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Here are the rest of the suggestions for my characters in my book. I hope you’ll make some comments and maybe even be interested enough to read more about them in my books. Q = Phil Pearce. Phil is the only character I’ve created with a specific face in mind, that of J.D. Qualls. Robin Rivera Also suggested Gerard Depardieu, another good choice. R = Ruthie Hersh, the elderly fireplug who guards the police station from the front desk and knows everybody’s business. She has fading red hair in a bun in the first book.  There were no suggestions here, so I picked Debbie Reynolds and Betty White. S = Sam Brewster, Chief of the Pequod Police Department. I still don’t have a perfect vision of him and there were no takers for him either. He is a combination of my brother and Chief Chris Blue of the Chapel Hill Police Department. With regard to actors, I see him as possibly looking a bit like Philip Seymour Hoffman. Chief Chris Blue T = Tanya Davis, a minor character in the first book who reappears briefly in the third. She is an African American undergraduate who looks like she could be an athlete but in fact is a physics nerd. Jemima Pett suggested the British long jumper Jade Johnson. My pick is China Anne McClain, a young American actress. U = Senior FBI Agent Bongiovanni. Geoff came up with a young John Cleese or Kevin Kline. Bongiovanni is described on the basis of a high school classmate of mine, but I see him played by none other than Jeff Goldbloom. V = FBI Agent Michael Bowers.  No one had any suggestions, and I want someone who could be clutsy, arrogant, socially inept, but also sweet. Jeremy Renner came to mind. W = Will Brewster, the cad of a husband. Jemima suggested a young Chris Noth could be slimy enough. I definitely see David Hyde Pierce. X = Bitsy Wellington, one of the villains in the first book and a huge part of the third. I didn’t have a good vision of Bitsy when I started writing her, but then I saw the Grave Digger episodes on Bones, and knew I had found the perfect person – someone capable of playing a small woman, aggressive and downright nasty: Deirdre Lovejoy. She is currently playing a badass senior administrator with a Southern accent on Black List. Y  = Rhe, and I have to admit I do not have a focus on her yet. Perhaps it’s best that way. In an indirect way, a high school classmate suggested Lee Remick, an actress probably most of you don’t remember since she was popular in the 60s. Geoff, not to be stumped, suggested Sandra Bullock. Z = Zoey Harris, Will’s lover and the cause of the breakup of his marriage to Rhe.  Slender, blonde and self-centered, she led to Jemima’s suggestion of Elle McPherson, and I thought of a young Gwyneth Paltrow. Thanks to all of you who responded with these suggestions. Geoff and Jemima take the cake for participation! So, what do you all think now? Agree? Have other suggestions? Don’t forget, many of these characters return in Death by Pumpkin, along with some great new ones and some hair-raising moments for Rhe! 0 0

Whew! Congratulations to everyone who participated in the A-Z challenge, and THANK YOU to everyone who visited my blog during this time. Your comments were fun, funny and perceptive. I hope I’ve piqued the interest of some of you to read my books (there’s always an ulterior motive, right?) To create some more fun, I’ve compiled pictures of suggestions from all of you (plus some of my own) with regard to who the characters look like. This will stretch over two posts and I will do it alphabetically, beginning with Marsh Adams. No takers here, so this is my suggestion for Marsh: Kevin James. B was Bob Morgan, and I had received a picture from Elizabeth Hein and suggestions of Robert Wagner from Elizabeth Calwell, a young John Candy from Jemima Pett, David Duchovny from Liz Brownlee, and a young Ryan O’Neil (mine). E was Nancy Ennis, Rhe’s red-headed fellow nurse and Geoff Le Pard suggested Merida from the Disney movie Brave.  Brilliant! F was Frank Boyette. Again, no takers, but since he owns the pizza place, Ernie’s, I see him as rotund, How about Dom Deluise? H was Sylvia Hutty, the fashionista director of Human Services at Sturdevant, and again no takers. But I remember Shirley McClain when she was young, and I could see her in this role. I also recalled Claudette Colbert, a featured actress in some of my favorite old movies (It Happened One Night) and a woman with great sophistication. I was Kelly Ingram, the football player, and I had a ton of suggestions for him: a young Ryan O’Neil (Jemima Pett and Keith Channing), Ryan Gosling or Channing Tatum (Geoff Le Pard) or a young Zach Effron (my suggestion – how could you not like him?). For Jack, two suggestions: McCauley Culkin (Luccia Gray) or Jay North (mine – does anyone remember Dennis the Menace?). I used James Barnes for K. He was the kidnapper/killer in Death in a Dacron Sail. I offered up my own picture and had no takers. L was Lyle Pendergrass, the ancient guard at the rear of Sturdevant Hospital in both books. Geoff Le Pard suggested David Jason while I thought of James Cromwell. M was James Manning, the slimy CEO of Sturdevant Hospital. Geoff jumped in again with the    suggestion of Richard Chamberlain, while keeping with the red hair trait, I thought of Eric Stoltz. N was Mary Noon, the Irish farm woman, and I have three suggestions: Judi Dench (Jemima Pett), Mrs. Doubtfire (Robin Williams, suggested by Geoff), and Fianula Flanagan (my idea and she’s Irish!). O was Tom O’Neil. Here we have the real Tom O’Neil – Nat Wilson, or someone I’d been thinking of as I created the character: Sam Elliot. P was Paulette, Rhe’s best friend. Charlotte Hoathar suggested Reese Witherspoon, and I had her on my list, too. Geoff suggested Olivia Coleman and I thought Porter Girl (Lucy Brazier) could also be Rhe! The rest of the alphabet next time! What do you think of these choices? 0 0

Bet you didn’t see I’d have a Z! Zoey begins as a strong minor character in Death in a Red Canvas Chair but returns with a vengeance in Death in a Dacron Sail.  I don’t think we’ve seen the last of her and I see her returning in my fourth book. Zoey is an undergraduate at Pequod College, and Rhe talks to her as part of her investigation of the death of a fellow student. Here is how I describe her: When she finally emerged from the classroom, I saw a model-thin young woman, all legs, dressed in a denim skirt so short heavens know what you would see if she bent over. She was wearing cowboy boots, the latest campus fad. “Are you Zoey Harris? I asked, as she paused to drape her raincoat through her backpack. “Yeah, and you are…?” she said cautiously. With a closer look, I saw she was wearing a good deal of make-up, perfectly done, which seemed strange for a wet day of running to classes.  And chewing gum. *** Zoey certainly fell in the category of what I called the ‘Beautiful People’. It’d been my experience that the beautiful and handsome kids tended to congregate with each other, at least in high school and somewhat in college, so it was not surprising that she and Lili hung out together.  And I was also pretty sure Zoey had at least a few brains to go with her looks.  She was definitely socially adept. *** Zoey looked at her wrist watch, which I couldn’t help but notice was thin, gold, and looked to be a Patek Philippe. I glanced at her other wrist and saw she had a diamond tennis bracelet, which went with what I had assumed were fake diamond studs in her ears.  A little pricey for a college student if they were real. In Death in a Dacron Sail, the real Zoey emerges: “Up until her question, I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but just then I spied Will, sitting at a table toward the rear of the room. With him was a Pequod student I knew well, Zoey Harris.  They were holding hands and looking into each other’s eyes with undisguised lust.” Any thoughts on Zoey? What does she look like? Whew!  I’ve come to the end of the A-Z challenge for 2016. A few thoughts: First of all, THANK YOU to everyone who has followed my blog for the month of April. I’ve loved exchanging comments and visiting your posts! Second,  I hope you’ve enjoyed meeting some of the characters from my books.  If you haven’t read them, I hope you’ll give them a try. It’s good to read them in sequence, but they are nearly stand-alone so you can jump in anywhere. Third, I will soon post pictures of people suggested for my characters. Because of privacy issues, I chose them from Hollywood denizens, who love publicity. And finally, the cover reveal for Death by Pumpkin is also upcoming, and I thank everyone who voted in the first and second rounds. The book will be out sometime later in May. Stay tuned! 0 0

At last we come to Rhe herself. I have purposefully not described her fully because I want readers to conjure up their own Rhe. What I have written is that Rhe is tall, generally good-looking, and toned from swimming and her job as an emergency room nurse, which keeps her on her feet. She is in her early to mid-thirties and has dark hair but I have not specified brunette, dark red or chestnut – definitely not black. Rhe is a type A – she often leaps before she looks – and is very intelligent. She has an outgoing personality, but tends to cultivate just a few close friends. Hopefully it is clear that Rhe has a snarky sense of humor, which emerges most frequently when she’s with Sam or Paulette. In a scene with Paulette: “Grateful is not what I wanted to hear, but I guess it will have to do for now – OW! I think I stapled my finger!” “Good thing you’ve got a nurse handy, then.” In two scenes with Sam: 1. “Well, nice to meet you,” I replied and turned back to the dock ladder. Calling thanks to Pete, I began the climb back up to the dock, with Sam following behind me, to keep me from falling or so he said. I really think he wanted an opportunity to make a comment on how big my rear had gotten.  Lucky for him, he didn’t. 2. “Will do. Call me when the DNA results come in. How about dinner with us sometime this week?” “You know I can never resist a home-cooked meal. Let’s see how the week plays out.” “Any special requests?” “Just something edible.” I couldn’t help it – my inner child took over and I stuck out my tongue at him. Rhe is intensely loyal to her friends, is devoted to her son Jack, but her feelings toward her husband Will change over the course of the three books.  Keeping all the balls in the air is a challenge for Rhe — balancing home life, her work, and investigations for the police department. Rhe is not a good cook, at least not at first, and her cooking has been a source of amusement for her brother-in-law Sam. Under the tutelage of Paulette, however, she is getting better. She does love to eat and has never met a foodstuff she doesn’t like. Hence there is a minor role for food in all three books. This may be the most difficult character to imagine, but I look forward to your suggestions! 0 0

I just realized that I had posted on Michael Bowers earlier – color me embarrassed. My mind is rather scrambled as I try to make yet another revision of Death by Pumpkin with comments from another editor and my copy editor and complete the A-Z Challenge. Here is a new V! The town of Pequod is definitely  a character in my books. A small coastal town in Maine with a waterfront park, its streets and businesses and colorful citizens populate my writing. The waterfront park is the site of the Pumpkin Festival that opens my third book, Death by Pumpkin. I drew Pequod in part from  Camden, which is a delightful old town just north of Boothbay Harbor, where we stay when we visit Maine. I love finding names for the various stores and store owners and using Maine historical figures for the names of the streets. Keep an eye out for these when you read my books!   0 0

Another letter where I can do no better! I’ve decided to introduce you to Bitsy Wellington. She plays a major role in Death in a Red Canvas Chair and my readers liked her so much that I brought her back in Death by Pumpkin. In the first book, Bitsy is the Dean of Students at Pequod College, often butting heads with Will Brewster because of her bend-over-backwards attitude in dealing with the students. She and Rhe grew up together. “Bitsy sat at a delicate antique wooden desk at the very back of the room, framed by windows that looked out over a well-kept garden full of fall flowers.  She wore a corporate grey suit, white blouse with a ruffle at the neck, and was perfectly, if overly, made up.  Her salt and pepper hair was swept up in a French twist, and not a strand was out of place. I could see she was sitting on a cushion, which I figured boosted her high enough to work at the desk.  Her face was much as I remembered, thin and pinched with a narrow nose. If I were a student, I wouldn’t come here on a dare.” “Her real name was Elizabeth, but because of her small size, we had always called her Bitsy, which she hated. She had been a full-blown bully as a child, for which I blamed her parents who considered most of the children in town too good to mingle with their daughter.  Whether it was swimming lessons or sailing Beetle Cats in and out of the harbor, Bitsy had taken every opportunity to belittle her so-called friends, and I was frequently a target.  She hadn’t changed much as an adult – subtly pompous and positively unctuous when she wanted to impress someone. She was not married, and I seriously doubted that matrimony would improve her disposition.” In Death by Pumpkin, Bitsy has become a full-blown sociopath and she is out to wreak revenge on Rhe and anyone around her because of perceived and real actions on Rhe’s part. Her appearance changes. She’s gained weight and looks like she’s been living hard: “Her black coat was filthy and stained with large spots of something dark, and stringy, unwashed hair stuck out of her watch cap. Her face wasn’t any cleaner, with smudges of dirt here and there.” What do you think about Bitsy? Can you see her in your mind? 0 0

Will Brewster is a character who started out as the ideal husband, a little too ideal as one of the members of my critique group pointed out. Far better that he be someone who creates tension, so I rewrote this character as a man I’d love to hate. Rhe and Will have been married for fourteen years. Will is an Assistant Professor at Pequod College, a private liberal arts college on the northern outskirts of the county.  Despite his PhD in Psychology, Will still doesn’t completely understand Rhe. He is not as tall as his brother – about six feet tall – and more slender, but has his same fair hair and is also balding, although not quite as much. Both brothers wear glasses, but Will is short-sighted and needs to wear his all the time. A thread through the first two books is Will’s increasing frustration with Rhe’s involvement in various investigations. Initially. he grudgingly allows her to continue when she becomes a paid consultant with the police department, which helps their finances. Rhe in turn resents being ‘allowed’ by her husband to do something she loves. But as time goes on and Will becomes increasing vocal in his opposition, sparks fly. Plus he is hiding a something from Rhe that will change their lives. More, I cannot say without giving away one of the plot lines in Death in a Dacron Sail. What do you think Will looks like? Got a suggestion for me? 0 0

If Agent Bongiovanni is Jeff, then Bowers is Mutt. He’s much shorter than the senior agent, and Rhe noticed when she first met him that he was nervous, tapping his fingers on the table, checking his phone, and biting his nails. Bowers also has hubris, as evidenced in this exchange: “We’ll tell the CEO of the possibility of contaminated transplant tissue immediately, but we’ll need to find a paper trail to confirm it. Hopefully he’ll be cooperative,” continued Bowers. “It’s going to take some time to find everything, but we have agents working on it right now. Mr. Moretti is going to be indicted for a long list of federal and local crimes, don’t you worry,” he finished in a condescending tone. I could almost hear the missing ending: your pretty little head.  I wonder if he’d passed the FBI gender sensitivity training.  Do they even have that? Michael Bowers plays a larger role in Death in a Dacron Sail, since he is assigned to work with Rhe on the kidnapping case. Here I describe him more fully: Bowers fits the image of a standard issue agent: neatly dressed in a dark suit with a striped tie, his thin, blonde-white hair neatly trimmed and combed to the side. Aside from his nervous ticking – he taps the desk surface with the end of his pen – his most remarkable feature are his eyes, a luminous gray, peering out through dark-framed glasses. Bowers is clearly not pleased to be assigned to work with Rhe and makes his feelings known, but after a trip to tell some parents that their little girl is dead, he regards Rhe with more respect. He is also clearly a rookie – he nearly dies while investigating a possible perp – but he and Bongiovanni come to Rhe’s rescue at the end of the book. Bowers is a somewhat humorous character, innocent and bumbling. Both he and Bongiovanni with return in Death in a Mudflat, my fourth book. Again, I used a high school classmate by the name of Bowers for this character, but not for his description. Do you have a vision for this character?   0 0

U and V are hard for me, because there are no names, you see! So let me introduce you to the two FBI agents who play major roles in both Death in a Red Canvas Chair and Death in a Dacron Sail. Senior special Agent Bongiovanni is so tall he can’t fit his legs under a conference room table and sits sideways, but with his short cut, graying hair, he looks more mature than his fellow agent and underling, Bowers. The agents are critical to the case in the first book, since it involves cross-state human trafficking. When I bring them back in the second book, they have a bigger role, working with Rhe and Sam to track down a kidnapper and killer of prepubescent girls.  The usual tension between overlapping jurisdictions is evident. We climbed three creaky wooden steps to the porch and were just about to knock when the door opened with a screech. Agent Bongiovanni stood glowering in the doorway. “What are you doing here?” he asked, sotto voce, the annoyance in his voice reflected on his face. He folded his arms across his chest. “This is an FBI investigation.” “Not completely,” replied Sam, drawing himself up to his considerable height, which was only an inch or two less than the agent’s. “Rhe and I drove up to talk to you personally about what happened with Agent Bowers. Since it just so happened you were at Cornwell’s farm, we decided to head out here and have a look for ourselves. Sorry if we interrupted anything.” “Well you have. Agent Bowers should not have involved you.” In the end, both agents play an important role in rescuing Rhe. Read Death in a Dacron Sail to find out more! I modelled this character after a high school classmate (who is very proud of being Agent Bongiovanni, especially since that is his real last name.) Who do you see playing this role? 0 0

Tanya Davis is a young, African American Pequod student who meets Rhe in Death in a Red Canvas Chair, during Rhe’s on campus search for students who might know the dead girl in the red canvas chair. When she finds Tanya, she sees a young woman over six feet tall, toned but not muscular, and clad in the typical college uniform of frayed jeans and a T shirt. Hers said “GEEK is the new sexy” in blazing red letters. She is just this side of attractive, with a broad face and even features and long, straightened hair pulled back from her face with a red head band. There is a little acne on her chin. Tanya is indeed on scholarship but not for sports. She is studying math and physics and is one of only seven black women in her class. Tanya is beaten by her boyfriend and ends up at Sturdevant Hospital, where Rhe meets Tanya’s grandfather and begins the investigation of the boyfriend. I can’t tell you more without giving away a plot line! Tanya is such a great character that I brought her back for a brief encore appearance in Death by Pumpkin, where she is now student body president and helps Rhe during Sam’s recall election. Can you see Tanya? Tell me what you see! 0 0