Death at the Midnight Dragonfly
Argent Ocean Publishing (November 10, 2017)
Paperback: 216 pages

Synopsis

On the fourth day of Christmas,
In Mercy, Mississippi….

Four suspects lying,
Three sleuths a sleuthing
Two clues a hiding
And a very, very dead body.

It’s the Christmas season in Mercy, Mississippi. But things are far from jolly.

For Vlad Templeton the sleepy little town where he spent his childhood provides the perfect place to conduct his state funded sleep study. But when the local bank manager, who was participating in the study, is found dead on his doorstep, is it a set up…or is Vlad somehow involved?

But, when someone makes an attempt on Lily Gayle’s and Dixie’s life, the two realize they better move fast….or they might end up sleeping forever.

Excerpt

Bah Humbug. I thought to myself as I stood in the chilly December air of downtown Mercy later that evening. Across the parking lot, in the old train depot building, party goers dressed in their Christmas best gathered in groups beyond the un-curtained windows.

Folks must have already been into the Christmas punch based on the animated conversations that appeared to be going on inside. Big smiles. Arms waving. Oops! I saw a splash of the punch swish over the side of a cup being waved around and splash onto the reindeer sweater of Marlene from the newspaper. Marlene screamed, jumped back and slammed into someone I couldn’t see from my angle. She looked to be apologizing pretty hard to whoever it was.

I sighed, wishing I felt more animated about attending the Mistletoe Magic Extravaganza, as the annual Mercy Christmas Party was called.

But I just didn’t seem to be in the Christmas spirit. I’d had a very busy couple of months with dressmaking. Everything from Renaissance to Old South for women belonging to various historical groups wanting new dresses for their own Christmas celebrations. Maybe that had made my personal Christmas cheer go out the window because I seemed to be over the whole merry and bright thing even though Christmas wouldn’t be here for two more weeks.

Why, I hadn’t even put up my Christmas tree or stockings. And forget about any seasonal display on my big front porch. A shocking state of affairs according to my best friend, Dixie. She’d been over to the house just yesterday complaining about my lack of enthusiasm. I’d poo-poo’d her words, but deep down, I knew she was right.

And now, here I was, lurking outside the annual town Christmas party in a decidedly non-merry state of mind. The party was pretty much a command performance though. I kicked the tire of a truck in frustration. The only effect it had was to scuff the toe of my brand new leather boots.

I sighed again. Maybe a cup, or two, of Miss Edna’s special recipe Christmas punch might set me up right for the party. Good thing this was an adults only party and those who didn’t care for alcohol in the punch brought their own drinks. Funny how traditions come about in small towns.

However, Miss Edna came with Miss Edna’s punch. And ever since she’d worked with Dixie and me a few weeks ago to help solve the mystery of who killed Luxen Natolovich up at the Midnight Dragonfly Inn, and who killed the wolf man before that, she bout near drove me crazy wondering when our next ‘case’ would come along.

Personally I thought she was grieving over her old flame and how everything had come out about his life that prevented him from asking her to marry him all those years ago. I considered myself lucky that she hadn’t brought any of that stuff up again at the breakfast this morning. Guess she got distracted by the information about Vlad and his sleep study.

Oh, Lordy. Would Vlad be here at the party? I sure as shootin’ didn’t want my first meeting with him after all these years to be in full view of most of the town.

About the Author

Susan calls McNairy County, TN her home ground even though she has moved away. It was here, at Bethel Springs Junior High School that she began her writing career with two friends. They formed their own little writers group that was so secret they were the only ones who knew it existed. She still has some of the stories they wrote carefully preserved in a loose leaf binder and tucked away for safety.

She has worked in retail management, briefly for the Census Bureau and for many years in the investment/insurance industry in the regulatory compliance arena. All of which are left brain activities. So she exercises her right brain activity with reading and writing…just to keep both sides even.

Reading has been a passion since she was very young. As a toddler, her mother read to her from her ‘baby books’ and her Mother tells a story about her holding one of them upsidedown and ‘reading’ by repeating the story verbatim from memory.

Susan writes mysteries set in the big city of Memphis, TN and the fictional small town of Mercy, Mississippi.

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