There are some places you can’t visit anymore, poetry and writings take you there. ~Vaishal sheth
I guess I got too sneaky on my last random line. Nobody knew or guessed which book I grabbed it at random. Well, sort of random. I do look for a line that speaks a little of the story. I guess this one didn’t speak loudly enough.
A dream room where her imagination could take flight. Until nightmares had intruded.
If you have read my Hidden Springs mysteries, the line might have poked your memory. One line out of thousands we’ve read doesn’t always stick in our heads. But that line is about Maggie, my 15-year-old character in Murder Is No Accident. Maggie is an aspiring writer who liked to climb up into the tower room at her elderly friend, Miss Fonda’s house and let her imagination carry her off into storyland. When death and murder intrude, she loses her special place to write. Since she had been sneaking over to the empty house since Miss Fonda went to a senior care facility without telling her mother, she didn’t want to admit she was in the house because she was afraid of getting into trouble. But then trouble came hunting for her anyway.
At the end of the first chapter after she’s heard someone fall and then finds that person dead at the bottom of some steep stairs, she’s running away from the house after making an anonymous call to the police. The last line of that chapter could have been another random line I could have pulled out of the story. She looks around but doesn’t see anyone as she runs across the yard.
She didn’t think about whether anybody saw her.
And so the mystery starts.
The secrets of small towns have fascinated writers and readers since the first psychological thriller was penned. ~Fiona Barton
My inspiration or at least the beginning thought for Maggie in the story is the house in the picture above. This house is on my town’s Main Street and when I was a kid, I was always entranced by the thought of having a writing spot in that tower room with windows all around. I would be up there in my own private world where like Maggie, my imagination could take flight. I’m one of those writers who prefers solitude while I’m writing. I’ve learned to write even with noises and people in the house with me, but it is easier to get into a made up world when nothing from the real world is tugging at your thoughts.
So when I thought about a murder happening in that house and a young girl being a possible witness, I let Maggie be a young writer in that tower room the way I imagined it might have been for me at her age.
The picture at the top is the cover I hope to use on the audio version of Murder Is No Accident once I finish the narration on the story. Do you like it?
I have more work to do on my narration before it’s ready for listeners. I’ll be sure to let you know when it is, but that’s a few months away. No worries, the print version is readily available. If you do decide to go to Hidden Springs and haven’t made that visit yet, you might like to start with Murder at the Courthouse and then Murder Comes by Mail to get the full flavor of my small town of Hidden Springs and Michael and Alex’s stuttering steps toward romance.
Okay, are you ready for a new Random Line? If so, here goes.
She had no idea who she was bringing into her house. Could be that trouble sneaking up on her.
If you know which book I grabbed this one from or make any kind of guess, you’ll get an entry in my book giveaway. A guess on each new random line gets you that extra entry if you’ve already entered on other random line posts. You have to be at least 18 to play and the deadline for entries is October 29, 2022 at midnight EST. Three winners will get their choice of one of my books, autographed to them or to someone else if they want to give it a friend or family member. Remember you can go to my website and peruse my books to get a guess if no book comes to mind.
Not sure if this one is easy, hard, or somewhere in between. But right or wrong, you still get that entry to have a chance to win a book.
As always, thanks for reading!
Comments 18
Author
Thanks for all your comments and most of you were right. Sorry to be slow to post Wednesday’s last installment of the game, but I’ll explain in the Thursday night post.
Along A Storied Trail, I haven’t read it yet, but it seems to be the one everyone is picking.
Along A Storied Trail
I can’t remember lines from books at all so I wouldn’t know but I’ll say Along A Storied Trail.
Author
I guess you remembered enough this time, Lucy. 🙂
I really have no idea which book contains the quote you selected, but I’ll just guess “The Outsider”.
And, yes, I really do like the photo of that marvelous house at the top of today’s post! I think it would have been fun to grow up in a house like that, but I’m another one who could not manage the stairs at my age.
Author
If your folks didn’t have the money for a maid, you might have had to do a lot of dusting, Roberta. LOL That would a lot of house to clean. But it does look like it would be a great place for a kid to find a lot of nooks and crannies for fun places to hide or play.
I like that you guessed something different for the random line. Not right, but it’s a book no one else has guessed yet in the game. 🙂 Thanks for playing.
Along A Storied Trail
Along a Storied Trail
Along a Storied Trail
Is it River to Redemption? I love the picture of the house and think it would be a wonderful cover for your book! Have a blessed week!
Love the house-it looks like a good place to write and for a mystery to occur. Your latest line stuck out to me right away and I thought of Perdita and Coralee in Along a Storied Trail. So, I was wondering if I was right, and my curiosity got the best of me and managed to open my copy of it to the exact right spot! 🙂 Great story that I am now going to have to make time to read again! Thanks for a fun game!
Author
That’s fun, Hope, that you opened the book to the confirming spot about the random line. I loved writing the scenes with Perdita and Coralee. I hadn’t really planned any of that while thinking about the story before writing, but both characters turned out to be a gift. Thanks for playing my games here.
Along A Storied Trail !
My guess,The Refuge
I love that house,would make a great book cover.This game is HARD , but fun!!!
Author
Glad you’re having fun even though the guessing is hard, Lisa. You got one of them though, didn’t you? I thought sure you’d get the one from Angel Sister. But I certainly don’t expect you to remember every random line.
Love the house! I always wanted to live in a big house like that. Now I would not be able to handle the stairs, But it would be lovely to sit on that veranda with a cup of tea, a couple of cookies and one of the Hidden Springs books!! I recently reread them too.
Author
As you may remember, several people in my story didn’t manage those stairs well, Marjorie. A house like that does sound like a treasure, but I’d never get all the dusting done. And this one is supposed to be haunted. But from the stories the haunting is is limited to playing a piano now and then. LOL.