Slim Randles'  Home Country

Romance tones down murder mystery

[December 12, 2009]  Anita Campbell watched as her husband, Dud, quietly built a fire in the fireplace. She was still a fairly new bride, but she had learned at least this much of his body language by now, and she fixed two cups of coffee. Fire, coffee, evening equals serious talk.

"It was us getting married that did it," he said, finally. "I want you to know I'm really happy being married to you."

"Well, thank you, sir," she said, smiling, "but our marriage did what, exactly?"

"Got me thinking about the book."

Oh, the book. "Murder in the Soggy Bottoms," which Doc said sounded like a young mother with too many diapers. The rest of the local world referred to his book as "The Duchess and the Truck Driver."

"What about the book, Hon?" she asked.

"Maybe I should tone down the murders and put more love in it. I mean, after all, the duchess and the truck driver had a dukelet together, even though the truck driver doesn't know it and he married someone back home and had a daughter, and his wife died in childbirth, and the daughter wants to marry the dukelet because she doesn't know he's her half brother, and the dukelet likes her, too. So instead of their parents being murdered, what if they get together again?"

Anita sipped her coffee and smiled. "I've always liked love stories better than murder mysteries, myself."

"But you see, I have all these murders … I'm down to just six of them throughout the book. So if I have a happy ending for the duchess and the truck driver, that cuts me back to just four murders, and then I'll have to figure out if they'll live in her castle just outside Budapest, or at his place back home. Then I'll have to figure out who killed those other people before I get to the end of the book because I can't have it be the same guy as before, because that would wreck the romance, you see."

"I know you'll figure it out, Dud," she said, putting her arm around him.

The strain of the creative demon in him showed plainly in his furrowed brow. It used to be so easy to just do his job and come home each night, but literature makes a guy's brain hurt.

[Text from file received from Slim Randles]

Brought to you by "Sun Dog Days," Slim's latest novel. Available at www.slimrandles.com.