what goes on. Often, her expertise gives her an advantage—because she knows the true value of the stolen rare book, beyond its price, she can understand the motivation to take it and identify the killer the police never suspected.

Ultimately, the cozy is about community. The characters and their relationships drive the plot, and the entire novel. And so I find the label “cozy” a positive choice. A hopeful choice.

As I often tell readers, cozies are the comfort food of the mystery world. And don’t we all crave a little mac and cheese now and then?

HANK: That’s such a great way of putting it.  What do you think, Reds and lovely readers? Have you had the “cozy” battle, er, discussion with anyone? Who's your favorite cozy author?

 

ABOUT KILLING THYME:

In Seattle's Pike Place Market, Spice Shop owner Pepper Reece is savoring her business success, but soon finds her plans disrupted by a killer in the latest from the national bestselling author of Guilty as Cinnamon.

Pepper Reece's to-do list is longer than the shopping list for a five-course dinner, as she conjures up spice blends bursting with seasonal flavor, soothes nervous brides fretting over the gift registry, and crosses her fingers for a rave review from a sharp-tongued food critic. Add to the mix a welcome visit from her mother, Lena, and she's got the perfect recipe for a busy summer garnished with a dash of fun.

While browsing in the artists' stalls, Pepper and Lena drool over stunning pottery made by a Market newcomer. But when Lena recognizes the potter, Bonnie Clay, as an old friend who disappeared years ago, the afternoon turns sour. To Pepper's surprise, Bonnie seems intimately connected to her family's past. After Bonnie is murdered only days later, Pepper is determined to uncover the truth. But as Pepper roots out long-buried secrets, will she be digging her own grave?

ABOUT LESLIE:

Leslie Budewitz blends her passion for food, great mysteries, and the Northwest in two cozy mystery series. KILLING THYME, her third Spice Shop Mystery, set in Seattle’s Pike Place Market, is due on October 4. DEATH AL DENTE, first in the Food Lovers' Village Mysteries, set in Jewel Bay, Montana, won the 2013 Agatha Award for Best First Novel. The immediate past president of Sisters in Crime, she lives and cooks in NW Montana.

Find Leslie and excerpts from her books on her website, and chat with her on Facebook.