 Her routine night turns terrifying.
As the storm of the century howls through Destiny, Texas, Dr. Paige Wade remains at her clinic to care for any animals that might need assistance. Her quiet night is disrupted when a man dumps an injured dog on the doorstep just hours before Paige is attacked in the parking lot. He's uncovering deadly connections. A call from the local animal hospital where his friend works sends Police Officer Gabe Harrison hastening to respond. The crime seems random until someone starts stalking Paige. When Gabe and his K-9 partner, Loki, discover the man who dropped off the injured dog is now a murder victim, Gabe uncovers a link between the deceased and whoever is threatening Paige. They are running out of time. For years, Paige has ignored her feelings for Gabe. Working closely with him means gambling with her heart. As another winter storm approaches and the murderer becomes desperate, will the risks they take not only save her life, but give them hope for a future together?
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 One of my favorite parts about writing Frozen in Jeopardy was including dog characters who play a vital role in the story. As the release of this book approaches, I thought it would be fun to introduce you to the three dogs that you'll either meet or hear about.  First, I'd love for you to meet Loki. When I originally decided to write a book about a police officer and his K-9 partner, I knew immediately that my dog (whose real name is Loki) would be my inspiration. Even though my Loki isn't a full German shepherd, his personality is what I picture in my mind when I write and talk about Loki in the book. Truthfully, I don't think my Loki could be a police dog, primarily because he truly believes everyone everywhere is potentially a new best friend. Ha! He was found wandering the streets at six months, and we took him in shortly after that. Until he came into our lives, I didn't think it was possible to become a dog person. He definitely proved me wrong. I can't imagine my life without him!  Lucy, aka Jane Dog, is actually the first dog you'll meet in the book. This sweet pit bull comes to Paige injured and shrouded in mystery. I have personally never had a pit bull, but I think that there is a lot of stigma surrounding them. I know several people who say pit bulls are some of the best dogs. And seriously, look at that face. How could you not love that face? So I decided to include a pit bull in the book. And trust me, you'll fall in love with Lucy as soon as you meet her!  Finally, let me introduce you to Pepper. In the third chapter of the book, we learn about a dog that Paige used to have. She was very attached to Pepper, a Catahoula mix, who passed away nearly a year before. Paige still misses her canine friend. Fictional Pepper was a nod to our own Pepper, one of the sweetest dogs we've ever had. Our Pepper was also a Catahoula mix. The moment we saw her as a tiny puppy, she completely stole our hearts. Unfortunately, we didn't have as many years with her as we should have, but we loved her until the end. It's been years since we said goodbye, but I think of her often. Being able to honor her in this book meant a lot.  I do want to mention two other dogs. Natty is another one of our dogs, and she is a full German shepherd. We got her when she was a tiny puppy, and she is super sweet. I can't imagine her as a police dog because she's very nervous around people or even animals she doesn't know. But the way she looks is how I imagine Loki, in Frozen in Jeopardy, looks. Just beautiful!  The last dog I want to introduce you to is Barco. If you read my blog post earlier this year about my ride along with our local police department, you got to hear about Barco, Officer Cox's K-9 partner. It was amazing to meet them both and to learn about the kind of training that a dog like Barco goes through to work with the police department. I got to watch him conduct a search for narcotics. So when it comes to how Loki searches for someone in Frozen in Jeopardy, most of that is thanks to what I learned from Officer Cox and Barco. Do you enjoy reading books that include dogs in the story? Do you have a dog? Feel free to comment - I'd love to hear from you! Frozen in Jeopardy - Releasing July 25th  Her routine night turns terrifying.
As the storm of the century howls through Destiny, Texas, Dr. Paige Wade remains at her clinic to care for any animals that might need assistance. Her quiet night is disrupted when a man dumps an injured dog on the doorstep just hours before Paige is attacked in the parking lot. He's uncovering deadly connections. A call from the local animal hospital where his friend works sends Police Officer Gabe Harrison hastening to respond. The crime seems random until someone starts stalking Paige. When Gabe and his K-9 partner, Loki, discover the man who dropped off the injured dog is now a murder victim, Gabe uncovers a link between the deceased and whoever is threatening Paige. They are running out of time. For years, Paige has ignored her feelings for Gabe. Working closely with him means gambling with her heart. As another winter storm approaches and the murderer becomes desperate, will the risks they take not only save her life, but give them hope for a future together?  I'm working on my new series, Danger in Destiny, which means I'm actively writing three different stories. Fear the Shadows - A prequel novella for newsletter subscribers only coming soon Out of the Ashes - The first official book releases March 28th Frozen in Jeopardy - The second book releases July 25th While one of my characters, Officer Gabe Harrison, is featured in Frozen in Jeopardy, he actually makes an appearance in the other two books as well. He works for the Destiny Police Department as a member of the K-9 unit. He and his German shepherd partner, Loki, specialize in tracking.  When I first started this series, I knew very little about how a K-9 unit operates within the police department. I did a lot of online research, but information wasn't easy to find. That's when I decided to reach out to our local police department. I spoke with Lt. Moran who not only answered some of my questions, but he suggested I go on a ride-along with one of the K-9 units and put me in touch with Officer Timothy Cox and his dog, Barco. I was fortunate to be able to go on a four hour ride-along with Officer Cox and Barco a couple of weeks ago. Not only was Officer Cox super helpful when it came to understanding how he and Barco are involved in the every day workings of the police department, but I got to see how their vehicle is set up, including the kennel that Barco rides in. I also learned a lot about how police dogs are trained and even got to watch Barco perform a drug search. It gave me a great deal of respect not only for what the dog can do, but for all of the hard work that goes into what the handler does to train the dog and read his reactions in order to track effectively.  Later in the evening, I had the chance to ask some questions directly related to a few scenes I had planned. In several cases, not only did I come away with more details, but I even had to alter the basic situation simply because that's not how it would really work. It's important to me to make the scenes as realistic as possible, so having that clarity was huge.
For example, there's a scene in Out of the Ashes where someone breaks into a house. I originally had Gabe and Loki going in and clearing the home. Instead, I learned that they would wait for backup and then go in with at least one other officer. I'm excited to apply everything I've learned to this series, and I look forward to being able to share the books with all of you! Nearly every year, I take Christmas portraits of our pets. Sometimes they are pretty or cute, other times they are just funny.
Jessie - We strongly suspect that she is a kelpie, although we've never done genetic testing for her. We adopted her when she was six months old in 2015. She's definitely our smallest dog, but my goodness does she have a lot of attitude. She sleeps in our daughter's room, and they do nearly everything together. She loves to play with tennis balls and lives for tug-of-war. Loki - He was a rescue in 2020, and about six months old when we saw an ad about him and decided to bring him home. He walked into our house and right into my heart. He's definitely my buddy. He weighs about 90 lbs. and is a mutt through and through. We did do genetic testing on him and he's primarily Australian cattle dog and German shepherd. He's super sweet, and I'm hoping to do obedience training and possibly some agility with him next year. Natty - This is the baby of the family. She turned a year old in November. We got her at six weeks - probably the youngest puppy I've ever had. It's hard to believe how fast they grow! She's a German shepherd and around 75 pounds. She's super sweet but can be a little timid. That said, she's an amazing guard dog. She and Loki love to play together! Jasper - He's our angel. We just said goodbye to him on December 10th, and our home isn't the same without him. We found him as a puppy in 2009 running on the side of the road and brought him home. He was such a sweet, mellow guy that loved food, gave true hugs, and was always happy. We were blessed to have him in our lives for 13 1/2 years. Hello, friends! I realize I haven't posted on my blog in a really long time. Honestly, I took it off my site because I found the process of keeping it up-to-date very overwhelming over the last year or so. In that time, I've also found that I've truly missed it. So I'm back, and I hope at least some of you are still out there. To start a new blog post off, I'm going to share the message in my latest newsletter. Then I'll be posting new content from then on.  We've had quite the beginning to our new year. We got a new puppy for my husband's birthday. Shortly after that, we all came down with COVID one-by-one. Dealing with being sick and a young puppy who is getting up multiple times at night to go out or because she was hungry hasn't been easy! On top of that, both our daughter and my husband were sick for their birthdays. Our son is having some health issues in addition to COVID. We're all mostly feeling better, finally, but are still dealing with congestion and fatigue. I'm so ready to get back to normal. Oh, and spring. I'm really ready for spring. Ha! Okay, enough about being sick. On to the new puppy! My husband named her Natty Gann, and we call her Natty. She's about 9.5 weeks old now, and fits perfectly with our family. We bought her to be my husband's dog. My dog, Loki, turned a year old in December. The two absolutely LOVE to play together. I really don't know how we would've made it through not feeling well if it weren't for Loki entertaining Natty so much. Natty is supposed to be a full German shepherd, but that didn't matter too much to us. I guess time will tell as she grows. We may do one of those DNA tests with her that we did with Loki because it was fun. But will wait a while for that.  Have any of you used a Virtual Reality (VR) system? My husband wanted one last year and I finally got him one in November thinking I'd never use it in a million years. After trying it that first day, I absolutely loved it and had to get one of my own.
I've been using it for Beat Saber, which is a music and rhythm game, and for Supernatural, which is an amazing fitness game. I've used them regularly for about two months now and I'm seeing improvements in my strength, heart rate, blood pressure, and my stress levels. I so look forward to my time on there. Being able to take an hour a day to do something for me, to better my health, has made such a difference on the days that stress would normally have me feeling down. While I haven't been able to get in an hour straight since COVID, I do feel like doing at least some exercise a day has helped with my recovery time. Hopefully I'll be back to normal again soon. And yes, I had to buy the sticker you see on the picture above to make the VR system look like Baymax from Big Hero 6. Ha! I hope you are all doing well and hanging in there. It seems like so many people I know are sick right now. Take care of yourselves, okay? |
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