from The Vampire Shrink by Lynda Hilburn
 



FBI Special Agent Alan Stevens has been on the case of "the vampire murders" for months, following a bloody trail across the country. In addition to indulging his irreverent, curious nature, he has a unique -- secret -- reason for being so obsessed with the crimes. 

Alan, how and why did you and the FBI get involved in this case?
I actually brought the "vampire murders" to the attention of my bosses at the FBI. They're used to my unusual interests, so at first they dismissed my story. Of course, they're all thinking the killer is human -- a "normal" serial killer. After the bodies began to pile up, they finally sent me out to investigate. My task is to work with the local police in each jurisdiction and to offer my assistance. To tie the cases together. I never tell anyone what I really think is going on. They wouldn't believe me, anyway. 
 
Tell us about this case. What made it so special?
You probably know that the FBI deals with serial killers quite often. More often than the public knows about. The special thing about these "vampire" murders was the fact that the bodies were drained of blood. Totally. And there were those strange, little holes in the victims' necks. During my investigation, I stumbled on an informant who blew my mind. His story pushed me into a new investigative direction and brought me to Denver, and a group of individuals who could blast the case wide open. And then there was Dr. Kismet Knight, a Denver psychologist who didn't realize what kind of tiger she had by the tail. She thought she was counseling vampire wannabes-- sad Goth pretenders -- when the truth was much weirder. Lucky for me, she was open to my advice --and my romantic advances.  
 
What made the case hard to solve?
It was a combination of the various police jurisdictions not connecting the dots and sharing information, the fact that there was no forensic evidence left behind, and the ability of the individuals involved to keep secrets. In fact, it wasn't until Dr. Knight and I joined forces that the case began to unravel. She has some unique abilities of her own.

Did  anyone else help you with your investigation?
Yes. I couldn't have done it alone, even though I'm pretty amazing, if I say so myself. In addition to Dr. Knight, I was assisted by the Denver police department, especially Lt. Bullock. She had her own reasons for being a bulldog on the trail. And, then there were my "unnamed sources" in the Goth and occult communities. Without them, I'd have been in the dark.
 
Has this case affected your personal life in any way?
Big time. Now I have verification of something I've long suspected but couldn't prove, and that knowledge is both exciting and terrifying. I have my own personal reasons for wanting to learn about these paranormal groups. Once you've seen things that are "impossible to believe," life is never the same. Meeting Dr. Knight has changed me, too. I don't know what's going to happen with us -- I have heavy-duty competition --but now I know for sure that anything's possible. I also know that no matter how scary our human nightmares might be, reality is worse. 


 
Lynda Hilburn writes paranormal fiction. More specifically, she writes vampire books. After a childhood filled with invisible friends, sightings of dead relatives and a fascination with the occult, turning to the paranormal was a no-brainer. In her other reality, she makes her living as a licensed psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, professional psychic/tarot
reader, university instructor and workshop presenter. Her first novel, The Vampire Shrink  -- which introduced us to Denver Psychologist Kismet Knight and a hidden vampire underworld -- was first released in 2007 and is being re-released (the
rewritten, expanded version) by Quercus Books in 2011 and Sterling Publishing/Silver Oak in 2012. Several more books are planned. Undead in the City, an erotic paranormal novella, and Diary of a Narcissistic Bloodsucker, a satire/parody, are now available in e-form from Amazon.com. Her short story, “Blood Song,” is part of the Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance anthology, April, 2009. For more information, visit Lynda’s website: 
www.lyndahilburnauthor.com. 

  
from A Hard Day’s Fright and six other Pepper Martin mysteries by Casey Daniels


           



Visiting today, Pepper Martin, tour guide in Cleveland’s Garden View Cemetery and world’s only private investigator for the dead.
 
Pepper, you are not with the police department. How and why did you get involved in this case?
It all started at the cemetery where I work when I tripped and hit my head on the mausoleum of an old mob boss named Gus Scarpetti.  The next day when I came to work, Gus was there waiting for me. Yeah, dead guy. But that didn’t stop him. It hasn’t stopped any of the ghosts since. I’ve investigated cases for a rock star from the 60s (if you heard the gossip, it’s true, we did fall in love), a long-dead president and in my most recent case, a teenager who went to a Beatles concert back in 1966—and was never seen again.


When did you know you were able to communicate with ghosts?
Like I said, it never happened until that unfortunate fall in the cemetery. Up until then, my life had been blissfully ghost-free.  Now?  Not so much.

Tell us about this case.
My most recent case involves a girl named Lucy.  She attended that Beatles concert with a group of friends and left for home with them.  But she was the last one off the train, and no one ever saw her again.  Honestly, I don’t think I would have bothered with ol’ Lucy if it wasn’t for the fact that it turns out my boss, Ella Silverman, was one of those kids at the concert with her.  Even after all these years, Ella still misses her friend.  Bad enough, yes, for a PI to the dead who’d rather avoid a case?  Worse, because I realized Ella still felt guilty about leaving Lucy alone that night. Don’t let word of this get around, but truth be told, I’ve got a pretty soft heart.  I couldn’t stand the thought of sweet, fluffy Ella feeling bad about something that wasn’t her fault.  I had no choice but to investigate.


What made the case hard to solve?
Well, 40-year-old murder for one thing.  For another?  No one ever found Lucy’s body.   No corpse, no clues, and a ghost who told me she couldn’t rest in peace until she was properly buried.  Yeah, all that was hard enough, add to it a few other complications, like my on-again-off-again relationship with Quinn   Harrison, bullheaded, hunky Homicide detective. 

Did  anyone help you with your investigation?
If we use the word“help” it its broadest sense, yes. Ariel, Ella’s annoying  teenaged daughter for one.  Once she decided she wanted to be a detective just like me, there was no getting rid of the kid. Then there was Ella, of course, because she knew more about Lucy than anyone.  And the other kids (now adults) who were at the concert with Lucy that night.  Oh, and I can’t forget  Reggie and Delmar, two guys I met on a previous investigation. Don’t worry, nothing we did (well, nothing anyone ever found out about) violated their probation.

Has this case affected your personal life in any way?
Oh yeah, big time.  For one thing, finding the solution to the mystery helped out Ella.  That was a big plus.  For the other . . . well, something happened to Quinn.  Something Big.  I’m not going to divulge anything here, let’s just say it turned both our worlds upside down.

Has being able to communicate with the dead changed your life?
Absolutely, and not for the better.  Being shot at, knifed, kidnapped, mugged, etc., etc., etc., isn’t exactly my idea of a good time.  Then again, I have helped a few ghosts cross over, and I made sure one really bad ghost got what she deserved.  So if nothing else, I suppose I’m performing a public service.  Provided the public we’re talking about is dead.



Casey Daniels once applied for a job as a tour guide in a cemetery.  She didn’t get the job, but she did get the idea for the Pepper Martin mysteries. Pepper works in a cemetery and solves mysteries for the ghosts there.  A Hard Day’s Fright (released last April) is the seventh book in the series.  It will be followed by Wild, Wild Death, which will hit store shelves on January 3,and by a ninth book which she’s working on now.

Before writing mysteries, Casey wrote both historical and contemporary romance under the names Constance Laux and Connie Lane.  She’s also written YA horror as Zoe Daniels.  All told, she’s published 40 books and has been nominated for the prestigious RITA award by Romance Writers of America.  

In addition to writing the Pepper Martin mysteries, she also writes (as Kylie Logan) the Button Box mysteries.  The first book in that series, Button Holed, premiered in September.

She can be found atwww.caseydaniels.com and every Wednesday at www.thelittleblogofmurder.com and http://wickedauthors.blogspot.com. Her books are available in bookstores and online and she urges readers not to forget independent bookstores when they do their shopping.


 
 
 

  
Two readers who leave comments will be chosen to receive a copy of one of Marja McGraw's books.
                 
Sandi Webster is from Old Murders Never Die by Marja McGraw. Chris Cross is from Bogey
Nights, also by Marja McGraw.     

 


Today Sandi Webster and Chris Cross are visiting all the way from Los Angeles. Sandi is a female private eye who has more fun investigating crimes and murders than any gumshoe should be allowed. Chris Cross bears a striking resemblance to Humphrey Bogart, and he’s the one everyone actually calls a Gumshoe.

Sandi, and Chris, how did you decide to become private investigators?

Sandi:
I got into this line of work for all the wrong reasons. I grew up watching vintage mystery movies with my mother, and when I watched those old P.I.’s search for clues and get their man, I just knew that was the life for me. They made it look so romantic and fun. It turned out I was right, although it is a lot of hard work.
 
Chris is an amateur detective. I don’t think he and his wife, Pamela, should be solving crimes because they’re not professionals, but I have to admit they do manage to get the job done.  Chris and I met when he started following me, trying to learn the business. By the way, I introduced him to Pamela.
 
Chris:
Sandi tried to give me the bum’s rush, but I’ll give her points for knowing Pamela.  I’m
not really a P.I. My wife and I own a forties-themed hash house. There was a time when I wanted to be a gumshoe, and that’s when I met the Dish here. She did some fancy footwork to show me I wasn’t cut out to be a private Dick, but we managed to solve a case together anyway. Now people come to me, asking me to solve crimes. 

      
What is the hardest thing about being a private eye?

Sandi:
Patience is a virtue. Uh, I guess I’m not very virtuous. I find myself sighing a lot because things simply don’t go the way I want them to, and this is a frequent occurrence.  I don’t have a lot of patience.
 
Chris:
Patience? She’s not just whistlin’ Dixie. She had no patience with me.  This dame tried everything to get rid of me, but I was tenacious.
 
Sandi:
Did you see that? He rolled his upper lip under and pulled on his ear lobe. Sometimes I think he really believes he’s Bogey reincarnated.
 
Chris:
Okay, I was wet behind the ears, but I ain’t got bats in my belfry. I can follow clues with the best of ‘em. And I have put a couple of goons in the slammer, without Sandi’s help.

      
Tell us about this case. 

Sandi:
My partner, Pete, and I decided to take a well-deserved vacation. It didn’t come as a surprise to me when we got lost in the mountains of Arizona. Hm. Pete never listens to me. Anyway, what did surprise me was that we found a ghost town which was just as the people who’d lived there left it. We became stranded when this cowboy, on horseback no less, tinkered with our Jeep. We found an old house to stay in and ran across the records of the old-time sheriff from 1880. He wrote about a series of murders. When you’re stranded in a ghost town, there’s not a whole lot to do after you’ve gone through the old buildings that are still standing. We began reading the records to see if we could solve the crime from what information the sheriff had left. 

In the meantime, that crazy cowboy kept getting in our way and under my skin. What a pain in the… Oh, and I can’t forget Bubba, my half wolf/half Golden retriever. He was with us. Now Bubba is about the size of a small bear, and he’s as graceful as that ol’ bull in the China shop. In other words, between being lost, having a big dog, a boyfriend, a mysterious cowboy and being stranded in a town haunted by old murders, I had the best time of my life. Seriously. I really did.

Chris:
I heard about that caper. I wish the Dollface and I had been with you.

Our case started when the original restaurant burned down. Pamela and I bought a 1920s-style house to convert into the new eatery. Before we even got the renovations started, Sherlock and Watson discovered a stiff buried in the basement. Oh, those are our two yellow Labrador retrievers. 

Unlike the cupcake sitting next to me, I’ll keep my story short. According to the coppers the cadaver has been underground since the forties. Anyway, we found out the vintage home had once been a boarding house, and we followed clues to find the killer. And let me tell you, we were mighty surprised. I have a seven-year-old stepson named Mikey. I call him Ace. He helped out, too, although they told him to deep six the dead body talk at
school. Zero tolerance stuff. I should mention that we took on the case at the insistence of Midge and Pidge, relatives of the stiff. They wouldn’t take no for an answer.


Sandi, does he always talk like this?
(Shaking her head)  Yes
      
What made the case hard to solve?

Sandi:
The fact that the murders took place around 1880, which meant all witnesses and   victims were long gone. And so were most of the clues, although we did uncover a few surprising things.
 
Chris:
The bride and I had it a little easier than Sandi. A number of people who were around the boarding house in the forties were still breathing. But it was hard to eyeball everything when the caper took place so long ago.

      
Did anyone help you with your investigation?

Sandi:
Just my partner, Pete. Well, I have to be fair. Bubba helped in his own doggie way.
 
Chris:
Ours was a family affair. Pamela, Ace and the dogs all did their bit to help solve the crime. Well, we also have a copper friend named Janet Murphy. She might have done her part.

      
Has this case affected your personal life in any way?

Sandi:
In the long run it did, and it will continue to cause some major changes in my life. 
 
Chris:
Change my personal life? You betcha. Now every Tom, Dick and Harry in Los Angeles wants help solving crimes. Sometimes we have to play it kinda close to the vest so we don’t step on the coppers toes, but thanks to Pamela we have a connection at the P.D. now. And Ace sees a mystery in every corner. That kid is crazy like a fox--way too savvy for his age. He wants a mystery to solve, and he won’t let it go. 
 
Sandi:
Paula, thank you so much for allowing me to visit and share a little about my latest case. Who knows? Maybe this interview will drum up some new business for me and Pete. 
 
Chris:
Yeah, thanks, Angel.  This has been a hoot, but I guess I’d better take a powder now. (He holds out his hand.) Slip me some skin, and have a good life.

Thank you, Sandi and Chris, for being with us. We wish you the best in solving future cases.
 
Note: Sandi and Chris first met in The Bogey Man by Marja McGraw. Two lucky readers will be chosen at random to receive one of Marja McGraw's books. Just leave a comment between now and October 21. 


Marja McGraw has written eight books including the Sandi Webster Mysteries and the Bogey Man Mysteries. She was the editor for the Sisters in Crime Internet Newsletter for a year and a half. She’s appeared on television and been a guest on various radio and Internet radio shows.  She currently resides in Arizona with her husband, where life is good. Her latest book, Old Murders Never Die, was released July, 2011. Information on her or any of her books can be found on her website: www.marjamcgraw.com or blog   http://blog.marjamcgraw.com/. Catch the trailer for Old Murders Never Die at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTBOpzq-wDM.


 
 
 
 

 from Blinded by the Sight by S.L. Smith


                 
 


We have with us today Lt. Peter Culnane with the St. Paul Police Department.  Lt. Culnane, please tell us about yourself.
Most people call me Pete … or a number of other names that don’t bear repeating. I’m a lieutenant on the St. Paul Police Department. Incidentally, in St. Paul we’re called   investigators, not detectives. I’ve been with the St. Paul PD for nine years.
 

Pete, tell us about this case. What made it so special? 
This case was special right out of the chute. The murdered man was believed to be homeless, but he was wearing a ring with a huge diamond. That made no sense. The body was reported by two young boys who disappeared a short time later. Attempting to determine the reason for their disappearance and whether they were safe became another priority. The lack of cooperation from some members of the victim’s family made
parts of the investigation difficult and revealed they were a splintered and secretive group. When all was said and done, I was amazed by the ways an attempt to help someone can go awry, ruining many lives.
 
Did anything make this case hard to solve? 
Two words sum it up:  loyalties and fear. The victim’s family was torn by conflicting
loyalties. Those loyalties were long-standing and divisive. In addition, poor   communication meant family members were afraid of implicating each other and  themselves. Fear also dictated the actions of others critical to solving the case. This fear wore many faces: the rejection of one’s cohort, the retribution of a parent or an employer, and betrayal to name just a few. Interestingly enough, each time fear was a factor, loyalty was always a part of that equation.
 
Did anyone outside of the police department help you solve this case? 
The two boys who reported the body and a homeless man were key. Although I’m not in a position to discuss the boys, gaining the trust and cooperation of the homeless man was  essential. Also, out of necessity, I solicited the cooperation of another police department. The cop with whom I worked was a real team player.
 
Has this case affected your personal life in any way? 
During this investigation, I gained a glimpse into and appreciation for both the plight of   the homeless and the absurdity of the stereotypes attributed to this group. It’s now impossible for me, as a regular citizen, to ignore a request for help from one of these people. I’m enough of a realist to know that the money doesn’t always go for the stated purpose. Whenever possible, I provide for the stated need in lieu of cash.
 
Anything else? 
We all assume things, and we often act on those assumptions. This case provided an excellent example of the tragedy that can result. Several people acted on assumptions they either failed to verify or were afraid to verify. They went off half-cocked and made
tragic mistakes—and the tragedy touched many lives. What a waste! I wish I knew of a way to get people to think more and react less. Yes, that includes me.
 
The last thing is more difficult to share. Since my wife’s death, I’ve avoided the opposite sex by hiding behind my job. Having run into a former acquaintance during this   investigation, I feel like I’m ready to pick up and carry on. And I love kids, want some of my own, but I want to do it the traditional way. My job makes my hours irregular and unpredictable, so I think it’s even more important for someone like me to ensure the stability of a traditional life foe my future. 

Pete, we wish you well with future investigations. I'm glad that you are ready to move forward in your personal life.
 
 
S. L. (Sharon) Smith was born in St. Cloud and moved to the Twin Cities after graduating from St. Catherine’s University in St. Paul. For Blinded by the Sight, S. L. drew upon her education in psychology, a career with vast amounts of law enforcement interaction, and her thrill for the investigative hunt. She is a member of the National Writers Union and Sisters in Crime (an organization that supports mystery writers). Blinded by the Sight was released on September 1, 2011 and is available at many St. Paul and Minneapolis bookstores. For more information visit her website www.slsmithbooks.com or email her at slsmithbooks@gmail.com.