A Blast from the Past - Marja McGraw

My featured author this week is Marja McGraw. When I originally posted this, Marja had two publishers - one for each of her wonderful mystery series. Since then, she has moved to Washington state and gone on to write several more books and to self-publish them. She creates - and has recreated - all of her own covers and a little bird told me that she's currently writing her 20th novel! 

 

Marja McGraw

This is the third in the Bogey Man Mysteries (and my personal favorite), featuring Chris and Pamela Cross, along with their son Mikey and two Yellow Labs, Sherlock and Watson.

Marguerite Turnbal was a bestselling Gothic mystery writer in the 1950s. A little on the eccentric side, she had her home renovated, adding secret compartments. In her later years she told her twin daughters, Coral and Carol, that there was a treasure to be found, and she gave them only one clue to its whereabouts. 

Over twenty years after Marguerite’s death a young woman is murdered in the old empty house. Chris Cross’s parents have come for a visit. His mother, Judith, and his son, Mikey, want to solve their own mystery in true Cross family tradition. Judith, also a little eccentric, breaks into the house after seeing strange lights and finds the body – not quite the mystery she was hoping to find. The Bogey Man and his family are soon gumshoeing their way through life again, looking for a murderer and hidden treasure.

Buy link:

http://www.amazon.com/They-Call-Ace-Bogey-Mystery/dp/1610090675/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1361716945&sr=1-1&keywords=they+call+me+ace

Bio:

Marja McGraw is originally from Southern California, where she worked in both criminal and civil law enforcement for several years.

Relocating to Northern Nevada, she worked for the Nevada Department of Transportation.  Marja also lived in Oregon where she worked for the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office and owned her own business, a Tea Room/Antique store. After a brief stop in Wasilla, Alaska, she returned to Nevada. She’s also worked for a library and a city building department.

Marja wrote a weekly column for a small newspaper in No. Nevada and she was the editor for the Sisters in Crime Internet Newsletter for a year and a half. She’s appeared on television in Nevada, and she’s also been a guest on various radio and Internet radio shows.

She writes the Sandi Webster Mysteries and the Bogey Man Mysteries, and says that each of her mysteries contains “a little humor, a little romance and A Little Murder!”

Website : http://www.marjamcgraw.com/ and Blog: http://blog.marjamcgraw.com/

 

A bonus! Ms. McGraw has just released another mystery! It's available on Kindle at the link below and will soon be available in paperback. You won't want to miss this one!

http://www.amazon.com/Mysteries-Holt-House-Mystery-ebook/dp/B00BDTQ5NS/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1361123657&sr=1-1&keywords=mysteries+of+holt+house 

Gin Mill Grill

Sandi and Pete have earned a reputation for solving old cases, and they’re approached by a woman who’d like a 1930s crime solved. A man was brutally murdered and his brother immediately disappeared. The authorities believed the brother was their best suspect, but they weren’t able to track him down.

Case closed – or was it? A lone police officer didn’t like the results and spent the rest of his life searching for answers.

Their client’s father had tried to clear the name of Harley Glosser, the dead man’s brother, but his efforts were futile. His interest in the case? Horace and Harley Glosser were his cousins.

With the discovery of a private room in the house where the crime was committed, Sandi and Pete change their thought processes and start running down other suspects and looking at other locations, including an old speakeasy. The potential suspects are people in their nineties, so they also have to hope they’re still living.

Why would someone in the current day try to put a halt to the investigation? After all, the murder took place in the 1930s.

Circumstances are often not as they seem, and this case is no exception.

Available at: https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_8?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=marja+mcgraw&sprefix=marja+mc%2Caps%2C218&crid=1WIXR1MN09W9N

Marja’s Mystery Blog: http://marjamcgraw.blogspot.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/marja.mcgraw

 

Marja McGraw

Expect the Unexpected

Half the fun (and work) of writing mysteries is that the author can set the stage and circumstances to suit the story the way he or she wants them. That makes it sound too easy. Often when writing I set a circumstance to lead to other circumstances. Unfortunately, when I get to the crux of the matter, I often find myself taking off in a new direction.

Such was the case with “Gin Mill Grill – A Sandi Webster Mystery”. The idea for the story came from a vintage newspaper article I read wherein a man was murdered. His brother was in the house and the police were sure he was the killer, but somehow the brother managed to simply disappear, even with a police presence. I didn’t look for follow-up articles because I didn’t want to know what the outcome was. I suddenly realized that I had my own outcome to create.

Gin Mill Grill – A Sandi Webster Mystery has drama and humor, and dead bodies practically crawling out of the walls. That’s actually a play on words regarding the story, but you’d have to read it to understand. Expect the unexpected.

I write mysteries that are easy reading and contain a little humor – and a little drama. Finding the balance between the two is the most difficult part of writing for me. However, it mirrors real life. I learned early that in almost any situation you can find something to lighten the drama. Notice, I said almost. The nice thing about fiction is that we can stack the situations as we want them. Although, I have to admit that non-fiction is often more unbelievable than fiction.