This seems to be my fall for good news. With the help of fab literary agent John Talbot, I have just secured a three-book deal to publish the Local Foods Mystery cozy series with Kensington Publishing Company. I am thrilled almost beyond words.The first book is titled A Tine to Live, a Tine to Die. Novice farmer Cameron Flaherty just wants to grow and sell organic vegetables, flowers, and herbs on her great-uncle’s Massachusetts farm (photo of a farm share courtesy Arrowhead Farm in Newburyport, MA). Cam doesn’t count on finding dead bodies on the property.
Cam, a software developer in the Boston area, has lost her job to outsourcing. Her crusty great-uncle Albert invites her to take over his farm when his foot amputation forces him to move to assisted living. She takes a leap of faith and her severance pay and moves to the farm in the small town of Millsbury north of Boston. Her customers are eager to buy locally grown produce. Cam, by nature an introvert, struggles to balance satisfying a colorful group of locavores who subscribe to her Community Supported Agriculture farm-share program with trying to clear her farm, Produce Plus Plus, and her own name of the taint of murder. Some of her
fellow farmers at the weekly farmers’ market support Cam. Others just might be killers.One character I'm already having fun with is 14 year-old Ellie Kryzanski, who is working on her Girl Scout Locavore badge. She comes to the farm to work with Cam after school one day, and sees a clue all the adults have missed. Another is a bigger-than-life chef at The Market restaurant who gets his produce from Cam and might be looking for a little romance, too. Cam is also going to develop partnerships with local wine and beer makers, and sponsor a pickup site for a CSF, Community Supported Fishery.
A Tine to Live, a Tine to Die will be released just in time for the Northeast's growing season in 2013. I am having so much fun creating this world. I'll be giving updates here along the way.
What about you? Do you belong to a CSA or a CSF? Shop at your local farmers' market? Grow your own veggies?
I belong to a CSA and I love the name Millbury. There could be one on the North Shore. There isn't but there could be one. Congratulations on your book deal.
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful that you have so much good news to celebrate this season, Edith! I'm an old western Mass. gal, and my dad still grows a huge garden every summer, so I'll be anxious to read your local foods mysteries.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Ellie and Linda! See, Ellie, I even named a character after you. ;^)
ReplyDeleteMega congrats, Edith! I love how the stars are lining up for you. Good luck with this new series!
ReplyDeleteCongratulations! I love my weekly CSA box, and I can tell I'm going to love this series!
ReplyDeleteGreat news, Edith. I am looking forward to the first book -- and then the others.
ReplyDeleteOh, thank you Kaye, Gigi, and Aine. Isn't it wonderful? You know, if every CSA in the country sold just a couple of books, I'd be in hog heaven! (Or maybe on the bestsellers list...)
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to see this one in the bookstores!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Pat. Me, too!
ReplyDeleteEdith, I don't buy produce from a farmer's market, but you've got me wanting to do it. Thanks for the push.
ReplyDeleteI recommend it, June! Thanks for stopping by.
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