Tuesday, July 18, 2017

BOOK TOUR and GIVEAWAY: DEAD STORAGE by Mary Feliz


DEAD STORAGE
by Mary Feliz

Genre: Cozy Mystery
Pub Date: 7/18/2017


As a professional organizer, Maggie McDonald brings order to messy situations. But when a good friend becomes a murder suspect, surviving the chaos is one tall task . . .
Despite a looming deadline, Maggie thinks she has what it takes to help friends Jason and Stephen unclutter their large Victorian in time for its scheduled renovation. But before she can fill a single bin with unused junk, Jason leaves for Texas on an emergency business trip, Stephen’s injured mastiff limps home—and Stephen himself lands in jail for murder. Someone killed the owner of a local Chinese restaurant and stuffed him in the freezer. Stephen, caught at the crime scene covered in blood, is the number one suspect. Now Maggie must devise a strategy to sort through secrets and set him free—before she’s tossed into permanent storage next . . .

Mary Feliz has lived in five states and two countries but calls Silicon Valley home. Traveling to other areas of the United States, she’s frequently reminded that what seems normal in the high-tech heartland can seem decidedly odd to the rest of the country. A big fan of irony, serendipity, diversity, and quirky intelligence tempered with gentle humor, Mary strives to bring these elements into her writing, although her characters tend to take these elements to a whole new level. She’s a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and National Association of Professional Organizers. Mary is a Smith College graduate with a degree in Sociology. She lives in Northern California with her husband, near the homes of their two adult offspring.


Follow the tour HERE for exclusive excerpts and a giveaway!



EXCERPT


My calendar says we’re meeting at 8:30 today. Do I have that right?
Stephen was an early riser, so I’d agreed to meet him as soon as I dropped my teen boys at the middle school and high school. He’d promised me coffee and bagels. At the thought of food, my stomach rumbled and my mouth filled with saliva. I was starving and caffeine deprived. My golden retriever, Belle, thumped her tail, whined, and leaned into me, looking up with yearning. Normally, I didn’t bring Belle to work with me, but Stephen was a friend of mine, a dog per- son, and Munchkin was Belle’s BFF.
“They’ll be back soon,” I told her, referring to both Stephen and his seldom-absent canine partner. “I’m sure everything is fine. How often are they ever late?”
Belle made a polite sound in response. “Right,” I said. “Never . . . Well, nearly never.”
Extreme and unrelenting punctuality was a fault of Stephen’s, an artifact of his time in the military. Some of his friends found it an- noying, but I shared the trait and appreciated his timely arrival when- ever we got together. I bit my lip, sighed, and squinted into the sun to scan the neighborhood. There was no car in the drive. He must have had a last-minute errand that went longer than he had planned. Unex- pected traffic tie-ups were a recurring Silicon Valley problem. With the high-tech economy, growing population, and high-density build- ing projects booming, the area was home to a record number of peo- ple. More people meant more cars. A trip to the dentist that took fifteen minutes a month or two earlier could easily take thirty min- utes or longer today, even without a rush-hour fender bender creating gridlock. The problem grew worse daily and there was no easy solu- tion.
I looked at my watch. Any minute, I expected to see Stephen and Munchkin loping up the street from one direction or the other. At six- foot-four inches, accompanied by a dog that weighed almost as much as he did, Stephen was hard to miss.
I paced in front of the house. This situation reminded me too much of a client session I’d begun four months earlier, standing on a front porch a few blocks away when my client was late. That morn- ing had culminated in the death of a dear friend. I shivered, drew my fleece coat closer to me, peered at my phone, and dialed Stephen’s number.

The phone rang before I could finish punching the buttons. “Hello?” I said. The phone responded with crackles and pops. “. . . police station . . . jail . . .”
“Hello? Who is this? I’m not going to fall for that trick. My kids are safe in school.” I disconnected the call. Our entire town had been plagued with phishing phone calls from crooks pretending to be our children or grandchildren. The calls all followed the same pattern: a distraught young voice claiming to be kin begged for money to be wired immediately. Most people, like me, recognized it for what it was and hung up the phone. But older people, those in the beginning stages of dementia or vulnerable in other ways, grew distraught. A friend of my mom called her daughter nearly every day to be reas- sured that the children and grandchildren were safe. The scams were criminal, disruptive, and downright cruel.
I shook off my righteous indignation and dialed Stephen again. In the process, I noted that the crooks, whoever they were, were getting crafty. My phone reported that the phishing call originated from the police station in Mountain View, the town that abutted Orchard View’s southern border. I made a mental note to tell Jason about the call the next time we spoke. When he wasn’t helping flood-ravaged towns in Texas, Jason was an Orchard View detective. He’d know who to no- tify about calls from people impersonating the police.
My call went to voice mail.

1 comment:

  1. I enjoyed the excerpt and would like to read more. I love the cover. I can't resist a beautiful dog like that.

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