We are pleased to announce that we are the publishers for Paradise is Deadly: Gripping Tales from Florida Gulf Coast Sisters in Crime. The chapter's anthology committee anticipates announcing the selected authors and their stories in mid- to late January, 2023. Paradise is Deadly has an early July 2023 targeted publishing release date.

A Haunting at Marianwood is now available for preorder on Kindle!

Life is good for Dash Hammond. He's recently remarried his childhood sweetheart, Dr. Maevis Summers, and together they're raising his four-year-old son, T.J. in the Hammond family homestead in Clover Pointe, Ohio. A retired Army colonel, Dash now keeps himself busy fixing everything from a leaky faucet to an unsolved murder.
It is no wonder that his cousin Billy McCafferty calls on Dash for a road trip to Kentucky when  his oldest sister is in trouble. The president of a religious order, Sister Miriam Patrice, Miri Pat to those who knew her before she took the veil, has been hearing things, seeing things and misplacing things. A very competent woman, she refuses to accept an unearthly reason for all this.
Marianwood, the motherhouse of the Sisters of the Blessed Mother of God, is located on an old plantation thought to be haunted by its original inhabitant, Miss Victoria Harris, who is rumored to prowl the grounds and cemetery in search of her murdered beau. 
When the Ohio contingent arrives, they discover that things are not as simple as your ordinary haunting. 
In a battle of wits, will the victor be supernatural or a very corporeal retired Army colonel?

The book will be available in print and on Kindle October 18th!

More information on E.M. Munsch:

​Elaine Munsch is a native of Cleveland, Ohio, but has spent her adult life in Louisville,
Kentucky. She graduated from Nazareth College of Kentucky located outside of Bardstown and
attended The Ohio State University for her graduate work. She has been a bookseller for fifty
years working in both large and small, chain and independent bookstores. She opened the first
Barnes & Noble in Kentucky where she set up a mystery reading group which is still active
today. She also taught classes in the mystery genre for the Veritas Society and joined the local
chapter of Sisters in Crime.

With Susan Bell, she co-edited MYSTERY WITH A SPLASH OF BOURBON, an anthology of
bourbon related stories.
​
As E.M. Munsch, she writes the Dash Hammond series set on the shores of Lake Erie. The latest
title, A HAUNTING AT MARIANWOOD, is set to be released October 18th.

I'd say it was hard to believe it has been so long since my last post, but that would be lying. We've been terribly busy with personal issues, mostly connected with our families. It has been an emotionally and physically exhausting time.
On a slightly better note, we also had an American wedding in May, which we hope will better preserve our rights if the Supreme Court or Congress turns against us.

Despite the above issues, we did succeed in getting Strangely Funny IX published. It's available in print and Kindle from Amazon, and features stories from the usual suspects plus some newcomers. B.F. Vega's "Blood of Thespius" is one of my favorites from the new bunch.

In other news: we will be releasing a novel from E. M. Munsch. Stay tuned for the cover reveal, slated for this Friday!

Our third book for the year, Sparky of Bunker Hill and the Cannibal Caper by Rosalind Barden, is awaiting final edits. 

Last year, and this year, have been busier than usual. My mother's health has taken a turn for the worse, and we have been tied up with her needs. If you really want the gory details about it, you can look at the blog post on my personal site. We had to turn down several submissions of novels and story collections because we could not devote the time that they would involve.
The good news is that we are still plugging away at projects in between the blocks of time we must devote to my mother's needs and concerns. Sort of like grout.
Late this spring, we will publish this year's Strangely Funny, which is a nonnegotiable must-do as far as I'm concerned. We will also be introducing the sequel to Sparky of Bunker Hill and the Cold Kid Case, in which Sparky falls into the soup again. We also have a submitted novella that will be coming out under a new imprint.
Gwen and I have been working on the third novel in the Three Snowbirds series, but progress has been slow. We have no projected date of publication at this time, but we hope it will be this year.
Thank you so much for your patience!

We joined our local chapter of Sisters in Crime at the Ponce Library in Pinellas Park yesterday for a panel on mysteries. It was a good opportunity to introduce ourselves and some of our products to potential new readers. The only book on the table we didn't publish was Hoosier Hoops and Hijinks, but Gwen and I did have a Three Snowbirds story in it.
This was the first appearance in what we hope will be a better year for in-person sales for ourselves and our authors.

Gwen Mayo and I had the pleasure of returning to Kentucky for the Kentucky Book Festival on November 6th. We saw family and friends, along with our comrades in writing from the Derby Rotten Scoundrels chapter of Sisters in Crime. You can see their account of the festival here.
The reception before the event was hosted by Campbellsville College and featured many of the leading lights in Kentucky literature. 

The day of the festival, our corner of the room was very busy! Many fellow authors and bourbon fans stopped by to chat and pick up a copy of Mystery with a Splash of Bourbon, signed by the contributors in attendance. 
By 3 PM, all the copies Joseph-Beth's provided us with had sold out, and authors were dipping into their personal stash so we could fill the need. The store has contacted the chapter about doing another signing before Christmas. Good news for them, and good news for MAHLLC!

Many people say my line of work is an old-fashioned one, but I suppose that’s part of the “charm,” really. People are still nostalgic for the image of the sleepy little suburban house with flowers on the windowsill and a bottle of milk on the doorstep.
That, however, doesn’t explain one of my frequent stops. Every morning, I drive to these steps, where I find two empty bottles and payment for the last morning’s milk. I collect them before placing two milk bottles on the last step before the staircase of concrete enters the sea.
I sometimes tell myself work is work and I shouldn’t question these things, but often on the way to the next order, I have attempted to rationalise it. Someone lives nearby and wants to convince themselves to walk by the sea in the mornings. Someone wants to have a bowl of cereal or a cup of coffee while watching the waves.
If either of those explanations were true, it did not explain this one morning. After I placed down the bottles and ascended, I heard a slurp and turned around to see a large wet spot where the milk used to be.

Our first Sisters in Crime chapter, the Derby Rotten Scoundrels, invited us to talk about how we formed Mystery and Horror, LLC, and share the details of our journey. They also wanted to know what was involved in running a small press. We each took turns describing what they do at MAHLLC and how the indie press works. You can see the recording of our talk here!!

Your story is one of the raciest we've ever printed in Strangely Funny. How did you decide what would happen?
I've always enjoyed pushing limits, so that comes naturally to me. I have a 12-book series with Rena Marin about a deranged sex doll. Because of that, not much feels too wild to me. I enjoy writing satire and making people laugh, so there are generally hidden messages about society and social situations in my work. By day, I work as a therapist and find that laughter is the best treatment plan for anything. My writing reflects that often. 

You've teamed up with other authors (Rena Marin, Sara Schoen) to write novels, which is anathema to most of the authors I know. What helps the most when working with another creative mind?
I have about 100 published titles. About half of those are co-written. I've been really fortunate to make close friendships in the indie writing community. Rena and I generally write humor, while Sara and I write thrillers. With Rena, the ability to banter back and forth as characters helps keep things funny. With Sara, we write with no plot and keep each other in suspense - something that translates into our books for readers. For me, co-writing is nice because it gives me new ideas and has taught me to write in all tenses and points of view. 

You're phenomenally prolific. Can you tell us a little about your writing process? Do you have a psychedelic hut somewhere? A fairy godmother? A shrine to Stephen King?
LOL. I wish I had a magical answer. My true answer is discipline. I write 2,000 words a day seven days a week no matter what is happening in my life. Some days, those words are only journal entries but they keep me in the habit of daily practice.