Posts Tagged ‘mystery’
Book Review: ‘Eyes of a Stalker’ (by Valerie Sherrard)
It’s been a while since I read a book meant for a young adult audience. But the title intrigued me and I was in the mood for some less time-consuming reading.
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‘Eyes of a Stalker’ is a “A Shelby Belgarden Mystery” by Valerie Sherrard (Dundum, 2006). Shelby is an engaging Grade Eleven student. Her close relationship with her Mom and Dad, her compassion for an elderly neighbour and her feelings for her boyfriend, Greg, took me back to the years of High School.
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When Shelby decides to round out her school year with some activities in drama and creative writing, she never expects her new interests to lead to the unwanted attentions of a stalker. The story is fast-paced and engaging—you will be kept guessing the identity of the stalker. Her family takes steps to protect her, but the author keeps the tension chapter after chapter. Then, when the stalker seems to be winning, you will work with Shelby to try and find a way out of the predicament she is in.
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I will definitely be reading the other books in the “Shelby Belgarden Mystery Series.” Many thanks to the author who writes these books!
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All my best!!!!
Happy reading!!!
Jane Tims
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Book Review: Jan Fancy Hull’s new Tim Brown Mystery
February: Curious by Jan Fancy Hull (Moose House, 2022)
February: Curious is a delightful walk through another month of a year-long sabbatical with newspaper editor Tim Brown. Enjoy Tim’s thought process as he prepares to delve into the intricacies of rural life in Nova Scotia. Although he plans and thinks more that he actually does, Tim is able to discover a mysterious problem and find a solution that assists the victim, a young man in need of a mentor, and the entire community. I love his approach to plotting his daily activities and overcoming his troubles—maintaining a household, outfitting a new office space, deciding what to wear. All the old friends are back—Stella, and her perils of politics, and Robert and his coaching of the choir. In spite of being on sabbatical, Tim works with the temporary editor to improve the newspaper in ways he would not have done when he worked full time.
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Looking forward to the next book – March: Enigma.
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All my best!
Go find a cozy corner and read a book!
Jane
adding books to Little Libraries
Had some fun today. Drove around to a few Little Libraries in our area and left some of my books. I was impressed to see books for both kids and adults. The Little Libraries were well constructed, keeping the books dry and safe.
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I left copies of my books in the Little Libraries on:
Smith Road in Geary, New Brunswick
Beaumont Lane in Rusagonis, NB
The Covered Bridge Park in Rusagonis, NB
Covered Bridge Estates in Nasonworth, NB
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I left two books in each Little Library, some poetry, some mystery, one science fiction:
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If you haven’t visited a Little Library before, try it! Look for one of my books or a book that would interest you or your child. I saw all genres of writing, some Nora Roberts, a ‘Game of Thrones’ and lots of mysteries. Just take a book to leave in exchange for the one you take!
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If you would like to read one of my books, they are available at Westminster Books in Fredericton and Dog Eared Books in Oromocto.
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All my best,
Jane
Stained Glass – new cozy mystery
It’s all ready for ordering! Stained Glass, my new Kaye Eliot Mystery is live on Amazon, in both paperback and ebook. Stained Glass takes place in Nova Scotia and will take you on another adventure of the Eliot family… Kaye, Michael, Katie and very funny, very lovable, Matthew.
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When Kaye discovers the body of a suicide in his living room, she is unsettled to hear he has made a special request in the event of his death. Spread across the countryside are seven stained glass windows, telling the story of four friends in the 1950s. One of the four has disappeared, never to be seen again. But what happened to her and who was responsible for her disappearance? Only the stained glass windows will tell the story.
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Join Kaye’s family as they drive the countryside to find the windows. Some of the owners will be happy to see her, some will not be welcoming at all. The book will also take you back to the 1950s, to meet the four friends and to see what they were doing to pass the time, all those years ago.
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To order the book from Amazon, click here. If you would like to get the book directly from me, or from Westminster Books in Fredericton, I will have copies by April 20, 2022.
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All my best,
And happy reading.
Jane
new mystery series
As my forth Kaye Eliot Mystery nears publication, I have begun work on another mystery series. These Urban Mysteries will feature the cities I have known, for example, Halifax and Fredericton. Each will feature a young professional woman who is thrown into a mystery not of her own choosing.
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These books will be short (novella sized, between 15,000 and 20,000 words) and illustrated. They will feature some of the folks we see every day in our cities–the police, the shop owners, the homeless, the university students. Urban climbers and lovers of parkour will also make it into some of the stories.
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These mysteries were fun to write since I have used many of my own haunts and experiences in the writing.
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This model of the Dome that once topped the building is from Pieces of Saint John.
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Another feature of these stories is that I consider them Meniscus Peripherals, in other words, they are written in the same universe as my Meniscus Science Fiction Series. They are not at all about outer space, but each story will include a short mention of an alien abduction and each story gives the circumstances around the abduction from Earth of one of the characters in my Meniscus books: Tagret the chemist (Book 5), Rist the Slain (Book 5), Belnar the Slain (Book 2), Blue-Eye-Brown (Book 11) and Aagle (Book 11).
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The first of the Urban Mysteries will come out in June, 2022.
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All my best,
Jane
a book to lose yourself in …
My most recent read is a book I could not put down. The first in the Tim Brown Mystery series is ‘January: CODE’ by Jan Fancy Hull (Moose House Publications, 2021). The book is funny, engaging and makes me want more!
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Tim Brown is a newspaper editor in small-town Nova Scotia who has decided to take a year off to dig deeper into local stories of interest. He finds himself over his head right away when he is asked to solve a mystery that has no clues and no suspects … the mystery itself is a mystery. Readers will be charmed by Tim’s personality and his relationships with the characters he encounters. His attempts to dress the part of a local ‘detective’ are funny and relatable.
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I am looking forward to the next adventure in the series — if the book’s title provides a clue, I can look forward to eleven more of these mysteries! Write faster, Jan Fancy Hull!
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Enjoy your reading in the New Year!
All my best,
Jane
next Kaye Eliot Mystery: Stained Glass
Set in Nova Scotia, the Kaye Eliot Mysteries feature a woman and her young family as they set out to solve local mysteries. You will love the kids, especially Matthew who adds his own naive curiosity to the mystery.
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When I started writing the mysteries, I wanted each one to include a communication from the past. The mystery in How Her Garden Grew is sparked by a dusty bundle of letters found in a crawlspace. In Something the Sundial Said, Kate finds an old diary that leaves clues to a century-old murder. In Land Between the Furrows the family finds a stack of post cards and solves the mystery of a valuable stone.
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Stained Glass presents a new mystery to the Eliot family. This mystery is also a communication from the past, from an artisan in the community. He has created a series of stained glass windows in houses along the Bay of Fundy shore. The stained glass artist asks Kaye to solve the mystery by finding the windows and discovering a secret he has kept for forty years.
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Stained glass has always been my favourite art form. The interplay of colour and light creates a magical medium for telling stories and expressing emotion. In this mystery, Kaye will also make use of her botanical skills, interpreting the meanings of various plants and flowers included in the stained glass windows she finds.
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Stained Glass will be published by the end of March 2022.
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Here is a short excerpt from the story:
I looked into the room where the cat had gone. Not a room, but a long hallway, with a stairway at the end. I shrugged and followed the hall. At the foot of the stairs, I hesitated. Wandering around the main floor of an empty house was one thing. Climbing those stairs would be brazen, even for me.
The stairs led to a landing where a huge stained glass window let in a marquee of coloured light. I was very like the glass panel decorating the landing of our house. Even the picture was similar. Two women and two men. A grape vine gone crazy. One of the women, the one with the wings and a crane of stars, was looking out to sea, precariously near the edge. One of the men held on to her elbow. If I had to name the piece, I would have called it ‘teetering on the edge.’
I turned to face the room opposite the stairs and screamed.
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Happy New Year and happy reading everyone!
Jane
now available: a glimpse of dragon
a glimpse of dragon, second poetry book in the ‘glimpse of’ series, is now available at Westminster Books in Fredericton.
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The book is illustrated with my black and white drawings and considers extraordinary things in ordinary life. These are poems about comets in the sky, ghost cars in the covered bridge and dragons lurking in the campfire.
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campfire dragons
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dragons prowl
in balsam
backcrawl in amber
blisters of pitch
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dragons lurk
under mantles of smoke
blacken the stones
spurt throatfuls of fire
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dragons leap
to the Draco sky
watch us grow small
with sparking eyes
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close their lids
and sleep in flight
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You can also order a glimpse of dragon at Amazon, click here.
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I hope you enjoy ‘a glimpse of dragon.’
Jane
a glimpse of dragons
This year, I am continuing to gather my various poems into categories for publication. I intend to publish three books of poetry in the ‘a glimpse of…’ series.
So far, I have published ‘a glimpse of water fall,’ a collection of poems about waterfalls and the way lives can sometimes take a ‘downwards’ turn. In 2012, the manuscript for a glimpse of waterfall won Honorable Mention in the Writers’ Federation of New Brunswick’s competition for the Alfred G. Bailey Prize.
Next year, I will publish ‘a glimpse of sickle moon,’ poems journeying through the various seasons of the year. In 2020, the manuscript for a glimpse of sickle moon won Third Prize in the Bailey competition.
Later this fall, I will publish ‘a glimpse of dragons.’ This poetry collection is about the mysterious events in my life that take imaginative reasoning to understand. The title comes from the idea, in the Dark Ages, that unexplainable celestial events were the actions of dragon-kind.
I have gathered six types of poems into this collection and I illustrate many of the poems.
1. those ordinary things in my life that seem imbued with magic;
2. my ‘observations’ of dragons;
3. unexplainable events in my life that would fall into the category of ghost stories;
4. my encounters with magical people;
5. poems about my deep appreciation of sky and the awe that accompanies trying to understand the reality of space;
6. a tribute to the crow, an animal I feel kin to, and the dark women I associate with crow-kind.
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The poetry book ‘a glimpse of dragons’ will be published by kdp and available in paperback on Amazon in December. The book will also be available from Westminster Books in Fredericton.
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Take care in these days of pandemic,
all my best,
Jane
Book Launch
If you live in the Fredericton area, I will be at Westminster Books tomorrow, Saturday, from 1 to 4 to launch the next in the Kaye Eliot Mystery Series, Land Between the Furrows. I will be there with friend Chuck Bowie who is launching two books: Her Irish Boyfriend (in the Donovan, Thief for Hire Series) and, writing as Alexa Bowie, Death Between the Tables (in the Old Manse Mystery Series).
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In these worrisome times, we will be wearing masks and keeping our distance. And no cake will be served.
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Looking forward to talking about mystery writing and local books!
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My best to you!
Jane
nichepoetryandprose 