JAMBALAYA JUSTICE

Jambalaya Justice is finally available through Amazon.com, Bn.com, independent book stores, and other websites where books are sold. I will also have some available int he near future from my website, but have to get my computer guy (translation, brother-in-law) to add the info to sell through Paypal. It's supposed to be easy to do, but for some reason I couldn't get it accomplished on the Gumbo Justice website and had to get him to do it for me. But that's what family is for, right?

In any event, I was pleased to see it is finally out, although it is not yet available on Kindle or Nook, but hope it would be soon. I saw today purely through luck that someone has already done a really nice review of the book.

Soon, I will be re-organizing my blog to include guest bloggers, interviews and book reviews, and am continuing to work on the third in the Crescent City Mystery Series, Chocolate City Justice, which is a little darker as it opens as Katrina approaches and follows the various characters through the hurricane.

And of course I'll be getting word of Jambalaya Justice out there. Hope you enjoy it.

Guest Blogger Marilyn Meredith

Today, I have mystery writer and good friend Marilyn Meredith guest blogging. Marilyn writes two different and distinct mystery series, the Deputy Tempe Crabtree Mysteries and the Rocky Bluff P.D. Mystery Series. Today, she tells us about the latest in the Deputy Tempe Crabtree series, and the difficulty in determining a sub-genre. Today is also Marilyn's birthday, so happy birthday Marilyn and thanks for joining us!!!

So, What Sub-Genre Should My Mysteries Fall Under?

This is a question I’ve pondered for a long time and frankly, I don’t really have an answer.

There are the straight mysteries (and I don’t mean as opposed to ones with gay detectives though I don’t have any gay detectives and so far not even any gay characters) and these are the ones where there is a puzzle to solve and it’s pretty straight forward. The clues are there for both the reader and the sleuth to find.

Remember, the sleuth can be most anyone these days from a cook to a Werewolf, a ghost or a vampire. In my Deputy Tempe Crabtree mysteries, the sleuth obviously is a deputy. She’s much more than that though, she’s a wife to a minister, a mother of a college age son, and she’s Native American.

Since she’s a deputy maybe my books should fall into the police procedural genre. Maybe, but in Tulare county, California, where the book is set (though Bear Creek where Tempe is the resident deputy is a fictional mountain community in Tulare county) the deputies are also deputy coroners though if there’s a violent crime, detectives would investigate. (Now how do you like that run-on sentence? My critique group would scream.)

My latest book, Bears With Us, is more about what goes on in Tempe’s life, both private and in her job as a deputy. Like most people in law-enforcement, she has a lot going on every day. When bears invade Bear Creek, Tempe has her hands full. Not only is she chasing bears off the school grounds, out of people’s houses, and other places, she’s called to a home where a teen has committed suicide. The parents’ strange behavior piques her curiosity. A prominent female citizen makes a complaint against Tempe and her husband. An old romance comes to light, and a woman with dementia is missing from her home.

This story doesn’t fit in any of the mystery sub-genres. Usually people think of them as cozies since I don’t use bad language and I shut the bedroom door, but once in awhile some pretty gory things happen.

What I suppose I’ll do is wait until people have had a chance to read Bears With Us and let me know what sub-genre they think it should fall in.

Bears With Us can be ordered directly from the publisher http://www.mundania.com and all the usual places.

Marilyn Meredith

Bio: Marilyn is the author of over thirty published novels, including the award winning Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery series, the latest Bears With Us from Mundania Press. Writing as F. M. Meredith, her latest Rocky Bluff P.D. crime novel is Angel Lost, the third from Oak Tree Press. Marilyn is a member of EPIC, Four chapters of Sisters in Crime, including the Central Coast chapter, Mystery Writers of America, and on the board of the Public Safety Writers of America. Visit her at http://fictionforyou.com and her blog at http://marilymeredith.blogspot.com/

Jambalaya Justice

Information on Jambalaya Justice, which is at the publishers now, due for a summer release:

The murder of a hooker in a New Orleans crackhouse is destined to become another unsolved homicide until prosecutor Ryan Murphy takes an interest in the case. Ryan has a connection to the victim and won’t back down until the murder is solved, even if it means she has to go undercover as a hooker herself and keep her fingers crossed that her detective boyfriend, Shep, won’t find out. She’s also juggling her Strike Force cases, including the prosecution of a mobster murderer, a nasty domestic violence, and the armed robbery of Big Who’s strip club. Not to mention a home invader she prosecuted is off of probation and might be following her. Being an outspoken pit bull of a prosecutor makes life dangerous enough for Ryan; trying to find a killer and hiding it from the one person who can protect her may end up being deadly.

Shep is on a secret quest of his own, investigating the identity theft of Ryan’s former best friend, Edie, who is presumed dead. As he delves further into the case, he begins to question whether Edie may still be alive and out to harm Ryan. Ordered by his captain, Ryan's father, to keep the investigation quiet, Shep not only has to lie to Ryan, but find a way to protect her from harm she doesn’t know exists. He'll also have to figure out what to do if Ryan ends up discovering the truth, because secrets have a way of getting out.

Set against the backdrop of pre-Katrina New Orleans, Jambalaya Justice is the second in the Crescent City Mystery Series, which eventually follows Ryan through Hurricane Katrina and into the strange new world of post-Katrina New Orleans.

The third in the series, Chocolate City Justice, is in progress.

Jambalaya Justice

Just as I am finished editing Jambalaya Justice, the second in the Crescent City Mystery Series and follow up to Gumbo Justice, I saw on the news that one of the New Orleans police officers originally convicted in relation to a police-Katrina murder has had his conviction overturned and has been granted a new trial. The feds are reviewing the federal judge's decision to determine if they will re-try him or not.

I have blogged about this particular murder before. There were five officers, some rank, allegedly involved. During the aftermath of Katrina, when the police had set up makeshift district offices, a rookie sharpshooter was accused of shooting a civilian who was attempting to approach the office. Two other officers were accused of taking his body from his brother and another individual who were attempting to save him, and burning it. Another officer was accused of writing and filing a false police report and then lying to federal agents about it, and finally, a rank was accused off intentionally not tying the three separate incidents together and realizing it was a scheme to cover a murder. The sharpshooter was convicted, as was one of the officers who burned the body. The officer accused of the cover up for filing a false report was the third convicted, and the one whose conviction has now been overturned.

The last guy happens to be a friend of mine. His wife and I were assistant district attorneys together in the late 1990's. He was a police officer even then, which is how they met, and he actually arrested my brother-in-law once for possession of marijuana. Travis, the officer, always seemed to me to be a straight shooter who played by the rules. He certainly didn't offer any leeway for my brother-in-law after finding out who he was.

When Travis was convicted, I was upset. I could only imagine what his wife was going through, and while I could picture Travis following an order someone gave him, I couldn't imagine him intentionally doing something on his own like hiding the truth about a murder. But I wasn't there, and Katrina was an unprecedented event and I can't swear as to how anybody will act under those type of conditions.

When he was first convicted, I had to believe everything would work out. I am an appellate public defender now, an officer of the court, and probably lean a little hard on making sure individuals' rights are not violated. It's been my job for the past 11 years, so it's ingrained in me at this point.

In Travis' case, he has maintained from the beginning that he assisted a ranking female officer with the writing of the report, and the factual basis was not his own, but hers. She testified for the prosecution, changing her testimony more than once. She was caught in several lies, and given complete immunity as far as the murder. Immediately after her testimony, she took early retirement from the NOPD, for which she was still employed. One of the biggest issues was the original report that she wrote. She claimed the original report was altered by Travis, but for some reason she had not kept a copy of that original report. Soon after the trial, one of the acquitted officers submitted what he said was the original police report written by the female rank, which shows the report eventually submitted was not altered by Travis. The prosecution tried to argue the report was a fake, but offered no proof to that. The judge found that if the original police report had been provided to the jury, the jury would have acquitted Travis, which is the standard for newly discovered evidence. While the rank who eventually provided the report may have been holding out on providing the report, perhaps fearful he would be convicted and would need the report to get a new trial himself, his failure to provide the report, for whatever reason, was not the fault of Travis. Obviously, if Travis would have had access to the smoking gun that would have exonerated him, he would have used it at trial.

It so happens my mystery series revolves around a prosecutor and the dysfunction of the New Orleans criminal justice system, that somehow usually ends up rendering justice if not necessarily fairness or what is right. Obviously, the two concepts are not the same. Justice requires a trial without legal errors, not one that ultimately results in the guilty getting convicted and the innocent going free, although those should be desired results. The belief that only those, and all of those, who deserve punishment are punished, is childish. The law doesn't require perfection. It only requires that nobody cheats or makes a mistake during the process.

So seeing that two of the individuals involved were convicted and their convictions upheld, two others were acquitted by the jury, and one was convicted and his conviction set aside, all I can think is that the premise and theme behind my Crescent City Mystery Series is correct, that things maybe eventually do work out the way they are supposed to, even if sometimes they need a little help.

Blog Talk Radio Show

Monday, April 11, 2011, at 1:00 p.m. CST, I am participating in a Blog Talk interview at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/, with Sylvia Dickey Smith. The focus of the interview is writing strong female characters, and I will be talking about writing Ryan Murphy, my protagonist from Gumbo Justice, and the soon to be released Jambalaya Justice.

The interview is thirty minutes long, and you can call in to chat or ask a question at 1-347-843-4128. (Not a toll-free number.) If you miss the interview, it will be played twelve hours later, and then archived so you can listen to it whenever you would like.

I have been interviewed on t.v. before, not as a writer, but as a parent, and I HATE the way I sound in a recording-- like a ten-year-old boy. I had to think long and hard and push myself to decide to do this interview because of that, but in the end I thought the topic was so interesting, strong women, that I couldn't stand to pass it up. (I don't believe I am nearly as strong as Ryan, who would have signed up without a moment's hesitation. Of course, her voice is prettier than mine.)

In any event, it should be interesting.

Guest Blogger Marilyn Meredith

I have a very special guest today, Marilyn Meredith, author the Rocky Bluff Police Department Mystery Series--which she writes as F.M. Meredith-- and thirty other novels, including the Tempe Crabtree Mystery Series. Marilyn is blogging today about her newest in the Rocky Bluff PD series, Angel Lost.

I was fortunate enough to read an advance reader copy of Angel Lost and have to say it is a must read. In Angel Lost, Marilyn creates the perfect blend of action and suspense against the backdrop of a small, close-knit community, with a dose of supernatural thrown in for good measure. Reading the Rocky Bluff series is like catching up with old friends, and Angel Lost does not disappoint. While you do not have to read the books in order to follow the story, I would definitely recommend reading all of them, because they’re all that good.

HAPPY APRIL FOOL’S DAY!

How many of you have pulled tricks on your family or friends on April Fool’s Day? When my kids were little they delighted in trying to fool me. Sometimes what they thought was funny was a bit on the scary side—like screaming and telling me someone was hurt. It’s a wonder I survived raising five kids and then a couple of grandkids later on in life.

I’m not trying to fool anyone with this post; however I may fool some readers with my latest book in the Rocky Bluff P.D. crime series, Angel Lost. Though there are definitely crimes in this latest edition, there is something missing. You’ll have to read it to find out what.

If someone picks up Angel Lost thinking it is a religious book, they’ll be disappointed. Yes, there is an angel in the book and a smattering of religion, because some of the characters are religious—but that’s not what the book is about. It’s about how people react to unusual things that happen in the town of Rocky Bluff and to the people who live and work there.

What about the angel in the title you may ask. There is an angel—but not in the sense you might expect. The title has a double meaning. Authors sometimes have a difficult time coming up with an appropriate title, but in my opinion, this one is a perfect fit.

Angel Lost is one of those books that I had great time writing. Because I know my characters well, I knew what would happen if I put one in jeopardy. To be honest, I almost always put someone in jeopardy because that’s the challenge, finding out how everyone is going to feel and what actions he or she will take.

And those are my April Fools thoughts.

F. M. Meredith a.k.a. Marilyn Meredith

Bio: F.M. Meredith, also known as Marilyn Meredith, is the author of nearly thirty published novels. Her latest in the Rocky Bluff P.D. crime series, from Oak Tree Press, is Angel Lost. Marilyn is a member of EPIC, Four chapters of Sisters in Crime, including the Internet chapter , Mystery Writers of America, and on the board of the Public Safety Writers of America. Visit her at http://fictionforyou.com and her blog at http://marilynmeredith.blogspot.com

Angel Lost Blurb:

As plans for her perfect wedding fill her mind, Officer Stacey Wilbur is sent out to trap a flasher, the new hire realizes Rocky Bluff P.D. is not the answer to his problems, Abel Navarro’s can’t concentrate on the job because of worry about his mother, Officer Gordon Butler has his usual upsets, the sudden appearance of an angel in the window of a furniture store captures everyone’s imagination and causes problems for RBPD, and then the worst possible happens—will Stacey and Doug’s wedding take place?

Jambalaya Justice

Jambalaya Justice is complete! The moment arrived Saturday night, at 8:26. I remember the exact moment because my kids were waiting for me to watch the new Zack and Cody movie (Suite Life on Deck something something on Disney). We had DVR'd it, so we could skip the commercials and were going to start watching at 7:30. At that time, my youngest was wrapped up in Build-A-Bear online and couldn't be disturbed. At 8:00 she was ready, but I was so near the end of Jambalaya Justice I told her to give me a few more minutes, and there it was! I haven't felt that good about finishing something in a really long time. Both of my girls even noticed my good mood.

The only bad part was that the DVR glitched and even though it showed it was taping the movie, it wasn't, and my youngest was devastated for about five seconds. Fortunately, Disney plays those things over and over so we will get another chance in the next week to watch it together.

I emailed my publisher yesterday to let her know my good news, and I think she was as excited as I was. She has waited patiently for quite a while, and it felt good to be able to type that email. I am editing right now, although part of the reason I take so long to write is because I continuously edit, so hopefully I won't have to do too much more before sending it to her. It is a big longer than Gumbo Justice, and I am a little nervous, hoping those who enjoyed Gumbo Justice will like Jambalaya Justice as much.

So hopefully it won't be too long before I have the date Jambalaya Justice is on Oak Tree's release schedule, and will let everyone know as soon as I do. I can't wait.