Second week choices for Rev and Rye Short Stories

Rev and Rye Shorts – Winter Short Story, 2023

(this is a side highlight to my blog — feel free to ignore)

Would you like to help shape a new free short story coming to you in February from Maria Mankin and Maren Tirabassi in the “Death in Fair Havens” cozy mystery series (with two novel-length sequels already scheduled for publication)? Three sets of questions, one a week, get us headed in the right direction. You do not need to have voted last week to make your mark with this week’s question – choice of three mysteries (nature of crime).

But first the winning setting from last week is Number 3 (half the votes, Numbers 1 and 2 were exactly evenly divided)

Setting 3: Midwinter should be a perfect time for a week getaway with a friend. But when Wanda and Rye get ready to really relax — Wanda to sit in the warmth and read a lot of mysteries and Rye to discover if she can still hold her own in roller derby — you know there will be trouble. For solving this case there is no inside-info from the local police or chatty old friends.

Thank you to the thirty-two people who voted on the setting where Rev Wanda Duff and Vice Principal Prudence Rye are going to …

well, they are going to solve the crime, of course. That is the promise of any genre ‘cozy mystery.’ But it is possible they might be the ones getting into criminal mischief, because they have been known to bend the rules a little. What kind of a mystery is it going to be … Suspicious death, theft, or blackmail?

(Remember to vote on The Rev and Rye Cozy Mysteries – Calling All Characters Facebook Page.)

1.  Suspicious death. OK it might be categorized accidental, but the personality of the victim leads our sleuths to inquire further.

2.  Theft. Whodunit? and Whydonit? It’s going to be a low priority for law enforcement because this … manuscript or family heirloom (but originally very cheap) jewelry or grandmother’s recipe box … has no monetary value, but Wanda and Rye know it is important.

3. Blackmail. Suggestive photograph?… Potentially plagiarized degree-getting paper? Contents of a ‘sealed’ juvie record? Exaggerated private interchange or date that could cost the job of a teacher, therapist, clergyperson? Our sleuths must figure out — Who? why? and how to stop it?