Bøger af Jo Lauer

In the first story of this collection, Paddle, free spirit Lucas Plumb in her battered up VW bus drives into and through the life of Paddle, a small town girl on the banks of the Mississippi River, leaving her life changed forever in the wake. After a shamanic journey, she hitchhikes to San Francisco and winds up on the streets of Berkeley in the 70ies. Next, in Roots in My Garden, we find Emily and husband Robin traveling from Akron to San Francisco for a chef's convention. On impulse, they drive up the coast to Sonoma County in an attempt to recapture a missing piece of Emily's childhood, one of her lesbian mothers from whom she was taken at a young age. In the third story, All for One, four girls, outcasts of small town America, the brunt of cruelty and derision, create The Radical Outsiders club that helps them survive childhood and connects them through life until they return as adults to clean up unfinished business, and bury one of their own. The fourth story, In The Light of KerKhar, follows Eema, an albino child of the Miwok tribe, who is captured and raised in another culture. Because of her colorless skin, she is both revered and feared. Years later, under threat of death to the unborn child she carries, she is exiled and journeys back to her homeland. The final story, Waltzing With The Azaleas, provides an inside look at what happens when you enter the world as the wrong gender. Cory goes through his own personal metamorphosis as she emerges into the woman she was meant to be. These stories are connected by the theme of the heroine's journey-women catapulted into the world, bumped, banged, and honed by the process. They return home (to a physical loca- tion, or a place of self-identity), transformed, able to tackle the unfinished business of life. This collection contains gay-and trans-positive material.

Killed by a Silver Bull is the third in "A Little Old Ladies Mystery" series where, once again, Amanda and Marion, housemates and best friends, while attempting retirement, are dragged into the middle of an unsolved murder. This time, an elderly woman's death is about to be ruled as cardiac arrest by the local ME until Marion's psychic gifts-or curses, depending on the day-are pulled into play when the elderly, quite dead woman calls to her in the middle of her funeral, "Follow the bull!" Amanda, long time sleuth-at-heart, joins in to crack the case. This leads them to interact with a host of unsavory characters who lurk at the edge of the neighborhood park, and the woman's ner-do-well nephew who has a lot to gain by her death.Just as one mystery is solved, Amanda gets the surprise of her life when someone who she thought was dead reappears, bringing with her the chaos of her past and the possible discovery of a black-market operation on a commune in the Ozarks.It's looking less and less like retirement is in the stars for Marion and Amanda. Sigh.

It's in the Ink (Book Two of A Little Old Ladies Mystery) Psychic sleuthing duo Marion and Amanda, after recouping from solving their last mystery, are up for some R&R (retirement and relaxation). Marion suggests they check out the alcohol inks class at the local senior center. Amanda poo-poos the idea as b-o-r-i-n-g, until she hears the new art instructor is a lesbian, and single. Suddenly, Amanda develops an insatiable interest in learning all about painting with alcohol inks. A face emerges in Marion's first painting, the way you see pictures in clouds. Only this face is recognizable as the old woman who disappeared from a nursing home weeks prior. So much for retirement.