Out of the Ashes -- A Thanksgiving Treat -- The Phantom Ranger and the Skateboard Gang

The only unpublished novel that was on my usb memory stick snug in my purse when the house burned down in '08 was a middle reader novel my husband and I wrote called THE PHANTOM RANGER AND THE SKATEBOARD GANG. Recently Cheryl Pierson and I started a new publishing company, Prairie Rose Publications, blending our talents. This is a publishing company strictly for women's western fiction. We quickly discovered that there was a need for more, so we also formed Painted Pony Books for the younger readers. THE PHANTOM RANGER AND THE SKATEBOARD GANG is just the first novel to be published under the Painted Pony Books imprint.

THE PHANTOM RANGER AND THE SKATEBOARD GANG By James and Livia Reasoner

Codi Jackson and her father have been forced to move again. Codi’s getting used to being the “new girl” in her fifth grade class—but that doesn’t mean she has to like it. Can’t life just be normal? With her mother out of the picture and her father working odd shifts as a police officer, friends are important—as long as they’re not the wrong kind.

When Codi and a classmate, Keith Wright, are assigned to work on a history project, Codi has to make some hard decisions about her popularity in her new school.

But everything changes when Codi picks up an old Texas Rangers badge that belonged to one of her ancestors and he appears right before her eyes! Her great-great-great-grandfather says he’s come to help her, but how? And how is she going to explain the ghost of her long-ago Gramps to her history project partner and her father?

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Romantic Times Review of The Fatal Funnel Cake

RT rating 4 stars.

This mystery is nicely crafted, with a believable ending. The camaraderie of the Fresh-Baked Mystery series’ cast of retired schoolteachers who share a home is endearing....

Go here for the rest of the review.

Now Available in Mass Market Paperback -- Wedding Cake Killer by Livia J. Washburn

Wedding bells will be ringing in Weatherford, Texas, this Christmas when Phyllis Newsom opens up her home for her best friend’s wedding. And although the bride is wearing white, no one suspects that she’ll soon be wearing black....

After all the planning—and the cake tasting—the big day has finally arrived. Eve Turner, one of Phyllis’s boarders—and her best friend—is moving out and getting married to the affable Roy Porter. While she’s sad to see Eve go, Phyllis is more than happy to host the event in her home and to bake the bride and groom a delicious three-tiered coconut wedding cake. Even though a snowstorm in the forecast seems like a recipe for disaster, the day runs as smoothly as buttercream. 

But the marriage doesn’t last long past the honeymoon. When Roy’s found dead at a Weatherford bed-and-breakfast, Eve’s the top suspect. Now Phyllis must find out who iced Roy before her friend finds herself behind bars….  

I've been blown away by the reviews.  It has 25 reviews on Amazon and they're all 4 or 5 stars. 

PRAISE FOR THE FRESH-BAKED MYSTERIES

“Engaging…a cozy distinguished by its appealing characters and mouthwatering recipes.”—Publishers Weekly

“The whodunit is fun and the recipes [are] mouthwatering.”—The Best Reviews

“Washburn has a refreshing way with words and knows how to tell an exciting story.”—Midwest Book Review

“Delightful, [with a] realistic small-town vibe [and a] vibrant narrative…A Peach of a Murder runs the full range of emotions, so be prepared to laugh and cry with this one!”—The Romance Readers Connection

“Christmas and murder. It’s a combination that doesn’t seem to go together, yet Washburn pulls it off in a delightfully entertaining manner.”—Armchair Interviews

“A clever, intriguing contemporary cozy.”—Romance Junkies

“I loved it!...Definitely for people who just love a good mystery.”—Once Upon a Twilight

Now Available -- The Fatal Funnel Cake by Livia J. Washburn

It’s time for the State Fair of Texas—and cooking contests galore! Fryers are heating up and stomachs are growling. But Phyllis Newsom had better watch out. Someone’s brought an appetite for murder....

Phyllis and her friends Carolyn and Sam are ready to whip up their best dishes and win some ribbons in Dallas. And they’re excited to learn that one of their favorite celebrity chefs—Joye Jameson of The Joye of Cooking—is broadcasting her TV show from the fair. When Phyllis’s funnel cake is picked as one of the best of that category, Joye invites her and the other finalists to prepare their delicious recipes live on the air.

But Phyllis’s moment in the spotlight is spoiled after Joye suffers a deadly allergic reaction from one bite of her funnel cake. Now she’s gone from top entry to top suspect. So in order to clear her name, Phyllis will have to turn up the heat on this investigation before the real killer slips through her fingers.... 

               

Latest Cover Revision

Originally published under the pen-name Elizabeth Hallam. 

When smoke jumper Annabel Lowell's duties propelled her from San Francisco 2000 back to 1906, she faces one of the worst earthquakes in history. But she also finds the passion of a lifetime in fellow fireman Cole Brady. Now she must choose between a future of certain danger--and a present of certain love--no matter how short lived it may be... 

"A timeless and haunting tale of love" The Literary Times.

Revising Bookcovers

 The nice thing about ebooks is the fact you can change bookcovers. I took a couple of my older books and did a little tweaking.  Well, on SPIRIT CATCHER I did a little more than tweak.

With MENDING FENCES I changed the color of the font outline.  Amazing how a little change makes a big difference.  I also added some text about the book.  MENDING FENCES was a sweet romance novel set in the area my in-laws grew up in.  James and I had fun researching the area and looking at the fences that were cut in the fence-cutting war.

SPIRIT CATCHER ended up with new images and updated fonts.  I think it gave it a fresh new look. SPIRIT CATCHER is a steamier type of book, so maybe I should have added a shirtless cowboy.

Now Amazon has to catch up and post both of the new covers.

   

Naomi Washburn Teaching Scholarship

My mother, Naomi Washburn, passed away July 14th 2013. I've been trying to think of what I can do to honor her.  She grew up in a farming family, the second child of seven. Growing up, one of the things that really bothered her was having to be pulled out of school to work the fields. To help pay for her parent's farm, she worked as a field hand. Picked pretty much anything, including cotton. She loved school and hated missing any of it. She was also very smart and even though she missed school, she advanced a grade. This put her in the same grade as my dad.

After graduating from high school, she worked many jobs to put herself through college, becoming the first in her family to attend college. She earned an accounting degree, and after that she and my dad married and started having a family. She wanted to work to help support the family, but she didn't want to leave her children, so Mom and Dad took some hair stylist classes, built a beauty shop next to the house, and became beauticians with her taking care of the accounting and working in the shop next to my dad. One of the stories she loved to tell was about me climbing up to the top of the ladder when they were shingling the beauty shop roof. I was two years old and wanted to see what they were doing. My brothers and I were probably pretty annoying to my parents. Any time there was a big ruckus we'd bang on the wall that connected it to the beauty shop. I'm amazed they didn't kill us as much as we did this.

One of her customers was the current principal at the local elementary school, and she was also one of Mom's past teachers who encouraged her to go to college. She then encouraged her to go back to college and get a teaching degree, promising her that if she did, she would have a job waiting for her. Well, Mom went back to school and got her bachelor's degree in education around age 40, and she was hired to teach first grade at Walnut Creek Elementary by the principal who came to the beauty shop.

One of my perks from this was having even more books to read. She was assigned some pretty cool books to read in college. This was the reason I got my hands on CATCH-22 at age 12.

Mom loved teaching. She loved all of her students and put her whole heart into her job. They became her kids, too. Education continued to be very important to her. She wanted to learn more and do the best she possibly could at her job, so she went back to college evenings and summers until she had her masters degree. Along the way I was blessed to have her as my daughters' teacher. We told her she couldn't retire until the youngest was past first grade! She handled it in such a way that the other students really didn't believe they were her granddaughters. After that, Mom retired because Dad's health was bad at the time. She nursed him back to health, then volunteered at the schools, working mostly with the kids who had reading problems. She influenced  my daughters so much they both became teachers, one working in elementary education, and the other in high school science, while also getting her masters degree.

Mom started getting symptoms of Alzheimer's later in life, and then it became severe.  She still had lucid moments when she remembered us. It was hard to decide whether to remember her with donations devoted to finding a cure for Alzheimer's or to benefit education.  She was a very giving lady and helped many young people get their education, so the family decided to have a scholarship for an Azle High School student planning to become a teacher. If you would like to donate to this, I've added a Paypal button below.  Any amount would be greatly appreciated.

Naomi Washburn Teaching Scholarship