Melissa Westemeier

The Wild West, gangsters, railroads, Pinkerton PIs, murder, intrigue, one bad-ass heroine, and Mark Twain are all featured in Dana Stabenow’s new book The Harvey Girl. I was astonished to learn this prolific writer’s been churning out books for ages! I’m officially a Danamaniac, listeners! Dana shares how visiting family in the Southwest inspired her new series. Fred Harvey created the prototype of franchise restaurants and women made it happen while they helped establish com

Fri.- Sat. May 1 - 2 Lakefly Writers Conference, Oshkosh, WI (presenting humor writing workshop) Sat. May 9 1 - 4 p.m. Caramel Crisp Bookstore, Oshkosh, WI (Spring Wine Walk / Mystery Event) Sat. May 30 11 a.m. - 2 p.m. Block of Books, downtown Appleton, WI

Guest of Honor Annette Dashofy and ME at Malice Domestic 2026 A spring weekend in Bethesda, MD is wonderful, but getting to schmooze with writers I admire, meet other mystery readers and learn pro tips to improve my writing game at Malice Domestic '26 raised the awesome bar considerably. Yes, I got to shop at the Gap (not an outlet, a real Gap store, Nicole!) and eat a crab cake sandwich and walk around outside wearing short sleeves but that's barely exciting compared to the

Murder is ON THE TABLE all weekend long!

If you’re a fellow Anglophile who watched The Crown, you MUST check out S.J. Bennett’s series Her Majesty the Queen Investigates. The Queen of England as amateur sleuth? YES PLEASE! Bennett gives readers an inside look at royal life while serving up a puzzler of a crime for HRH to solve. Sophia discusses the inspiration behind her series, which includes her father’s service to the Crown and her own attempt to land a job in the Queen’s inner circle, how she researches her char

When I was young I remember making umbrellas out of construction paper and our teacher hung them on the classroom wall with the words " April Showers Bring May Flowers ." In May we cut tulips and other flowers from the stack of construction paper to replace those umbrellas. The smell of Elmer's Glue brings me back in time... Spring's a sloppy season for Midwesterners. In a single day we can get snow, sleet, seventy degrees and sunshine, a tornado warning, and torrential rain.