Kyrgyzstan 2008-2009: A Love Story

How far would you go to save the one you love?

Fran Stewart has fallen in love with the little boy she is set to adopt from the Central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan. Just as she enters the final stage of the adoption process, a sinister coalition of politicians, bureaucrats and cynics begin working to halt international adoptions. Fran’s fight get her son home, based on the real life six year drama over international adoption in Kyrgyzstan, is the subject of Kyrgyzstan 2008-2009: A Love Story.

Fran is too seasoned, too plain, and too practical. In short, she is no one’s ingénue heroine. Nevertheless, she rises to the circumstance into which she is thrown. She works to get her boy home while struggling to determine how far ethically she can and should go to try and save her child from a horrific future. Should she sacrifice a budding romance, her body, her freedom?

Kyrgyzstan 2008-2009: A Love Story is a novel about devotion, faith, and action. It is a race against time in which Fran must figure out what to do before an adoption moratorium stops any chance for her son to have a healthy future. Fran’s background, beliefs, and what she knows of history push and pull her toward one awful act that just might get her child to safety."

The Gereizt Housewife

The second Samantha Sherman mystery novel

“Marriage is an adventure, like going to war.”  G. K. Chesterton

People always used to tease Samantha Lee Sherman about how “the civil war must rage in your marriage” because of the juxtaposition of her maiden name Lee with her married name Sherman.  However, since Sam solved a couple of murders (in The Happy Housewife) it was not just a joke anymore. Her new confident self was coming in increasing conflict with her old husband.

In an effort to work on her marriage, Sam travels with her husband Doug to Zurich, Switzerland on his work trip. But crossing the Atlantic only seems to multiply the Sherman’s problems. On their first day in Switzerland, Sam witnesses a murder.

Sam cannot resist the pull of a challenge and finds herself battling old money, UN hierarchy, and a cynical reporter as she wades into a new case. While she is running through a garden maze and figuring out what happened years ago in Congo, she is also enjoying and fighting fantasies of a handsome detective while trying to find a killer and fix her marriage.

The Gereizt Housewife is the second book in the Samantha Sherman mystery series. This time Sam is gereizt, “irritated” in German, and must use her self-education, curiosity and pluck to track a killer and moved forward with her life.

The Happy Housewife

The first Samantha Sherman mystery novel

Samantha "Sam" Sherman is a thirty something stay-at-home Mom without any problems. She loves her smart husband, her sweet daughter, and her career choice. One day, in the process of helping a friend, she is drawn into the investigation of two murders. Suddenly, her steady world begins to sway. Insecurities from years ago return, her husband is annoyed at her involvement in the case, and then there is the acerbic detective with dark curly hair and green eyes who seems to be everywhere. Sam is miserable and stressed out and well, slightly exhilarated.  Imperfection can be a deadly draw.

The Happy Housewife is a suburban murder mystery with an unexplained explosion, a bloody fire poker, and a touch of romance. One ordinary woman is snatched from her seemingly ideal life and forced to confront a mistake from her past in order to solve two murders.