Terry’s New Toy

A few years ago when my first novel, Big Lake, made the New York Times bestseller list, we celebrated by buying a new Breville toaster oven for Terry. She has said many times that it’s one of the best purchases we ever made, and she has used it for everything from baking bread to making roasts, and just about anything in between. We liked it so much that we bought one for her mother, and when we moved out of the motorhome and into our house, the Breville came with us.

But nothing lasts forever, and though the Breville was still working, it was showing its age and wear. Sometimes we had to push the buttons two or three times to make them come on and things like that. Terry has a birthday coming up in just over a week, and I’ve been asking her for a month now what she wanted for her birthday. The answer is always the same, “I have everything I need.”

Well, that’s not good enough, you have to have something whether you want it or not. I was thinking about buying her a new shotgun, or maybe another pistol, knowing they would look very good in my gun safe. But then I thought, no, she would probably wind up shooting me with it. So instead, I bought her a new, upgraded Breville smart oven.

This one does everything the other one did, plus more. One of the features I think we are going to like us that it’s also an air fryer. I’ve heard some good things from people who fry chicken drumsticks and wings and things like that. It’s also a dehydrator. I ordered it from Amazon on Thursday evening and it was here Saturday morning, even though it wasn’t Prime.

When it arrived we started to set it up and quickly discovered that it’s a larger overall than the Breville she has been using. Not by a lot, but enough to make a difference. It’s three inches wider, two inches deeper, and almost two inches higher. Which means that it will not fit on the metal rack on the counter between our stove and refrigerator, where the old Breville was. There is not enough room to get between the legs of the rack. So for now, the rack is gone, and the Breville is sitting on the counter itself while Terry is trying to figure out some way to add a little more storage above it. I’m sure she’ll make it work for her, one way or another.

For my part, I hoped to knock out 2 to 3K words yesterday in the first book in my Tinder Street series. But they just kept coming, and by the time I was done, I actually got in just over 8K words, which puts me at a bit over 37K words so far in just under two weeks. I never know how long a book will be, I just write until I get to the end. But I suspect at this point that the first book in the series will come in somewhere around 100,000 words. It’s not my typical mystery, it’s historical fiction. A family saga beginning just before World War I and going through the Vietnam War. To be honest, I don’t know how my readers will receive it, but it’s something I have wanted to try for a long time.

Speaking of books, forgive me, but I’m going to take a minute to brag here. Last night my latest book, Big Lake Massacre, was at #526 of all paid Kindle books on Amazon and #49 on the Hot New Release list for mysteries. I am very pleased with that and I appreciate all of you who have supported me and helped make the book a success.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for an audiobook of The Driving Lesson by my friend Ben Rehder. While Ben writes some excellent, mysteries, including the wildly popular Blanco County series, this tale of a boy and his grandfather on an unplanned road trip across the country is a coming of age story that will tug at your heartstrings. To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening.

Thought For The Day – I saw a bumper sticker saying: “I’m a veterinarian, therefore I drive like an animal.” Suddenly I realized how many proctologists are on the roads.