Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 6

A boy breaks a date with his girlfriend for the winter formal, a young woman with a secret struggles when love finds at her, a delightful story about a high school junior struggling with the death of her father and whose life changes at Christmas, and the stalking of a Nashville country star. This group of Christmas novellas has something for everyone. 

In Holly Hearts by Tanya Hanson, high school senior and part-time ranch hand Haggai Procter breaks his date with Elli Martin for the winter formal. The reason is that his mother is hiding something from him; she’s apparently sick and he believes they’ll need every bit of money to pay for expenses. The rest of his senior year, college, and a basketball scholarship look increasingly problematic.

 

Elli is disappointed, but she knows Haggai’s heart is in the right place. She, her father, and the large Martin clan at the Heart’s Crossing Ranch will help Haggai get through whatever it is he’s facing with his mother’s health. 

 

Midnight Clear by British author Autumn Macarthur takes place in Huckleberry Lake, Idaho. Claire Robinson is the town’s schoolteacher, and she resists the overtures from town handyman Ryan Connor with snark, put-downs, and borderline anger. She knows she’s attracted, but Claire harbors a secret about her past in Texas that she knows will destroy any hope for a relationship.

 

Ryan is loved by the town, and more than one person is trying to play matchmaker between him and Claire. He doesn’t need convincing, but he knows that something must have hurt Claire in the past and hurt her powerfully. The crisis arrives when the two are thrown together to help a friend give birth.

 

My Secret Santa by Jaclyn Weist turns out to be something of a sleeper surprise. Claire is your typical high school girl – bright, athletic (she’s trying out for the basketball team), snarky, and sarcastic. She’s trying to get over the death of her father while helping her mother run the town diner. What she doesn’t need is a regular group of boys, led by Chad Damon, ribbing and insulting her whenever they eat the diner. In fact, instead of calling her by name, Chad calls her “Diner Girl.”

 

Claire’s English class gets an assignment that’s grown out of A Christmas Carol. Each member of the class picks a name from a basket, and the assignment is to learn 10 things about the person whose name you’ve drawn. Claire draws Chad’s name, and from that point on her life turns upside down, including being on the receiving end of online bullying by Chad’s former girlfriend. She soon finds herself falling in love with the guy who calls her Diner Girl. The strength of My Secret Santa is the sparkling dialogue by the characters, which is going to take you right back to high school.

 

And now for the stalker. In The Christmas Stalking by Lillian Duncan, Nashville singing superstar Destiny, aka Holly Stone., is on the run. A stalker is after her, and the incidents are escalating toward violence. She’s cut her hair, changed her appearance, and heads back to the upstate New York town of Serenity and Peace, where she spent many summers with her grandparents. No one is supposed to know she’s there, most of all the stalker.

 

She almost immediately connects with Robby Trenton, a childhood friend who’s now the town sheriff, when he stops her for speeding. She eventually tells him her story about the stalker, and he works to protect her and perhaps find who’s doing it. Three suspects emerge, including Robby himself. And then there’s a wild climax in the woods. The story stretches a bit thin at points, but the season often strains credulity. 

 

Related:

 

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 1.

 

Christmas, Suspense, and Romance: Christmas Novellas, Part 2.

 

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 3.

 

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 4. 

 

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 5.

 

Top photograph by Eugene Zhyvchik via Unsplash. Used with permission. 

Christmas Romance Novellas Part 5

A Canadian exchange teacher finds love next door in suburban London, a movie star comes home and discovers his childhood love, seat mates on an airline flight from Los Angeles to Minneapolis via Denver experience more than connecting flights, a New Orleans sous chef finds an old childhood friend in the Rockies of Colorado, and an interior designer with a domineering and bedridden boss loses her heart to the boss’s son. It’s the next batch of Christmas romance novellas. 

In Christmastime in London Town by Clare Revell, Kelly Seda is a Canadian schoolteacher raising his daughter Wendy on his own after his wife’s death. The opportunity to teach in London that he almost received unexpectedly reappears, with only a few days to prepare before he’s teaching first grade in a suburban London school. 

 

Staci Kirk is a writer raising her son Tommy alone, her husband having been killed in action in Afghanistan. She suddenly has a new neighbor, and she goes the extra mile to welcome Kelly and his daughter to England. As the Christmas holidays approach, Kelly and Staci discover there may be more to neighborliness. A major scene of the story takes place in central London, and it’s fun to read about Hanley’s Toy Store, the big Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square, and St. Martin-in-the-Fields Church. 

 

A Christmas Homecoming by Kimberly Rose Johnson tells the story of interior designer Bailey Calderwood, who lives in Oregon and is working for a tough boss who’s recovering from a stroke. The boss’s son, Stephen Belafonte, returns home from France, where he’s been living after the death of his wife three years previously. 

 

His mother wants Stephen to fire Bailey, but she won’t say why. What Stephen learns is that Bailey is the glue holding the business together, and he doesn’t understand why she puts up with his mother’s bullying. He’s also falling for her. In addition to the family issues and a growing attraction to Stephen, Bailey senses she’s being followed everywhere she goes by someone driving a silver sedan. The story mixes together some Christmas, some romance, and a bit of suspense.

 

In Mistletoe Movie Star by Stacey Weeks, Jonas Blade is a movie star with a passel of romantic movies behind him (think the Hallmark Channel). He’s returning home to Misteltoe Meadows to close his grandfather’s estate, which included a lodge, a Christmas tree business, and even an old motel now occupied by homeless people when they’re not chased away by authorities. Charlene is Jonas’s old teenaged friend and now a veterinarian. Charlene’s also trying to convince the town’s council to do something for the homeless, while trying to watch out for three girls she suspects fall into that category.

 

Jonas and Charlene meet by accident (literally) and only slowly realize who they are; Jonas Blade is a film name and Charlene has changed considerably when they spent summers together as teens. He’s determined to help her address the homeless problem; the two are also rediscovering the love of their teen years. 

 

First Class Christmas by Katy Eeten brings together two seatmates on an airline flight. Mandy Brockman is flying home from Los Angeles, where she was in a friend’s wedding. She had expected to have her boyfriend be her wedding date and then go skiing with his family, but he broke up with her right before the wedding. On the plane, she’s seated next to Chase Hawkins, an Olympic pole vaulter also on his way home to Minneapolis. 

 

Mandy and Chase discover a mutual attraction, but there’s a problem. She’s drifted away from church, while Chase is not only firmly anchored in his faith but is also part of the church worship band and an outreach program to the city’s less fortunate. He pulls Mandy to the church service and to helping others, but will their relationship take off?

 

A New Orleans sous chef is the heroine of Deep Freeze Christmas by Marian Merritt.  Leona Buquet has accompanied chef Julian Mayeux from their native New Orleans to Colorado. They’ve been hired for a week to cook for some old friends of Julian’s who are in the movie production business. Leona is thrilled to be visiting a part of the country she’s never experienced, and to see snow at Christmastime. 

 

Cameron Fleming is the son of the movie production company chief, and he remembers growing up in New Orleans and helping Chef Julian in the kitchen, so much so that he really wanted to be a chef himself. He’s expected to accompany a diva of a movie star who’s also visiting, but he has no interest in her at all. But he knows Leona looks familiar, and a growing attraction between him and sous chef quickly leads to rekindling a long-ago childhood romance.

 

Related:

 

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 1.

 

Christmas, Suspense, and Romance: Christmas Novellas, Part 2.

 

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 3.

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 4. 

 

Top photograph by Levi Midnight via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 3

A Jane Austen lookalike, a holiday romance Down Under that may turn into something else, a boy who wants a dad (and a puppy) for Christmas, an unusual Christmas present from a sister, and a town so full of mistletoe that’s that what its name is– all are the subjects for Christmas novellas. 

In Christmas with Miss Austen by Laura Briggs, Julia Allen works in a coffee shop and volunteers at a historic home in Delaford, Mass. For the house’s December program, she dresses as Jane Austen and reads from Northanger Abbey, in keeping with the Regency Christmas theme. One night, as she’s hurrying home across a city park, she bumps into what she hopes isn’t a mugger, and in her hurry to get away she unknowingly drops the book, part of an antique set loaned to Julia by a friend for the readings.

 

Eliot Weston is a young college professor who happens to be the “non-mugger” Julia bumps into. He’s taken by the woman in period dress, but she disappears before he can find out who she is. He does find Northanger Abbey in the snow, and that sets in motion a series of events that may lead to Christmas romance. It’s a fun read whether you’re a Jane Austen fan or not.

 

The Present by Toni Sheridan (a pen name for author Ev Bishop) tells the story of Candice Cane-Bryant, a 20-something trying to hold down a job and care for younger twin brothers, an adult sister, and a much younger sister. It’s a family that happened because of their mother’s bad choices (and three marriages), And Candice has all she can do to simply get through each day. And life is generally crazier when it’s the Christmas season.

 

Her younger adult sister is a nurse, and she unexpectedly brings home a fellow nurse, Dean Harlowe, whom Candice assumes is the sister’s new boyfriend. Dean isn’t the sister’s new boyfriend; he’d seen Candice and become interested. The sister talks him into something of a setup for Candice, but everything keeps going badly wrong. The story hinges on whether Candice and Dean will overcome bad ideas about each other and find the relationship both are looking for.

 

In An Aussie Christmas Angel by Clare Revell, Englishman John Connington has taken leave from his job to travel the world, and as December rolls around he finds himself in Sydney, Australia. And without a place to stay, except for a seedy hostel whose guests seem more interested in stealing from your suitcase. His sister had given him a name to call in Sydney in case he ran into problems, and he finds himself spending a week with two young women, one of whom is getting ready for the wedding. 

 

The other young woman, Jo Heyward, is a bit put out having to accommodate a man and a stranger right before the busy Christmas season. But she decides to take to heart the Bible’s teaching about offering hospitality to strangers, and romantic interest suddenly and unexpectedly takes over for both John and Jo. But he’s returning to England after his week in Sydney. It’s an entertaining tale that happens to be based upon the true story of Revell’s brother.

 

In A Dad for Christmas, author Wendy Davy tells the tale of Reed Mason, a high school physics teacher in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley. It’s nearing Christmas, and he notices his new neighbor, Emma Richards, in line with her young son Luke. He finds a letter to God on the floor (the kids drop them off at the post office), and the clerk asks him if he could take it home and pray for the anonymous child who wrote it. 

 

The letter’s author is Luke, and he’s hoping for a new dad. His dad had previously died, and he and his mom had moved from North Carolina to Virginia to make a fresh start. Luke’s confident that God will answer his prayer, and that his new dad will also like puppies. But is Reed, not to mention Emma, ready for romance? It’s a sentimental, heartwarming story, but then there’s nothing wrong with sentiment and warm hearts, especially at Christmas.

 

Mistletoe Melody by Stacey Weeks is the story of Melody Staff and Quentin Oxford. For Christmas, Melody, her adult siblings and their children, and her parents are staying at the inn in Mistletoe Meadows on Cape Cod. The inn is owned by Quentin’s parents, and the two families had long ago been neighbors. All Melody really remembers of Quentin is how, during his wild senior year in high school, he’d gotten his girlfriend pregnant. It’s now years later, and Quentin is rearing his daughter alone and his wife cleaned up from drug addiction but then during from an overdose when she relapsed.

 

Melody is also taking drugs for multiple sclerosis, a fact her family is aware but which everyone has concealed from outsiders. Quentin can see something is wrong, but Melody refuses to explain. What Melody doesn’t know is that Quentin has become a committed Christian, something he doesn’t go out of his way to divulge to Melody. Will lack of openness and misunderstandings wreck a relationship before it has a chance to start? 

Related:

Christmas Romance Novellas, Part 1.

Christmas, Suspense, and Romance: Christmas Novellas, Part 2.

 

Top photograph by Jonathan Borba via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Christmas, Suspense, and Romance: Christmas Novellas, Part 2

It’s Christmas time in Headley Cross in southern England, and DCI Boaz Matthias is visiting his family. Matthias is taking a break from his police job up north and is finding all kinds of interesting things to see and do in in his hometown. He’s been running each morning, timing his run to see the attractive young woman who runs at the same time.  

Detective Constable Isabel York of the Headley Cross police enjoys running; she’s also enjoying the handsome stranger she keeps meeting on her runs. They meet for coffee, and then for dinner, and they both discover a strong and mutual attraction. Until they discover what each other’s jobs are, and then DCI Matthias is put in temporary charge of the Headley Cross force while the regular DCI has a family emergency.

 

The attraction flares into antagonism, and right in the middle of a murder investigation. Men playing Santa Claus keep turning up dead, and while it looks like suicide in each case, DC York has her suspicions. And she turns outs to be right. 

 

Dark Streets Shineth is part of the York and Zander police mystery series by Clare Revell (Ellery Zander is Isabel’s police partner; she rents a room from Zander and his grandfather, and both are highly protective of DC York). It’s a fun mix of romance, mystery, murder, and Christmas, and Revell keeps the story moving briskly along.

 

A Blessed Blue Christmas by LoRee Perry takes a different turn, with Christmas down Texas way. Dahlia Delisi operates the Blue Dahlia Boutique in a small town. Not long before Christmas, into her store walks U.S. Marshal Sloan Letheby, her first love from her teen years whom she hasn’t seen in a long time. The attraction is still there, however, even though there’s underlying anger at how they parted.

 

Letheby still feels that same attraction, but he’s in the town on business. He and his partner are investigating a known criminal who’s rumored to be looking for a hit man. And Dahlia’s sister-in-law knows this guy from when she worked at a bar during a rough patch in her marriage. As it turns out, the criminal’s interests lie a bit too close to the Delisi family.

 

Both stories fall into the Novella / Romance / Christmas / Christian fiction genre, which turns out to be quite a bit larger than I realized.

 

Related:

 

Carnations in January by Clare Revell.

 

Top photograph by Paola Vic via Unsplash. User with permission.

"Love's Thankful Heart" - Three Novellas

The Amish romance has been a strong sub-genre of Christian fiction for close to four decades now, and it seems to be still going strong. A decade ago, I posed the question, “Does it always have to be an Amish romance?” – a kind of vague complaint. Then one of my favorite authors, Dale Cramer, pulled from his own heritage and wrote a series of Amish romances. And I started the series, because it was Dale Cramer, and actually read (and enjoyed) them. But that was my total experience with Amish romances. Until now.

Love’s Thankful Heart is a collection of three novellas by three authors, all writing an Amish romance centered on the Thanksgiving season. Laura Hilton has written a number of works in the genre, as has Rachel Good. Thomas Nye writes in a kind of sub-sub-genre – Amish romance horse stories (I didn’t know this sub-sub-genre existed).

In Laura Hilton’s “Gingerbread Wishes,” Becca Troyer is selling late-season vegetables in a small-town Missouri farmer’s market when a member of a performing mime group kneels and presents her with a toy ring and a proposal. She’s flustered and embarrassed, not the least reason being she’s quietly attracted to a local boy, Yost Miller, a good friend but one who seems disinterested in romance. The mime, of course, is Yost, and he’s anything but disinterested. His problem is shyness. He’s also a volunteer firefighter, and a crisis occurs that changes their relationship.

In “Thanksgiving Stranger” by Rachel Good, Crist Petersheim is a former Amishman disillusioned with faith after a family tragedy. He’s wandering around a rough area downtown area of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, appearing to be homeless. He’s actually working undercover, trying to spot and identify illegal drug activity. Faithe Beiler and her mother operate a restaurant in downtown, and it’s here that Crist seeks a cup of coffee. Over the days and weeks leading to Thanksgiving, the man who’s lost his faith will fall in love with the woman who ardently holds on to hers, no matter what the circumstances.

“Thanksgiving Frolic” by Thomas Nye, Monroe is in love with Rosemary, and she’s possibly in love with him, but he seems to take too many chances with the fancy horse he uses for his buggy. They’ve been courting for three years, but Monroe seems to not want to move beyond courtship. Part of the problem is a silly bet he made with a friend, and part of the problem is Monroe’s father, who believes in charity begins at home and looks askance at any farmer who doesn’t take care of his own farm first – like Rosemary’s aging grandfather. These obstacles, and more, look like they’ll stop any hope the two have for marriage. Or will they?

The three novellas of Love’s Thankful Heart share the Thanksgiving season in common, but they represent three very different approaches to the Amish romance.

Top photograph by Randy Fath via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Christmas, Romance, and Second Chances

One of the most common themes in romance novels is second chances – a hero or heroine having the opportunity to rekindle an old romance, rediscover an old love, find forgiveness, or having the opportunity to start a relationship over again. Setting the story during the Christmas season heightens both the conflict and its resolution. Christmas isn’t supposed to be about old hurts, anguish, and emotional pain. But in these stories of second chances, the resolution seems all the sweeter.

Of course, the Christmas story itself is a story about second chances. The law didn’t work as intended in terms of reconciling man to God. Something else had to happen; the story of God becoming man to reconcile humanity to himself is perhaps the archetypocal story of second chances.

One Christmas Eve by Robin Patchen

One Christmas Eve by Robin Patchen is a novella in which three of the main characters all find second chances. And it happens in less than a day.

Blake Carmichael is a film star, familiar from numerous popular action movies. He’s also a recovering drug addict, the drug in this case being cocaine. What pulled him out of addiction was a mentor, a fellow movie star, and becoming a Christian. He’s been drug-free for two years, and he’s moved from Hollywood to New Hampshire to be near his teenaged son, Eli.

Blake’s ex-wife and Eli’s mother has remarried, and Eli is staying with his dad during her honeymoon. Eli is hostile towards Blake; he’s heard the stories from his mother about drugs and extra-marital affairs and generally bad behavior by his father, most of which are believable but untrue. 

Blake waits until he believes Eli is asleep and goes to his room to pray for him. What he finds is pillows under the covers; Eli is gone. Blake desperately beings calling people and learns that Eli may be with his girlfriend Kelsey. Blake gets hold of Kelsey’s aunt, Tallie, and the two begin a late-night journey to Boston, where the two teens have likely gone for a concert. Tallie is in her early 30s, and she is certainly aware of the actor Blake Carmichael from church.

Will Blake and Eli be able to reconcile and communicate? Will Tallie be able to overcome the stories she’s heard about Blake? And will Eli forgive his father learn that his father truly loves him?

One Christmas Eve is a short, compelling story about three people giving themselves and each other second chances.

Savanna’s Gift by Camille Eide

Savanna Holt is driving her goddaughter to a mountain resort in Oregon, bringing the girl to her paternal grandparents while her mother cares for her dying father. The resort brings back memories; this is where she met the handsome ski instructor ski instructor Luke Nelson while she did summer work during college.

Luke had proposed and Savanna had accepted, until she returned to nursing school in the East and began to have second thoughts. She was career-minded, determined to escape the family life she had been brought up in. She had begun to consider Luke as having no more ambitions than to be a ski instructor. She had mailed the ring back with a written apology.

Except Luke is now the manager of the resort. And Savanna’s visit, meant to be an overnight stay only, becomes extended when a snowstorm blocks the only road out. And as Savanna soon learns, Luke is still angry over her rejection. For her part, Savanna knows she made a terrible mistake, but will Luke ever forgive her?

Savanna’s Gift by Camille Eide tells the story of Savanna, Luke, and a second chance.

Photograph by Nick Fewings via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Christmas, Romance, and Returning Home

A common feature of many romance novels is the idea of returning home. In some, it’s a prodigal son or daughter coming back to family. Others have a main character who’s become wildly successful – in Silicon Valley or Nashville, for example – but returning home for a family illness, a career crisis, or a personal issue, among other reasons. And “home” is usually a small town, with small-town values and where everyone knows everyone else.

And the idea of “returning home” is perfectly suited for Christmas, because millions of people in real life return home to family for the annual holiday.

A Christmas Homecoming by Melissa McClone

In A Christmas Homecoming by Melissa McClone (part of her Bar V5 Ranch series), Josiah Whitaker returns to his hometown of Marietta, Montana, but not voluntarily. The board of his highly successful Silicon Valley company has forced him to take leave for the month of December. Josiah had cut his hand on a zipline and developed a blood disease as a result, which had left him exhausted and somewhat frail. But his workaholism had driven him back to work before he should have gone. A fainting spell in his office forced the board the act.

Josiah, perhaps borrowing a characteristic from Ebenezer Scrooge, hates Christmas, because it disrupts work, and work is what life is about. His hometown also brings back memories of the death of his best friend Buck Smith, the teenager who befriended the then-geeky and friendless Josiah before dying of cancer. It turns out that Buck’s sister Ellie works at the ranch where Josiah will be staying. Ellie is still working through her own issues from her brother’s death, including a good head of resentment that her life and her parents’ lives revolved around her brother’s illness for years.

At first slowly and then quickly, two people are brought together by shared memories, their hometown, and the discovery that they may have more in common than they realized.

Love, Snow, and Mistletoe: Four Novellas

Love, Snow, and Mistletoe is a collection of four novellas by various authors that have to do with returning to hometowns, 

In “Her Fake Christmas Date” by Victorine Lieske, Jennifer is returning home for Christmas to stay with her mother, and she’s not looking forward to the visit at all. Her best friend growing up, and the “boy next door,” is Shane, who sees her struggling with her suitcase and helps her. She doesn’t at first recognize him; Shane had been kind of geeky and not one of the popular kids. But Shane has grown up too, and Jennifer is at first shocked that the geeky boy she remembers is the handsome, broad-shouldered man who helps her. For his part, Shane had always loved Jennifer, but he recalls the overheard conversation at school where she referred to him as “a nobody” because she wanted to be part of the poplar crowd. But then Jennifer needs a fake date to escape her mother’s matchmaking activities, and Shane agrees to do it.

“A Holiday Rescue” by Tamie Dearen involves Amy Pinkerton, a successful mystery writer who is spending Christmas week at a cabin in Wyoming to write the next book in her stated-based mystery series. She’s caught in a snowstorm, and rescued by Max, once a top country singer but living in seclusion with his daughter since the death of his from cancer. At first Max thinks Amy is one of those husband-chasing women who saw a recent story about him in a music magazine, but he soon learns she’s oblivious to his fame. Romance ensues.

In “A Second Chance for Romance,” Grace is a single mother who unintentionally moves into an apartment across from Sam, who once dearly loved Grace. She opted for the more glamorous boyfriend (a mistake), while he never married. He now owns a car repair shop, which Grace will shortly find herself in great need of. And both Grace and Sam will discover that second chances for romance do happen.

“The Billionaire’s Perfect Match” by Annie Houston is about a professional matchmaker, Aurelia James, media-famous for finding mates for wealthy people. On a plane home for Christmas, she encounters Lander Perry, an old friend from her childhood, who’s not familiar with her work or her fame. They discover their parents have been traveling together and are planning to share part of the holidays together as well. Aurelia and Lander will find themselves thrown together more than they might have expected, until Aurelia’s firm has a crisis involving hacked files. 

Love, Snow, and Mistletoe is four stories, four different authors, but each involving some idea of going home again. 

Top photograph via Freestocks and Unsplash. Used with permission.

“Coming Home” – Seven Novellas about Tiny Houses

For the last two years or so, a common publishing event has been a joint work by a group of authors writing on a common subject or theme. It might be Christmas or Valentine’s Day romances, for example, or a group of mystery stories. But I haven’t seen a theme like what I found in Coming Home – a collection of seven short works about tiny houses, those small home constructions often built for homeless people, single people, or people who want to de-clutter their lives.

The stories are primarily romances, and the role played by a tiny house varies by the author. 

In “Love is Sweeter in Sugar Hill” by Ane Mulligan, a hospital RN, who lives in a tiny house, finds herself constantly butting heads with the hospital’s administrator – and a backdrop of medical malpractice. “Kayla’s Challenge” by Linda Yezak begins with an almost-bride in Savannah, Georgia, running away from the altar (with the groom’s approval) and learning to become self-sufficient in the Texas Hill Country. In “If These Walls Could Talk” by Pamela Meyers, two people believe they own the title to an old Victorian home on a Wisconsin island. Romance ensues.

In “First Love” by Yvonne Anderson, an older woman is trying to put her life back together after a divorce and begins living with her dog in a tiny house near her childhood home. “Dash of Pepper” by Kimberli McKay involves a young woman who herself falling for exactly the wrong kind of guy. “Big Love” by Michael Ehret is about a young woman who runs a tiny home construction company that’s part of a family’s larger building company. She’s to be interviewed by a hotshot architectural magazine writer who plans to do a number on her and who lies about who he is at their first meeting. And “The Light Holding Her” by Chandra Smith is about a woman living in a tiny house meeting the missionary guy next door and being stalked by someone who keeps leaving yellow marbles. 

The stories of Coming Home are all entertaining and read quickly. I was surprised by the one I considered the best romance in the group – “Big Love,” the one written by the only man among the writers. I suppose the moral of the tiny house story here is that, yes, men can write romance stories, too.

Top photograph by Geran de Klerk via Unsplash. Used with permission.

“Deadly Duo” by Margery Allingham

Golden Age mystery writer Margery Allingham (1904-1966) didn’t just write Albert Campion detective stories. While she’s best known for the Campion novels, she also produced an array of other mystery stories with varying detectives, heroes, and heroines.

Deadly Duo, first published in 1949, includes two non-Campion novellas.

In “Wanted: Someone Innocent,” Gillian Brayton is a young woman not long out of school who works fort rather sub-standard wages for a milliner.  At a retirement event for her old school’s headmistress, she meets Rita Fayre, an alum several years older than Gillian. Rita offers the young girl an attractive position on the spot, to become a kind of companion. Rita is vague about her duties, and unsuspecting Gillian, desperately in need of income, accepts.

The reader gets suspicious as soon as Gillian arrives at the Fayre country home, even if Gillian herself seems a bit naïve. She discovers she’s to be a companion for Rita’s convalescing husband Julian. But things more nefarious are underfoot.

In “Last Act,” Margot Robert is a young actress, French by birth but living in England. She’s returning from a rather triumphant theater tour in the United States, looking forward to seeing her family dominated by her adopted mother, Madame Zoffany, herself a former actress and known to the family as Zoff. Gillian had been engaged to one of Zoff’s grandsons, Victor; she has broken the engagement because she has fallen in love with the other grandson, Denis.

Margery Allingham

The family get-together has all the markings for fireworks and mayhem, and mayhem certainly ensues – Zoff is found dead in her bed, murdered. At times during the investigation, virtually all of the family members, servants, and various hangers-on are suspects; all except for Margot have a motive.

Allingham almost always manages to include a bit of romance in her novels, and these two novellas are no exception. But they’re not romantic stories or romances; Allingham was in the serious business of writing murder mysteries, and the romance is always a secondary consideration.

Deadly Duo is a fun read, exemplifying Allingham, at her non-Campion best.

Related:

Margery Allingham’s The Case of the Late Pig.

Margery Allingham’s Flowers for the Judge.

Margery Allingham’s Death of a Ghost.

Margery Allingham’s Black Plumes.

Margery Allingham’s Look to the Lady.

Margery Allingham’s Police at the Funeral.

The Essential Margery Allingham Collection.

Margery Allingham Box Set #2.

The Margery Allingham Society.

 Photograph: Audley End in Essex, UK, by Geoff Doggett via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission. The English country house is like those in the two novellas that comprise Deadly Duo.

Short Takes: Three Novellas

Short Takes is a new feature here that focuses on works than can be read in an hour or less. Today it’s three novellas – a mystery, a work of suspense, and what I can only call a computer hacker procedural (a new genre in the mystery/suspense field, I’m sure). All three are actually introductions, either to larger works and / or a series.

Three Sisters by Helen Smith introduces a rather unlikely detective, Emily Castle, a young woman who is still mourning the loss of her dog. She lives in a south London neighborhood, and she finds an invitation to a party slide under her door. It’s a squat party, which means it’s being staged at a nearby house that is occupied by squatters. It’s a rather lavish party for the neighborhood, with food, drink and entertainment. Except one of the entertainers ends up dead. Or does she? Emily rather persistently (and slightly obnoxiously) continues to investigate.

Suspects abound, and it’s quite a trick for author Smith to keep them all straight in the relatively short narrative. She’s written full-length Emily Castle stories, and based on Three Sisters, they’re well worth checking out.

Before Paris by Adria Cimino is, I suspect, a rather large chunk of narrative removed from Paris, Rue des Martyrs, to help shorten the manuscript. Cimino has turned it into a novella, focusing on one of the four stories she covers in the full-length novel (the novella is subtitled “A Prequel to Paris, Ruse des Martyrs”).

The novella is the back story for Rafael Mendez of Colombia, who is resisting his father’s demand that he join his parents in the emerald trade, a rough-and-tumble, borderline criminal activity on a good day. Reluctantly, he goes with his parents for what turns out to be their last trip – they’re shot dead while driving to the mines. His father’s dying words are “Find Carmen,” whom Rafael determines lives in Paris – on the rue des Martyrs.

It’s not a complete story (it is finished in the full-length novel) but it is a good introduction to Cimino’s style and how she constructs a story. (You can read my review of Paris, Rue des Martyrs here.)

In Social Engineer by Ian Sutherland, we meet Brody Taylor, a self-described “white hat” computer hacker who makes a living by trying to hack companies’ computer defenses. He’s called to a British pharmaceutical company after the company learns that Chinese hackers are nosing around, trying to obtain the research on a new Alzheimer’s drug. Taylor tells the story on a double track – explaining how he was able to hack the company’s systems and his relationship with a new girlfriend. She thinks he’s a movie location scout, and is ignorant of his hacking profession.

Sutherland takes the reader on a few interesting twists, the most surprising of which brings the story full circle. Social Engineer is a fun read and a good introduction to computer hacking, and how it’s done. The novella is also the introduction to a series of Brody Taylor stories.

Photograph by George Hodan via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.