Category: police procedural

Guest Blogger ~ Pamela Fagan Hutchins

~ patyjag

Vigilante with a Badge in the Modern West: Delaney Pace

My Delaney Pace Series is set in the Bighorn Mountains of Wyoming, present-day—the real-life Modern West. It’s a setting I know well. I live there, right on the eastern face of the Bighorns near Sheridan. For the book, I created the fictional town of Kearny. Its name was inspired by Fort Phil Kearny near Story. My husband and I used to live across the street from its ruins and the museum that now stands in its place. That setting has fueled many of the books I’ve written.

But any good series is driven by its lead character more than anything, so it is with that in mind that I present to you my vigilante with a badge, Deputy Investigator Delaney Pace. My friend Daisy is the inspo for Delaney, and you couldn’t get more Modern West than Daisy—or more kick ass.

A few years ago, my husband Eric posted that we were giving away rusty, fire-damaged barbed wire. One of the takers was Daisy, who showed up with her family to claim some to use for a project.

We soon learned that she’d given up oil field trucking in North Dakota—and a side gig as a reality star— for taking over the family homestead, raising her second daughter twenty years after her first, and being a service to others through philanthropy and her physical labor. She was a key player in organizing one of the largest agricultural relief efforts in the history of the United States through a huge convoy of truckers, donors, and volunteers after historic fires devastated America’s Midwest. She and her family raise (and butcher) a large flock of turkeys every year to feed 300+ people at a free community Thanksgiving dinner.

Daisy’s the one you want as your second in a knife fight, who could have been a model or actress instead of a rodeo star and extreme trucker, and she’s the friend you can knock back a cold one with or take to meet your pastor (after you’ve done your best to prepare them for the encounter). If by some small miracle you find her in a church, you won’t see her sitting in the pews… she’s the one standing in the back.

She was forged in the kind of volcanic upheaval that can result in smoking rubble or beautiful rocky mountain ranges. Daisy, through character and force of will, is the latter. If you enjoy Delaney as much as I do, it is because of my friend Daisy. {Daisy, thank you for agreeing to let me reshape you in fiction.}

Whether it is her love for her niece, her desperate need to find her father’s killer and unravel the mystery of her mother’s disappearance, or her passion for hunting down killers (and for the handsome deputy she works alongside), Delaney goes all in. Her spirit embodies the Modern West. Rugged, self-reliant but selfless, with one foot in 1950 and one in 2024.

I think she and I have a long road to travel together, and I’m thrilled to ride shotgun on her fictional journey.

Hop in with us—we’d love to have you, too!

Pamela Fagan Hutchins

Catch Delaney Pace in her latest adventure: HER FORGOTTEN SHADOW https://amzn.to/3Nh54xYA violent storm erupts over the small town of Kearny, bringing a devastating mudslide. Amongst the debris, the worn threads of a child’s blanket, hides the body of a young girl, her long dark hair matted with the fallen earth that killed her.

When the rescue team find rope marks around the ankles of the teenage girl, they call in Detective Delaney Pace. Fourteen-year-old Marilyn Littlewolf went missing five years ago after moving to Kearny from a local reservation. Fearing she was dead, nobody expected Marilyn to ever come home. So where has she been? And why is her body covered in bruises?

Delaney thinks Marilyn was held captive in the mountains that tower above the town, but with acres of remote wilderness to search, the investigation seems impossible. Diving into Marilyn’s case, one name stands out that makes her blood turn cold as ice: her friend and longstanding babysitter to her two adopted daughters, Skeeter Rawlins.

Racing to his home, she finds it in disarray, it’s clear he left in a hurry. In disbelief, Delaney takes in the empty whisky bottles and wonders if she was wrong to trust her reliable old friend with her darling girls?

As evidence piles up against Skeeter, Delaney’s heart shatters when another girl is reported missing. Tracing her to a remote cabin deep in the woods, she fears she’s about to finally uncover the truth about her once-trusted friend. But when she bursts into the disheveled shack nothing could have prepared her for what she finds. Was she wrong to suspect Skeeter as the twisted mind behind the missing girls? And is she already too late to save another innocent life?

Pamela Fagan Hutchins is a USA Today bestselling and Amazon All Star mystery/thriller/suspense author with books in ten languages, who believes in soulmates, loves to laugh, travels too much, and lives out the adventures in her books at a rustic lake camp at Maine’s Mooselook Lake and in an off-the-grid lodge on the face of Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains with her husband, sled dogs, and draft horses. She’s currently along for her husband’s year-long assignment on the Mediterranean coast of France, writing her fifth Delaney Pace crime thriller in a tiny village where no one speaks English or has ever seen Alaskan malamutes before… and loving it.

Website: http://pamelafaganhutchins.com

Mailing list with free starter library: https://pamelafaganhutchins.com/pages/the-next-chapter-with-pamela-fagan-hutchins

BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/pamela-fagan-hutchins

Facebook http://facebook.com/pamela.fagan.hutchins.author

Pamela’s Posse for Readers: https://www.facebook.com/groups/pamelasposse

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/author/pamelafaganhutchins Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pamela_fagan_hutchins/

You Just Feel It

~ patyjag ~ 3 Comments

I finished book 12 in my Gabriel Hawke series two weeks ago. This is the first book that when I finished, I didn’t have any doubts that I had forgotten something or that it dragged in places or that it wouldn’t sit with some of my readers. I finished this book with a smile on my face feeling as if it was a good book. Not all books feel that way when I finish.

Many writers understand this. There are very few books that when I have it ready to go to my CP and beta readers that I feel I captured everything I wanted and gave all the right clues and nailed the characters. Even the killer. I figure the places that I’m worried about they will see, and I can fix them.

As usual this was what I call my first draft. Over the decades of writing and having published 58 books, not counting the 7 that never made the cut to being published, this was the first time I finished without any doubts about the story. Having been writing this long, I have a system where I what I write the day before is where I start the following day. I begin where I started writing and read through, making changes to scenes, sentences, and words. So by the time I do type the last word in a book, it is the draft I send to my CP and Betas. After they read and send me their thoughts and suggestions, I do what I call the second draft. This one goes to my line editor. Who will also catch any wrong names, duplication of information, and my legal mistakes. From her, I go through it one more time, the 3rd draft, and send that to a proofreader. After I change what she finds, that is the final draft, and it is published.

Now I could be all wet and full of myself on this one, but so far, the beta readers have liked it and found little to comment on. Well, except for my retired police officer. And what he commented on wasn’t anything to do with police procedure. He didn’t like that Hawke kills a rattlesnake. He thought Hawke should have backed out of the cougar’s cave he was crawling into and waited for the snake to leave. I’ve thought about this since his text to me about enjoying the book other than that scene. I’ve bounced around different ways I could change the scene, but they don’t harken to the urgency that Hawke feels about finding more evidence.

My other beta reader liked the whole book. Didn’t see any problems with any of the story. She did catch some typos.

I’m waiting for my CP to get it back to me and see if she mentions the snake scene. I felt Hawke was doing what he needed to do to keep him and Dog safe while they finished their search of the cave. A small area that they couldn’t have avoided being bitten by the snake if they moved around inside upsetting it.

The scene will stay as is. And the book that when I finished felt right and made me smile, is available for pre-order.

This double cold case and current homicide have Oregon State Police Fish and Wildlife Trooper Gabriel Hawke calling in favors… and exploring a childhood he shoved into the deep recesses of his mind. 

While patrolling on the Snake River in Hells Canyon, Gabriel Hawke’s dog digs up a human bone. Hawke is confronted by an aunt he doesn’t remember, and he finds a canister of film when the rest of the remains are excavated. The film shows someone being killed and a rifle pointed at the photographer.

Going through missing person files, Hawke discovers the victims of the
decades-old double homicide. A person connected to the original crime is
murdered, giving Hawke more leads and multiple suspects.

Attending a local Powwow with his family, Hawke discovers more about his childhood and realizes his suspects have been misleading him.

Pre-order: https://books2read.com/u/bQGkXw

A Few Of My Favorite Things

~ patyjag ~ 2 Comments

I’m one of those people who loves Christmas music. All of it! From the good old songs by Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, and Brenda Lee to the new ones by Mariah Carey, Kelly Clarkston, and Cher’s new one. If there are bells jingling, joyful lyrics, or reverent lyrics, I like it all.

Listening to Christmas music while I cook, clean house, and put things away from my recent book selling events, makes the task lighter and more fun. My hubby rolls his eyes as I dance around the kitchen putting dishes away, totally absorbed in the song that is playing. (If I’m absorbed how do I know he rolls his eyes?) Because he makes a noise or says something that draws my attention to him. He isn’t a Grinch, but he isn’t into the holiday as much as I am.

Where I’m going with this is I have learned I may be more auditory than I thought. I started listening to one audiobook so I could see what I would need to produce if I ventured into making my books into audiobooks. I enjoyed listening to a book because my hands were free. Now when I sew, cook, clean house, or drive long distances, I prefer to listen to audiobooks. Except this time of year because I’m listening to Christmas music. Audiobooks have kind of become my addiction because I can listen to them while doing other tasks. My mind can wander into the story while my hands and eyes are doing something else.

Lately, I’ve felt like I don’t have enough hours in a day to read for pleasure. But I can listen and continue doing certain tasks. Even my walks, I can listen to a book and get my exercise and fresh air. Our last trip to see our daughter, while my hubby drove, I listened to a book with my earbuds because his pickup doesn’t have the capability to put it through the radio, but our trip before that with my car, he even listened to the book.

I’m finding at the book selling events I attend that more people are saying they listen to audiobooks. Which is good for me since my three mystery series are all on audio. As a means to get more of the books purchased, I joined a Facebook website group for authors with audiobooks wide, meaning not just published through Audible. This group has proven to be more helpful in teaching me how to promote my audiobooks than any other workshop or event I’ve attended.

Right now, the authors at Indie Audiobook Deals are having a MASSIVE year-end giveaway. If you like audiobooks as much as I do, you might want to enter the giveaway. You can sign up to follow the authors with audiobooks in the genre you like to listen to as more ways to get your name in the drawing.

Five entrants will win a $50 Kobo gift card! Kobo is the premier site to listen to fantastic audiobooks.🎧

We’re picking FIVE winners so make sure to complete all of the extra entries to enhance your chances of winning. Good luck and wishing you a happy holiday season!

Enter here: https://kingsumo.com/g/pt4ez1/win-1-of-5-kobo-50-gift-cards

And if you are a mystery fan who likes books with diverse characters, right now I’m listening to book 2 Peril at the Exposition by Nev March and enjoying it. I discovered Ms. March earlier in the year with her first book that I purchased through Chirp, an audiobook distributor that has sales constantly. After listening to that book, Ms. March had asked a question on a crime scene email group I’m on. I emailed her to let her know how much I enjoyed her book and she agreed to be a guest blogger here in February.

Anyway, I got away from reading about diverse characters. Her first book is set in India in the 1800s. The one I’m listening to now is set in Chicago. The two main East Indian characters left India so they could be married. For some reason I enjoy reading books set there. I also like Sujata Massey’s Mysteries set in 1920 India. When I finish reading the book Blood Sisters by Vanessa Lillie, I will dive into The Mistress of Bhatia House by Ms. Massey.

I believe my interest in other cultures is why I write mysteries with Native American characters. I like to learn about their culture and reveal it to others. Though I reveal it slower than an Indigenous writer would because I didn’t grow up in the culture and have to learn about it and understand it before I’ll put it on a page.

Also this month, I have my audiobook, Murder of Ravens, book 1 in the Gabriel Hawke series for $0.99 at Chirp. Double Duplicity book one of the Shandra Higheagle Mysteries, Double Duplicity is $0.99 at Spotify. Or you can get the first three audiobooks of the Shandra Higheagle Mysteries at Barnes and Noble Nook for $2.99.

If you haven’t already finished your holiday shopping, a book or audiobook is a great gift. The recipient will step into another world and be the better for it.

Happy Holidays!

Paty

Why we write what we do

~ patyjag ~ 4 Comments

I started writing a post on here about Indigenous People Day. Which is today. It was made a federal holiday alongside Columbus Day in 2021. But by the time I was at the end of writing the post, I decided someone might take my post as political and moved it to my personal blog. If you’re interested, you can read it here: https://writingintothesunset.net/

But today is why I write the mysteries I write. I have been fascinated and in awe of the Indigenous people since I was old enough to understand all that they have gone through. And to see how some of the tribes have grown along with technology and have raised their people up in knowledge, living conditions, and being heard. I know there are some that are still struggling with being heard and seen as productive part of society, but there are others who are thriving. Getting back their culture and language and being economically sound and successful for their tribe.

Their resiliency, belief in their culture, and their desire to give each generation the best life inspires me to write about them. To bring their horrors and their determination to readers. That’s why I have Native American characters in my three mystery stories, to show readers that while they live a different culture, they are just like everyone else with the same dreams, goals, and desires.

I hope that my stories, while they aren’t as full of the culture as some other writers, still portray the culture and the real people who live each day not only with similar struggles but also with more. They are still labeled and seen as different by many.

The theme of my books all deal with injustice. Whether it is someone who is killed, someone who is believed to be the suspect, or it is the characters dealing with prejudice.

My newest release, Damning Firefly, deals with a completely different injustice. One that I tried hard to portray with empathy and from the first reviews, I did my job.

Damning Firefly

Book 11 in the Gabriel Hawke Series

A church fire.

An unconscious woman on Starvation Ridge.

Gabriel Hawke, fish and wildlife officer with the Oregon State Police, helps with a fire at the Lighted Path church before heading out to check turkey hunters. He discovers a car wedged between two trees and a woman with a head injury reeking of smoke. Is she the arsonist?

Hawke encounters the county midwife gloating over the burnt church and learns she and the victim in the car know one another.

Two seemingly separate events lead Hawke to a serial rapist and a county full of secrets. https://books2read.com/u/bQeBDZ

Random Ramblings

~ patyjag ~ 2 Comments

My summer has been busy! More so than usual. The only upside is I have been gone so much I didn’t have to help with as much hay harvesting. 😉 However that running around has drained me and made it take longer to get my next book out.

I told myself when I planned my 10 day trip to Hawaii that I would still work on my writing for half of the day. Well, I didn’t. And that put a book that I was already struggling with too much of a lag between starting and finishing it. Thank goodness my beta readers and editor found the places where I changed someone’s name or had a character looking at something they couldn’t have seen because the other character hadn’t been home to leave it. Little timeline things that I was sure I’d written but obviously only in my head.

Turtles on the rocks in Hawaii

As a writer, do you have instances like that? I have on several books known I’d written a scene that led up to something and neither I nor a beta reader can find it. It was a scene I’d played over in my mind while I was walking or driving and then when I sat down at the computer I started with the scene after it and was sure I’d written the one that was still in my brain. That’s frustrating. At least the scene is there, and usually, I can write it better than it played out in my mind.

In the book that is off to my final proofreader, I had many spots that I had to “fix” after the beta readers read it. I also had more scenes and paragraphs that I took out or manipulated to make my character more sympathetic to the victims in the story. I have never had so many saved documents of partial scenes that don’t make it in the book. I sure hope my readers like this one. It’s a true Hawke story but it does delve into something more controversial than his other books.

I spent Labor Day Weekend at a Flea Market where I and another writer friend usually have brisk sales. This year there were so few people who wandered by our trailer, it was kind of eerie. I only sold about a third of what I normally sell. Most of those were to my return readers.

This week, I’m headed to Mt. Angel, Oregon to sell my first in series books along with books by other NIWA (Northwest Independent Writers Association) members. It should be a fun weekend.

As soon as I return from there, I’m diving into a Shandra Higheagle Christmas mystery. I’ve had a multitude of Shandra fans ask me for one more book. I’m writing a Christmas novella to hopefully give the readers closure. I hope I can get it out before Christmas!

Right now you can pre-order Damning Firefly. It will release on September 25th.

Book 11 in the Gabriel Hawke Series

A church fire.

An unconscious woman on Starvation Ridge.

Gabriel Hawke, fish and wildlife officer with the Oregon State Police, helps with a fire at The Lighted Path church before heading out to check turkey hunters. He discovers a car wedged between two trees and a woman with a head injury reeking of smoke. Is she the arsonist?

Hawke encounters the county midwife gloating over the burnt church and learns she and the victim in the car know one another.

Two seemingly separate events lead Hawke to a serial rapist and a county full of secrets. 

Universal Book Link to Pre-order: https://books2read.com/u/bQeBDZ