Maggie Pill Mysteries

    I have started listening to narrators for the audio version of the second Trailer Park Tales book, Twice the Crime This Time. I had a contract with a narrator a year ago, but COVID intervened, and the contract was never fulfilled. Now I'm looking for a new narrator, and I posted the audition yesterday. This morning I had three auditions...all men. I never thought about having a male narrator. The first book was read by a woman I've worked with before, and I didn't think about it much. Still, the stories are told by four men and four women, so it shouldn't matter who does the reading. Listeners will have to accept the change to another reader no matter what, so why shouldn't it be a male? All three auditions were good. So is it my prejudice that makes me think I should hear a woman reading this?  I'm afraid so. I will wait a day or two in order to get the best narrator I can find, but I need to get over the idea that a woman can read men but a man can...

(Thanks to reader Margaret who sent this darling pic of her cat Murphy with Sleuth Sisters Book #2)   I recently read a post where a woman said she re-reads books at bedtime because knowing what happened makes it unlikely she'll be kept awake by the story. A woman who bought my book at an author signing told me she reads the last chapter first, so she knows if the rest of the book is worth reading. In times of stress, my sister re-read favorite books as a way of comforting herself. They were usually romances, because one of the requirements is a "happily ever after" ending. Reading fiction serves many purposes in our lives. There's enlightenment, vicarious adventure, understanding of other times, places, and peoples, and, like the examples above, comfort, intellectual stimulation, and sleepiness.  Often I see lists of "MUST READ" books, and the implications of the NYT , Oprah, and other best-seller lists is "Here are the books you should be reading....

When you're thinking like an author, the best people are those who not only like your work, but also help you spread the word that it's out there and it's good. With that in mind, here's a link to an interview I did recently with Manybooks.net, which does just that. They liked The Sleuth Sisters , but they let me talk about my other work too, which is kind of them. Here's a link to the interview:  https://manybooks.net/featured-authors/maggie-pill-cozy-mystery-featuring-sisters As a reader, you might not be able to interview me online like they did, but you can still help. Spread the word: Tell others about books you like. Most people choose books that are recommended by someone they know. Loan your books : This is touchy for some, but I love sharing stories I enjoyed with people who might feel the same way. I have fans who read, then mail the books to faraway relatives and friends, which gets them read in a whole new part of the country. Comment on reviews ...

Readers are smart people. We know that. Reading almost anything makes you learn things, even if they're not massively important things. Non-fiction is the most reliable source for learning, although you have to be careful whose nonfiction it is. Recent studies showed that reading fiction make a person more empathetic, presumably because you frequently put yourself in the place--even inside the head--of others and see life from viewpoints other than your own. (I enjoy writing the Sleuth Sisters Mysteries for that very reason: I have to think like each sister in order to tell the story the way she would see it.) We develop habits over time with our reading, and that's both good and bad. If you always read one genre and even one sub-genre, sooner or later you're going to end up in a rut. I've gone through quite a few phases in my lifetime. For a while I read lots of biographies and autobiographies. Then I read almost exclusively historical fiction. Now I read mostly my...