A little over a year ago, we had to make the difficult decision to move my mom from her house to an assisted living home. It’s been difficult for both of us on many levels, one of which being the fact I’ve lived two doors away from her for decades. Now I live two doors away from an empty house. Seeing it day in and day out makes my heart heavy. Going through it in preparation to put it on the market has been gut wrenching. I do well for a while, tossing stuff that Mom saved for heaven-only-knows what reason. But then I come across something that has sentimental value, and I choke up. I lock the house, come home, and weep. But this weekend, we’re turning a page. Moving from the Past to the Future. We have a buyer for the house. My grand nephew. Yes, the family home is staying in the family. I couldn’t be happier. He’s moving in over the next few days. I still have to go through Mom’s “stuff” and clear it out. But some of what’s left after a year of my slow archeological dig can

As promised, today is the BIG REVEAL of my next book's cover! With a Vengeance will be in stores May 3rd, but you can get a sneak peek AND a chance to win your choice of any of the Zoe Chambers mysteries at Dru's Book Musings !

As always, I'm behind on updating my website. This will be a priority next week, however. For one thing, I have a bunch of new personal appearances and guest blog dates either already confirmed or in the works. Stay tuned for the list. For another thing, Monday is the big reveal of my next book cover! I'm super excited about this one. It seems like a long time coming. After all, the first three came out boom boom boom --six months apart. It's been a year for this one. I'm as eager and impatient as my readers! Dru's Book Musings will be rolling out the new cover for me. I'll post the exact link as soon as it goes live. One other small request: If you've registered for Malice Domestic already, and IF you've read and enjoyed Bridges Burned, I would very much appreciate it if you would consider nominating it for the Agatha Awards (Best Contemporary Novel). I don't stand a chance of being a nominee without my readers' support.

Yes, I fell off the blog map for a while there. At the risk of sounding redundant because I've apologized for it multiple times over the last few years, I'm sorry. One of my goals for 2016 is to blog more. Another goal is to finally set up a real newsletter. But I digress. Happy New Year a day late. And since I didn't do my usual look back on New Year's Eve, I'll lump that in here, too. My goal for the last two years has been to find balance. Hey, it's a work in progress. I'll give myself a solid C+ and try to do better. Another goal for 2015 involved travel. I definitely fulfilled that one. I went to Williamsburg VA with Hubby (strictly vacation, no work) in March, Bethesda, MD in April/May, New Jersey in August, Colorado and New Mexico in September, and Raleigh NC and Nashville TN in October. And that's not counting the numerous Pennsylvania road trips I took. I loved every second of it. Except maybe the four-hour flight delay getting out of Ra