Friday, May 22, 2020

Dear Abby - Videos Abby Likes: The Calmest Dachshund Puppy

Dear Friends,

I hope you are having a good day!  I've had a busy week, so I will be short and sweet with my post here today.

I found a cute video about a very calm little dachshund puppy.  He has shiny black and tan fur and great big eyes.  This video is from the Loulou and Coco channel on Youtube, and the doxie lives with his family in the Netherlands.  It is a quiet, restful little video.



I hope you enjoyed watching this little puppy video!  It reminded me a bit of my puppy days, which were (ahem!) a few years ago.  One of my friends has a young dachshund puppy (shout out to Emily the doxie!) and I enjoy hearing about her adventures and mischief.

Have a great weekend!

Love,

Abby xoxoxo

Book Review and Giveaway - Killing Time (A Dodie O’Dell Mystery) by Suzanne Trauth

My Review
Killing Time is a cozy mystery set at Halloween on the Jersey Shore.  Dodie O'Dell manages a restaurant called the Windjammer and works with the Etonville Little Theatre.  She's currently working on a production of Dracula, but when a mysterious murder takes place that may involve one of her actors, she starts sleuthing ...

I wanted to read Killing Time because of the community theater setting.  I worked in theater years ago and love books with theater settings.  I also love cozy mysteries and Halloween, so this sounded like a fun read!

This was my first read in the Dodie O'Dell Mystery series.  I picked up on the characters and setting very quickly and enjoyed this book as a standalone.  That said, I have now added the rest of the books in the series to my "to read" list!

I throughly enjoyed this mystery.  It is especially well paced, with Dodie balancing work at the theater, work at her restaurant job, and planning a wedding with her police chief boyfriend, Bill ... all while doing some great sleuthing.

Dodie is a talented amateur detective who manages to get herself in jeopardy several times by taking chances.  She's a likable character, smart, hard working, and relentless about solving the case.

The mystery aspect of this book was well done.  There were a couple of surprising little twists along the way, and the denouement was exciting.

I recommend Killing Time for fans of cozy mysteries, and especially for anyone who enjoys Halloween mysteries or back stage theater settings.  It's a fun read!

Book Synopsis

With Halloween just around the corner, Dodie O’Dell is making preparations to transform the Windjammer Restaurant on the Jersey Shore into a haunted house, while the Etonville Little Theatre is staging Dracula. But casting the titular Transylvanian is proving challenging. The amateur actors in the company are not shy about chewing the scenery, but who among them can convincingly sink their fangs into a victim’s neck? When a mysterious newcomer with a transfixing Eastern European accent lands the part, rumors that he might be an actual vampire start to take flight—not unlike the bat who’s recently been spotted in the town park.

But everyone’s blood really runs cold when a stranger is found in the cemetery with a real stake in his heart. Dodie decides to put her Halloween theme menu on the back burner and stick her neck out to bring the killer into the light of day. She’d better keep her wits about her, though—or Dodie may be the next one to go down for the Count . . .

Author Bio

Suzanne Trauth is a novelist, playwright, screenwriter, and a former theatre professor at a university. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, the Dramatists Guild, and League of Professional Theatre Women. When she is not writing, Suzanne coaches actors and serves as a celebrant performing wedding ceremonies. She lives in Woodland Park, New Jersey.

Author Links 
Webpage: www.suzannetrauth.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SuzanneTrauth/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuzanneMTrauth
GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6187623.Suzanne_M_Trauth

Purchase Links
Amazon – B&N – Kobo

Giveaway
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Book Spotlight and Giveaway - Monarchs Under the Sassafras Tree by Lillah Lawson

Book Synopsis
It’s an unusually warm autumn, 1929, and O.T. Lawrence is about as content as a cotton farmer can be in Five Forks, Georgia. Nothing—not poverty, drought, or even the boll weevi—can spoil the idyllic life he shares with his doting wife and children and his beloved twin brother Walt. Until illness and Black Tuesday take everything O.T. ever held dear in one fell swoop. Grieving, drinking, and careening toward homelessness, O.T. is on the brink of ending it all when he receives an odd letter from a teenage acquaintance, the enigmatic Sivvy Hargrove, who is locked away in Milledgeville’s asylum for the insane. Traveling through desperate antebellum towns, O.T. and his daughter Ginny are determined to find Sivvy and discover her story. Set against the backdrop of the Great Depression, Monarchs Under the Sassafras Tree is a love story to Georgia and the spirit of its people—a story of family, unconditional love, poverty, injustice, and finding the strength inside to keep on going when all is lost.

 

Amazon | Barnes and Noble | IndieBound


Author Bio
Lillah Lawson has been writing since she was 8 years old, when she won a short story contest at her elementary school. The story was about a Princess who gets tired of waiting for the Prince to show up and saves herself. Once she saw her words printed in the local newspaper, she knew she wanted to be a writer.

Having written professionally as well as dabbling in poetry, children’s books and blogging, Lillah finally completed her first novel, Aroha, as part of a NaNoWriMo challenge in 2012.
She lives in Georgia, in the United States, with her partner and son and three rambunctious animals. She is currently working on another novel.

 

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads


Giveaway  
During the Blog Tour, we are giving away a paperback copy of Monarchs Under the Sassafras Tree! To enter, please use the Gleam form below. 

– Giveaway ends at 11:59 pm EST on May 22nd. You must be 18 or older to enter. 
– Paperback giveaway is open to the US only. 
– Only one entry per household. 
– All giveaway entrants agree to be honest and not cheat the systems; any suspicion of fraud will be decided upon by blog/site owner and the sponsor, and entrants may be disqualified at our discretion. 
– The winner has 48 hours to claim prize or a new winner is chosen.  
Sassafras Tree