Where Have You Been and How Come You Haven't Written About My City or State?

One of the fabulous perks about writing time travel mysteries and adventures is the fact that I can take my characters anywhere back in time, not to mention the time era itself. I bounce all over the place according to whatever strikes me at the time. However, I’ve quickly learned that “what strikes me” may not have the same effect on others. 

Listed below are the places I’ve written novels about. They are listed in chronological order according to time, not the order in which the books were written or the sequence for the Light Rider series. Here goes:

            The Ice Age

            78 A.D. in Ancient Rome, one year before Mt. Vesuvius erupts

            1296 A.D. in East Lothian, Scotland

            1789 in Paris, France, just in time for the French Revolution

            Mid 1700’s on the island of Anguilla in the Caribbean

            1923 in upstate New York

            1930 in central and eastern Arizona

            1953 in Springfield, Missouri

            1973 in upstate New York

            Present Day Boston, MA, Tucson, AZ, Geneva, New York and Portland, Oregon

Now, here are some of the actual responses I’ve gotten:

Why did you pick Missouri? I’m from Wisconsin. Couldn’t you write about Wisconsin?

Someone already wrote about the Ice Age.

Will your characters be falling into the Grand Canyon or is that in New Mexico?

No one has ever heard of Anguilla. Why didn’t you pick St. Thomas? I went there on a cruise last year.

What the heck is in upstate New York? 

If I tell you where I’m from, will you write a novel about it?

Good News! I’m warming up for 2015! So if you have a particular time and/or place you’d like me to consider for a future novel, please email me at agarizona@hotmail.com or send me a message on the Time Travel Mysteries Facebook page:

 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Time-Travel-Mysteries/203269666361516 

I will consider absolutely everything but I make no guarantees that you’ll like it. Some places are simply an acquired taste, like my hometown. But . . . I promise to keep the suspense and mysteries going strong. I’m truly smitten with time travel because this is one travel experience that won’t wind up on my credit card (at least not yet!).

           

Borrowing or Pilfering - Only the Culprit Knows

            Maybe it was the title, The Time Borrower, that put the idea into someone’s head, but the result was pretty clear – someone walked off with a copy of my latest novel, right under the nose of the reader who bought the book in the first place. It happened in a medical office when the reader put the book down on the coffee table, bookmark in place and inscription clearly written on the title page, as she approached the window.

            When she returned, the book was gone along with whoever took it. I found out about the incident days later when the reader contacted me at my second home, the dog park, to purchase another signed copy. I didn’t know whether or not to be flattered because someone stole the book I had written, or outraged because they had committed a theft. Frankly, it was a little bit of both and the combination of curiosity and ego got to me. I had to know more.

            “Wow. That’s awful. They ripped off the book right out from under you.”

            (Holy cow! Must have been the cover design.)

            “No kidding. It was only on that table for a few seconds.”

            “Um. Do you mind telling me, were there other books on that table?”

            (Did I have any competition?)

            “Mainly magazines but there were a couple.”

            “Did they take those, too?”

            (Maybe the thief was into quantity.)   

            “No, they were still there.”

            “Gee. I don’t know what to say. That’s terrible.”

            (Ah hah! They really wanted my book.)

            “And the book was brand new. I’m only a few chapters into it. It wasn’t some ratty old book that had been sitting in that office for years.”

            “You didn’t possibly get a chance to see who wrote those other books, did you?”

            (Who did I beat out?)

            “No. I didn’t.”

            “Well, I’m really sorry. Maybe they thought the medical office loaned out its books.”

            (Really? Those offices wouldn’t loan you a pen without collateral.)

            “No. I think whoever took it was too lazy to go to the library or too cheap to buy one.”

            “They might bring it back.”

            (When hell freezes over)

            “Ugh. It could come back full of germs. No, I’ll just get a new one.”

           

            I nodded in agreement and raced home to tell my husband what had happened.

            “Don’t you see?” I said. “They could have stolen any of those other books but they took mine!”

            “I wouldn’t get too excited if I were you. Some of those people sit in waiting room offices all day long. They probably read those other books.”

            And there it was in a nutshell. No reason at all for ego inflation.

            “So that’s it, then. Petty theft.”   I was crestfallen. Not only did that person steal my book and ruin my reader’s day, but they walked away with my ego, too.

            WARNING  TO READERS:  Don’t leave a book in a doctor’s office or it may just disappear. Worse yet – It may come back all germy!