Website at http://liviawashburn.com

I finally have a new website up. While trying to set up my domain name, I discovered my name, Livia J. Washburn, was taken. I could have used .net or .biz, but I wanted .com, so I dropped the J. It took me weeks to hunt and peck my way through FrontPage to come up with a website. I even gave up at one point after I did all the work creating the pages in FrontPage and couldn’t get it to publish. I went out and bought a simple web builder program at Half Price Books, created a new website, and then couldn’t get that to load either. One of the problems I had with the first program, FrontPage, was the fact I’d lost the manual since the last time I’d used it. I looked everywhere I could think of, but in a house full of books, it was a losing game. It wasn’t until I was trying to get my youngest daughter to please, please help me, that she pointed out my older daughter had borrowed the book. Hey, at least she still had it and apologized when she returned it.

After that it was back to the first program to figure out exactly where I’d gone wrong, and what I could do to solve the problem. I would experiment and try publishing the pages, then try something different, then something else, and so on. It was really a shock when it finally worked. Of course there were a few things I wanted to change, so when I made the revisions, it didn’t work again. I’m amazed I have any hair left. So I went back to trying one thing after another until finally I have a new website. And when it’s time to make revisions . . . I won’t remember a bit of what I did this time.

Some of the problem might have been the pain killers I’ve been on for a bad toothache. I did finally get the site working properly after the root canal.

Release Date / First Review

A PEACH OF A MURDER
A Fresh Baked Mystery
Signet
ISBN 0-451-21974-0
October 2006

Today is the release date for A Peach of a Murder, and I received my first review for it. The review is by Melissa Fowler at The Romance Reader's Connection at this link: http://theromancereadersconnection.com/reviews2/washburnliviaj11006.html

She had this to say about the book:

A PEACH OF A MURDER is the delightful first installment of author Livia Washburn's Fresh Baked Mystery series. A realistic small town vibe is created by the collection of characters and the author's vibrant narrative. Phyllis as a heroine is quite accessible, so too is her son Mike. The plot twists and turns smoothly, sure to keep readers eagerly turning pages until the very end. A PEACH OF A MURDER runs the full range of emotions, so be prepared to laugh and cry with this one!

Thank you, Melissa, for such a nice review.

Maraschino Cherry Incident

Don’t let anyone tell you that writing can’t be dangerous. While buying groceries, I decided to pick up some items to experiment on a new cookie recipe. I wanted to get started cooking some of the recipe ideas from the research I’d done earlier. I kept the items for the cookies separate to keep track of the money spent. Well, great idea, but I learned this can be hazardous to your health. I had picked up a jar of maraschino cherries and placed it with the growing stack in the part of the cart the toddler rides in. I failed to lift the plastic guard to cover the opening for the child’s legs. As the stack grew, something fell over and pushed the jar of cherries out. If you’ve never seen it, a jar of cherries explodes into a huge mess. First I had to make sure no children got into it while trying to find someone in the store to tell, “Yes, I’m the reason you have cherries, goo, and glass all over the aisle.” The girl was very kind. She was starting trying to put the glass in a pile while waiting for someone to bring more supplies. Pieces of the glass flew a good twenty feet. I helped her put glass and cherries into a bag, leaving her to mop up the mess. I left the store much poorer, sticky, with glass on my shoes, and shards stuck on my slacks, and still with great plans for making cookies.

If you’re wondering what the cherries were for, I’m trying to come up with a dark chocolate covered cherry cookie, or possibly a dark chocolate/white chocolate mix. We’ll see what works best. Luckily I can taste one, and then send the rest off to work with my daughter where I’ll have at least a dozen testers.