For more than twenty years, America has been obsessed with reality TV. Something about watching “real” people engage in a variety of activities calls to our inner voyeurs. Producers love reality TV because it costs less to produce than a scripted series. Americans love getting a peek at outrageous activities and cutthroat competitions. Let’s take a look at some of the good and bad things reality has to offer. The Good: Anyone can be on a reality show, claiming their fifteen minutes of fame, even if they aren’t an actor. All you need is a sense of adventure, the willingness to try something that seems a bit wild, and the ability to not go to work for the duration of filming. When Jen gets laid off at the same time her apartment converts to condos, she doesn’t know what to do with her life. Going on the show gives her a chance to decompress and figure things out while competing to earn enough money to help her pay off her debts. It’s a win-win situation. The Bad: Reality TV also tends to bring out the worst in people. From Puck on the Real World to Omarosa on The Apprentice to…

My grandmother was an Edwardian. Whenever I say or think that it makes me realize just how close the first decade of the twentieth century actually was and at the same time what a colossal difference there is between my life in America now and the Edwardian attitudes to class, social conventions and the formality that existed between parents and their children in England when my granny was a girl. Florence Violet Williams was born in 1895, she was nineteen at the start of World War I. When her fiancé, Raymond, was killed in the Battle of Somme in 1916 Florence never thought she would marry. But she did. She married my fun-loving grandfather – George Dudley who survived the war in Mesopotamia to sweep her off her feet at a dance held in the house of a neighbor. The grandmother I knew had a cloud of white hair and large, dark eyes. Like many women of her age she never raised her voice, but she was a huge stickler for the rules. I never saw her in pants, and she always wore a hat when she went out and if you wore a hat you had to wear gloves…

When I’m strolling Riverwalk in New Orleans, with thick fog rolling in and the mournful toot of a tugboat off in the distance, I have every confidence that I can convincingly capture this ethereal moody image on paper – even though I don’t actually live there. I’m one of those authors who buzz in and out of cities to snatch a quick whiff of atmosphere and head-spinning locale. And I really love it that way. Because when I visit New Orleans, I’m dashing around that grand old city at breakneck speed, tasting oysters, downing an Ibita Beer while listening to zydeco music, sneaking into above-ground cemeteries, and buying potions and spells at French Quarter voodoo shops. These are all fabulous elements that come together and form a kind of author’s gumbo that I can sprinkle like zesty herbs throughout my Scrapbook Mysteries. The same goes for Charleston, South Carolina, the setting for my Tea Shop Mysteries. Charleston is another old-world city that’s filled with history and mystery. They’ve got narrow alleys where duels were fought, Revolutionary War-era graveyards, spooky old plantations, the pounding surf of the Atlantic, and historic grande dame homes along with old Huguenot families with plenty of…

I loved writing COLD PRESSED MURDER, the second book in Berkely Prime Crime’s OLIVE GROVE MYSTERY series, following ONE FOOT IN THE GROVE. One of the elements I’m most excited about in this second cozy mystery is the recipe section at the end of the book. Each recipe featuring olive oil is taken directly from the pages of the story. And one of my all-time, most favorite recipes was developed just for this story! Precious Darling’s Famous Cold-Pressed Olive Oil Peach Cake is to die for. It’s dense, super-moist and sweet—but not too sweet. And it’s deliciously satisfying, especially when topped with fresh fruit. Happily, when I developed and tested the recipe, it was during peach season here in Virginia. So once I nailed the recipe down, I baked one final version, sliced myself a fat piece of warm cake, and slathered that puppy with fresh peaches and freshly prepared whipped cream. Not normally a cake person, I was on cloud nine devouring the fruits of my labors! Moreover, the cake tasted absolutely scrumptious the next morning when I had a piece for breakfast, topped with a medley of fresh fruit and yogurt. Needless to say, my olive oil cake…

The heroine of my Profiler series, Evelyn Baine, is kind of a badass. Not in the walks-with-swagger, carries-a-big-gun and takes-no-prisoners kind of way you might expect, but in a quiet, ultra-observant way. The FBI authorizes her to carry a badge and a gun on her hip, but she rarely uses them. Most of the time, it’s her intellect that has law enforcement officers across the country asking for her help. She’s a profiler for the Bureau’s elite Behavioral Analysis Unit, which means that instead of leading an investigation and chasing suspects, she travels to a much scarier place: into their minds. It’s her job to figure out not just what kind of person committed the crime she’s been called to profile, but also how police can find him and what he’ll do next. Throughout the course of my Profiler series, Evelyn’s ability to predict the next moves of serial killers, child abductors, terrorists and kidnappers has put her into their paths. Along the way, I’ve gotten to show some of her physical strength, too, but also how she outwits criminals into underestimating her. Regardless of her tiny, 5’2” frame, she’s still got FBI tactical training and more than her fair…

Ask me how much fun it is to kill people and to eat fab food! But believe me, it is not for the feint of heart. We can all handle the murder part because what’s a cozy mystery without some (off screen) bloodshed? But writing a culinary mystery adds another ingredient – food stress. Believe me. It’s great fun plotting a new book. By the time I started this second one in the Dinner Club Mysteries, ROUX THE DAY, the characters were my old friends. The task is finding ways to make sure readers feel that way too, while knowing these characters must face challenges that will in some way change them or the way they look at the world. Without losing the friendship of readers. The setting, Half Moon Bay, a quaint village-like community in Burlington, VT remains the same for each book. Although this time the body is found at a fundraising Casino Boat event, miles from shore, cruising on Champlain Lake. The victim is TV personality Miranda Myers and her co-emcee, Connor Mac, shares a past and an argument with her. Now he’s disappeared and tops the suspect list, with J.J. a close second. It’s up to…

“Don’t even think about it,” Julian warned as he leaned back on the plush seat of their limousine. “Think about what?” Kristin asked angrily. “If you jump from a moving vehicle, you’ll more than likely end up breaking your neck, and that would be a shame. You’d miss Vegas and the wedding.” It irritated her that he not only had known exactly what she was contemplating, but had quickly come to the same conclusion as her. There was no way she was taking a swan dive from a moving vehicle. She’d been so shocked by his outrageous behavior that she hadn’t been able to speak until now, even though they’d been riding for several minutes. How he’d gotten the fancy limo down a closed street, she didn’t know. But Kristin was fairly certain it had a lot to do with the chief of police being Julian’s cousin, Dante. The old chief had retired just a few months ago, and Dante Sinclair had taken the promotion when it was offered to him. Kristin shot Julian a furious glare. Even though it was already getting dark, the vehicle had lights in the passenger area. As far as Kristin could tell, the fancy…

In my book, OPERATION PROM DATE, Kate is a huge fangirl and often talks about all the fictional couples she ships (the couples who she really, REALLY wants to be in a relationship, in case you’re new to the term shipping. It baffles my husband when my daughter and I start having conversations about our fandoms). Kate and I have that in common. Whether it’s Olicity on Arrow, Stydia on Teen Wolf, or Captain Swan on Once Upon a Time, Kate gets rather involved with what’s going on with her favorite couples. (I’ve also been known to scream “KISS ALREADY” at my TV shows and books. You know, like a calm, normal person. LOL) Cooper, the guy who’s made a deal to help Kate land her crush in time for prom (AKA “Operation Prom Date”) doesn’t know what half of her fangirl jargon means, but he loves how passionate she is about it. He loves having her as his temporary rowing partner as part of their deal, too, because it means lots of time with just him and Kate in his rowboat on the lake. What he doesn’t love is how jealous he is when all of his help starts…

Writing fiction fell upon me through my own devices of dreams and things. After some research online where I found the affair of my 19th century, barely out of her teen years debutante, I thought, I must write this story of love, disappointment and murder. I know, I said to myself, I’ll write a book. After all, I had written a chapter for a history book and been wooed by a publisher. I wrote up school catalogs, wrote course curriculum, wrote up interior design and architectural history lectures, proposals for jobs, poetry and love letters. Surely writing a book would be a piece . . . Gail . . . Read more here INDIGO SKY by Gail Ingis In a whirlwind romance, a lovely New York socialite marries a fêted, debonair author. But beneath the charm is a cheating husband addicted to hasheesh. Her dream marriage turns sour and the simplicity of her life runs amok when a handsome stranger, her husband’s business partner, threatens her staunch loyalty to her wayward husband. When she faces the ugly truth about her marriage, her need to finalize her divorce sends her on mad chase across the wilds of nineteenth century America with…

For a lot of people, magic equals witches. While that might be a common assumption, magic and magical beings encompass more than just the witchy world. There are a phenomenal assortment of magical romances featuring complex witch and warlock characters, but there also a lot of extraordinary romances with many other varieties of magic users and abusers. Magic takes many forms and I love the variety that so many authors offer. The first books I read featuring witches and spellcasting were actually cozy mysteries – the Bewitching series by Madelyn Alt and the Ophelia and Abby series by Shirley Damsgaard. These mysteries intrigued me because the female characters were realistic, everyday people with run-of-the-mill jobs like that of shopkeeper and librarian, but they experienced the thrills and chills that magic brings. Since I’m a romance fan, I naturally started looking for some of the same fun witchy stories but with a bit more romance in the mix. Linda Wisdom’s Hex series is just as entertaining and lighthearted as her colorful covers would suggest. In addition to the tightknit coven of witches, Wisdom throws in all kinds of were-creatures, vampires, and finally – the devilishly mischievous, but fiercely loyal, magical bunny…