For thirty-something blogger Cora Chevalier, small-town Indigo Gap, North Carolina, seems like the perfect place to reinvent her life.
Shedding a stressful past as a counselor for a women’s shelter, Cora is pouring all her talents—and most of her savings—into a craft retreat business, with help from close pal and resident potter Jane Starr. Between transforming her Victorian estate into a crafter’s paradise and babysitting Jane’s daughter, the new entrepreneur has no time for distractions. Especially rumors about the murder of a local school librarian . . .
But when Jane’s fingerprints match those found at the grisly crime scene, Cora not only worries about her friend, but her own reputation. With angry townsfolk eager for justice and both Jane’s innocence and the retreat at risk, she must rely on her creative chops to unlace the truth behind the beloved librarian’s disturbing demise. Because if the killer’s patterns aren’t pinned, Cora’s handiwork could end up in stitches . . .
About The Author Mollie Cox Bryan is the author of the Cumberland Creek Scrapbooking mystery series. She is also author of two cookbooks, the regional bestseller Mrs. Rowe’s Little Book of Southern Pies and Mrs. Rowe’s Restaurant Cookbook: A Lifetime of Recipes from the Shenandoah Valley . An award-winning journalist and poet, she currently blogs, cooks, and scrapbooks in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia with her husband and two daughters. Scrapbook of Secrets was nominated for an Agatha Award for Best First Novel.
Gulp. Just look at how ridiculous this thing looks. It’s a giant black sea slug known as a sea hare and it’s freaking monstrous. You don’t really hold it in your hand as much as the sea hare, which can grow up to over 3 feet long and weigh over 30 pounds, just swallows your entire arm. Brave Wilderness found the black sea hare in the tide pools off the coast of the Pacific Ocean in San Pedro, CA and described holding it as super slimy and unbelievably slippery.Source: Just Look at This Freaking Giant Black Slug
All sorts of narratives, including literary fiction, TV shows and even certain video games could help boost our fellow-feeling.That is the conclusion of a new review by Professor Keith Oatley, a cognitive psychologist and novelist. your brain (artist’s rendition)
Literary fiction, in particular, which simulates the social world, may help to boost our empathy with others.
One study gave people a test of empathy after they had either read some literary fiction or some nonfiction.
It was the literary fiction which produced the most empathetic response in people.
Professor Oatley said:
“The most important characteristic of being human is that our lives are social.
What’s distinctive about humans is that we make social arrangements with other people–with friends, with lovers, with children–that aren’t pre-programmed by instinct.
Fiction can augment and help us understand our social experience.”
Professor Oatley said:
“What’s a piece of fiction, what’s a novel, what’s short story, what’s a play or movie or television series?
It’s a piece of consciousness being passed from mind to mind.
When you’re reading or watching a drama, you’re taking in a piece of consciousness that you make your own.
That seems an exciting idea.”
The study was published in the journal Trends in Cognitive Sciences (Oatley, 2016).
from PsyBlog http://bit.ly/2a9tFE4
In glittering Newport, Rhode Island, status is everything. But despite being a poorer relation to the venerable Vanderbilts, Emma Cross has shaped her own identity—as a reporter and a sleuth.
As the nineteenth century draws to a close, Fancies and Fashion reporter Emma Cross is sent by the Newport Observer to cover an elite house party at Rough Point, a “cottage” owned by her distant cousin Frederick Vanderbilt that has been rented as an artist retreat. To her surprise, the illustrious guests include her estranged Bohemian parents—recently returned from Europe—as well as a variety of notable artists, including author Edith Wharton.
But when one of the artists is discovered dead at the bottom of a cliff, Rough Point becomes anything but a house of mirth. After a second murder, no one is above suspicion—including Emma’s parents. As Newport police detective Jesse Whyte searches for a killer, Emma tries to draw her own conclusions—with the help of Mrs. Wharton. But with so many sketchy suspects, she’ll need to canvas the crime scenes carefully, before the cunning culprit takes her out of the picture next . . . Praise for Alyssa Maxwell and her Gilded Newport Mysteries
“Another entertaining entry in this cozy series.” —Library Journal
“Maxwell’s second entry has a credible mystery, solved by a female detective who’s likeable.” —Kirkus Reviews
About The Author Alyssa Maxwell has worked in publishing as an assistant editor and a ghost writer, but knew from an early age that being a novelist was what she wanted most. Growing up in New England and traveling to Great Britain fueled a passion for history, while a love of puzzles of all kinds drew her to the mystery genre. She lives in South Florida in the current year, but confesses to spending most of her time in the Victorian, Edwardian, and post WWI eras. In addition to fantasizing about wearing Worth gowns while strolling manor house gardens, she loves to watch BBC and other period productions and sip tea in the afternoons.
A new study demonstrates that shaking a negative first impression is often diabolically difficult, providing just one more reason to make sure that you show up on time for your next job interview.
“Moral and immoral behaviors often come in small doses. A person might donate just a few dollars to charity or cheat on just one exam question,” explain University of Chicago psychological scientists Nadav Klein and Ed O’Brien. But how many positive or negative acts must a person undertake before we change our minds about someone?
Across five experiments, Klein and O’Brien found that this moral tipping point is asymmetric — a moral improvement takes a lot more work for us to notice compared to a moral decline, even if the evidence is we observe is the same in each case. In other words, “it is apparently easier to become a sinner than a saint, despite exhibiting equivalent evidence for change.”
In one experiment, Klein and O’Brien attempted to measure the moral tipping point – the number of behaviors that will change our assessment of someone. A group of 201 participants took part in an online study in which they read a scenario about an average office worker named Barbara. All of the participants were told that Barbara’s personality was pretty neutral; most of the time her behavior towards her colleagues was inoffensive, but occasionally she was especially nice (e.g., holding the door, giving compliments) while other times she was kind of a jerk (e.g., cutting in line, spreading gossip).
Participants were then told that there had been a change in Barbara’s behavior over a period of several weeks. One group of participants was told that Barbara was now doing many more nice things and another group was told she was now doing many more mean things. Participants were then asked how many weeks of this behavior change (1 – 16 weeks) would convince them she had made a substantial moral change as a person.
When Barbara’s behavior turned mean, it only took a few weeks for participants to conclude that she had taken a turn for the worse. However, it took many more weeks of positive behavior to convince people that Barbara was changing for the better.
“Put another way, these results suggest an asymmetry in the moral tipping point that truly depends on valence: it takes relatively few bad actions to be seen as changed for the worse, but relatively many good actions to be seen as changed for the better,” the researchers explain.
In another online experiment, 200 female participants read a very similar scenario, but this time the information about their coworker’s behavior changes was presented in increments. After reading that the coworker had shown a change in behavior for a whole week, participants were asked whether they were convinced this person’s moral character had “officially” improved or declined. If they responded “yes,” the session ended. If they responded “no,” they were told the behavior had continued for another week and were asked if the personality change had tipped.
Again, the results showed that people were much quicker at concluding the change in behavior showed a moral decline and much slower at acknowledging moral improvement.
“People apparently need to commit just a few bad actions to appear substantively changed for the worse, but need to commit many good actions to appear substantively changed for the better,” Klein and O’Brien report.
A recent article published in Perspectives on Psychological Science demonstrates just how influential small acts can be in our assessment of another person’s morality. In one experiment, participants were told about a company hiring a new CEO. One of the candidates requested an expensive marble table as a perk. Participants found this request so morally appalling that they “reported a preference for paying an additional $1 million in salary to a different job candidate just to avoid hiring a candidate whose salary request included a $40,000 marble table.”
Participants viewed a candidate who asked for such perks as more likely to act on his own selfish interests rather than the good of the company.
In their article, Klein and O’Brien argue that it’s important to be aware of this strong bias against negative information. Because the threshold for forming negative impressions is much lower than positive ones, we may want to be more open to giving people opportunities to redeem themselves after a bad first impression.
References
Klein, N., & O’Brien, E. (2016). The Tipping Point of Moral Change: When Do Good and Bad Acts Make Good and Bad Actors?. Social Cognition, 34(2), 149. doi: 10.1521/soco.2016.34.2.149
Uhlmann, E. L., Pizarro, D. A., & Diermeier, D. (2015). A person-centered approach to moral judgment. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 10(1), 72-81. doi: 10.1177/1745691614556679
from Minds for Business – Association for Psychological Science http://bit.ly/2aiwGz6
>>>Enter to win an e-copy of Mud Bog Murder<<<
When Jenny McCleary leases her property to be ravaged by the annual mud bog races, the small rural town of Sabal Bay, Florida, is divided into warring camps: environmental activists versus monster truck fans. Jenny, who frequents the consignment store owned by Eve Appel and her friend Madeleine, doesn’t seem to mind when Eve and Madeleine join the protesters the day of the races.
During the race, Eve catches Jenny’s airborne head after it is tossed into the air by the wheels of a truck. Now every protester is a suspect in Jenny’s murder. What’s left of her alligator-gnawed body is found near the airboat business of Eve’s Miccosukee Indian friends, Sammy Egret and his grandfather. When more evidence turns up nearby, Grandfather is arrested.
Even without the disembodied head, Eve has her hands full. The town resents her role in the protests and is boycotting the consignment shop on wheels. She is torn between two men–GQ-handsome, devoted PI Alex and tall, dark, and exotic Sammy. Jenny’s sweet and needy teenage daughter is dating a petty criminal. Will Eve and Madeleine ever be able to move into their new digs? Not unless the town forgives them. And not if whoever decapitated Jenny gets to Eve before she and her sleuthing buddies solve the mystery.
Q: Aloha Lesley, and welcome back to Island Confidential. Can you tell us a little bit about Eve Appel?
A: The protagonist of the Eve Appel mystery series and the newest book in it, Mud Bog Murder, is Eve Appel, a woman who has spent her life in the Northeast and has now moved to rural Florida to open a consignment shop there with her best friend, Madeleine Boudreaux Wilson. These two friends couldn’t be any different in appearance. Eve is tall, willow thin with spiky blonde hair (with dark roots, her fashion statement) while Madeleine is short, round and has red curly hair. They are different in personality also. Eve is an in-your-face gal and Madeleine, although a bit physically clumsy, is polite and always knows the right thing to say. Eve may know what is socially appropriate, but she seldom feels compelled to say or do it. The two have been friends since childhood, sharing a commitment to righting wrongs and a loyalty to friends and family. Eve loves designer fashions as long as she doesn’t have to pay full price, so she’s addicted to consignment shopping, and she’s determined to bring the opportunity to dress for less to rural Florida. And, oh yes. Eve is as snoopy as can be especially when it comes to murder. Q: How much of you is in Eve? How would you feel about her if you met her in real life?
A: There is little of me in Eve except that we both probably share the need to find answers to questions. My questions involve more mundane issues such as where did I leave my glasses while her questions are both mundane (what should I wear today?) and significant to her life and her community (who killed my friend?). In Mud Bog Murder, that means Eve not only catches the severed head of the victim, but she searches for the killer. There’s no question that if I had caught that head, I would have dropped it and run like crazy. I admire her and Madeleine for different reasons. I can certainly relate to Eve’s search for secondhand merchandise. I’m addicted to yard sales, consignment shops and bargains in general. There is nothing that Eve won’t take on when it comes to social injustice—insults to the environment, family upheavals, as well as theft and murder. Who wouldn’t want a friend with the attitude of can do, or as they say, in the South a get ‘er done approach to problems? Madeleine’s warm, friendly, ladylike exterior hides a streak of real spunkiness. Madeleine is the lady my mom raised me to be. I guess it didn’t take. But, for Madeleine, lady combined with spunk really works. Q: Do your characters change and evolve throughout consecutive books in the series? I imagine catching a severed head (!) would be a transformational experience, no?
A: Yes, they do. I think it’s necessary for characters to face challenges and change to handle these in each book, but I think a writer must take series characters through life journeys especially if the writer decides to age the characters which is what I do. Throwing murder at a character necessitates adjustment and self-exploration especially if solving the crime means the character confronts situations she fears and people she doesn’t like. In a mystery series, writers do this again and again, so the reader has a right to see a character altered by so many encounters with death. Subplots that involve the character’s personal life and development entail the same consideration: what does love, family, friendship and the absence, presence or alteration in all these mean for the character. How is she different at the end of the series from what she was in the beginning? Eve has certainly confronted some interesting issues, and she has been changed by them. Love is one of these, and what happens to Eve’s love life in Mud Bog Murder may surprise the reader. It certainly surprised Eve. Q: So just between you, me, and the millions of people with internet access: Have you ever thought of killing someone that you know in real life–on the pages of a murder mystery, I mean?
A: Sure, and I did it in an early manuscript in which I also made the murderer someone I knew and disliked. It was quite cathartic, and some really bad writing on my part. I radically altered that story and it later was a book in which the story is nothing like the original version. However, I have to thank the people I disliked for helping presenting me with characters I could enhance and recreate. It sure was fun! Q: How realistic is your setting? Do you take liberties, or are you true to life?
A: The setting for Mud Bog Murder is rural Florida a place few tourists are familiar with or visit and where few Floridians live. The county I live in has more cattle than people and probably more alligators too. This is really “old Florida”, the Florida before interstates, sugar fields and runaway development. I try to stay true to the setting and what it means to its people although I do alter names of towns and streets sometimes. I want the story to not only be about murder, but I want the impact of that to be imbedded in the setting such that to move the story away from that setting would change the tone and the significance of it. Because I’m not a Florida native, neither is my protagonist. She’s an outsider, someone who can see what is happening with new eyes, but who becomes more and more a part of the community in each book. Q: When the movie or TV series is made, who plays the major parts?
A: I’m not much of a moviegoer. My husband and I prefer watching British comedies and mysteries on Netflix. I’m not good at knowing actors, but there is the short, shapely blonde on Big Bang Theory who, with a red wig could play Madeleine. She seems to have the bubbly persona of Madeleine. As for Eve, she is physically like Angeline Jolie but with short, blond hair. Since the mystery is humorous, it’s always difficult to find comic actors who can carry the parts. Q: What’s the worst and best advice you’ve heard or received as an author?
A: In the writing world, we’re always told to write what we know, but sometimes it’s important to understand what it is we know, and it’s not always what we have spent our lives doing. My first manuscript featured a college psychology professor. That’s what I did, so I figured I was on safe ground writing about it. I was so close to the college world that my manuscript lacked sizzle. It was boring. Once I used what I knew to create, not copy the world in the story, the manuscript improved. Writing is all about imagination and the creation and crafting of the work. Sometimes we leave that out when we tell beginning writers to write what they know. Most important is to learn your craft. You can only break the rules when you understand what they mean to your story. As for what you know, you can always learn what you don’t know. Research is important—interviews, experience, involvement in new endeavors as well as research on line and in libraries. It can open a world of writing opportunities.
About the Author
Lesley retired from her life as a professor of psychology and reclaimed her country roots by moving to a small cottage in the Butternut River Valley in upstate New York. In the winter she migrates to old Florida—cowboys, scrub palmetto, and open fields of grazing cattle, a place where spurs still jingle in the post office, and gators make golf a contact sport. Back north, the shy ghost inhabiting the cottage serves as her literary muse. When not writing, she gardens, cooks and renovates the 1874 cottage with the help of her husband, two cats and, of course, Fred the ghost, who gives artistic direction to their work.
She is the author of a number of mystery series (Microbrewing Series, Big Lake Mystery Series, Eve Appel Mystery Series and the Laura Murphy Mysteries), a standalone mystery (Angel Sleuth) and numerous short stories.
Visit her on her website: www.lesleyadiehl.com
Webpage: www.lesleyadiehl.com
Blog: www.lesleyadiehl.com/blog
Twitter: @lesleydiehl
Facebook: [email protected] Buy on Amazon
Leaders’ propensity for generosity seems to depend on whether they feel like they’ve earned their high-status position, according to new research conducted by psychological scientists Nicholas Hays (Michigan State University) and Steven Blader (New York University).
The findings indicate that a boss or colleague who feels that their high-status position is unearned is likely to be much more generous compared to someone who feels like they’re entitled to a spot at the top.
“For instance, high-status CEOs—who have a greater sense of hubris and thus are likely to have an exaggerated sense of their value to their organizations— extract more compensation and yet devote less time and effort to advancing organizational goals compared to lower-status CEO,” write Hays and Blader. “Because generosity is often strategically demonstrated to attain status, generosity may decrease once status-attainment goals are achieved.”
Previous research published in Psychological Science has shown that attaining a position of power really can change people for the worse: Across five experiments, Joris Lammers (Tilburg University) and colleagues found that “irrespective of how power was manipulated or hypocrisy was measured, we found strong evidence that the powerful are more likely to engage in moral hypocrisy than are people who lack power.”
However, power only seemed to compromise people’s moral judgement under circumstances in which people felt like they had earned their position: “Our final study demonstrated the crucial role of entitlement: Only when power is experienced as legitimate is moral hypocrisy a likely result. If power is not experienced as legitimate, then the moral-hypocrisy effect disappears.”
For their first experiment, Hays and Blader surveyed a group of 255 MBA students. The students were working together in 51 teams over the course of a six-month field project with real clients. The students completed two surveys asking them to assess how helpful they were (i.e., “I will be willing to help when needed”) and how important they were to their group’s success. The first survey was completed at the very beginning of the field project; in a second survey, completed three months into the project, participants also rated each member of their group on a 7-point scale for how much respect, esteem, and prominence they had within their team.
“As predicted, there is a significant positive relationship between status and generosity at low legitimacy and a significant negative relationship at high legitimacy,” the researchers report.
A second experiment looked at whether status influenced people’s actual behavior. A group of 339 college students were assigned roles in a business scenario, ostensibly based on their scores from a business aptitude assessment. In reality, the participants were randomly assigned to either high- or low-status roles and either legitimacy or illegitimacy conditions.
Those in the legitimate conditions were assigned to a status role that matched their “score” on the assessment, while those in the illegitimate condition were told they’d received a lower score than their team members but would be given a higher-ranking role.
After learning their scores and role assignments, participants played a game in which group members could allocate 100 points among themselves and their two teammates. These points could be exchanged for lottery tickets at the end of the study, and generosity was gauged based on how many points participants allocated to their teammates.
As expected, those who felt they were entitled to a high-status position were significantly less generous towards their teammates than participants who thought their high ranking was not earned. Across all six experiments, those who felt entitled to their high-status position showed significantly less generosity than people who felt they’d ended up at the top through a fluke.
“Complementing previous work indicating that generosity leads to status increases, we find that once an individual has obtained high status, the legitimacy of that status determines whether he or she tends to behave more or less generously than low-status group members,” Hays and Blader conclude.
References
Hays, N. A., & Blader, S. L. (2016). To Give or Not to Give? Interactive Effects of Status and Legitimacy on Generosity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. doi: 10.1037/pspi0000067
Lammers, J., Stapel, D. A., & Galinsky, A. D. (2010). Power increases hypocrisy moralizing in reasoning, immorality in behavior. Psychological Science, 21(5), 737-744. doi: 10.1177/0956797610368810
from Minds for Business – Association for Psychological Science http://bit.ly/2aapvcT
Joanna Campbell Slan / Vendetta: A Cara Mia Delgatto Mystery – The House of Refuge on Gilbert’s Bar is known for its 150-year history as a way station for shipwrecked sailors. But when Cara Mia visits, the museum becomes the scene of acrime.
Linda Gordon Hengerer / Dying for School Tea: A Beach Tea Shop Novella – Chelsea Powell and her sisters are providing treats for Citrus Beach High School’s freshman orientation. Can they solve the murder of the beloved softball coach before someone else dies?
Carole W. Price / The Glass Birdhouse – Will Bella find clues to Fawn Daniel’s death in her unfinished glass birdhouse?
Lesley Diehl / Bobbing for Murder – A visit from Darcie’s family is always chaotic, and this time the relatives bamboozle Darcie into having a Halloween party. Will that decision come back to haunt her?
Nancy Jill Thames / Raven House – When reporter Karla Wilson is murdered after the Raven House Ball, will Jillian Bradley and her Yorkie Teddy uncover the killer and unleash Karla’s secrets?
Teresa Trent / Falling for Murder – Helpful hints columnist Betsy Livingston is an expert at household organization but her skills are put to the test when she’s called upon to conduct an efficiency review for a haunted house.
Maggie Toussaint / Dead Men Tell Tales – In this third installment of the Lindsey & Ike romantic mystery novella series, things don’t add up after a suspicious hunting accident. The more Sheriff Ike Harper and newspaper editor Lindsey McKay dig, the more questions they find. Will a dead man tell tales?
Anna Celeste Burke / All Hallow’s Eve Heist – When a shooter decides to pick off patrons at Marvelous Marley World, publicist Georgie Shaw gets stuck mopping up the mess. Can she also track down the culprit?
Randy Rawls / Accident, Suicide, or Murder – Retired policeman Jonathan Boykin’s primary interest is improving his golf game. Aaron Dunniker, his golfing partner, refers him to Homer Whittaker to investigate the death of Whittaker’s son. Young Whittaker died after a fall from an eleventh floor balcony during a Halloween party. The police investigated, but could not determine the cause: Accident, Suicide, or Murder. Are Jonathan’s detecting skills par for the course or will he miss the cut?
Nancy J. Cohen / Haunted Hair Nights – As the new stepmother to a teenage Brianna, hairstylist Marla hopes to win brownie points by helping out her daughter with a haunted house project. Marla has her work cut out for her when she stumbles over a corpse.
Terry Ambrose / Spirit in the Rock – Wilson McKenna dreams that Kimu, his ghost-advisor, is trapped in a museum display case. Kimu was McKenna’s best friend’s great-grandfather, dead now for over a decade. The only way McKenna can save him is to find a killer and solve the mystery of who stole the Spirit in the Rock.
Deborah Sharp / Haunting in Himmarshee – When a ghost comes to call, Mace must sort out the haunted from the homicidal in Himmarshee, Florida.
Q: Aloha Joanna, and welcome back to Island Confidential. Congratulations on the new collection! Can you tell us a little about the protagonist of Vendetta?
A: Cara Mia Delgatto has been a “good girl” most of her life, except for when it comes to love—and for those, she’s paid a high price. When her parents die within six months of each other and her son goes away to college, Cara decides it’s time to get a life…a real life of her own. A road trip gone wrong leads her to impulsively snatch up an abandoned building in Central Florida. Except it isn’t exactly abandoned. It comes with a fresh corpse. Despite that bump in the carpet, or perhaps because of it, Cara manages to open a business, The Treasure Chest, a store that features upcycled, recycled, and repurposed home décor items with a coastal vibe. And of course, you can’t run a retail business alone, so Cara gathers around her a cast of interesting women who become her best friends.
Q: How much of you is in Cara? How would you feel about her if you met her in real life?
A: I would adore Cara. She and I have a lot in common. We both love to turn trash into treasure, and we both love the Florida coast. Like Cara, I get by with a lot of help from my girlfriends. They comfort, nurture, and occasionally slap me up the side of the head.
Q: Do your characters change and evolve throughout consecutive books in the series?
A: Yes. In the first book Tear Down and Die, which is free at a variety of sources, see http://bit.ly/teardownanddie), Cara is struggling to find herself. Although she’s always been crafty, she doesn’t recognize her talents. She’s far too sure of her business mind, and not nearly trusting enough of her creative self. Also, she has come to believe she’ll never find the right man.
Q: Have you ever thought of killing someone that you know in real life–on the pages of a murder mystery, I mean?
A: I do that all the time. Really, that’s half the fun, isn’t it? I often say, “People who kill people—on paper—are the happiest people in the world.”
Q: How realistic is your setting? Do you take liberties, or are you true to life?
A: Unfortunately, too realistic. I chose to use my home area, The Treasure Coast. That occasionally means I need to do heavy research or modulate what I write. The pay-off is that readers tell me they’ve traveled to the area and checked out the restaurants and spots in my books. That’s very gratifying, because it allows me to share what I love. I happen to live on a very exclusive island, home to Tiger Woods, Celine Dion, and many billionaires. My Florida readers get a peek at this unusual spot.
Q: What’s the worst and best advice you’ve heard or received as an author?
A: The worst was a book doctor who told me ordinary people are boring. They aren’t. The best was when Wendy Corsi Staub told me that the best marketing tool was another book. What she didn’t say, but I now know, is that the more you write the better you get.
About Joanna
National bestselling and award-winning author Joanna Campbell Slan welcomes your emails! You can contact her at [email protected] with your comments and questions.
National bestselling and award-winning author Joanna Campbell Slan has written 30 books, including both fiction and non-fiction works. Her first non-fiction book, Using Stories and Humor: Grab Your Audience, was endorsed by Toastmasters International and lauded by Benjamin Netanyahu’s speechwriter. She’s the author of three mystery series. Her first novel—Paper, Scissors, Death (Kiki Lowenstein Mystery #1) –was shortlisted for the Agatha Award. Recently she released Glue, Baby, Gone(Kiki Lowenstein Mystery #12). Her first historical mystery—Death of a Schoolgirl: The Jane Eyre Chronicles—won the Daphne du Maurier Award of Excellence. Her contemporary series set in Florida continues this year with All Washed Up (Cara Mia Delgatto Mystery #3). In addition to writing fiction, she edits the Happy Homicides Anthologies and has begun the Dollhouse Décor & More series of “how to” books for dollhouse miniaturists. Recently, one of her short stories was accepted for inclusion in the prestigious Chesapeake Crimes: Fur, Feathers, and Felonies anthology. When she isn’t banging away at the keyboard, Joanna keeps busy walking her Havanese puppy Jax and watching her family’s League of Legends Team Apex on Twitch. Her husband, David, owns Steinway Piano Gallery-DC, so he provides the class in the family while she figures out how to turn trash into treasure.
In her ongoing quest never to see snow again, Joanna lives with her husband and their Havanese puppy, Jax, on an island off the coast of Florida.
Kim and Brien’s excellent adventure at the swanky Sanctuary Resort & Spa continues when an unwelcome visitor drops in on New Year’s Eve.
An elusive marine GPS device found and lost again, unleashes another wave of murder and mayhem in Corsario Cove! What is it about that thing? Will the secret be revealed when they visit the chamber of heinousness? Stooges, Krugerrands, and monks—oh my! Is it going to be a Gnarly New Year for Kim and Brien? Character Guest Post: Truth or Chore?
Brien and Kim are back from their honeymoon. They’re not in Corsario Cove but out in the California desert where they met. It’s a balmy evening in January on the patio of the condo they rent. The moon is shining, the palm trees are swaying, and they’re lingering over a cold beer and a platter of nachos. ~~~~~
Brien: “These are awesome nachos, even without the beef.”
Kim: “Gracias, Dude. I’ve been getting tips from St. Bernadette so I can better perform my wifely cooking chores.”
Brien: “Too bad you don’t cook every night. You’re way better at it than I am, even without Bernadette’s tips. Maybe I should ask her for help, too.”
Kim: “Sure, you could do that. Nachos aren’t that hard to fix. Heck, it’s hardly even cooking. Especially if you leave out the barbacoa or carne asada you carnivores love so much.”
Brien: “Like the ones we had that night we met. Those were epic nachos.”
Kim: “That’s what you remember about the night we met—the nachos?”
Brien: “Not just the nachos. It’s my turn to ask you questions, though. Truth or chore: what do you remember?”
Kim: “It was an evening a lot like this one—gorgeous lounging on the Huntington’s patio overlooking the swimming pool and golf course. I remember being nearly knocked out by that house Jessica’s dad had designed and built. It’s a work of art. When I worked for Mr. P, he had an enormous house up in the Hollywood Hills. That one was dark and sinister—like a holdover from a gothic horror movie set. He was so impressed that it had once been owned by a dead monster movie mogul. Complete with secret rooms and passage ways. Creepy. How did I get on this topic?”
Brien: “Uh, you were talking about meeting me for the first time. My memories of nachos are way better than your memories of creeps!”
Kim: “Jessica’s house triggered those memories, not you. Give me a break. It’s still a little hard for me to open up about mushy stuff like feelings, Brien. You must know that about me.”
Brien: “I do.”
Kim: “So, truth—no chore. I wasn’t just knocked about by that house. You wowed me, too, Moondoggie.”
Brien: “I thought you were a knockout, too. I tried not to stare at you in front of the Cat Pack but whoa, that tattoo of yours was so hot!”
Kim: “My tattoo? That’s what grabbed you about me—my Saraswati tattoo?”
Brien: “I didn’t know she was Saraswati, or that she was a goddess. She was beautiful, like you. Your face and that smokin’ hot body of yours. What did you like about me? Truth or chore.”
Kim: “Okay, truth. You do have a bodacious body, as you surfer dudes like to say. I was totally in awe. I’m not even sure I could hear what you were saying, Brien. You didn’t say much did you?”
Brien: “Nah, I was tongue-twisted.”
Kim: “Tongue-tied is what you mean, right?”
Brien: “Probably. You were quiet that night, too.”
Kim: “I still am, but not like then. I didn’t like being around a lot of people. All those awful parties I had to go to working for Mr. P. At least I didn’t run off to a corner and hide that night at Jessica’s house.”
Bien: “I wouldn’t have let you go off by yourself, Kim. Truth or chore: was it love at first sight?”
Kim: “Truth. I don’t believe in love at first sight. Let’s just say I felt a strong attraction to you.”
Brien: “That’s fair. I’d have to say it was hard to figure out if it was love or not with all that animal magnetism between us.”
Kim: “Yes, that’s a perfect way of putting it. You also made me nervous—maybe because I was fighting off that attraction. Besides, I didn’t want to get involved with anyone.”
Brien: “Yeah, I could tell that, Kim. That’s why I didn’t push it. From what you and Jessica went through with Mr. P and the Doc, it couldn’t have been good hanging with those bogus guys—and you did that for years. I felt bad for you. Sometimes, though, I thought it was me you didn’t like.”
Kim: “You irritated me. I didn’t understand that when you’re nervous instead of hiding in a corner or clamming up like me, you talk. The more anxious you get the more you say, and that’s when you make mistakes. Truth: that drove me up the wall at first.”
Brien: “Malapropisms—you told me all about that. What changed?”
Kim: “Later one night when you drove me home. We were alone and you were quiet, except for a question or two. Something simple, like how are you doing? The way you said it—the way you often say things—was so sincere. I remember feeling safe answering you honestly. That surprised me.”
Brien: “That night changed things for me, too, Kim. We were friends after that.”
Kim: “Yes, friends. And I wanted to see you again. Just you, without that crowd around. That’s why I said yes right away when you asked me to go with you to the 60’s beach movie film festival.”
Brien: “Truth or chore: when did you realize it was love?”
Kim: “Soon. You became my dream date—my very own Moondoggie. Was that ever a shock. It took me a while longer to deal with it. Then one night you called me Gidget. That’s when I knew you were on to me.”
Brien: “I was—at least I hoped I was since I was in deep by then.”
Kim: “Me too, even though I still couldn’t say I love you.”
Brien: “You had to hear it from me first. Not quite love at first sight, huh?”
Kim: “Close enough, Moondoggie.”
Brien: “One more question. Truth or chore: Do you want me to take that job and move with me to Corsario Cove or not?”
Kim: “Um, it’s going to have to be a chore.”
Brien: “You won’t tell me the truth?”
Kim: “I can’t, because I haven’t figured what that the truth is yet. Maybe we should take that second honeymoon, then make a decision.” ~~~~~ Will Kim & Brien leave Palm Springs, their friends and their jobs behind? Stay tuned for their next adventure to find out.
About The Author
Anna Celeste Burke is an award-winning and bestselling author who enjoys snooping into life’s mysteries with fun, fiction, & food—California style! Her books include the Jessica Huntington Desert Cities Mystery series set in the Coachella Valley near Palm Springs, the Corsario Cove Cozy Mystery series set on California’s Central Coast, and The Georgie Shaw Cozy Mystery series set in Orange County, California–the OC. Coming soon: The Misadventures of Betsy Stark that take place in the Coachella Valley. Find out more at http://www.desertcitiesmystery.com.
Gulp. Just look at how ridiculous this thing looks. It’s a giant black sea slug known as a sea hare and it’s freaking monstrous. You don’t really hold it in your hand as much as the sea hare, which can grow up to over 3 feet long and weigh over 30 pounds, just swallows your entire arm. Brave Wilderness found the black sea hare in the tide pools off the coast of the Pacific Ocean in San Pedro, CA and described holding it as super slimy and unbelievably slippery.Source: Just Look at This Freaking Giant Black Slug
You must be logged in to post a comment.