ABOUT THE BOOK
Professional pet sitter Daphne Templeton loves the holidays in Sylvan Creek, Pennsylvania. And nothing gets her into the spirit more than the town’s annual Bark the Halls Ball. The whole community will be there to wag their tails, especially this year’s special guest—Celeste “CeeCee” French, founder of a national chain of pet care franchises, who’s returning home to announce plans for a bright new flagship store.
But not everyone’s celebrating CeeCee’s homecoming. Daphne’s friend Moxie Bloom, owner of Spa and Paw, a unique salon for people and their pets, has plenty to growl about. So when CeeCee is found face down under Sylvan Creek's town Christmas tree, stabbed with a distinctive pair of professional-grade pet shears, suspicion lands squarely on Moxie. Despite Daphne’s promises to Detective Jonathan Black, she quickly reprises her role as amateur sleuth. Ably assisted by her basset hound sidekick, Socrates, she must hurry to prove her friend’s innocence before a killer barks again . . .
Book Details:
Title: A Midwinter’s Tail
Author’s name: Bethany Blake
Genre: Cozy mystery
Publisher: Kensington (November 27, 2018)
Print length: 324 pages
On tour with: Great Escapes Book Tours
LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT WITH BETHANY BLAKE
A few of your favorite things: A sparkly little snowman who holds my paperclips.
Things you need to throw out: Old journals with ideas I’ve rejected.
Things you need in order to write: Music and coffee.
Things that hamper your writing: Finding the right music and going for more coffee.
Things you love about writing: Creating fun worlds filled with characters who become like friends.
Things you hate about writing: Deadlines and more deadlines.
Favorite foods: French fries, pizza and pasta.
Things that make you want to throw up: The slimy rice-paper wrappers on spring rolls.
Favorite smell: Sandalwood.
Something that makes you hold your nose: My dog’s face after she gets skunked – which keeps happening!
Something you’re really good at: Parallel parking.
Something you’re really bad at: Using a computer when someone is watching.
Last best thing you ate: No-knead homemade bread from a recipe I found on the Internet.
Last thing you regret eating: A whole bunch of “Mexican hot chocolate Chex Mix.” It was so delicious, but I gained two pounds!
Favorite places you’ve been: India, Italy and England.
Places you never want to go to again: My attic! There are squirrels up there, and they aren’t friendly!
Favorite things to do: Reading, cooking and writing .
Things you’d run through a fire wearing gasoline pants to get out of doing: Laundry. Thankfully, my teenagers are very good at it!
Proudest moment: Probably when I earned my Ph.d., and my daughters were in the audience cheering their old mom!
Most embarrassing moment: I rolled out of a chair at a job interview, doing a complete backward somersault. No one told me it was broken.
READ AN EXCERPT FROM A MIDWINTER'S TAIL
One
Moxie Bloom might’ve been caught off guard by the unexpected appearance of an imperious and wealthy, not to mention impeccably dressed and perfectly coiffed, high school bully, who wasn’t supposed to arrive in Sylvan Creek before the Bark the Halls ball, according to Moxie’s rumor mill. Yet I had to give my best friend credit for grace under pressure when CeeCee French rudely brought up cheating with Moxie's old boyfriend - a topic that most people would’ve been ashamed to mention.
“How have you been, Celeste?” Moxie asked politely, her voice level but her chin high. She wisely ignored CeeCee’s reference to Mike Cavanaugh, whom Moxie certainly did remember. She forced a smile, trying hard to be kind. “It’s been a long time.”
CeeCee took a moment to coolly survey the lobby, her angular jaw jutting as she absently stroked her poodle with long, red-tipped fingers. Her toes, encased in sharply pointed, distinctive crimson shoes that contrasted with her black, form-fitting shift, tapped the thick carpet, as if she was already impatient with the whole affair. I supposed that I should’ve been awed by our multi-millionaire classmate, but, to be honest, I couldn’t muster more than mild curiosity and a bit of disappointment to learn that she was still arrogant, and, let’s face it, mean.
“Yes, it has been a while,” CeeCee finally agreed, again looking Moxie and me up and down, her cool gaze taking in Moxie’s vintage outfit and my old barn jacket. “And I find that nothing’s changed.” The corners of her lips twisted upward, and she got a knowing, almost secretive gleam in her dark eyes. “At least, nothing’s changed... yet.”
Excerpt from A Midwinter's Tail, reprinted with permission from Bethany Blake.
“How have you been, Celeste?” Moxie asked politely, her voice level but her chin high. She wisely ignored CeeCee’s reference to Mike Cavanaugh, whom Moxie certainly did remember. She forced a smile, trying hard to be kind. “It’s been a long time.”
CeeCee took a moment to coolly survey the lobby, her angular jaw jutting as she absently stroked her poodle with long, red-tipped fingers. Her toes, encased in sharply pointed, distinctive crimson shoes that contrasted with her black, form-fitting shift, tapped the thick carpet, as if she was already impatient with the whole affair. I supposed that I should’ve been awed by our multi-millionaire classmate, but, to be honest, I couldn’t muster more than mild curiosity and a bit of disappointment to learn that she was still arrogant, and, let’s face it, mean.
“Yes, it has been a while,” CeeCee finally agreed, again looking Moxie and me up and down, her cool gaze taking in Moxie’s vintage outfit and my old barn jacket. “And I find that nothing’s changed.” The corners of her lips twisted upward, and she got a knowing, almost secretive gleam in her dark eyes. “At least, nothing’s changed... yet.”
Excerpt from A Midwinter's Tail, reprinted with permission from Bethany Blake.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bethany Blake lives in a small, quaint town in Pennsylvania with her husband and three daughters. When she's not writing or riding horses, she's wrangling a menagerie of furry family members that includes a nervous pit bull, a fearsome feline, a blind goldfish, and an attack cardinal named Robert. Like Daphne Templeton, the heroine of her Lucky Paws Mysteries, Bethany holds a Ph.D. and operates a pet sitting business called Barkley’s Premium Pet Care.
Connect with Bethany:
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Buy the book:
Amazon | Barnes & Noble
