Sadly, with the passing of my dear friend Judith Simpson, Lost Bard Books has also passed away. Watch the website for news about the future of the Junior Handlers Mysteries.
Some of you may have noticed that I haven’t been posting much lately. That is not to say, however, that I haven’t been writing. I have, in fact, been nose-first in the written word quite a bit lately, including a last run-through edit of my first mystery story for young readers.
The Corpse That Wasn’t There is the first installment of The Junior Handler’s Mystery Series, which will be published by Lost Bard Books. The book is done, and the editors are putting it through the final spell-check and tweak before assembling all the parts and putting the finished product online. Rest assured that I’ll be posting here as soon as it’s available for purchasing!
Lost Bard Books is a new e-book and print on demand publisher. Their first run of books will be online very soon, including “Corpse”, as we’ve fondly grown to call it. (How quaint, yes?) While you’re eagerly waiting to purchase the novels Lost Bard will be making available for your reading pleasure, you can visit the website and download quite a nice selection of free short stories right now.
The team at Lost Bard Books are doing a wonderful job, as the samples online will show you. I’m extremely excited, as they have hired the amazingly talented Jen Hawkyard to do the cover illustration for The Corpse That Wasn’t There. You can view the book cover on her website right now, http://jezhawk.com/Illustration.html, as well as many other examples of her lovely artwork.
The second book in this series, Wild Wings of Danger, was my NaNoWriMo novel draft for 2009. I posted here about my NaNo adventures, and am pleased to say that the story didn’t turn out half badly. It was good enough, in fact, to be readily accepted by Lost Bard, and I look forward to seeing it join its predecessor some time in the future. Within the past week, I’ve been jotting notes for Book Three as well–I’m having fun scheming, and look forward to the meat of the writing adventure.
Needless to say, I’m extremely thrilled to see the first book in the Junior Handler’s Mystery Series hitting the virtual shelves very soon. My deep gratitude goes out to the good folks at Lost Bard Books, particularly my editor Judy Simpson, and to Jen Hawkyard for sharing her wonderful talents with my story. While you await the final product, please enjoy, here, the synopsis to:
The Corpse That Wasn’t There
Junior dog handler, Rhiannon (Ree) Antonio’s best friend in the whole world is Merlin, her cream Saluki. Coming in at a close second are Jake and Stacy, who also participate in Junior Showmanship with their dogs, Irish Setter Finn and Basset Hound Clyde. The kids think they have normal dogs, who are enjoying normal dog shows, until Merlin begins to behave strangely, and lands the kids right in the middle of a mystery.
The Saluki slips his collar and the kids chase him through the show grounds, where he discovers a body buried in trash behind some storage sheds. When the trio of Juniors finally convince the adults to follow them back there, however, the body has vanished…and everyone thinks Ree made up the story as a joke!
The kids know different. They are determined to find that body, and prove to the grown-ups that they were telling the truth!
Their search leads them into the museum on the grounds, and the American Workers exhibit. Ree finds clues there that expand her search, but a scary encounter between the museum’s cranky curator, Mrs Kennedy, and Merlin (who appears to have gone off the deep end) adds a whole new element of fear and danger to the day. Ree finds herself not only trying to prove her own truthfulness, but save her dog from being put to sleep as vicious!
The kids’ saving grace turns up in an unlikely person. Detective Aaron, who was originally called in to investigate a missing museum exhibit, takes a shine to the Saluki, and believes that there is more to Ree’s story than an over-active imagination.
Merlin continues to follow the clues, guided by his inner sense for trouble, and leads the trio of Juniors through the scary halls of the old museum, and into the dark of night. Their adventures culminate in a police chase that speeds down darkened back roads to the parking lot of a run-down motel.
There, the mystery is revealed, the criminals apprehended, and we finally meet the “vanishing corpse” in person!
Links of Interest:
LostBardBooks.com
Jen Hawkyard’s Website
I love the illustration, but then I am biased eh? Good luck with the venture – I still have the ebook in its’ original form on my Palm from ohhhh. I don’t know, whenever you first wrote it.
.-= Lin´s last blog ..PAW – Regal Elegance =-.
Thank you, Lin! I can’t tell you how thrilled I am that Jen was available to do the cover art.
She most definitely has the knack of capturing the soul of the Saluki.
Wow, that was years ago. The story’s basically the same but there’s been a lot of editing and tweaking since the first version … it’s much better now.
I’m very excited to see it on Lost Bard, and am also very much looking forward to its sequel being finalized as well!