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Beverly Allen | Readers Ask About the Bridal Bouquet Shop Series
Author Guest / January 13, 2015

Beverly Allen is here to answer popular questions from readers about her Bridal Bouquet Shop mystery series. The most recent series installment, FOR WHOM THE BLUEBELL TOLLS, is available now from Berkley. Welcome, Beverly! How did you come up with the characters? Are they based loosely on some folks you know? Perhaps I had a little inspiration. Audrey Bloom’s Grandma Mae is patterned loosely after my own wonderful grandmother. But that’s probably the closest parallel. Much of the character development starts with Audrey. She’s really the girl next door, or at least that’s what I was aiming for. She doesn’t have it all figured out, but she’s getting there. She has a bit of a romantic streak, especially shown in her love of flowers and for the language of flowers, but it’s balanced with an inherent practicality, normal insecurities, and just a tinge of residual angst, so she’s not so idealistic and sentimental that her feet ever leave the ground. Where the other people come from is a little more complicated. It’s hard to create a person out of thin air. Some characters, like her cousin Liv, have helped Audrey become the person she is. Others might be antagonistic. Just…