The View from the Other Side

Every once in a while, Marja McGraw runs out of ideas for posts, so this week I’m giving her a break and taking over. My name is Sandi Webster-Goldberg, I’m a private investigator, and taking over is something I do often.

I’m not altogether sure how Marja thought me up, but I once heard her say she originally planned on basing me on a younger version of Sally Field. Well, I showed her. Within the first chapter of the first book, I took on a personality of my own. I didn’t want to be based on anyone but myself.

I later heard her say she’d decided to base my menopausal mother on Sally, but as you can read for yourself in the books, that plan fell short of the mark, too. My mother is a one-of-a-kind. Why, she once took down a mugger while in the throes of a mood swing. Poor guy – I almost felt sorry for him.

As a P.I., I’m proud of the work I do. I do a lot of work for insurance companies, but I’ve also brought down a number of bad guys – some of them really bad.

My life is full. I have Pete, my partner and now husband, our friends Stanley and Felicity, and I should probably explain that I hired Pete not long after I opened my agency. In true fictional form, the business took off and I needed help. We’ve had our ups and downs, but overall we make a great couple.

Stanley was one of our first clients. He was being stalked, but I won’t go into that because Marja has already written a story that will explain Pete’s and my relationship with Stanley. When we met him, he was writing verses for greeting cards, but now he works for us. Stanley met Felicity when Pete and I were out of town and she stopped in to ask for help. They are the cutest, smartest and clumsiest couple I know.

I have an elderly neighbor named Dolly who owns a cat named Miss Kitty. I always feel a little silly when I refer to Miss Kitty. Dolly is like the grandmother I never knew, and she loves what I do for a living even more than her soap operas. She hasn’t been in the last couple of books much, but she’ll be back soon.

I have a dog named Bubba. He’s half wolf and half Golden retriever, and he’s, well, big. Very big. And he smiles frequently. The first time he smiled at me he was a stray and I thought he was baring his teeth at me. I almost called the dog catcher. However, it turns out that Bubba’s just a big ol’ bear-sized lovable mutt. And he can be very protective when the need arises. The latest addition to the family is a Chiwienie named Clementine, half Chihuahua and half Dachshund. She’s quite a character.

 

So far Marja has exposed me to a hundred-year-old family-related murder, Bubba thinking there was a ghost in the attic, a young woman being harassed by a bum, and an eight-something year old woman (P.I. in the 1940s) who wanted me to solve a cold case for her. As if that wasn’t enough, Marja brought the Bogey Man into my life. I have to admit, he was quite a character. One of my favorite actors is Humphrey Bogart and this guy was a dead ringer for Bogey. After that, Marja sent Pete and me to a ghost town where we became stranded. Actually, that was a lot of fun.

 

We helped my mother and stepfather renovate an old house full of mystery to be used as a Bed & Breakfast, we saved a billionaire with the help of my eccentric Aunt Martha, solved a cold case in Battle Ground, Washington, where we now own a vacation home, and we became involved in a cold case involving an old gin mill. I could go on, but I don’t want to give away any secrets.

I can’t help but wonder what Marja has up her sleeve next. I know my author is sometimes frustrated with me. She wants to go one way and I want to go the other. She’ll write a scene for me, scratch her head and rewrite the whole scene. Sometimes I’m dizzy from all the rewriting.

After all is said and done, all I can say is that I think it’s very generous of me to take over the blog this week. I hope Marja is busily writing me into another mystery as I carry her load.

Like Marja always says: Until next time, have a great week and enjoy a big chocolate bar. We do have chocolate in common.

CLICK HERE to visit Marja McGraw’s website

CLICK HERE for a quick trip to Amazon.com

Marja: Actually, I’m working on a Bogey Man mystery right now (my 20th book), but Sandi’s latest case will be on the drawing board soon.