And the Winner Is...

Those of you who follow me on FaceBook know that I have been having a battle with my muse, trying to come up with a title for my now completed manuscript. If you read Bridgeton Park Cemetery Books, I hope you'll be happy to know that Book 3 is soon to be released. But trying to come up with a name for this puppy almost took me to the mat.

Normally, I don't have that much of a fight for a title. The story suggests the title, most of the time. It did for Haunted. It most certainly did for Dead Voices. Even Dead of Summer was a gimme. But Book 3 was a fight and a half. It was even worse than trying to find a title for Saving Jake.

A little bit about that: Saving Jake was written under the working title Ultimate Magic. If you haven't read the book -or even if you have and have since (understandably) forgotten- "ultimate magic" is a direct quote from one of my main characters, and it seemed to me a good choice for a title. Especially since the two running motifs in that novel are magic and shipwrecks. The editor who accepted the manuscript, however, had other ideas. She told me, and I admit that she is right, that if I used the word "magic" in the title, it would suggest that the story had more to do with the fantasy and perhaps sword-and-sorcery worlds than it did with the paranormal. I had to concede that point. Thus began something like a three-week struggle to name the work, and in the end, the only thing we could all agree on was Saving Jake. I needed a while for that to grow on me, but now it's fine and makes all the sense in the world. And I am now more careful about the word "magic."

For my newest Bridgeton Park book, however, the discussion involved my three beta readers as well as myself, and all of us agreed on only one point: if I titled it aptly, I would also give away the whole story. No matter what combination of certain words and phrases I concocted, all of them led to a conclusion that would spoil the story for anyone who chose to read it. So we brainstormed and discussed, and suggested and discussed, and discussed and discussed. And finally, out of desperation, I looked at one of them and said, Drawing Vengeance. And that was it.

So the newest book, hopefully available early next month, is called Drawing Vengeance. I wish I could include a picture of the cover art. Carmen Elliott, the wonderfully talented woman who does all of my covers, has come up with another spectacular image for this one. But I have a feeling she's still tweaking it, even though I've already seen and agreed to it, and so I guess the first place it will show up, besides Amazon, is when I announce the release on FaceBook, or email certain parties that the Kindle version is available. (Print always takes just a wee bit longer, but I'll announce that, too.)

The story picks up where Dead Voices left off, so if you are one of the folks who was ready to strike me with a blunt object after reading the end of Book 2, you will be glad to know that various situations are dealt with in this volume. That does not mean that Book 3 doesn't leave it's own loose ends at the close, however. Hey, this is a series! I want readers to come back, right?

At any event, thank all of you for your patience. I hope the book meets and even surpasses your own hopes and expectations. And I guess it's time to turn my attention to Book 4, huh?