Author Guest Post with Rebecca Lee Smith

When her aunt suffers a stroke, New York portrait artist Emory Austen returns home to the North Carolina mountains to mend fences and deal with the guilt over her husband’s senseless death. But that won’t be as easy as she hoped.

Welcome to the November 19th stop on the blog tour for The House on Crow Mountain by Rebecca Lee Smith with Goddess Fish Promotions. Be sure to follow the rest of the tour for spotlights, reviews, author guest posts, and a giveaway! More on that at the end of this post.

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Author Guest Post

Writing a Mystery… How Easy is That?

For me, the easy way to write a mystery is…oh, I’m sorry, there is no easy way. At least, not for me. But that sure hasn’t stopped me from trying to find one.

Some writers seem to possess that effortless gift for weaving storylines, themes, and character arcs together in just the right way until a plot emerges fully developed. Like magic. Some writers do this without breaking a sweat. I am not one of those writers. I’m the writer who considers crafting a credible mystery plot only slightly easier than pulling teeth. My teeth. Without a feel-good hypodermic of Lidocaine standing by.

I like making up things as I go along; I think it keeps my manuscript fresh. But the genre I’ve chosen to write in, and love, doesn’t allow me that freedom. Before I start writing a mystery, I have to figure out the nuts and bolts of how the crime was committed, who is guilty and why, who had those old standbys: motive, means, and opportunity, and an original plot that is both believable and surprising. Plotting can be a tricky business when writing a mystery. The suspects must have valid reasons to suspect them. The clues must be legitimate. The sleuth must have a compelling cause to solve the murder. Plausible red herrings must be cunningly planted to misdirect the reader. And it all has to make sense in the end. If you decide to throw a little romance into the mix, where the couple has internal and external conflicts they must resolve while falling in love, staying alive, and solving a murder, then you have a nightmare.

I’m still searching for that elusive, easy peasy way to write a mystery. I’ve read books and articles and blogs on how to plot. I’ve poured over charts and diagrams and spreadsheets. I even ordered a kit by a well-known writer promising a foolproof method for writing a cozy mystery (or any novel). I ripped open the Amazon box feeling giddy, like a kid receiving a brand new pencil box on the first day of school. But my heart fell as soon as I removed the contents: a tiny foldout instruction sheet, a pack of four-inch colored pencils, a pocket-size notebook, and a stack of 3 x 5 unlined brightly colored notecards, looped together on a flimsy wire. Three of the cards were stamped with the words BUT, THEREFORE, and MEANWHILE, which, I guess, was supposed to propel me through the manuscript, plotting and planning like a house afire. All it did was depress me.

Was I missing something? Where was the magic formula? Why hadn’t I read the Amazon product description more carefully? And what the heck were all those colored pencils for? Was I ever going to discover the secret of writing a mystery the easy way?

In a word: no.

But that’s okay. If writing a mystery (or any book) was a piece of cake, I don’t think I’d have such a gratifying sense of accomplishment when I finished a manuscript. To quote the great Nora Roberts—“No writing is ever easy, and I don’t think it should be. If it wasn’t hard, everybody would do it.”

About the Book

The House on Crow Mountain
by Rebecca Lee Smith

Published 14 July 2021
Wild Rose Press

Genre: Mystery
Page Count: 310
Add it to your Goodreads TBR!

When her aunt suffers a stroke, New York portrait artist Emory Austen returns home to the North Carolina mountains to mend fences and deal with the guilt over her husband’s senseless death. But that won’t be as easy as she hoped.

Someone in the quirky little town doesn’t like Emory. Is it the sexy architect who needs the Austen land to redeem himself? The untrustworthy matriarch? The grudge-bearing local bad boy? Or the teenage bombshell who has raised snooping to an art form? Even the local evangelist has something to hide. Who wrote the cryptic note warning her to “Give it back or you’ll be dead?” And what is ‘it’? As the clues pile up and secrets are exposed, Emory must discover what her family has that someone would kill for.

Amazon US | Amazon CA | Amazon UK | B&N | Kobo

Excerpt

The piecrust table still sat upside down where it had come sailing through the window the night before. Inside the house, bloodstains from Henry’s wounded shoulder streaked across the floor, the oak hall tree lay on its side like a coffin, and one of the oil lamps had been shattered. Everyone said it was a miracle the place hadn’t caught fire.

I wrapped my good arm around the wooden porch post and gazed across the meadow at the brilliant azure sky. One lone crow soared overhead. A harbinger of death or a good luck sign? Its glossy black feathers reflected off the sun. The bird dipped across the horizon, leading with its sharp pointed beak, riding the breeze up and down before disappearing behind the woods I had run for my life in the night before. In the morning light, the deadly thistles were invisible, blending in with the tall grass to cunningly disguise their razor-sharp leaves.

James climbed the steps and stood beside me. “Are you ready for this?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

I raked my fingers through my short curls, the same curls he had washed so carefully in the sink at the Thompson Motor Lodge. He held out his bandaged hand, blistered to the bone from holding Daisy’s rope, and I took it.

Sheriff Riley rounded the corner of the house. “We’ve found something.”

About the Author

Rebecca lives with her husband and a dog named Wilbur in the beautiful, misty mountains of East Tennessee, where the people are charming, soulful, and just a little bit crazy. She’s been everything from a tax collector to a stay-at-home-mom to an award winning professional actor and director. She loves to travel the world (pre-pandemic) because it makes coming home so sweet. Her Southern roots and the affectionate appreciation she has for the rural towns she lives near inspire the settings and characters she writes about.

Website | Twitter | Amazon

Giveaway Alert!

Rebecca Lee Smith will be awarding a $25 Amazon or Barnes & Noble gift card to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Nov 26	The Key Of Love	Nov 26	Booklover-Sue

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