A valued representative of Kauffman Real Estate and Auctioneering vanishes, and then $100,000 is take from the company safe. When old Friedrich Kauffman begins receiving threatening notes, skewered by antique hatpins, his anxious daughter Elsa turns to computer-whiz P.I. Patricia Delaney for help. But Delaney's tell-all computer databases and personal snooping quickly uncover more than the respectable Kauffmans wish to reveal, including shady business practices, bitter sibling rivalries--and murder....
I had only one ambition as a child--to be a writer. When everyone told me hardly anyone ever makes a living as a writer, I briefly considered becoming a policewoman (because the trench coats looked so cool in all those '70's police dramas) or a psychologist (with the hope of finally understanding my family). Nevertheless, heart won out over practicality, and I became a writer. The police and psychology bits, though, come through in my mystery writing.
Now, I delight in mixing humor with mystery in my Stain-Busting Mystery Series, published by Avon Books. The series features Josie Toadfern, self-taught stain expert and Laundromat owner, and is set in fictional Paradise, Ohio. Josie cleans up crime one hilarious load at a time, while sharing changes, advances and set-backs in her personal life. She's guardian to her cousin Guy, an adult with autism, and her best friends are Sally and Cherry. Her love life is currently a roller-coaster!
I am also a humor columnist; my column, Sanity Check appears every Monday in the Dayton Daily News (Dayton, Ohio) and covers everything from shredding pantyhose for stress relief, to talking refrigerators. My fiction credits include short mysteries published in Murderous Intent Mystery Magazine, Futures Mysterious Anthology Magazine, and Orchard Press Online Mystery Magazine.
