It’s time! My editor A.M. Offenwanger has sent back the MS from its final proofread, and that means we are awfully close to publishing. Which means it’s time to celebrate by sharing the cover and back copy!
First, though, you all remember Pauline Gray, yes?
Picture borrowed from a vintage dress pattern
Journalist by day, secretly writing adventure novels by night, she dreams of the day she can turn her attention to “serious” academic work rather than these frivolous stories she has to churn out to pay the rent. In the meantime, her attention keeps getting distracted by mysteries no else cares enough to solve. Pauline would prefer a quiet life, but she can’t deny aid to people suffering from injustice, not if it’s within her power to help. Her first adventure was in Candles in the Dark, but it’s by no means her last …
Pauline’s second adventure begins with a plea for help from a local woman bemused by a strange inheritance. It takes her outside of Canton, NY, into the Thousand Islands region, about 60 miles away.
Vintage postcard from the Thousand Islands
Fox Island, still privately owned but alas, no longer by my family. Wouldn’t it be fun to have your own island? Maybe I’ll have to write a story about that someday.
This is the area my dad’s family comes from originally–when my sixth great-grandfather (Samuel Bates) came to the US from England, he eventually settled in Cape Vincent, buying a farm on the mainland as well as one of the smaller of the “thousand” islands on the river. My dad’s mother’s parents had a dairy farm in Clayton for years until they moved to Canton, and my dad was born in Clayton.
It was great fun for me to be able to explore beyond my own hometown and “visit” another area that has ties to my family roots in this story. One of the best parts of writing these novellas is getting to know all these places a bit better than I did before thanks to all the research I do! (And is there any better form of research than calling your dad and saying, “So, Dad, about that island our family used to own …”?)
But enough about the background, I know what you’re interested in is the story itself.
Introducing …
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(Are you excited yet?)
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(Is the anticipation building?)
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Diamonds to Dust, the second Pauline Gray novella, coming August 14, 2020.
Horace Van Camp, of Clayton, NY, is dead, and his wealth has been divided among strangers. Arabella Warren cannot understand why she should have inherited a diamond necklace from a man she never met, and she asks Pauline Gray to look into the matter. Eager for a new challenge, Pauline takes the case. The deeper she explores, the more complicated matters become. Why was Van Camp’s great-nephew disinherited? Did the pompous lawyer have anything to do with it? How were the twelve beneficiaries chosen, and why?
When a dead body turns up on the Van Camp estate, the puzzle takes on a more sinister aspect. With the police dismissing it all as a series of coincidences and accidents, it is up to Pauline to set things right in the face of the greed, deception, and fear that lie at the heart of this disquieting case. It will take all of Pauline’s ingenuity to solve this case, but she is once again determined to see justice done for those who cannot seek it for themselves.
It will be available all the usual places–Barnes & Noble, iTunes, Kobo, Smashwords, Amazon, in the usual ebook and paperback formats. I can’t wait to share it with you all! My one regret in taking 2019 off from non-Patreon writing was putting this story on hold. It was worth it, though–the finished product you’ll be reading is much, much better than it would have been if I’d tried to push the book to be ready sooner.
I sat down the other day and wrote out a list of the stories I am working on, and the ones I would like to be working on within the next few years.
It’s quite the list.
First, there’s the next Whitney & Davies book, and the two I have loosely plotted to follow that one. (Both Yorkshire and Cornwall inspired a new W&D story, and I’m really looking forward to getting those written and revisiting both places in my imagination.)
Newnham College in Cambridge provided the inspiration for W&D Book 3–set at the fictional Saint Dorothea’s, the college for magicians hidden inside Cambridge UniversityThe ruins of Fountains Abbey in the Yorkshire Dales provided the inspiration for W&D Book 4The gloriously wild and rugged (or at least it was gloriously wild when we were there, thanks to all the storms) Cornish coast is the setting for W&D Book 5
Then there’s the unexpected sequel to From the Shadows, which might??? lead to a third book? I’m still not sure. Quite frankly, there wasn’t even supposed to be a sequel, so clearly I am not the one in charge of these stories, I just go where they direct.
I have plot outlines sketched in for a total of six novellas in the Pauline Gray series, and I would hope to be able to carry that series out even longer so long as the characters and stories don’t get stale–for readers as well as for myself.
You would think that would be enough, wouldn’t you? But no–I have ideas for a middle grade fantasy book, a young adult fantasy book, and a cozy mystery series. And this doesn’t even take into account the stories that pop into every author’s imagination and demand to be written!
I’m not complaining, not at all. It’s wonderful to have such a wealth of stories to play with, so many different worlds and characters to explore and share with readers. I am in no danger of getting bored for the next several years, that’s for certain.
So tell me: what sort of projects do you have teeming in your brain these days? What are some of your short-term and long-term creative goals? Whether it be gardening or knitting or sewing (oh, don’t get me started on my knitting and sewing projects!) or pottery or painting or baking or anything else creative at all! I’d love to get inspired by what’s inspiring you.
There’s a story waiting to be revealed here, too, it just hadn’t made itself known to me yet. Maybe you’ll be luckier … or more attuned to its whisper.
It is splendid to live so close to the ocean again, and to have our state opened up enough that we are able to cautiously enjoy it, so long as we follow the common sense guidelines. We escaped painting, cleaning, and all other house-related duties on Sunday and fled to the ocean, where we walked along the shore, clambered over rocks, hunted for sea glass, only saw a few other people and kept our distance from them all, and came home smelling of salt and sun. It was so very much needed.
Updates since my last post: we have a couch! And flatware. Still short one dresser. Many books are still in boxes, but the girls’ rooms both have bookcases now so their shelves are slowly filling up as their boxes empty. We are done with Round 1 of painting (finished that AFTER our shore excursion on Sunday): girls’ bedrooms, living room, dining room/kitchen, entryway/stairs/upstairs hall. Round 2 will be the mudroom and the downstairs bathroom, neither of which are crucial for comfortable living right now. Round 3 will only happen after we’ve done some other big projects, like turn the wall of closets in the library into built-in bookcases, and strip and refinish the floors in my study.
We are hoping to update our drivers licenses to reflect our new address this week, likewise change our license plates on the car so people stop glaring at us when we drive through town or park at the beach. It’s okay, we quarantined, we live here now, we’re not just out-of-staters coming in to spread disease! I can understand people’s suspicion of us, but it will be nice to no longer have it be an issue. The Town Hall and BMV have both just barely re-opened, so fingers crossed we can get an appointment SOON.
We’ve discovered lots more flowers on the property, including a honeysuckle bush tucked away in a back corner by an old apple tree. Hurrah for both! We’ve also made plans to have all the pines on the property removed (hopefully next year, maybe two years from now), and replace the ones that line the watery ditch with a couple spruce trees and a row of elderberry and highbush cranberry bushes. We have lots of landscaping plans, none of which we have time or energy to tackle this year. That’s ok, as we keep reminding ourselves–for once we’re not on a time limit in a place. We don’t have to do things within one, two, or even three years, because we are staying put for the indefinite future. That idea still takes some getting used to.
Oh yes, lots and lots of violets. I love the white ones best–Anne of Green Gables friends will know why
Writing-wise, what are my updates? Well, I will very soon have a cover reveal for you for Diamonds to Dust, the next Pauline Gray novella, to be soon followed by the novella itself. I’ve taken a bit of a break from that these last few weeks to work on the first draft of the (unexpected) sequel to From the Shadows, but I’m starting to get back into proofreading mode instead of drafting mode, so D2D will benefit from that switch. I am also tentatively attempting some sort of writing schedule, so I am either writing, researching, or doing important writing-related things like updating this blog, every day Mon-Fri. We’ll see how it goes.
Speaking of the cover to the new novella … how does everyone feel about cover reveals? Love them, hate them, find them a waste of time? Would you prefer the cover just show up on my blog, or do you like a countdown and a big splash made of revealing it? I never know how I feel about them, so I thought I’d leave it up to my readers.
In fact, here, let me see if I can set up a poll about it:
I hope June turns out to be more peaceful and joyful than the rest of this year so far–in all our lives and around the world. Keep carrying the light, friends! That’s all any of us can do, each in our own way.
Hello friends! Long time no chat. I wonder why? Oh, that’s right.
Moving Day!
We bought a house! Which I have no photos of yet because we’ve been too busy moving in, ha. I do have a few shots of fun features, though.
Hyacinth growing in our front garden, a pantry AND a china cupboard, a study/sewing room all my very own, and the girls turning the door off an unnecessary outbuilding into a seesaw of sorts as Carl demolished it.
Moving in a time of pandemic is … challenging, to say the least. One doesn’t exactly want to buy a sofa without first testing it. And how can one tell if flatware is going to suit one’s hand without hefting it? Not to mention choosing paint colors …
But we’re managing. We have plates, bowls, and glasses now, even if we’re still using plasticware. We all have beds, mattresses, sheets, and blankets. Three out of the four of us have dressers. We have no couch, but we have a dining room table and chairs. The books are still packed away (weep, weep), but the boxes are easily accessible, for a change.
And speaking of books …
As the title of this post indicated, I am extending the sale on Magic Most Deadly, From the Shadows, and Candles in the Dark until the end of April. Since the quarantine seems to be extending (at least in many places), so shall the sale! So until May 1, those three books are still FREE.
And hey, if you’ve already downloaded and enjoyed those stories, Glamours and Gunshots and Magic and Mayhem are not on sale, but are still less than the price of the wonderful coffee drinks none of us are able to indulge in right now (do I miss Carl’s and my weekly dates to our favorite coffee shop in Cambridge right now? Boy howdy, do I miss them). So you could definitely pick up one or both of them to round off your Whitney & Davies collection as it stands right now without it breaking the bank!
Hang in there, friends. In the words of the inimitable Red Green, “I’m pulling for you. We’re all in this together.”
Hullo and welcome! Notice anything different around here?
It’s an updated website, with a different theme and an added page–but most importantly, more organization, especially of the main reason we’re all here: the books!
I’ve been wanting to create separate pages for my books, organized according to series, for quite some time now, and when better to do that than while self-isolating, right? If you go up to the main menu, you will find there is now a drop-down menu under the “Books” tab, and further drop-down menus under that for the Whitney & Davies and Pauline Gray series respectively.
And while I was at it, I cleaned up the Books page itself, changed the theme, added some photos to different pages, added in a page to link to StarDance Editing (yes, I’m still offering manuscript critiques and proofreading services at my sister site), and oh yeah–notice anything special on the Whitney & Davies page and the Pauline Gray page?
Anything?
Like maybe, oh I don’t know … some new titles? And a release date?
That’s right! The second Pauline Gray novella, Diamonds to Dust, is coming out in 2020–that’s this year! I am planning a cover reveal soon, so stay tuned for that.
As for Whitney & Davies, the third book does not have a release date yet, but it does have a title.
Death by Disguise
The first draft is done, and I’m looking forward to getting deep into edits (which at this point will probably involve an entire rewrite, but even so, I’m looking forward to it) as soon as D2D is out into the world.
I know life has been topsy-turvy for us all, but I hope and trust that with spring approaching, we can all find some new vigor and joy.
Since moving back to the US, our family has been bouncing between western MA and northern NY, staying with our respective parents until our own living situation is in place. This week we’re in both places at once, as Carl and the kids are with his mom and I’m hanging out with my folks. Yesterday, in between measuring and cutting out pieces for the girls’ flower girl dresses I’m sewing for them for May, my mom and I went for a walk and brought back a bouquet of pussy willows. Always my favorite harbinger of spring!
This is a wild time in our world right now, as the CORVID-19 pandemic spreads further and further across the globe and new measures pop up every day to contain it and protect the vulnerable in our societies. There’s a lot of fear and uncertainty, but also a lot of beauty. It’s wonderful to see people coming together to protect the elderly, the immune-compromised, and those who can’t protect themselves. I’ve seen offer upon offer crop up of people volunteering to grocery shop for their elderly neighbors, for children now at home to write letters to people in nursing homes, of educational websites offering content for free, of places like the Metropolitan Opera streaming operas for free … people offering what they can to take care of each other.
In that spirit, I’m adding my own small offering to the pile of good things coming out of the pandemic, a way to bring comfort to those now stuck at home with too much time on their hands and too much frightening and negative information pouring in on them from various sources. From now until the end of April (possibly longer, should the self-isolation period continue past then), I’m making three of my books–all my first-in-series–free*.
For Maia Whitney, life after the Great War is dull, monotonous, and drab. Nursing soldiers in the bloody fields of France hadn’t been easy, but it was better than life at home, standing in her sisters’ shadows. There seems no chance for a change until the night she witnesses a murder in the woods. The last thing Magic Intelligence Agent Lennox Davies needs is this outspoken, independent lady crashing his investigation. Bad enough that a murder happened on his watch; much less that she had to see it happen. He works alone, and he does not have time for Miss Maia Whitney’s interference. But as Maia’s own magical talent blossoms and danger thickens around the two with every step they take, before long Len and Maia must rely on each other in a fashion neither has ever done before. If they can’t learn to work together, England itself might topple. Even worse, if Maia doesn’t learn to control her magic soon, she might do more to destroy them even than their shadowy enemy. Can they set aside their stubbornness and self-reliance in time to save themselves—and all England?
MMD is my first novel, and first in the Whitney & Davies series, followed by Glamours & Gunshots and Magic & Mayhem (the latter being a short story collection). The third novel will be coming out sometime in 2020–I can’t give away too much information, but I can tell you that it is set in Cambridge, an area of England I can now claim to know rather well after living there for a year and a half!
Whisked from her troubled, solitary life to a spaceship centuries in the future, widowed folk musician Riss Waldon must first figure out how she got there, and then if it’s possible to get home. Before long, she is visiting strange and deadly planets and meeting new alien races, and forming friendships with the crew. Even as they strive to discover a way for her to return, she wonders if it possible to step out of the shadows of her past life and stay here. But when the well-being of the entire crew rests on her shoulders, she isn’t sure she’s up to the task. What if she fails them? All she can do is try …
FTS was originally intended to be a stand-alone space opera. It was also originally intended to be a lighthearted tribute to Star Wars and Star Trek and other such shows. Somewhere along the line it developed a lot more depth and heart, and by the time it was finished I couldn’t bear to say goodbye to the characters forever. A sequel had to wait until the right story presented itself, but recently it did, and I’ve been tapping away at it off and on when my time hasn’t been taken up with moving concerns.
Pauline Gray, journalist by day and novelist by night, discovers anonymous letters are being sent to a young widow, insinuating that her husband did not die by accident. Pauline’s compassion and journalistic instincts combine to help her to seek an answer to who is sending these letters, and why. Was Bob Ferris really murdered, and if so, by whom? Before long, Pauline is uncovering evidence of a local smuggling ring and stirring up secrets some people would rather remain buried along with the dead. Despite the danger, Pauline won’t stop until she has shone a light into the hidden places of the past and seen justice done for the grieving widow and her son. No matter what the cost …
Candles is an unusual story for me–no fantastic elements, for one thing. It’s a novella, for another. My wordy self usually needs the room of a full-blown novel to spread out properly. It’s set in my hometown, a little village in the northern foothills of the Adirondacks, in the 1930s, and it is as much a tribute to community and family as it is a story about justice and compassion. The second novella in the series will be published soon–it’s in the final stage of edits.
So there you have it! My small offering to hopefully bring some light, some joy, and some comfort in the midst of these troubled times. No strings attached, no requirements from you (though obviously if you did choose to leave a review on any of them I’d be thrilled–but that’s not an obligation by any means). When we are so physically limited from each other, it’s good to be able to reach out in other ways, and this is mine.
*Amazon will not let me lower the price to free on their website unless I sell exclusively through them. I’m not willing to do that, so the books can only go to $0.99 there. If you want them through Amazon and you want them free, your best option is to click on their “report lower price” button and put in the link to any of these other retailers. If enough people do so, they should (emphasis on “should”) price match. It stinks, but it’s the best I can do.
There’s a lot of heaviness in the world right now. The holiday season can be rough–while there is a great deal of joy that comes with Christmas, it can also be a time of sorrow and/or weariness to many. Even in my own family, we’re struggling to maintain a Christmas spirit against 3+ weeks of illness and some unexpected travelling for Carl to be with his family in their time of need, as his aunt is in the hospital with pancreatic cancer.
Here in the UK, there’s been a lot of stress and tension over the recent general election, and a great deal of fear on all sides about what comes next. The US political scene isn’t much better, frankly.
Sometimes it can feel like the darkness presses in too closely, and looking around, there’s very little hope to be seen.
So on an impulse this weekend, I chose my most hope-filled book (aka the only one without any murders) and made it free until 1 January. No gimmicks, no strings, just my way of lighting a candle against the dark.
Kind of appropriate, when you think about it, that this book should be titled From the Shadows. Here’s to stepping out of the shadows and into the light.
Whisked from her troubled, solitary life to a spaceship centuries in the future, the young widow and musician Riss Waldon must first figure out how she got there, and then if it’s possible to get home. Before long, she is visiting strange and deadly planets and meeting new alien races, and forming friendships with the crew. Even as they strive to discover a way for her to return, she wonders if it possible to step out of the shadows of her past life and stay here. But when the well-being of the entire crew rests on her shoulders, she isn’t sure she’s up to the task. What if she fails them? All she can do is try …
Available at:
Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Smashwords, and Amazon (Amazon will only let me drop the price to $0.99, but if enough people report it as free elsewhere they just might lower it all the way there as well–it’s worth a shot).
May this be a season of hope for you, friends, whatever your circumstances. That is my earnest prayer for all of us.
Those of you who receive our family newsletter in addition to subscribing to this blog will already have an inkling what this post is about. For those of you who don’t, here goes.
As of February 2, our family will moving back to the U.S. from England for the foreseeable future.
There are a number of factors behind this decision. Health needs in our extended family have been drawing us back to be near to our loved ones and help them in whatever way possible–Carl is in Houston, TX right now, in fact, visiting his aunt in the hospital with pancreatic cancer. At the same time, Carl has felt a growing uncertainty as to whether an academic career in Biblical Studies is really what God is calling him toward, or if, rather, it is time for him to put what he has already learned into action in a local church and community. We have already learned before this that sometimes it looks as though God is calling us to a specific end, when in reality it is the journey that is important.
Whether that be the case here or not, what is certain is that we need to return to the States to support and care for our family. This is not, right now, an official goodbye to the PhD: Carl will be intermitting for the next six months and then will make a final decision–to withdraw or return to Cambridge–this summer.
Carl’s engineering firm has offered him a full-time position in one of their New England offices, which means Maine is our ultimate destination once we’re back. We are looking forward to living near the ocean again, as well as being close enough to mountains to go hiking (or hill walking, if we want to continue to use British terminology once we’re back) on weekends.
To close, I will quite directly from the newsletter:
As you might imagine, this change has left us more than a little breathless. Our hearts are at peace knowing we are walking in God’s will, though, and we trust that He will continue to make our path clear, as He has ever done. We know with absolute certainty that our time in Cambridge has not been wasted, even though this is not the outcome we’d anticipated. Truly, God’s ways are not ours, and we thank Him that His plans are perfect. Thank you all from the bottom of our hearts for your love, prayers, and support during our time here.
‘We love stories, then, because our lives are stories and in the attempts of others to move, temporally and painfully, we recognize our own story. For the Christian, the story of Jesus is the story par excellence. That God should be with us in the story of a human life could be seen as a happy accident, but it makes more sense to see it as God’s way of always being with human beings as they are, as the concrete, temporal beings who have a beginning and an end—who are, in other words, stories themselves.’
Hauerwas, Stanley. “Story and Theology.” In Truthfulness and Tragedy.
I am so happy to be able to introduce the sister site to StarDance Press: StarDance Editing. Offering manuscript critiques and proofreading for now, hopefully expanding to copy edits and content editing as I get my feet under me.
This is an exciting new step, though it’s one I’ve been contemplating for almost a year. I’ve always enjoyed critiquing and proofreading short stories and novels for friends, and as more and more of those mss I had a hand in birthing saw publication, I started to realize this was something I could do for others, as well. Knowing from personal experience how difficult it is, especially as an indie author, to find editors within one’s price range, I knew there was a call for this sort of service!
This year seemed a good time to begin this business, as I am taking a step back from my own writing projects. It’s a way for me to stay connected with the world of storytelling without feeling the pressure to create my own stories. In fact, polishing up someone else’s creative work to shine even brighter ought to be wonderful inspiration to me when I do pick up the pen and paper to start writing again!
If you or anyone you know is in need of a manuscript critique or proofreading, I hope you’ll visit StarDance Editing and see if it would be a good fit. I look forward to working with you!
