Murder in the Family

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Nobody died at Casa PG.

But someone did die in the world of the Catherine Tregowyn Mysteries, however.

Here’s how it starts:

Lostwithiel, Cornwall, England

Tregowyn Family Chapel

December, 1935

Chapter One 

“Harry! What are you doing here?” Catherine said to her bridegroom as he entered the robing room off the vestibule of the old chapel. “You’re supposed to be out at the front of the chapel! You’re not meant to see my gown!” 

“Sorry, old thing,” Harry said, looking about as though he had lost something and not paying attention to her at all. “You haven’t seen my uncle, have you?” 

“Uncle Jonathan?” 

“Yes. My best man. He’s not shown up.” 

“Oh, Harry! You’d best get back where you belong before everyone thinks you’ve got cold feet. My mother will be having vapors!” 

“Right. He must have had car trouble. Perhaps the old Hispano Suiza wouldn’t start. I’ll have the pater stand in for him.” He finally looked at her. “I say! You look devilish fine! You’re an out and out stunner, darling.” 

She grimaced at him. “Pretend you didn’t see.” 

Grabbing her about the waist, he kissed her before he left. “I’ll see you at the other end of the aisle!” he said over his shoulder.  

Where was Uncle Jonathan? Catherine tried to compose herself. She’d always dreamt of being married here in the family chapel. She loved its weathered granite walls and slate roof, now mostly green with moss. A thick Celtic cross, predating the chapel by centuries, stood nearly upright near the entrance beside an ancient stone well. There was a legend of an unnamed saint who had stopped to refresh himself on a journey and left a blessing that the well would never run dry. 


There’s more that follows.

Sharp-eyed visitors to TPV will note that PG’s other name is included on the cover below Mrs. PG’s name.

This was none of PG’s doing. Mrs. PG insisted it must be so.

PG has provided anonymous assistance to Mrs. PG with her books for quite a long time. Usually, he has been a proofreader, formatter, and general dogsbody and was quite happy to continue to act in those capacities for Mrs. PG.

For this book, Mrs. PG asked PG to write some scenes involving lawyers.

As regular visitors know, PG is a recovering attorney.

The most important thing to remember as a recovering attorney is that you’ll never be able to say that you are completely cured of attorneyism. You’re always one short step away from falling off the wagon, suing somebody, then you have to go through the seven-step detox program all over again.

So PG was a little concerned when Mrs. PG asked him to write a courtroom scene for her latest book.

He kept assuring himself that this exercise was not real. For one thing, the scene he drafted was set in an English courtroom. PG has been in English courtrooms on a couple of occasions (as an observer, not a participant) and observed the many similarities as well as more than a few dissimilarities to proceedings in American courtrooms, so that was a bit of a guardrail.

Although English and American courtrooms are not the same, they both involve human beings and, while cultures and traditions vary greatly, human nature is very much the same everywhere. That’s one reason the stories in the Bible still resonate thousands of years later to people who live much different lives than the people depicted in the Bible did. We see the same sorts of behaviors, good and bad, in the Bible as we do in contemporary society.

As a friend of PG’s once said, without human nature, lawyers wouldn’t have anything to do.

With that said, PG hopes that as many visitors who think they might enjoy Mrs. PG’s latest book, Murder in the Family.

(When PG posted this, Amazon’s Look Inside feature wasn’t working. He hopes it’s just because Zon’s computers haven’t gotten to that stage in the ebook publishing process.)

9 thoughts on “Murder in the Family”

  1. Inquiring minds want to know: which collaboration method did you use? Alternating chapters? By character focus? Something else? 😉

    • The collaboration method was Mrs. PG telling me that I would be writing this part or revising that part.

      I did run the MS. through Grammarly at the end, but that doesn’t count as creative writing.

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