I'm pleased to welcome Erik S. Meyers to Cozy Up With Kathy today. Erik writes the Sally Witherspoon Mystery series. DEATH IN THE OZARKS is the first book in the series.
Kathy: In DEATH IN THE OZARKS we meet Sally Witherspoon, a 50-something accountant turned biker-bar owner who loves solving puzzles. Personally, in addition to reading mysteries I like logic puzzles, but I dislike jigsaw puzzles. Do you enjoy solving puzzles? If so, what sort?
ESM: I love jigsaw puzzles and word puzzles.
Kathy: Sally has helped neighbors and friends find lost jewelry, lost pets, and lost loves. Have you ever helped anybody find something?
ESM: I’m passionate about genealogy and searching for my family history. I’ve helped friends do research online on their own family background.
Kathy: Sally is described as a cross between Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple and a Cheers bartender. If you were a cross between a character from a book and one from a TV series, who would those characters be?
ESM: I love this question! I would say a combination of Philip Carey in Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham and Toby Ziegler from The West Wing.
Kathy: What first drew you to mysteries?
ESM: Perhaps it does go back to solving puzzles. When you read a mystery, you are searching for clues to solve the mystery and that is always so much fun. I started early with Agatha Christie’s stories. My mother had most of the paperbacks and I loved them, particularly those with Miss Marple.
Kathy: Do you write in any other genres?
ESM: I’ve self-published a business book and an historical fiction novel. In addition, I’ve written many short stories that cover various topics.
Kathy: Tell us about your series.
ESM: Sally Witherspoon is a 50-something who left her life in Atlanta 15 years back to move to the Arkansas Ozarks and open up a biker bar. She loves her life there and never looks back. Somehow she stumbles into crime-solving, which fits perfectly with her love of solving puzzles.
Kathy: Do you have a favorite character? If so, who and why?
ESM: It would have to be Sally Witherspoon herself. She decided to make a huge change in her life, she loves what she’s doing and I love writing about her life in the Ozarks and her excitement and success with solving crimes.
Kathy: Did you have a specific inspiration for your series?
ESM: The story, the characters, and the location were inspired by a wide range of experiences. The fictitious town of Berry Springs was inspired by a wonderful trip I took to the Arkansas Ozarks in 2015.
Kathy: What made you decide to publish your work?
ESM: I started with self-publishing two books (business and historical fiction) because I wanted to offer my writing to a broader audience. For the Sally Witherspoon mystery series, I’m so grateful for my agent, Cindy Bullard at Birch Literary, and Shawn Reilly Simmons and all the wonderful people at Level Best Books for helping bring Sally Witherspoon into the world.
Kathy: If you could have a dinner party and invite 4 authors, living or dead, in any genre, who would you invite?
ESM: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, W. Somerset Maugham, Agatha Christie, and Ann Cleeves
Kathy: What are you currently reading?
ESM: I usually am in the middle of a non-fiction book and a fiction book at the same time. At the moment, these are Foreign Devils on the Silk Road by Peter Hopkirk and Big Familia by Tomas Moniz.
Kathy: Will you share any of your hobbies or interests with us?
ESM: I love being outdoors and take advantage of the local hiking trails as much as possible. I also love to explore and travel. Finally, my biggest passions are learning and knowledge so I’m always looking for new information, new books and the like.
Kathy: Name 4 items you always have in your fridge or pantry.
ESM: Yogurt, coffee, salmon, and potatoes
Kathy: Do you have plans for future books either in your current series or a new series?
ESM: The second book in the series, MURDER ON THE MISSISSIPPI, is due out in December. I’m currently working on the third book which is scheduled to be published December 2025.
Kathy: What's your favorite thing about being an author?
ESM: I love telling a good story.
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THE SALLY WITHERSPOON MYSTERY SERIES
by Erik S. Meyers
November 11 - December 20, 2024 Virtual Book Tour
DEATH IN THE OZARKS
A cross between Agatha Christie's Miss Marple and a Cheers bartender, Sally Witherspoon, a 50-something accountant turned biker-bar owner, loves solving puzzles. Up to now, she has focused on helping neighbors and friends find lost jewelry, lost pets, and lost loves.
But when she finds her best friend and business partner, Bill Arnold, dead in a dumpster behind her bar on a Saturday night, she needs all her wits and grit to find out who did it.
And she won't stop until she does.
Praise for Death in the Ozarks:
"Christie meets Cornwell in this vivid mystery, by Erik Meyers. I found myself investigating the story, lending a hand to Witherspoon but never quite unravelling the threads, and in the end experiencing a satisfying read that provoked everything from anxiety to relief."
~ Callan J. Mulligan, Bestselling Sci-Fi/Fantasy Author
"Move over, Jessica Fletcher and Agatha Christie. Here comes Sally Witherspoon, a small-town bartender with mad skills as an amateur sleuth. Determined to discover who murdered her best friend and co-owner of Sally's Smasher. Experienced in solving minor mysteries, the community isn't surprised when Sally launches herself into the murder investigation, frustrating the local authorities, but they aren't the only ones. Some secrets should stay secret or should they? Follow Sally and find out."
~ Wendy Bayne, 5-Star Goodreads Review
"I loved this mystery! Suspenseful and a real page turner. The main character Sally Witherspoon, the owner of a biker bar, is a gutsy, intelligent, likeable woman determined to find out who killed her business partner and this leads the reader on an exciting adventure. Thought I had it figured out but was surprised at the ending. Highly recommend!"
~ Lillian M. Finn, 5-Star Amazon Review
MURDER ON THE MISSISSIPPI
Six months after the events in Death in the Ozarks, Sally Witherspoon is trying to put that terrible time behind her. She books a river cruise down the Mississippi to get away and relax.
Unfortunately relaxation is not to be as as she's called on to get to the bottom of a mysterious death that occurs on board.
A combination of Cheers bartender and Miss Marple, Sally Witherspoon is as determined as ever to solve it.
Book Details:
Genre: Traditional Mystery, Cozy Mystery
Published by: Level Best Books
Series Links: Amazon | Level Best Books
Read an excerpt from Death in the Ozarks:
Chapter One
Sally Witherspoon dropped onto the sofa in her office with a sigh, the cracked brown leather groaning as she settled herself, and ran her hand through her graying chestnut ponytail. What a night. The fights in the bar on Saturday nights were getting worse. Sally loved her bar, Sally’s Smasher, and her adopted town of Berry Springs, but the violence was getting to her. She had come to live in the small town fifteen years ago.
An old college friend, Bill Arnold, was from there, and he had always urged her to come for a visit. With a population of two thousand, one hotel, two bars, two diners, and a few arts-and-crafts shops, it was very different from her high-powered life in finance in Atlanta, but now it was definitely home.
A home that didn’t include her husband, mind you. They had divorced soon after the trip to Berry Springs. Putting her life’s savings into buying an old run-down bakery—with a lot of financial help from Bill—and turning it into Sally’s Smasher had been quite a gamble, but life here was different.
The thought of living in the beautiful Ozark mountains in Arkansas and still sitting in an office like back in Georgia hadn’t been an option for her, and the bar seemed like the perfect alternative. Running it meant she had more time to explore and hike the local area. Yes, the nights were long, but the town had come to love Sally and her biker bar, and she’d made many friends.
With only two bartenders, Jay and Magda, to help, it took a lot to run the place. Most Saturday shifts were hard slogs, but that night had been an especially long evening, as she had to deal with three bar fights, each uglier than the last. First, her business partner, Bill Arnold, had gotten into a heated argument with his biker club, The Mountaineers, over who would get to ride Bill’s vintage Vincent Rapide next. As it was on display at the bar in a large metal cage, it was often a topic of contention. Bill was always worried it would be stolen, it was worth a lot, or worse, one of his buddies would ruin the perfectly restored and polished leather seat and shining metal.
Then Bethany Wells, the school assistant, had accidentally stumbled into Mayor Jennifer Milkowski on her way to the bathroom. Bethany did love her wine, and there had been a bit of a misunderstanding. Bethany got easily annoyed when she had had too much to drink. Jennifer was not the easiest to get along with, for sure, but she was always watching her image, and being involved in a bar fight would certainly not fit her mayoral brand, and she quickly defused the situation.
The third fight almost resulted in Sally calling the police. Her friend Jeff Bartholomew, a teacher at Clinton High School, was sitting with their local Catholic priest, Father O’Malley, and had become pissed off by the bikers yelling at each other next to their table. Jeff stood up, his fists at the ready. One of The Mountaineers lobbed him in the jaw, and Jeff swung in return. Jeff had had too many beers to be in top form, and his swing missed. As he swiveled around, he fell hard, knocking over a table full of glasses and falling on a metal chair in the process, which his broad six-foot-two frame bent out of shape. If it weren’t for Bill stepping in and throwing Jeff out of the bar at that moment, Sally’s Smasher would have been truly and royally, well, smashed up.
Unfortunately, this was not something completely unusual; the rough-and-ready people living in the remote town rising to conflict more than she’d seen in the city, but the fights that night had been more violent than normal. They’d completely torn up one corner of the place. Her insurance would pay for now, she hoped. She didn’t really have the funds to fix it up herself.
But reviewing the events of the evening wasn’t going to change matters, nor was it helping Sally relax. She pushed herself up from the couch to finish cleaning up and readying the place for the next night. She’d sent Jay and Magda home at half past twelve, not needing their help in finishing off the last of the jobs. Plus, she didn’t want to overwork them. If they quit, she would be up the proverbial creek without a paddle.
Sally went over to her desk to tally up the night’s receipts, making a note of the amount of cash in the drawer and putting all of it in the safe. While the overall accounting at the bar wasn’t as perfect as she wanted it to be—far too much red ink for her finance background’s liking—she always made sure the cash drawer was perfect.
She then headed back out into the bar to put the glasses away she had washed before closing for the night. Pushing all the tables and chairs back in their proper places, Sally made one final sweep of the bar before checking all the windows and doors. Casting her eyes over the decorations around the bar always made her smile. The deer antlers above the door came from one of her hunting trips. Bill’s vintage bike was a real pull. And the red wooden paneling had been specially made by the local lumberyard. She was so proud of what she had accomplished, though it wouldn’t have happened without Bill’s help, and his money.
As she did every night, she went to each window from left to right, making sure the catches were secure. Then she locked the front door. Back in her office, she grabbed her backpack and shut off the lights. Just before leaving through the back door, she set the alarm. The reassuring red light always calmed her nerves. After four break-ins in one month the previous year, she finally broke down and bought an alarm, a huge expense, but so far, worth it.
In the parking lot, she headed to her car, looking forward to falling into bed. She threw her red backpack in the back of her old blue Datsun and started the engine.
Damn, I forgot to put out the trash.
She turned off the car and reluctantly headed back across the parking lot. Looking up, she frowned. Bill’s fiery-red Harley-Davidson motorcycle was still parked in the back of the building near the trash bins. Bill didn’t have a car, so he couldn’t have taken that. And she had definitely checked everywhere inside to make sure no one was passed out in one of the bathroom stalls. Maybe someone had given him a lift home.
Bill was her business partner, but he acted like a very loyal customer most nights, drinking up the Murphy’s stout imported from Ireland for him. She walked over to the motorcycle and was surprised to find the engine warm to the touch. That’s strange, she thought. She glanced around the parking lot and the woods behind for Bill. Though, why would he be waiting outside?
At that point, she was too tired to think about the motorcycle any further. Bill was a big boy, and he’d make his own way home, and she went to get the trash bags. She stomped back inside. Annoyed with herself, she had to switch the alarm off. She’d left the damn things by the door but must have walked straight by them. There were three huge bags, so she would have to make two trips. To make it easier for herself, she moved the bags outside before locking up and turning on the alarm again.
She then grabbed two of the bags and lugged them across the lot. Why hadn’t she put the trash bins closer to the door? This was one of her many to-dos that never reached the top of the priority list. She should get Jay to do it for her next week.
At the dumpster, she opened the lid and threw the bags in without looking, brushing her jeans against some grease on the side. Jeans were pretty much her go-to outfits, or sweatpants at home. Everything else was a waste of money, as it got dirty so easily at the bar. And she didn’t do much beyond hiking, working, sleeping, and eating.
She went back and grabbed the third bag from the door, and returned to the dumpster. Her long night would finally be over. As she opened the lid again, she realized the bags she had just thrown in were too close to the top. The dumpster had been emptied the day before, so what was under the bags? If someone else was dumping their rubbish in her bin, she’d be having words.
Sally fumbled in her pocket for her cell, switched on the flashlight, and peered inside. Waving the flashlight, the light landed on something that was definitely not trash. She brought her hands to her mouth, dropping the trash bag, and screamed.
Staring back at her were the gray, unseeing eyes of Bill Arnold.
***
Excerpt from Death in the Ozarks by Erik S. Meyers. Copyright 2023 by Erik S. Meyers. Reproduced with permission from Erik S. Meyers. All rights reserved.
Author Bio:
Currently in Austria, Erik S. Meyers is an American abroad for years and years who has lived or worked in six countries on three continents, the longest in Germany. He is an award-winning author and communications professional with over twenty-five years of expertise in a variety of corporate roles. Reading and writing are his passions, when he is not hiking one of the amazing trails in Austria or elsewhere.
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