It's always exciting to me when I know that the release of a new book isn't far off. So I'm doubly excited right now. First of all, I got the word that the second Silver Sisters Mystery, SEVEN DEADY SAMOVARS, is now with the narrator, so the audio book should be released in the first quarter of 2009 as planned. If you read A CORPSE IN THE SOUP, you know all about our zany Silver Sisters and their equally zany mom and uncle. If not, rather than elaborating here, I invite you to visit either of my websites. www.silversistersmysteries.com or www.morganstjames-author.com. Our books are stand-alone although they're a series, but it would be fun to read A CORPSE IN THE SOUP before SEVEN DEADLY SAMOVARS is released. You can also check your library. Several across the US have the book in their collection - generally the MP3, but also paperbacks and CDs. If you want to see if they'll order it, use the ISBN numbers on the Silver Sisters site.

Hey, live dangerously. Visit both websites! They are packed with information about our books and my real life sister and co-author Phyllice Bradner, and of course, lots about me and what I'm doing. On the Silver Sisters site, you'll find a PDF of Chapter 1 of A Corpse in the Soup, an interview with the twins' 80 year old mother, an audio clip from the award winning audio book, reviews and lots more. So, drop by.

A very sweet short story I wrote, entitled SAYING GOODBYE TO MISS MOLLY, will be part of a wonderful anthology of short stories in all genres that have common threads. THE WORLD OUTSIDE THE WINDOW. This unique collection was written by 19 authors who are part of the Amazon Shorts books. We all have at least one story on Amazon Shorts. This book was the dream of one of the authors, more picked up the ball, a publisher hopped on board and when it comes out, it will represent authors all over the country who didn't know each other and pulled together a fantastic book. Again, the link is on our website.

Last but not least, we are clicking along writing the third Silver Sisters book, VANISHING ACT IN VEGAS, and I love being back in the swing of writing with Phylllice again. We have so much fun as sisters when we create the adventures and characters that our phone conversations go on for hours. After all, I live in L.A. and Las Vegas and she lives in Oregon.

Cheers. Think about giving someone who loves funny mysteries A CORPSE IN THE SOUP for Christmas. If you have a friend or relative who is sight impaired, the audio book is perfect.

Okay, there's lots of hype about Alaska right now. Some of the references to small town and unusual attitudes is right on. My sister and co-author of the Silver Sisters Mysteries, Phyllice Bradner was a resident of Alaska (both Anchorage and Juneau) for over thirty years, married into a political family and was a political print specialist who worked on campaigns of governors, senators and state financial reports. She has received four Alaska Press Club awards. So she knows a little something about Alaska.

For those of you not familiar with the Silver Sisters Mysteries, they are a comedic crime series featuring identical Baby Boomer twins Goldie and Godiva. Goldie is an aging hippie who owns an antique shop in Juneau and Godiva is a spoiled Beverly Hills widow who writes a syndicated advice column. These wisecracking twins have help from feisty elder-sleuths Flossie and Sterling Silver, their eighty-year-old mother and uncle who are former vaudeville magicians.

Although A CORPSE IN THE SOUP touches on some scenes in Alaska, most of the action taking place in California. The twins and their sidekicks lead the reader on a zany chase from Hollywood to South Bay in search of the real killer. The audio book was named Best Mystery Audio Book 2007 by USA Book News.

The next book, SEVEN DEADLY SAMOVARS, currently in production, takes place largely in Juneau, Alaska, with lots of authentic-style local color provided by Phyllice. Characters like Taku Ted and Ollie Oliver are reminiscent of people Phyllice knew while she lived there. Look for colorful descriptions of local attractions and customs as well, when Goldie receives the wrong shipment of samovars from Vladivostok (yes, from Russia in close proximity to Alaska) and a spree of murder and mayhem finds the sisters tracking bumbling but vicious Russian thugs.

Visit our website www.silversistersmysteries.com to find out more and for links to purchase A Corpse in the Soup. Seven Deadly Samovars will be out late this year or early next year. Watch for it.

DEADLY DANCE is a book that I started so many years ago we didn't even have e-mail. I think it's been at least nine years since it was first conceived as Dance with the Devil. The biggest problem with the first, second and third version was that at that time I didn't know how to write fiction. Wow, have I learned a lot.

I was a magazine article writer who thought that in order to have a good novel it had to be long. I also thought that a writer is a writer is a writer... That first manuscript was 750 manuscript pages. My goal now is to cut it to about 400 or 450 pages maximum. 350 would be even better, but I'm not sure I can do that without sacrificing anything relative to the story. My sister Phyllice Bradner and I learned so much writing the Silver Sisters Mysteries, that we are giving a workshop called "From Novice to Novelist" at the Las Vegas Writer's Conference in April.

For the Silver Sisters, we created Goldie Olivia DuBois, an advice columnist from Beverly Hills and Goldie Silver, an antique dealer from Juneau Alaska, identical twins with a nose for sleuthing. They are helped by their 80 year old mother and uncle, former vaudeville magicians, who love to dress in costumes and go undercover. After four rewrites, we had A CORPSE IN THE SOUP, now available in paperback and e-book, and it will be released as an audio book in April by Books in Motion.

I realized that I was ready to rewrite Deadly Dance yet another time because now I know all about things like point-of-view, tightening my writing and adding tension. Back then I didn't have a clue.

I feel myself sucked into working with "Dance" instead of other projects. I really want to finish it this time. I changed from using a third person narrative and telling the story in "what happened before" to first person telling it in real time. It really makes a difference and the story has gotten very powerful. There are still various characters who tell bits of the story from their point of view, but as I'm writing, I am each of those people. I guess that's why I'm so hooked. While writing one scene featuring the main character, Sandra Barton, a young ballerina who is kidnapped, raped, beaten and left for dead, I actually found myself crying as I wrote. I have been having chapters critiqued as I write and so far I have gotten lots of good suggestions, no negative comments yet and lots of praise from other writers. People say they want to keep reading more to find out what happens to her and that the scenes are very believable.

This book was inspired by some real incidents that happened back in the late 1950's. Parts of it may not have been 100% accurate because I learned about these incidents from letters to my mother written by the mother of the girl these things happened to, and she did tend to get facts mixed up sometimes. But I know for sure enough of it happened. I wanted to write this story for years and finally started it in the 90's. Her horrible experiences made a great starting point to create a story of mystery and romance.

This IS NOT A TRUE STORY. It is definitely fiction with some incidents based on what really did happen but the rest is pure fiction. I have posted parts of it on www.urbis.com, but I'm not taking reviews through urbis at this time. If you do read any of it and want to comment, please e-mail me at silversistersmysteries@yahoo.com.

MORGAN ST. JAMES
www.silversistersmysteries.com
A CORPSE IN THE SOUP
A zany romp through the glitzy world of TV Chefs
in search of a killer. Some of them will do anything
to win the Greatest Gourmet Gladiator medal...maybe even MURDER!