I'm pleased to welcome Mildred Abbott to Cozy Up With Kathy today. Mildred writes the Whispering Witch Mystery series. GOSSIPING ABOUT GRIMOIRES is the first book in the series. Be sure to come back tomorrow when I'll share my review.
Kathy: In GOSSIPING ABOUT GRIMOIRES we meet Maeve Hawthorn and her corgi, Mischief. Do you have any pets? Have they influenced your portrayal of Mischief?
MA: I have had pets my entire life. I grew up in a little farm town in Missouri and had all sorts of animals, but dogs have always been vital to me. In my adult life, I've had four corgis: Dunkyn, Dolan, Alastair, and Winifred. Oh yes, the corgi connection is very real and dear to my heart. Right now, I have two little mutts who are the loves of my life, Winston, a little Chihuahua terrier rescue who was so naughty that he was returned to the pound so many times they couldn't tell us how old he was or where he came from, sums him up pretty perfectly. And Phineas, a slightly larger terrier, dachshund, and schnauzer mix we got from the pound when he was about four months old. Dogs are life!
Kathy: Maeve writes about witchcraft, infuriating real witches. Have you ever written about subjects that people object to, for whatever reason?
MA: What a great question! And yes, in this day and age, or maybe it's always the case, someone's always upset about something. That's the beauty of freedom, we can all have our own opinions. I get so many wonderful emails from readers about all the things they love in my books and how much they adore the characters. And every once in a while I'll have an email with a list of things a certain character has done that they don't approve of. And, like Maeve, while I don't have actual witches upset with me, as far as I know, but there are plenty of people who did not want me to write anything about magic or paranormal and to simply stick with magic-free contemporary cozies. But... I say love and enjoy it all!
Kathy: Setting plays such an important role in a mystery. Indeed, some cities are a character unto themselves. What made you choose New Orleans as the setting for the Whispering Witch Mystery series?
MA: My other cozy mystery series, the Cozy Corgi, is set in Estes Park, Colorado. I lived there for several years right out of high school and lived in Colorado for nearly one-quarter of a century (way to make myself sound old!). I love having real places as the main settings in books both to give a sense of realness and authenticity to the writing but also to be able to throw in places and things that people can actually go visit and see for themselves. I moved to New Orleans a little over six years ago, and trying to see New Orleans from Maeve’s point of view as I was planning the series helped me fall deeply in love with the city, especially the French Quarter, which is where 98% of the Whispering Witch series takes place. I even have bakeries and restaurants in New Orleans lending me recipes to include in each installment!
Kathy: I love paranormal mysteries. What do you think makes them so popular? What makes them enjoyable to write?
MA: I think we all love to read to escape and to have experiences that are both enjoyable and out of our grasp in real life. For me, that's definitely a big part of why I love reading fantasy and paranormal. It's just so lovely to enter these worlds of magic and wonder as often as we can. Sometimes terrible and terrifying, but so often beautiful and wondrous. Anything can happen. I love it as a reader, but as a writer, the only limits are the ones that my little created world insists on itself. And then... who doesn't love a good whodunit puzzle? Talk about the best of both worlds!
Kathy: What first drew you to cozy mysteries?
MA: I grew up reading Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys, Agatha Christie, and several different mystery series when I was a kid. That slipped away for a while as an adult until I started reading Agatha Frost’s Peridale Cafe series and I fell in love all over again. Those books came during a pretty stressful, rough time in my life and they were just the perfect antidote to the realities of the real world. I had already been writing other genres and fell in love with Peridale Cafe so much that I reached out to Agatha Frost and asked if she minded if I'd switched genres to cozy mysteries because I was so enamored with her books. Agatha was lovely and welcomed me into the fold. I've not looked back since!
Kathy: Do you write in any other genres?
MA: In the past, yes. Although for the last many years I've written exclusively in cozy mystery only. I have books published under my own name, Brandon Witt, and then another pen name, Rosalind Abel. They definitely all have my voice and my view of the world, but all three are very, very different from each other.
Kathy: Tell us about your series.
MA: At its heart, the Whispering Witch follows Maeve, who, like so many of us, longed for magic and the supernatural when she was a little girl. When she grew up, that's what she wrote about. Then... when real-life witches come calling, angry at her accidentally spilling their secrets, she ends up getting her heart’s desire, discovering this wondrous magical world and being able to be a part of it. As with most things in life, however, it's not quite as simple as that. She's going to have to decide if this is the world she wants, even with its complications and dangers, and then how to flourish and live the life she's always dreamed of. She and her corgi, Mischief!
Kathy: Do you have a favorite character? If so, who and why?
MA: Honestly, that's one of the things I did differently when I switched to the cozy mystery genre. While I loved all of my main characters in my other genres and under my other pen names, frequently one of the side characters would be the one I ended up loving the most and longing to spend more time with. I wanted to change that with my cozy mysteries and my paranormal cozy-adjacent series. I wanted the character I loved the most to be the star. And that's what I've done. I love watching Maeve in her earnest naivety navigate this new world, figure it out, and become stronger and more self-assured with every passing chapter. And of course, Mischief, writing a corgi with attitude? Come on. It doesn't get more fun than that!
Kathy: Did you have a specific inspiration for your series?
MA: New Orleans itself is very much the inspiration and woven in through the storyline and books in every single installment. Beyond that, my favorite shows, as cliché as it may be, at a very pivotal time in my life were Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Charmed, with a healthy addiction to the movie Practical Magic. I let myself sink into the things I loved about all of those every time I sit down to write.
Kathy: What made you decide to publish your work?
MA: I didn't learn to read until I was ten. As soon as I finally caught the bug, I never let go and my nose was always in a book. School was always extremely hard for me. During my sophomore year when I was fourteen, I had a writing class with Miss Hungerford. It was the first time in my entire life that homework in school was enjoyable. I loved that writing class. Miss Hungerford said she enjoyed my stories and it was the first time I was able to do okay at any school subject without a ton of tutoring or agony. From then on, I dreamed of writing books. And being a reader whose life has been so beautifully impacted by books, I wanted to give that to other people as well, wanted to invite people into my worlds and hope that they find beauty, comfort, humor, enjoyment, and escape within their pages.
Kathy: If you could have a dinner party and invite 4 authors, living or dead, in any genre, who would you invite?
MA: Kelley Armstrong, Agatha Frost, Sarah Beth Durst, and Peter Beagle.
Kathy: What are you currently reading?
MA: I'm a big audiobook fan, so I am re-listening to Kelley Armstrong's Women of the Otherworld series for probably the fourth or fifth time. I'm finishing up book two of K.A. Linde's Oak and Holly Cycle series, and desperate to start reading Sarah Beth Durst’s The Faraway Inn.
Kathy: Will you share any of your hobbies or interests with us?
MA: I used to have a lot more hobbies, but being a self-published author and trying to make that a survivable income quite literally takes about every spare breath I have. In the meantime, I spend an exorbitant amount of time with my dogs and going on walks, and I absolutely love to cook. Cooking for my husband every night is one of my greatest joys. It's so relaxing and another creative outlet.
Kathy: Name 4 items you always have in your fridge or pantry.
MA: Oh Lord, this is telling. I should be ashamed to admit—but I might have spent my adult life split between Colorado and New Orleans, but you can't take the Midwest out of my heart. So... the first two: butter and mayonnaise (please don’t hate me). I'm a vegetarian, a new development over the past couple of years, so always a ton of vegetables. And then, they're not always in the fridge, but I could live on bread, cheese, and pasta and nothing else for the rest of my life and die very fat and happy.
Kathy: Do you have plans for future books either in your current series or a new series?
MA: Yes. The book four of the Whispering Witch series comes out this summer. And there are thirteen books planned in total for this series. The Cozy Corgi also is continuing, book forty is coming out this summer as well. I have other series brewing in the back of my head, of course, but I'll save those for a later date.
Kathy: What's your favorite thing about being an author?
MA: Another cliché for you, but it's true. I've heard lots of writers say the best part of writing is having written. And that is the truth. I love, love, love planning, and I love, love, love holding the book in my hand. Everything else is a mix of fear, joy, terror, and ecstasy.
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Maeve Hawthorn writes about witches for a living.
They want her to stop.
When a book signing ends in her abduction, Maeve’s only priority is escaping with her corgi, Mischief, alive. That urgency deepens when she learns her captors are real witches, furious that Maeve has been exposing their secrets to the world.
Before Maeve can make sense of how her fiction has become reality, she’s caught in the middle of a murder that leaves her marked by magic she doesn’t understand. When a dying witch’s power floods into her, Maeve becomes the prime suspect in a crime she didn’t commit—and a target for every supernatural being certain she knows too much.
Turns out, magic isn’t a gift. It’s a liability.
And clearing her name may cost Maeve far more than her safety.
With danger closing in and no clear allies other than Mischief, Maeve must navigate a hidden supernatural world that wants her silenced… or dead.
For readers who enjoy witchy mysteries with a little more at stake than a traditional cozy, Gossiping About Grimoires will appeal to fans of Danielle Garrett, Erin Johnson, and Juliet Blackwell.
(Includes the Shroom Boom recipe from Ayu Bakehouse, a beloved New Orleans bakery.)
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