Post Mortem

New Mexico Shenanigans – September 2024

My first book reconnaissance road trip (!!) was an absolute blast, especially because I got to share it with three of my besties. (Good friends are diamonds, but good friends with compatible travel styles are RED diamonds – i.e. the rarest and most precious kind.) One of them not only let me hijack their rare chance to visit with extended family members, but also convinced one of them to spend an afternoon driving us around Albuquerque’s business district so I could get a feel for where I wanted to set one of my character’s offices. “Hey, let’s go look at office buildings!” — not the typical vacay adventure.  And isn’t it handy that one member of said hijacked extended family also happened to be an architect who coughed up names for fun Southwest architectural features that are definitely not part of the Missouri landscape? (It’s a COYOTE fence, folks. Who knew??)

Santuario, the book currently under construction, is set in a fictional town of that name along the High Road between Santa Fe and Taos, so of course we had to explore that area. Sigh. Nasty job, but someone had to do it. (GORGEOUS!!) My characters also roam a tad, as we human types are wont to do, so we got to do likewise:  

  • We walked the labyrinth and played in the Zen Garden at Ghost Ranch (as well as checked out the very cool collection of dinosaur bones and the fascinating history of one of Georgia O’Keefe’s favorite haunts).
  • We soaked in the mineral hot springs of Ojo Calliente (including ARSENIC pools, which weirdly enough turned out to be my absolute favorite. Go figure).
  • We visited gorgeous old churches and fascinating cemeteries. What can I say?  Cemeteries are cool and if you don’t think so, I’m not sure we can be friends— though I’d still love for you to buy my book. 😊  
  • We ooh’d and ah’d over gorgeous creations at the Museum of Contemporary Indian Art and got to watch the Tewa dancers share their gifts and traditions at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center.
  • And we ate wonderful food and explored way too many fun little shops and galleries scattered throughout our southwest journey where I spent WAY too much money on the Four Horsemen of my pocketbook apocalypse: Jewelry, Crystals, Art, and Books.  But shall I repent? I shall NOT.               

NEXT trip??  Chicago in November for the Midwest Mystery Writer’s Conference!! Woot!!