A Serendipitous Misplacement and Discovery

                                                     

Oh, my! I recently discovered three unread paperbacks that have been languishing out of sight in my workroom. I remember buying them back in 2009  when I was one of a number of authors at Murder on the Menu in Wetumpka, Alabama. 

Deborah Crombie, Cara Black, and William Kent Krueger were among the authors, and I bought books by each of them. I devoured Deb and Cara's novels and began to follow their mystery series--one set in the UK, the other in Paris. I'd been strongly impressed by Kent Krueger's talk about his novels, set in rural Minnesota, as well as by his delightful personality, and had every intention of diving into his series. But, somehow, it didn't happen, and the books got misplaced. 

My loss then--but what a bonus for me now! Back then, there were only three books in the Cork O'Connor series. And now there are eighteen!

Total immersion in a beautiful, backwoods setting, compelling situations, twisting plots, and a continuing storyline with characters I already love. Heaven!

I spent much of Tuesday's rainy day deep in the Boundary Waters, the Quetico-Superior Wilderness, "more than two million acres of forest, white-water rapids, and uncharted islands on the Canadian-American border," with a missing country-western singer and the various men who are trying to find her--some to rescue her--others to kill her. 

This series reminds me of one of my favorites--Hillerman's Leaphorn and Chee novels. Cork O'Connor is part Anishinaabe, and the Native culture is strong in these stories. 

I zipped through Iron Lake and am halfway through Boundary Waters now and glad that Purgatory Ridge is within reach. As for the rest of the series--with Kindle, I can scratch the itch whenever. 

What a treat!

Faces in the Crowd

I was startled yesterday to find that PICASA, the program I use to manage my pictures, had decided on its own initiative to go through all my pictures and single out the faces. I don't normally take a lot of pictures of people -- except maybe at a mystery convention, so I was surprised to see that PICASA had managed to find well over a thousand. They included all sorts of faces  from all sorts of photos -- a romance novel cover, African fabric with a picture of Obama on it, a votive candle, a tile in my kitchen, a photograph on the wall of a restaurant in Indianapolis, two photographs that were in the background of a larger shot, and of course any number of real people.

So I felt compelled to do something with all these faces. And here they are.

There are several mystery authors represented including a good looking guy who's a NYT Bestseller, a southern-fried lawyer, a NY substance abuse counselor, and a perky little Canadian.

Friends and family are there, a couple of women who were in a quilting class I once taught, and more than one face I have no idea about.

More mystery authors, more family, a book cover face, a mystery man or two, and one dog. Recognize anyone?

I can't wait to see what PICASA does next. I wish it would go organize my pantry.