Everybody’s favorite herb is a winner in your garden. Whether you live north or south, east or west, you can grow and enjoy lavender. Growing tips, ideas for cooking with lavender, and lavender crafts.
The Faithful Violet
You might not think of the violet as an herb, but the plant has a long and interesting history of culinary and medicinal use. And while violets have come to be symbolic of steadfast devotion, they have also been associated with faithlessness and death.
NoBODY: A Novella – Crystal Cave Series Book 1
Ruby has a rare gift for seeing things others can’t. But when she tries to look into the secret landscape of her dream, is she seeing what’s real or what’s false? Enter Ruby’s mysterious world in the first book of this masterfully crafted trilogy.
A New Nest
The Bewick wren team has built a new nest on Bill’s workbench–and I’m moving my website to Wordpress!
SomeBODY Else: A Novella – Crystal Cave Series Book 2
Even music can hold a intriguing mystery. But is Ruby hearing the real song, or something else altogether? And why is Ethan Connors so interested in her psychic gift? Find out, in the second book of this suspenseful trilogy.
Out of BODY: A Novella – Crystal Cave Series Book 3
Investigative reporter Jessica Nelson brings Ruby a mystery only she can solve, a serial killer whose identity is hidden in an ancient image on the card he leaves at the scene of his crimes. A stunning conclusion to the Crystal Cave trilogy.
A Plain Vanilla Murder – Book 27
China Bayles and Pecan Springs police chief Sheila Dawson team up to solve a vanilla-flavored murder.
Starting Points: A Year of Writing Prompts for Women with Stories to Tell
If you’re a woman who writes or a woman who would like to write, if you’ve ever journalled just for yourself or written family history for your descendants, if you long to tell your own story to your family and friends or to the world, this book will help you get started and keep writing each and every week for a whole year.
The General’s Women
When former fashion model Kay Summersby is assigned to drive General Eisenhower in war-time London, they quickly become involved—in spite of Ike’s marriage to Mamie and Kay’s engagement to an American colonel. Kay and Ike struggle to keep their commitments but are increasingly drawn together. Mamie is battling jealousy, fragile health, and gossip. An engrossing and deeply sympathetic novel, based on Kay’s memoirs, Ike’s letters, wartime diaries, and extensive research in three decades of newspaper archives.
The Antique Rose
The antique rose on the trellis beside the deck is having a stellar spring.
The Darling Dahlias and the Poinsettia Puzzle – Book 8
It’s Christmas, 1934, and Darling, Alabama, is unwrapping a package of Christmas puzzles. Will the new bakery survive? Will Charlie Dickens learn his wife’s secret? Will the sheriff find out what’s brewing at the prison farm? But Darling folk have courage, respect for their neighbors, and dream of doing their best. There’s nothing puzzling about that!
Queen Anne’s Lace – Book 26
China and Ruby meet a former resident of Pecan Springs and delve into an intriguing mystery from the long-ago past.
The Darling Dahlias and the Unlucky Clover – Book 7
When the Lucky Four Clovers run into a string of bad luck, it looks like the music may have ended for Darling’s favorite barbershop quartet. And while liquor is legal again, moonshine isn’t, And as Sheriff Buddy Norris discovers when he confront Cypress County’s most notorious bootlegger, it helps to have a little luck in your pocket.
The Last Chance Olive Ranch – Book 25
China Bayles and Mike McQuaid spend an unsettling weekend settling a few old scores.
Blood Orange – Book 24
China comes to the aid of a nurse who ends up in the hospital and uncovers a complex case of fraud and murder…
Loving Eleanor
When AP political reporter Lorena Hickok–Hick–is assigned to cover Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, the wife of the 1932 Democratic presidential candidate, the two women become deeply, intimately involved. Their relationship begins with mutual romantic passion, matures through stormy periods of enforced separation and competing interests, and warms into an enduring, encompassing friendship that ends only with both women’s deaths in the 1960s–all of it documented by 3300 letters exchanged over thirty years.
Bittersweet – Book 23
This Thanksgiving, be grateful for China Bayles—who teams up with a game warden friend to solve a complex case of theft and murder.
The Darling Dahlias and the Eleven O’Clock Lady – Book 6
The Eleven O’Clock Lady ain’t no lady—at least, that’s what Sheriff Buddy Norris and the Darling Dahlias suspect. When she’s found strangled with her own silk stocking, the roots of the murder seem to twist around everything else in Darling, threatening the uneasy relationship between the town and the new CCC camp.
Death Come Quickly – Book 22
An artful crime and a crafty criminal teach China Bayles and her friends that death comes in many colors.
The Darling Dahlias and the Silver Dollar Bush – Book 5
Moonshine and money. Two big problems are vexing Darling, Alabama, while troubles of the heart plague Verna Tidwell and Liz Lacy. Seems like other troubles don’t just go away when there’s a crisis. There’ll be no pennies from heaven, but if anyone can balance things out, folks can bank on the Darling Dahlias.
Widow’s Tears – Book 21
The Storm of the Century helps Ruby find the key to the very special gift she inherited from her grandmother.
A Wilder Rose
The Little House books, which chronicled the childhood pioneer life of Laura Ingalls Wilder, are among the most beloved books in the American literary canon. Less well known is the secret, concealed for decades, of how they came to be. Now, Susan Wittig Albert tells the fascinating story of Laura’s daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, an intrepid world traveler and writer who returned to her parents’ Ozark farm, Rocky Ridge, in 1928. There she began a collaboration with her mother on the pioneer stories that would captivate over sixty million readers around the world.
The Darling Dahlias and the Texas Star – Book 4
The Texas Star herself—Miss Lily Dare, famous aviatrix and the “fastest woman in the world”—is bringing her Dare Devils Flying Circus to Darling. Unfortunately, she’s also bringing a whole lot of trouble. As the Dahlias prepare for the annual Watermelon Festival—where they will present Miss Dare with her own Texas Star hibiscus—rumors are…well, flying.
Cat’s Claw – Book 20
Police chief Sheila Dawson and China get snagged by several thorny mysteries. Life (and death) in Pecan Springs is never dull.
The Darling Dahlias and the Confederate Rose – Book 3
The Dahlias (the premiere garden club of little Darling, Alabama) are at it again, trying to solve a whole bouquet of mysteries. Verna’s in a terrible jam over money missing from the county treasury, Beulah must find out why Angelina Biggs’ hair is falling out, and Bessie is trying to solve the puzzle of Miss Rogers’ real identity. Just who is the Confederate Rose?
Mourning Gloria – Book 19
When a reporter gets involved too deeply with a story and disappears, China must find her–before she becomes headlines.
The Tale of Castle Cottage – The Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter – Book 8
It’s the heart of summer in 1913, and Beatrix is eager to marry her fiancé, solicitor William Heelis. But there are a few obstacles blocking the happy couple’s path to the altar, including (of course!) opposition from Mr. and Mrs. Potter and the death of a carpenter who is working on Castle Cottage. The final book in the series.
The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies – Book 2
The Darling hometown ladies (Liz, Verna, Bessie, and Myra Mae) meet Miss Lorelei LaMotte, the famous Ziegfeld Frolics dancer–in disguise. She is followed by a mysterious member of the notorious Al Capone’s gang. It looks like big-city crime is about to invade little Darling—and not even the indomitable Dahlias can stop it!
Holly Blues – Book 18
Bad-Penny Sally, McQuaid’s irrepressible ex, turns up in Pecan Springs–and turns a green Christmas blue.
The Tale of Oat Cake Crag – The Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter – Book 7
An aeroplane is terrorizing the people and animals of the Land Between the Lakes—until the developer meets a nasty accident on Oat Cake Crag. But over in Near Sawrey, romance blooms. Wedding bells? Whose? And who (or as Professor Galileo Newton Owl would say: whoooo) is writing poison pen letters?
The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree – Book 1
The 1930s are tough, but the ladies of the Dahlias Garden Club of Darling, Alabama, are determined to keep their chins up, their families fed, and their town beautiful. But before long, they find themselves searching for a buried treasure, an escaped prisoner, a stolen car, and clues to the mysterious death of Bunny Scott.
Wormwood – Book 17
China and her friend Martha Edmond visit a Kentucky Shaker village and are pulled into a deadly crime and a bitter history of loss.
The Tale of Applebeck Orchard – The Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter – Book 6
A burning haystack, a footpath closing, a mysterious ghost, and big doings at The Brockery, where the venerable Bosworth Badger begins to think about handing over the Badger’s precious Badge of Authority to the younger generation. And important developments in various village romances.
An Extraordinary Year of Ordinary Days
In An Extraordinary Year of Ordinary Days, novelist Susan Wittig Albert invites us to revisit one of the most tumultuous years in recent memory, 2008, through the lens of 365 ordinary days, when her reading, writing, and thinking about world issues—from wars and economic recession to climate change—caused her to reconsider and reshape daily practices in her personal life.
Nightshade – Book 16
China and McQuaid team up to solve a mystery and put an old family skeleton (and a very fresh corpse) to rest.
The Tale of Briar Bank – The Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter – Book 5
An antiquities collector dies in what looks like an accident (but is it)? An intrepid badger takes a winter swim in Moss Eccles Tarn. And an ambitious teenage dragon discovers that there’s more to life than guarding a golden treasure. Meanwhile, the villagers are mystified by a tangle of intrigues–and Miss Potter is troubled by hints of a romance.
Spanish Dagger – Book 15
What happens when Ruby falls in love with a cloak-and-dagger man with a past life full of secrets?
The Tale of Hawthorn House – The Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter – Book 4
An abandoned baby has turned up on the doorstep at Hill Top Farm and Miss Potter must find out who she is. Meanwhile, Jemima Puddleduck is mortified by the book Miss Potter has written about her. How would you like the whole world to know that you were so foolish as to lay your eggs in a fox’s back parlor?
Together, Alone
In this beautifully written memoir, the author of the popular China Bayles mysteries meditates on what it means to be married to a person and a place while needing to be alone, in solitude. How do we balance our desire for private time with our need for community? How do we give ourselves fully and intimately to a place, while at the same time satisfying the desire to reach out to far horizons?
What Wildness Is This: Women Write about the Southwest
How do women experience the vast, arid, rugged land of the American Southwest? The Story Circle Network, a national organization dedicated to helping women write about their lives, posed this question, and nearly three hundred women responded with original pieces of writing that told true and meaningful stories of their personal experiences of the land.