Please join me in welcoming author Lori Pollard-Johnson. Today, Lori is sharing a guest post about the popularity of endearing pets in cozy mysteries. Doting pet parents will relate to how these pets become such important characters. Fans of cozies will delight in this new release featuring a feisty sleuth.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Title: Corpse in the Craftsman Cottage
Author: Lori Pollard-Johnson
Genre: Cozy Mystery
BLURB:
Thirty-four, newly divorced and parenting two little girls, Jan Weatherly is determined to make it on her own doing what she knows best: do-it-yourself home flipping. With her BFF Pam Bacchus by her side, she purchases their first fixer-upper—a cute Craftsman cottage with quick profit potential in rainy Rainier, Washington. With the first swing of her claw hammer, however, Jan pries back faux cedar paneling and reveals a nude, snow-haired corpse floating in a makeshift aquarium. If that didn’t fully sour their dreams in a plume of formaldehyde-tinged air, Sergeant Daniels arrives and bans the women from the crime scene. Will they continue sleuthing, despite Daniels’s warnings, or simply wait for their dreams of financial independence to fall apart?
GUEST POST:
Cozy mysteries are well-known for their amateur sleuths and their endearing furry companions. They become as much a part of the series as any recurring character—often, they’re the ones we are most eager to read about again.
Take Janet Evanovich. Her car-exploding heroine, Stephanie Plum, cares for a skittish little hamster named Rex. Cozy mystery writer V. M. Burns based her entire Dog Club Mysteries around a poodle named Aggie. And then there’s one of the grand dames of cozies: Lillian Jackson Brown. Her “The Cat Who…” series features thoughtful and flawed Qwilleran and his curious Siamese cats Koko and Yum Yum.
This isn’t by chance. Cozy readers tend to be female, over forty years old, and looking for escape. Their “intelligent and intuitive” nature, as one agent describes them, makes them especially drawn to our lovable animal companions.
So as a cozy reader myself, it’s no wonder that my books often contain a loveable four-legged companion. My newest title, “Corpse in the Craftsman Cottage,” features Moxie, an elderly Chinese Crested, who serves as a mascot for my newly divorced BFFs new home-flipping business. She’s sweet and affectionate and reveals the true strengths of Jan and Pam as they navigate the ups and downs of divorce and single parenthood, potential financial ruin, and of course, discovering a dead body.
To see how Moxie changes everyone’s lives for the better, read “Corpse in the Craftsman Cottage,” available in eBook and Print.
AUTHOR BIO:
Lori Pollard-Johnson is a retired educator and current wife, mama and grandma. She writes from her homes in Washington and Arizona, and has been published in fiction, nonfiction and poetry, in publications as diverse as Vegetarian Journal, Seattle, Black Belt, Bridal Connections and The Binnacle, in addition to five novels. When she’s not writing, she’s playing with her grandbabies, braiding rugs, perfecting her shavasana, swimming, hiking, practicing her releves, renovating fixer-uppers, reading, or watching javelinas dance through her backyard.
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Jill Piscitello 