The other day my mailman (who has a face like a cherub) delivered a wonderful box.  Inside I found the CD and MP3 versions of FOX STREET. As if that wasn’t enough, I also found…

…the German edition of the book!  Which in real life has a cover even more vivid than my pitiable amateur photgraphy shows, not to mention does not need to be read while lying on your side (Argh).  It also shows Mercedes as well as Mo, which pleases me.  My friend who speaks German says the title translates roughly as THE MYSTERY OF MISSING THINGS.

Which also tickles me because…the book I am writing now turns out to be a mystery.  For years I have told people that, much as I love reading mysteries, I could never write one myself.  Plot is way too hard for me, let alone complicated, twisty-turny plot. And yet, mysteriously, here I am.   

What I’m hoping is the new book will have all the elements I love–strong characters, cool setting, beautiful sentences–as well as a puzzle at its heart.  For research (oh, a writer’s life can be so good) I’m reading two fantastic mysteries.  SILENT TO THE BONE is by that master, E.L. Konigsburg.  CROOKED LETTER, CROOKED LETTER, an adult work, is by a writer new to me, Tom Franklin.   Both books are superbly written, witty, heart-grabbing page turners.  In SILENT you’re told  early on that the main character is not guilty, and even as the narrator begins to doubt that, you don’t, and yet you can’t stop reading.  In CROOKED, the mystery has been solved, but with at least sixtypages to go, I still can’t put it down.  Both books, in other words, hook you in not only with the plot but with how you live and breathe with the characters. 

The plot thickens…