Please welcome my friend Maris Soule to the blog today. She has a new release, the 4th book in her P.J. Benson Mystery series, Something to Crow About. I enjoyed the other books in this series, so I've anxiously awaited this one.
Here's Maris to tell you about her latest book.
Thanks, Diane, for the opportunity to tell you and others about my
new book, SOMETHING TO CROW ABOUT.
I actually decided to write this book while riding in your car back
from a book event we’d attended. During the event, one woman had stopped at my
table and asked when I was going to write the next P.J. Benson mystery. She
wanted to know if P.J. had her baby and if P.J. and Wade did get married. Those
two questions initiated the fourth book in my P.J. Benson Mystery series.
SOMETHING TO CROW ABOUT takes place less than a year after the
first book, THE CROWS. P.J. is now in her ninth month of pregnancy, is married
to Wade Kingsley, the homicide detective she met in the first book, has become Wade’s
son’s stepmother, and her Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy is now full-grown and continues
to play a part in keeping her alive.
Basically, in this book, P.J. Benson is at it again. She has
clients’ taxes to finish and her baby is due in two weeks. This definitely is
not the right time to get involved in solving a murder.
Prior to her scheduled
Mothers-to-Be meeting, P.J. Benson enters a church bathroom and overhears
Brenda Cox, a friend and former co-worker, tell someone on the phone that she
was caught getting the information they wanted and barely got away. P.J. tells
Brenda to call 9-1-1, but Brenda says she’ll be fine and will see P.J. soon.
When P.J. and the other women attending the Mothers-to-Be session hear police
cars and an ambulance out front, they know it’s a serious accident, but it isn’t
until the next day that P.J. discovers the victim was Brenda. The police
consider the hit-and-run an accident, but P.J. is certain Brenda was murdered.
P.J.’s husband, Sheriff’s Deputy Wade Kingsley, warns her not to get involved,
and P.J. knows he’s right, but soon it’s clear the killer thinks Brenda gave
P.J. something. As P.J. tries to understand what Brenda took and why, she
discovers curiosity can put a person’s life in danger. Not a good thing when all
she wants to do is celebrate the arrival of her baby.
Excerpt:
I pointed toward the notepad. “Brenda is
the woman I talked to.”
As I summarized what I’d heard, Wade sat
near me, and made notes. Occasionally he asked a question: Was I sure that was
what she said? Did she mention a name?
“No name,” I told him. “Just that she’d
been at her computer looking at pictures she’d taken when her boss came up
behind her and saw what she was doing.” Saying that triggered a thought. “Hey,
you can find out where she works, and that will tell us—”
“Us,
P.J.?” Wade sat back and looked at me. “There is no us. We are not getting
involved,” he said firmly. “You are
not getting involved.”
“I know, I know,” I said, “I’m not going
to, but Detective Ferrell needs to know what Brenda said. Right?”
“Did she tell you what the pictures
showed?”
“Not exactly. Just that they showed
hidden compartments and origins of shipments. That information must have been
important because she said her boss threatened her and came after her.”
“You said she was going to meet the
person she was talking to at the brewery, that this person had promised to take
care of her. Did she say how?”
I shook my head. “No, but she said she didn’t
have any family.” I knew that. “And she wanted to be put somewhere where
they—whoever ‘they’ were—couldn’t find her.”
“You’re thinking witness protection?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. What I do know is Brenda
sounded scared. She said, ‘These people don’t play around.’ She was afraid for
her life.”
Wade said nothing for a second, then
asked, “Did she ask you for help?”
“No.” I sighed. “But I don’t think she
realized her life was in immediate danger. I think she thought this person she
was talking to would take care of her.”
“You do know that this sounds like
something out of a spy movie.”
“Maybe so, but this is real. Brenda’s
dead.”
Something to Crow About is available as an e-book and a
paperback.
Or ask your favorite bookstore to order the paperback from
Ingram
The e-book is on sale right now for .99c
Maris Soule is the award-winning author of 25 romances, 6 mysteries, and 2 short stories. Besides writing, she has also taught high school art, paints when she finds time, and for several years raised and showed Rhodesian Ridgebacks (the dog in her P.J. Benson Mystery series). Originally from California, she met and married her husband when she was studying for a Masters degree in art history. They moved to a small, rural community in southwest Michigan. It was that area that gave her the inspiration for the P.J. Benson Mysteries. She and her husband have two married children and two granddaughters. They now divide their year between Michigan and Florida.
