Trying Times

Hi everyone! I haven’t written a post in a long time, and with our stay-at-home days, now felt like the right time. I sincerely hope you’re all well and that you’ve found things to fill your time.

I stocked up on chocolate, so I’m happy. Too bad I didn’t stock up on toilet paper and tissues. Has anyone noticed, in the middle of all the talk about hoarding toilet paper, that the facial tissues have disappeared, too? Cleaning products? Forget it.

I know that people are having a difficult time during the Covid19 pandemic. Some people are feeling fear and panic. Wasn’t it Franklin D. Roosevelt who said, in his 1933 Inaugural Address, “There’s nothing to fear but fear itself?” Be cautious, use your common sense, and live your life, even if it’s within the confines of your own home. Read a book, watch television, play games or do whatever holds your interest. I hear a neighbor outside mowing his lawn. I live in the far northwest corner of the United States. It’s still cold here and I wouldn’t be out mowing my lawn, but to each his own.

Because of a few health issues, I’ve made my last trip to the grocery store for a while. I’m not willing to take chances so I’m using my common sense and staying at home, looking for things to keep me busy. My writing keeps me busy. My housecleaning keeps me busy, too, but there’s only so much you can do. So here I am, writing a post after a very long time.

I’m a firm believer in humor keeping us going. My daughter has found several jokes online. Some of them are dark humor, but I have to admit that they can still make me laugh.

One of my all-time favorite movies is 1947’s “The Egg and I,” with Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray. It’s entertaining and based on the humorous memoir by Betty MacDonald. As a newlywed, her husband wanted to start a chicken farm in Washington State. When she visited her family in Seattle, she related stories of her adventures, or misadventures, on the farm. Her sisters talked her into writing the book.

Once, when visiting my grandmother, I saw the book sitting on her shelf and she gave it to me. I’m afraid it’s been sitting on my own bookshelf since the late 1980s. On a whim, I picked it up this morning and started to read it. I’m only a few pages into the memoir and I can already see the humor in it. I have a feeling when I sit down this evening, with the book, that I won’t be able to put it down.

I believe she wrote the book in 1945. In those days no one had ever heard of political correctness. She’s honest in her feelings, and she’s funny. Set aside the PC attitude and enjoy a good story.

So instead of watching a drama on TV, or reading a horror story, try picking up something with humor. Look for the humor around you.

One of my dogs, Sugar, has a “thing” on her neck. It looks awful. I called the veterinarian yesterday and they had me send photos of this “thing.” It seems she probably scratched or cut her neck and it’s turned into a bacterial infection. I drove to the vet’s office (and it felt so good to get out of the house) , parked, and called them on my cell phone. They have a little table outside, by the front door. A young woman stepped outside, set Sugar’s medications on the table, and scurried back inside. I then left the car and picked up the package. Nothing funny about this so far, right?

I brought home antibiotics and a spray for her neck. After I sprayed her neck, my other dog, Murphy, was so excited and wanted to sniff what I’d sprayed on her. Knowing him, he probably thought I did it just for him. One sniff and he made a fast U-turn and ran out of the room. Oh, yes, the spray has a pungent odor. Murphy’s reaction was one of those things you had to see to recognize the humor in it. Sugar is probably thinking, “Spray me again so he’ll leave me alone.” He does act a little pushy from time to time. By the way, Murphy is a very large Yellow Lab trying to run on a hardwood floor. His exit was not graceful.

My whole point is, try to stay busy, use your common sense and look for something that will make you laugh. At the very least, you want something that will put a smile on your face.

My thoughts are with you all and I pray for all of us every day. God bless you and I wish you good health!

CLICK HERE for a quick trip to Amazon.com

(Sorry, but my website is a thing of the past. If I ever work up the courage, I may build a new one in the future.)

The latest Sandi Webster mystery is titled, “No One Will Find Me” and you might find a touch of humor as you get into the story. How do you combine a serial killer, suspense and humor? It can be done.

Another One?

I’m happy to say I recently completed my twentieth book, titled People Lookin’ Half Dead – A Bogey Man Mystery. I never, in my wildest dreams, thought I’d have twenty books to pick from, although I know a number of authors who offer more than that. The book is now available in both ebook and paperback format, but enough about the number of books.

 

I moved from Arizona to Washington State in 2015. Not long before I moved, during packing, I hightailed it to a fast food restaurant for a takeout dinner. I sure didn’t feel like cooking, and I’d already packed all my pots and pans anyway.

I was waiting for my food when a homeless man walked in. He was tall and extremely thin with long hair. His skin was ashen, and so was his hair. He looked grey from head to toe. Obviously he hadn’t bathed in a very long time. He slowly walked to the counter and asked for a glass of water. He was soft-spoken and polite. The young lady at the counter handed him a paper cup and pointed toward the water. He thanked her and filled the cup. Remember, Arizona is hot and dry and water is as important as food. I’m not going to tell you the rest of the story because it’s not pertinent to this post, but let me say there was a good ending. Oh, and I appreciate the fact that the young lady behind the counter treated him with respect. That said a lot for her character.

Anyway, I’ve never been able to forget this man. He was on my mind so much that I knew he needed to be in a book. The title I’ve chosen, People Lookin’ Half Dead, doesn’t refer to the man’s appearance, but to a heatwave in Los Angeles.

“It’s one of the hottest summers in memory and Chris and Pamela Cross are gearing up to open their new supper club, Gin Mill Grill.

Tillie Babcock, Chris’s grandmother, has moved to town and she’s ready to take over – everything. She loves a good cause and wants nothing more than to help a few homeless people come in out of the heat and gain a second chance in life. Unfortunately, a few of these people are disappearing right out from under her nose.

At Tillie’s insistence, Chris and Pamela now have a cause, or case, of their own -- to find the missing people before it’s too late.”

I could write about the plight of the homeless here, but unless you never watch the news or read a newspaper, you know it’s a worldwide issue, and I’m not here to preach about it.

I generally try to include at least a little humor in my books, and this one is no exception. How did I insert humor in a book about disappearing homeless people? You’ll have to read the book to find out. I’m one of those people who believes you can find something humorous in almost any situation. Sometimes it’s the main characters and the situations they find themselves involved in, and once in a great while a homeless person might make you smile, if only for a second. No, there’s nothing funny about being homeless, but even they sometimes have a sense of humor. (My daughter told me the funniest sign she ever saw a homeless man holding up said, “Bet you can’t hit me with a quarter.”)

So thank you to the homeless man who wouldn’t let me forget him. I hope that at some point he had a second chance at life.

On the other side of the coin, there was once a homeless man who started attending a writers group I belonged to in Nevada. One morning I was the first one in the parking lot. An old van pulled in next to me and it was the homeless man who started telling me about a story he was working on. The story involved killing other homeless people and he went into great detail about the killings. I found myself slowly taking steps so I wasn’t hidden by the van.

Another car pulled into the lot and I took a deep breath and thanked him for sharing his story with me. He laughed, got into his van and drove away. He never attended the group again, but as a writer I couldn’t help wondering if there were homeless people buried nearby.

There are two sides to every story, but the man from the writers group didn’t make it into my book. Or did he?

Until next time, I hope you have a good week and that your life is filled with blessings.

CLICK HERE to visit Marja McGraw’s website (Recently updated)

CLICK HERE for a quick trip to Amazon.com

What Happened?

When you finish a book, what’s the first thing you do? Sigh loudly and grin? Jump up and down in your chair? Wave your arms in the air and act like an idiot? Or maybe you just take a deep breath and breathe again. On the other hand, if you’re like me, you do all of the above and forget everything you should be doing, like writing last week’s post.

People Lookin’ Half Dead – A Bogey Man Mystery is about to be edited and will be available soon. Right now I’m working on the cover, which is a whole ‘nother story, but think hot summer with record-breaking temperatures. And in the midst of the heat, homeless people are disappearing.

 Rough draft of the book cover. It will probably change. Well, yes, it will change.

Quite by accident, and with the help of Chris Cross’s grandmother, he and his wife, Pamela, become involved – again. Keep the heat in mind because it’s not going anywhere, and neither are the people who live on the street – with the exception of the few who are disappearing.

There was a young, tall, very thin homeless man whom I saw at a fast food place in Arizona. He was so dirty that his skin looked ashen. All he wanted was a drink of water. He was so soft-spoken and polite that you had to listen closely to hear him. I’ve never forgotten him, and he inspired this story. I wish I could have known what happened to him, but since I don’t, I gave him his own story.

There’s a touch of humor in the book. Even homeless people can laugh at life sometimes.

What about the book cover? Have you ever looked at an asphalt street during the hottest part of summer? Have you noticed the heat waves emanating from the asphalt? I wish I could have found a photo like that to use for my book cover, but I guess you can’t photograph heat waves. So I’m sticking with a very hot sun and a view of the city from a distance. Simple authors create simple covers.

Once the book is released I’ll look at doing some promotion. I haven’t really promoted much over the past few years. Oh, well… Life has changed and so have I.

The next book will be another Sandi Webster Mystery, but I haven’t decided on the subject matter yet. Another cold case? Maybe. Something current? We’ll see. I’ll be as surprised as you.

Back to the grindstone. I can’t seem to get the cover quite right. At least it keeps me busy while I try to dream up another escapade.

What do you do when you type The End at the finish of your story? Something exciting, I hope.

Until next time, I wish you a week of beginnings instead of endings. Maybe your personal story is just about to begin, and I hope it’s filled with laughter.

CLICK HERE to visit Marja McGraw’s website

CLICK HERE for a quick trip to Amazon.com

Mystery Writer Meets Mystery

Several years ago a friend and I had to put our detecting skills to work. After all, we write mysteries and we’d know how to do that.

I have two close friends, who for privacy reasons I’ll call Brenda and Jackie, who also write mysteries. The three of us live in different states and we’re spread from the west coast to the east coast. Brenda was moving to a new home and Jackie and I knew we’d be out of touch with her for a few days. Not a big deal, right?

Well, a few days went by, and then a few more days, and still no word from Brenda. We tried to call her on her cell phone, but it went straight to voice mail. Jackie and I began to worry, which is something we do well. We’ve had plenty of practice.

 Where's Brenda?

It suddenly struck Jackie and me that we write mysteries for a living. If anyone could track Brenda down it should be us, because after all, we know how to do these things. We write about them. We research them. We lined up our facts and moved on from there. We knew that Brenda had hired a moving company that was owned and run by women. We knew when and where she was moving to, although we didn’t have the new address yet. And we both knew how to use the Internet. It would be a piece of cake. Uh huh.

I checked online for moving companies in the area we were interested in that were owned by women. I found one, and only one. Remember, this was a long time ago and not every company showed up online. Well, I called the company, but they said they’d never heard of Brenda and they said that they were the only female-owned company in the area. It never dawned on me that they might say that because they didn’t want me checking with the competition. That was one of my bigger Duh Moments during this caper.

I checked a map and the Internet for the small town that our friend was moving to, and called both the local police station and the county Sheriff. They couldn’t help me because I didn’t have enough information.

Then Jackie hit on something. She’d saved some emails from Brenda and she thought maybe the recipients of those notes could help us locate friends or family. She was right. The address line held names that had become familiar to us from stories Brenda had shared.

We began emailing people who’d probably never heard of us. As it turned out, Brenda had mentioned us, so they were great about helping with the search. A friend had received a phone call from Brenda, but the connection had been terrible. At least she’d heard something.

As it turned out, Brenda didn’t have good phone service at the new home, and no Internet connection was readily available – the woes of living in a rural area. On top of that, her electricity had gone out during a storm.

Where did we get our information? Her ex-husband had received one of our emails. What a guy! He’d been in touch with her.

So Jackie and I ended up feeling pretty good about our deductive reasoning skills, and maybe this little exercise would help us in telling some of our stories. In the meantime, we were grateful that our friend was okay.

The point of this story? Sometimes it takes a writer’s mind to figure out a mystery without the aid of a private eye or the police. If this had happened today, you can bet we would have taken even more steps to find our friend, but in the meantime, we patted each other on the back – figuratively speaking, since we lived in different states.

Until next time, wishing you a fun little mystery of your own and the skills to solve it.

CLICK HERE to visit Marja McGraw’s website (To be updated soon)

CLICK HERE for a quick trip to Amazon.com