Title: Down to Earth
Author: Tammy D. Walker
Genre: Cozy mystery
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Book Blurb
Stacey Hengesbach has enough to worry about with a pecan harvest, festival preparations, and a daughter who's eager to leave their tiny hometown all needing her attention. So when a radio antenna tower falls, seriously injuring its owner, she's willing to believe it's an accident like everyone else in the county does, including the sheriff. But then another antenna tower falls, this time on her best friend's cafe while they're inside. With the help of her family, friends old and new, and the local ham radio club, Stacey races to solve the mystery of the falling antennas before another one comes crashing down.
Excerpt
As thunder shook the old beams that held the Hengesbach farmhouse upright, Stacey Hengesbach shook her head at her daughter. The lights flickered. "Addie, I'm sorry," Stacey said. Lightning struck again, this time closer than the last. "We're not paying for you to drop out of school. You have two more years. Be patient." Which was, if she remembered right what being sixteen was like, just about as good as telling Addie she had another million years left before she could leave tiny Dawville, Texas for anywhere else.
"It's not dropping out, Mom." Addie grabbed a mug and filled it with the last of the coffee. "It's finishing my coursework early. I'll graduate. And I need to do this now."
"But you won't walk with your friends at graduation," Stacey said. She thought better of telling Stacey not to drink so much caffeine. One argument at a time. "And there's junior prom, two homecoming dances you'll miss, and senior prom. You'll regret it."
Addie spooned sugar into her coffee. "No, Mom, you'll regret me missing all those dances." She hit the sides of the mug with the spoon as she stirred, sending dark brown splashes onto the counter. "I wouldn't have missed them in Germany if you'd have let me go this year."
"I don't think they have homecoming dances in Germany, Addie." Stacey wiped up the spots of coffee off the counter. "At least they don't have homecoming mums, anyway."
"I'm not going to homecoming with a date this year."
Another flash brought Stacey's eye to the green apple clock on the kitchen wall. It had been Rick's grandmother's clock, one that had stopped not long after they were married. Rick took it off his grandmother's wall those decades ago. She'd told him if he could fix it, he could have it. He tinkered with it in the slow, careful way he tinkered with just about everything. One afternoon, he hung it up in their kitchen. The apple had ticked along cheerfully ever since. "It's time we took you to school."
"We?" Addie gulped down the rest of her coffee and set the mug down hard. "Are you not letting me drive myself to school now, too?"
"There's a nasty storm out, baby girl. That's all."
Addie grabbed the keys to her pickup, an old hand-me-down that had seen better days as the high school vehicles to all four of Stacey and Rick's kids. As the baby, Addie got the most run-down of things, but she never complained about it. "I'm going."
"Take the SUV," Stacey said. "If you're going out in the rain, at least take something more reliable."
"But you have errands to run today, Mom."
"I don't want to add pulling you out of the mud to the top of that list."
Addie put down the pickup keys and took the key-ring with the SUV's remote dangling off it. "Fine," she said. Addie looked back at Stacey. She couldn't help but see her little girl in those big hazel eyes of hers, even if they were framed by purple hair. "I'll be back right after school to help with the trunk shakers."
"If the storm keeps up, we'll have to put off the harvest for a bit. Much as I don't want to do that." Stacey sighed, not wanting to think about how putting the pecan harvest off would mean putting off dozens of other time-sensitive tasks.
"See?" Addie smiled at Stacey for the first time that week. "You don't like waiting, either, do you?"
Buy Links (including Goodreads and BookBub)
Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=2IseEQAAQBAJ
Books a Million: https://www.booksamillion.com/p/9781509256716
Author Biography
Tammy D. Walker writes cozy crime novels, and her latest from The Wild Rose Press is Down to Earth, the second in her Daw County Sisters Mysteries series. When she's not crafting mysteries or poems, she’s probably reading, teaching, trying to find far-away stations on her shortwave radios, dreaming about travel, writing letters, or spending time with her family. Find out more at https://www.tammydwalker.com/
Social Media Links
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tdwalker_/