Autumn 2024
I have two new short stories published and a reprint that came out recently.
“The Postman Always Flirts Twice”
The newest story is the cozy “The Postman Always Flirts Twice.” It’s a whodunit about love, family, and friendship. Someone murdered Hazel’s mailman and hid his body in the woods behind her cul-de-sac. Desperate to point the cops in another direction so they don’t discover her secret, Hazel starts her own investigation—focusing on her neighbors.
The story appears in the anthology Agatha and Derringer Get Cozy: Thirteen Tales of Murder, Mystery, and Master Detection. All the stories in the book are written by winners of the Agatha and/or Derringer awards. Thanks to editors Gay Toltl Kinman and Andrew McAleer for inviting me to contribute a story. You can learn more about this story and what inspired it here. You can find it at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and at your local indie bookstore through Bookshop.org.
“Gone to Pot”
The second new story is “Gone to Pot,” and it appears in the anthology Crimes Against Nature: New Stories of Environmental Villainy. In this comic story, Annabelle loves her next-door neighbor Micki like family. So when the regular pot smoking of Micki’s other next-door neighbors causes Micki’s cat, Chairman Meow, to get contact highs, endangering his health, yet those neighbors don’t care, Annabelle takes action, launching project We Vow to Save Chairman Meow.
This is a charity anthology, with half the royalties going to ecological nonprofits. Thanks to Editor Robert Lopresti for including my story. You can buy the book from Amazon here. You can also find it at other stores, including Barnes and Noble here. I talk more about the anthology and my story at SleuthSayers. Click here to read the column.
And the reprint …
My story “Dear Emily Etiquette,” which won the Agatha Award and the Ellery Queen Readers Award a few years ago, has been republished in the anthology Twisted Voices: Stories from Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. I am delighted editors Janet Hutchings and Jackie Sherbow chose to include it. You can buy the book in the usual online places, including Amazon. Click here for the ebook version and here for the paper version.
