Hello my fellow readers! For us, the summer is finally done. My boys are back in school. In the last two weeks – in addition to getting back into the swing of things with homework – we’ve had two back to school nights, a band parents meeting, a welcome back potluck, a goodbye backyard bbq, and I started back up with one of my handbell choirs. Not to mention all the after school activities pickups, volunteering in stadium concessions this week for band (getting all three required shifts out of the way early!) and our first football game tonight! It is interesting for me to experience high school marching band from the other side of the fence as a parent. I should have thanked my parents more when I was in high school. 😉

Anyway, all this is to say that things are settling back down and I am so glad to get back into a routine and have some time back to blog again. I have a few book reviews I need to catch up on. But first…

I am excited for today’s Quotable Thursday. I finally got my hands on an ARC of Wendy Tyson’s latest Greenhouse Mystery – Rooted in Deceit. I am about halfway done and am so happy to be back in the town of Winsome, as always. It is coming out in just a few weeks on the 4th of September, so mark your calendars, cozy mystery lovers!

I also have to say that I just love the cover, as usual.

No one answered her knock, but eventually her aunt called from somewhere inside the house and told her to come in. Megan twisted the knob and found it unlocked. She wandered through the small house until she spotted her aunt sitting at her dining room table, laptop open, typing madly away. An orange tabby sat placidly next to the computer, bathing himself in a slice of sunlight. The cat opened it’s eyes when Megan entered, then closed them languidly once more.

“Sit,” Aunt Sarah said. “Let me finish this scene.”

Megan accepted a chair. She pulled out her phone.

“No phone,” Sarah said without taking her eyes off the screen or her fingers off the keyboard. “Distracting. And don’t pet Harley. He’ll start purring again and that will distract me.”

And so Megan sat at the table listening to the click, click of Sarah’s short nails hitting the keys. After a few minutes, her aunt removed her yellow-and-black-striped readers and rubbed her eyes.

“I apologize for that,” she said. “Deadline.”

There were several different passages I thought about featuring today, but I really just personally enjoyed this one. This particular passage doesn’t have anything to do with the mystery; Megan’s conversation with Sarah after she finishes typing does relate to the story. I just read this passage and thought, I wonder if Ms. Tyson is writing from personal experience here. Is she channeling a little of herself in Aunt Sarah?

I’ve always heard that you shouldn’t write what about what you know, but write about what you love. I have a feeling that this passage just might be a little mix of both.

And just a little plug for the Greenhouse Mysteries – if you enjoy mysteries set in small towns that really feature the characters and their relationships, give the Greenhouse Mysteries a try. If Winsome was a real place I would visit in a heartbeat!