Wow! Hard to believe it's been almost three months since I
blogged. That's pathetic, especially when I have so much to report.

Here's a portion of the bounty I
received after winning the Chocolate Challenge. My total word count for
February was over 74,000 words. I almost finished the first draft of book four
and was able to reach the plot point where the detective and his sidekick
(Lieutenant Michael Stoddard and Private Nick Spry) realize who the perpetrator
is and the motivation for the crime. It's all set for serious action and a
chase. Now if I could only block out the time to finish the draft — and select
a title for the book! Yes, I've been eating chocolate. I'm still eating chocolate.
There's so much chocolate to be eaten. Many thanks to the Guppies for sending
all the delicious dark chocolate and providing me with words of encouragement
along the way.

Lunchtime on Saturday 1 March, I was one of
six authors at the Moveable Feast of Authors in Surf City, NC. Quarter Moon
Books sponsored the event, held at Indigo Marsh Restaurant. What's a moveable
feast? Well, booklovers purchase tickets in advance, are seated at six round
tables in a room of the restaurant, and receive the first course of their
lunches.  An author sits at the
table with them. At the prompting of a bell, the next course is served, and
authors change tables. This allows about ten minutes for authors to talk with
folks at tables and answer questions. At this moveable feast, the high energy
level kept all authors on their toes. Afterwards, lines at the signing tables
were 6-7 people deep. A thrilling event. Many thanks to Lori Fisher (pictured
here with me at Indigo Marsh) of Quarter Moon Books for arranging a seamless
event.

For the Moveable Feast, author Mark de
Castrique, his wife, and I were housed at The Pink Palace, a lovely B&B
right on the beach at 1222 South Shore Drive. Friday evening, 29 February, I
took a break from the home stretch of the Chocolate Challenge to watch an
outstanding sunset with the de Castriques from the west porch of the house. Few
vacation sites I've visited offer views of both a good sunrise and a good sunset. The Pink
Palace is one.

March on the beach in North Carolina can be
downright cold, but the weekend I was there, the weather was mild. This
facilitated several invigorating walks on the sand. From what I saw, this
area of the beach is also good for shelling. During my years in Florida,
I collected many shells, so this trip to the seashore, I picked up stones worn
smooth and oval by the ocean, with interesting looking veins and speckles in
them.

Living in the city, I tend to forget how bright
the stars are away from the neon. Saturday night, skies were clear, availing me
of an awesome view of the Milky Way. But early Sunday morning, I received a
rare treat: sighting the planet Mercury over the Atlantic before dawn. Mercury
is so close to the sun that it never rises very high before the sunrise
obscures it. Tricky catching a glimpse of it at all. But here it is, the winged
messenger of the gods. (Look just above the vertical white line. Okay, I know that even T.A.P.S. would have trouble finding it, but trust me, it's there.)

Saturday night, I was invited to dinner by
Nancy Adcox, owner of Xanzia. I first met Nancy back in 2002, at the Raleigh
chapter of NAWBO, and helped her with instructions for her game "U R 2 Me." Nancy
and her husband gave up on city life a few years ago, ran away to Surf City, and
are renting a home three streets from the beach. Now there's a fantasy!
Understandably, they show no inclination to move back to the city. But I so
enjoyed catching up with Nancy and hope to see her on my next visit.

On Saturday 22 March, Dr. Christine Swager, Sheila Ingle,
and I appeared at Cowpens National Battlefield near Chesnee, SC as part of
National Women's History Month. We repeated our panel discussion from Camden's
Revolutionary War Field Days in 2007, "In the Army and at Home: Women and
Children of the Revolution." Historical cartographer John Robertson moderated the panel.

Stacey Cochran interviewed my publisher and me on Friday 28
March as part of his series, "The Artist's Craft," appearing on local television
in Raleigh, NC. We saw Stacey again on Sunday 30 March, when he interviewed us
at Pomegranate Books in Wilmington, NC for the Wilmington Write to Publish
group. Both times, the topic was the path to getting published and the craft of
writing. Many thanks to Stacey for those media opportunities.

After all the activity in March, April was quiet, enabling
me to complete another draft of Camp Follower. I also began editing the
gobbledygook I'd produced in February on the fourth book. By the way, the
purpose of an activity like the Chocolate Challenge isn't to produce quality
literature. It's to push an author through a draft. The eloquent flow of words
arrives in later.

Saturday 3 May I signed books at Moores Creek National
Battlefield near Currie, NC during their annual colonial trade fair. This was
my first visit to the site, and it's quite pretty.

Next up: a presentation for the Upstate chapter of Sisters
in Crime on 22 May.