Hi All,
You know I used to write mysteries and thrillers under the name Gwen Hunter. That makes me REALLY picky about the mystery books I blurb or suggest to others. This series is MUST READ for all lovers of mystery. Check it out! Also — there is a giveaway involved in this blog tour. Read this post carefully for the link to details!
To start, Jean talks about mystery:
Morning Everyone! I’ll call this post — Running in Terror from Ben Franklin’s Ghost
The Dead of Night, a Piper Blackwell tale, opens with my sheriff caught in both a mystery and a thunderstorm. She’s standing on the bluff in Rockport, Indiana, the rain driving down so hard its turning the ground into a slurry mud mix.
And my brain asks: Wouldn’t it be nifty if Benjamin Franklin’s ghost appeared…if the lightning caught his specter and drew it forward into Spencer County?
One summer afternoon in 1752 in Philadelphia, Franklin was said to have flown a kite in a storm to demonstrate lightning’s electrical nature. He used hemp, silk string, wire that acted as a lightning rod, a house key, and a special jar (a Leyden) that could store an electrical charge. The kite managed to pick up an electrical charge from the storm, and it was drawn into the jar.
So my brain thinks I could write a grand book with Benjamin Franklin’s ghost trying to help Sheriff Piper Blackwell solve a cold-case murder. He would use 1700s idioms, would be gobsmacked by technology, and would find everything so interesting that he’d decide to stick around and complicate Piper’s life. The ghost would haunt the sheriff’s department.
Without justice, courage is weak, Benjamin Franklin said.
Yeah, he’d fit right in with my sheriff. But I can’t let it happen.
Faith Hunter asked what I considered the difference between Urban Fantasy and Suspense.
Benjamin Franklin is the difference.
I’ve written more than thirty fantasy, urban fantasy, and science fiction novels. And I could have found a way to slip Benjamin Franklin between the covers of several of them.
But I’m writing mysteries now—my choice, as I wanted a new challenge—and so Benjamin Franklin has to stay long dead and buried. In fact, my typing fingers are running in terror from his ghost.
Urban Fantasy lets you explore all the magical “what ifs” your brain can conjure. It can let you put demons in NYC subway cars (did that), ghosts in a San Francisco courtroom (did that), and trolls wandering the streets of Kings Cross in Sydney, Australia (did that too). It lets you use those wondrous elements to find the villain, reveal the crime, and vex your protagonists.
Suspense, mysteries, uncozy-cozies like I write can’t have those things…not at be true to the genre.
I Hope you enjoy my mystery sereis,
Jean
About THE DEAD OF NIGHT
In Spencer County’s history, mysteries are numerous—and lethal…
As Sheriff Piper Blackwell rushes to a clandestine meeting with an aging, paranoid veteran who believes spies are trailing his every move, she is caught in a fierce thunderstorm. Pounding rain drums against the bluff, washing away the earth and revealing a grisly secret someone tried to bury a long time ago.
Putting a name to the skeleton on the bluff, and searching for the thief who robbed the old veteran of his life’s earnings, sends Piper delving into the sleepy towns that dot her rural county. Now she’s digging into pasts perhaps best left alone.
Accompanied by Chief Deputy Oren Rosenberg, Piper seeks to expose a truth someone wants to remain forever hidden. The investigation may have started with a thunderstorm, but Piper aims to finish it and find justice. Uncovering fragments of Spencer County’s history could prove more dangerous—and deadlier—than she ever expected.
- Print Length: 259 pages
- Publisher: Imajin Books
- Publication Date: September 15, 2017
- ASIN: B074HHHHX7
ISBN: 978-1-77223-308-7
Purchase Links:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074HHHHX7
Universal Link: http://getbook.at/TheEdgeofNight
About Jean Rabe
USA Today bestselling author Jean Rabe has written thirty-seven mystery, fantasy, and adventure novels and one hundred short stories. The Dead of Night is the second in her Piper Blackwell mystery series. She calls them uncozy-cozies, or cozy police procedurals…of which she’s been told there is “no-such genre.” When she’s not writing, which isn’t often, she edits . . . more than two dozen anthologies and more than one hundred magazine issues so far. She’s a former news reporter and news bureau chief who penned a true crime book with noted attorney F. Lee Bailey. Her genre writing includes military, science-fiction, fantasy, urban fantasy, mystery, horror, and modern-day adventure. She shares her home with three dogs and a parrot.
Rabe teaches genre writing courses—at conventions, libraries, museums, and other interesting venues. Her hobbies include reading, role-playing games, visiting museums, tossing tennis balls to her cadre of dogs, and buying books to add to her growing stacks. She lives in central Illinois near three train tracks that provide “music” to type by. Visit her website: www.jeanrabe.com.
GIVEAWAY
There’s a tour-wide giveaway for Cracker Barrel and Starbuck’s gift cards or a little password book. In addition, two lucky bloggers will be chosen at random to win a Starbucks or Cracker Barrel Giftcard. Open to US residents only.
<a class=”rcptr” href=”http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/9751c0424/” rel=”nofollow” data-raflid=”9751c0424″ data-theme=”classic” data-template=”” id=”rcwidget_eh5hjq4h”>a Rafflecopter giveaway</a>
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Direct link to giveaway: http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/9751c0424/?
Accolades for The Dead of Night
Jean Rabe always manages to surprise and never fails to deliver the goods! The Dead of Night…Highly recommended! —Jonathan Maberry, New York Times bestselling author of Dogs of War and Mars One
Jean Rabe writes the perfect mystery! I was kept guessing about everything to the very last word. The girl can write! —New York Times bestselling author Faith Hunter, writing as Gwen Hunter
In The Dead of Night …a thoroughly satisfying and complex novel with deeply realized characters and beautifully vivid writing. —Jaden Terrell, Shamus Award nominee and internationally published author of the Jared McKean Mysteries