I taught high school for ten years. English and Sex Ed. You’d think wrangling teenagers in the most boring and most embarrassing of subjects would prepare me for anything.

You’d be wrong. I know I was. You see, my teaching years were also my convent years. I used to be known as Sister Mary Regina Coelis. (Don’t blame me. I didn’t pick it.) Back then nuns wore habits, which was a black dress with matching veil. The habit still inspired fear in most students. That gave me an advantage.

Now that I’m running Driscoll Investigations on my own, nobody fears a short woman with curly hair. My husband Frank and I used to run it together, but we kept butting heads. We also lost the dividing line between work and home. So he rehabbed his leg and returned to the police force and I became the owner of DI. Now we only bring work home some of the time, which makes for a better marriage. Well, at least what we think is a better marriage. Being a Bride of Christ is vastly different from being the wife of a physical man with, er, all that entails.

Culture shock. It requires an adjustment period.

That was an understatement. I prefer precision in my choice of words.

Culture shock. One of the reasons for the phrase, “It’s five o’clock somewhere.”

I’m not complaining, though. Almost every day I get to be the face of justice to deadbeat dads, bail jumpers, and so many kinds of con artists. Insurance frauds and straying spouses make up the biggest percentage of our “cheaters” clientele. Sometimes it’s hard to remember that most people are decent and hard-working, and that we’re all just trying to make a good home for our families.

I have my terrific staff to remind me of that. Sidney is the eternally perky Christmas Elf. She and her husband are expecting their first baby any day now. She’s still trying to get me to eat healthy and all-natural, but you can have my flavored coffee when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands.

There’s also Zane, my genius admin. He’s a refugee from the telemarketing job from Hell. He’s still getting used to a job where the boss and the employees joke with each other. Sidney and I will keep working. He almost made a joke the other day. That’s progress.

Four years ago, when I left the convent with the clothes on my back and $200 in my pocket (they had to return my dowry; it’s the rules), I had no idea where my life was heading. Now I have a successful business and every morning I wake up in my own house next to my husband. Except for the occasional all-night stakeout, when I wake up in the front seat of the Nunmobile with a crick in my neck.

The Nunmobile is my little Saturn Ion. My very own car. Not bad for someone who used to leave the convent to teach school with only a house key in my pocket. A car. A home, A family. My own vegetable garden. Easy access to flavored coffee. Bringing justice to clients.

I definitely have no complaints.

You can read more about Guilia in Nun Too Soon, the first book in the new “Giulia Driscoll” humorous mystery series, published by Henery Press. For more information about Giulia’s past, check out Force of Habit, Back to the Habit and Veiled Threat.

This is the first stop on the Nun Too Soon Great Escapes Book Tour. For other stops on this tour, click HERE

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Meet the author
Baker of brownies and tormenter of characters, Alice Loweecey recently celebrated her thirtieth year outside the convent. She grew up watching Hammer horror films and Scooby-Doo mysteries, which explains a whole lot. When she’s not creating trouble for Giulia Falcone-Driscoll, she can be found growing her own vegetables (in summer) and cooking with them (the rest of the year).

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