New Release: Ghost Walk Audio Book

And now for something completely different...

***drumroll***

I'm happy to announce the release of Ghost Walk as an audio book! Ghost Walk was, of course, the first book in the series where Sam and Lacey first met and started working together, and narrator Laura Wilson does an excellent job of projecting all the wonder, excitement and tension of that time. If you haven't met Sam and Lacey yet, this is the chance to do so in a way that's alive and immediate. If you have been following Sam and Lacey's adventures, this is a way to revisit the original story in a fresh and different dimension. Let's go back two years to that fateful beginning...

Lacey Fitzpatrick is an ex-LAPD detective with an axe to grind. Tainted by the betrayal of her drug-dealing cop boyfriend, she's on a quest to prove to herself--and the world--that she's still a competent crime-fighter. In order to do that, she teams up with Sam Firecloud, a half-Navajo man who communicates with ghosts. With his talent and her research, they tackle troubling unsolved crimes, but their latest case is the toughest. They have to solve a murder--where no record of a murder even exists. Can Sam glean enough information from the victim's ghost to unravel the mystery, and can Lacey convince the authorities that the murder actually happened?

Ghost Walk has been garnering recognition and awards since it was first published, including:

2017 Finalist New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards

2018 B.R.A.G.Medallion Honoree

2018 Chill With A Book Readers' Award, Chill Premier Award, Chill Awards: PB Special Award

And the reviews from satisfied readers continue to come in: 

This is a well paced, well written book with characters you won't forget and is a wonderful start to a great series. If you like paranormal elements in your mysteries, you really need to check this series out.

This story grabbed me from the very beginning.I will definitely be reading more of this series, and from this author.

Enjoyed the well written paranormal book. I have now read all in this series which I seldom do.

I loved this book.

Great read!!!

I loved this book so much that I immediately purchased Book 2, Skin Walk!

This is the 1st book I've read by this author and I will definitely read more!!

I've read 10 of these 'Walk'er novels, and am pleased to discover there are a few more in the series. You will not be disappointed.

Can't wait to read the others in this series.

This is one of my favourite paranormal mysteries.

Up there with household names in detective fiction. Very much enjoyed this.

The eBook for Ghost Walk is always only 99 cents on Amazon. 

Stay tuned for audio versions of the rest of the books in the series. Next up: Skin Walk!

Self-Publishing Children's Books

I know many people who have written, or want to write, children's books, but then may not know how to get them out there into the hands of waiting children. My particular experience started after my parents passed away and I was going through their files. My father was an artist and my mother was a teacher, actually almost direct opposites in temperament, so I was surprised and excited to find the layout of a children’s book written by my mother and illustrated by my father. It was very obvious the little project had never seen a publisher, so I determined to publish it for them.

Because the story was short and simple, appealing to younger children, I chose an 8”x10” paperback format for it — easier for small hands to hold, and the layout my parents had designed fit perfectly. Since the original work was done back in the 1950s, my parents had done a literal cut and paste — typing up the text on a typewriter, cutting the lines out with scissors and pasting or taping them onto the mat boards where my dad had drawn the illustrations. Lucky for me, the glue and tape held on after all these years, so it was easy for me to see exactly how they envisioned the set-up of the book.

My father had rendered the full-color cover for the book (above), and had hand-lettered the title. It was a simple matter for me to scan the painting into a jpg and add my mother’s name in a coordinating color and font style. I uploaded it to CreateSpace in the resolution required (at least 300 dpi) and created a back cover out of another painting my father did. (Since this original post, CreateSpace has announced they are closing, and KDP is taking over the self-publishing of paperbacks as well as eBooks.)

I scanned in all the old interior drawings and cleaned them up. It wasn’t hard to get rid of the small stains and smudges they had gathered over time and make them look like brand new. I used Paint Shop Pro, but there are several free image programs (like Gimp) that will work just as well. It was an easy matter to add the text without the laborious cutting and pasting, and I thought about how amazed my parents would be to see this way of making their old project new for the digital age.

I did end up putting each drawing and its related text on its own page rather than the three-to-a-page layout in the image above. I wanted each drawing to fill the page, and with a book this short, there was no reason to crowd the pages. The finished book was 24 pages long, just right for small minds at bedtime.

Because some of the story’s drawings were in color, I chose the color option for the interior, which unfortunately pushed the price up to $9.99, but I felt it was worth it. Interestingly enough, I was talking to a friend about this, and he suggested I remove the color and do the book as a coloring book! I thought that was a terrific idea, and I did that at a later date, not replacing this book but adding a new version of it. Not only did it cut the cost of the book, but it made it more “interactive,” in an old-fashioned and fun way. Because I also have hundreds of pencil drawings that my father did of various animals, both domestic and wild, I plan to do another themed coloring book without any story at all.

The great thing about children’s books is that they can be simple, fun and require much less gnashing of teeth than a 100,000-word novel. I would venture to say that many parents and/or grandparents might have ideas for stories like this, and it’s not that difficult to do. If you don’t know an illustrator or can’t find one within your budget, there are a lot of royalty-free images available on the web. Let your imagination run wild. You never know what you can create until you try. And your children (or grandchildren) will thank you.

Originally published by Indies Unlimited on April 7, 2015.

New Release: Karma Walk

Just in time for Christmas! Got your shopping done? Tree trimmed? Ready to curl up by the fire with a cup of cocoa, a warm afghan and a good book? Here's your chance. I'm happy to announce the release of Karma Walk, Book 15 of the Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud Mystery Series. 

Here's the skinny:

Abe Sydlowski was a cop in Long Beach, California, and had a long, distinguished career—until he died. Now his ghost is appearing at a beach he used to patrol, and his brothers of the shield want to know why. Lacey Fitzpatrick and medium Sam Firecloud are called in but get one surprise before they even start. Daniel, Sam’s fourteen-year-old son, wants to work with them. When the trio goes to investigate, they find not one ghost, but two. Who is the young girl whose spirit haunts the beach with Abe, and what’s the connection between the two?

Sound intriguing? It is! And to celebrate, Karma Walk will be only 99 cents through December 9, 2018.   

If you're not yet familiar with Sam and Lacey, Ghost Walk, the award-winning Book 1 of the series, is always only 99 cents.