Peg Herring, Mystery Author

Some days my head spins! For those who've asked, here's what's new/changed with my books. Shakespeare's Blood has a new cover and a sequel, Charlie Dickens' Documents. Both stories involve Mercedes, an American who gets into all sorts of trouble in the UK. Like other suspense novels, this one is less "Whodunit?" and more "Will she make it?" There's lots to be revealed, and the clock is ticking. My English teacher background crops up in the focus on two giants of literature, and I had great fun weaving tidbits of their lives into the lively escape-or-we'll-be-dead plot. Becky Boyd, Voice Actress The Loser Mysteries are now mine again, after five years with a publishing house. I've put new covers on them and have some beta readers at work seeking out those last few errors that seem to creep in any time an author re-opens a file, like extra pages or spaces or lines that break for no

Readers are aware that I'm making the Loser Mysteries mine by getting new covers, re-editing (which I shouldn't do but can't stop myself from), and re-releasing them. That's enough to keep me busy...sort of. The problem is there's lots of wait time. Wait for proof copies. Wait for beta readers to comb through for those last few niggling mistakes. Wait for more proofs. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Because I can't stand to be idle, I took up a side project: the sequel to SHAKESPEARE'S BLOOD. I blame this on a reader who claims it's the best book she's read in years--how's that for incentive? When I had an agent for SHAKESPEARE'S BLOOD, she told me to work on the sequel while she shopped the book to publishers. Being the good girl I am, I did that. Then after a year, I got a letter saying she couldn't sell the book (though she said she still loved it) and she was dropping me as a client. That's how it goes in the biz. Anyway, I

I reported recently on the reversion of the Simon & Elizabeth Mysteries, my historical series, to my own again. When you sign with a publisher, they get the rights to a book or series for X number of years. They're professionally edited, and the publisher builds an audience that can speak for their quality. Downside: the cost is high due to people other than the author needing to make a profit. When I got Simon's stories back, I got new covers and re-published the series at a much lower cost. Now Loser will get the same treatment. The Loser Mysteries center on a homeless woman who finds herself involved in solving a murder. From the beginning I knew it would be a 3-book series, since the stories begin with her at her worst and follow her recovery from trauma. The books are beloved by a certain set, and many suggested I might extend it, but once Loser is back to (almost) normal, I felt that further stories would only have presented more murders to solve. There were too f

Last post was about getting the rights to the Simon & Elizabeth series back and re-releasing them with new covers. I went one step farther in the last week and put all four books into one e-book. Better price. All four adventures in one place. Still the same lovable Simon and unstoppable Elizabeth. To quote Publishers' Weekly, "...this historical series shines." Links: Amazon   or Everybody Else

My first successful series was the Simon & Elizabeth Mysteries with Five Star Publishing. Going on the "write what you know" advice new writers get, I focused on Elizabeth I of England, one of my favorite historical characters. She had so much going against her as she grew up--I mean, how many girls can say their father had their mother beheaded? In the last decade or so, some authors have (very successfully) attacked Anne Boleyn's character, making her seem like Satan's First Date. I'm afraid that's more drama than historical accuracy, but we all interpret history to suit our own thinking...and some knowingly twist it to make a salacious story. I won't argue the right and wrong of that, since Shakespeare did a lot of the same things to make his stories work. It's just sad to me that those who read only fiction might believe it. Anyway, my series focuses on Anne's daughter Elizabeth, and she's a very sympathetic character. In Her Maje